Another rainy day, and we visit Manuel and Augustina, who live on the edge of the city, for lunch. Augustina cooks mole, the famous Mexican chocolate sauce, which she probably started at 6am.
With mole, each ingredient is cooked separately before adding, and the stew can contain 40 or 50 separate things, so it is a long and intense process. Unfortunately, I’m not all that keen on the result, but it’s wonderful of them to cook us something so special, so I attempt to eat it while balancing Daisy on my lap.
Manuel and Augustina’s house is on the edge of the city, looking out onto fields and mountains. Perhaps it would be better described as a conservatory, since much of it is outside. The steps lead up to a kind of outside courtyard (very slippery in the rain) and the rooms run off this, and have a corrugated iron roof. When the conversation gets beyond me, I count the holes in the roof and wonder how they cope when it is really throwing it down.
Like most Mexican houses, the decoration is austere, consisting mainly of photographs of the family, and, bizarrely, of us. There is a picture of us on our wedding day, and one of me making bread in the kitchen. Do they just get these out because they know we are coming, or are they always there? It’s slightly weird, really.
Whilst we eat, we are forced to watch a DVD of an awful Colombian Christian singer, who dances exceptionally badly. I probably shouldn’t have remarked on this, since the youngest daughter clearly has a crush on him, and looks slightly sulky.
We learn some new words in Tzotzil, which is the language Manuel and Augustina speak at home. ‘Olol’ seems to be the word for baby, which would explain why we keep hearing it in the market, while the word for dog sounds a bit like a sneeze. Daisy seems to quite like being talked to in Tzotzil, and is very happy cocooned in Augustina’s arms.
The family are very amused that I can remember how to say “monkey ears” in Tzotzil – such an accomplished person I am. My repetition of this phrase (“chicken mash” – easy to remember), provokes a disproportionate amount of laughter. Perhaps it actually means something far ruder?
Manuel wants to take us up to La Era, the place in the mountains where he comes from, where an evangelical church has been started with the permission of the village elders. Given that the family were thrown out of their village because they had become evangelical Christians, this is a big deal, and it is a great honour to be invited, and would be fascinating.
However, last time Paul went up there with Manuel the villagers threatened to throw him in prison and harm Manuel, so we’re not quite sure that this is a good thing to do. Manuel insists it is safe, but we won’t take Daisy up there until we’re thoroughly sure he has permission to bring the ‘kashlan’ (white people, or chickens, depending on your point of view) up into the mountains to church.
Last time, Paul only escaped thanks to a bribe and some hastily purchased refrescos, which just goes to show how important fizzy drinks are to the average Mexican.
Refrescos – an all-purpose word for Coca-Cola, Pepsi and a variety of other soft drinks called things like Squirt, pop up everywhere in Mexico. You’re served them when you get on a bus, and you take them to people’s houses instead of a bottle of wine, and in some villages they even pop up in church.
The Catholic/Mayan villagers believe that burping is very holy, and so they drink Coca Cola in front of the images of the saints to induce a kind of holy burp-fest. Daisy, of course, will be one of the holiest people they’ve ever met. In Chamula, where this practice is common, the richest person in town is the man with the Coca Cola franchise (followed closely by the Pepsi man).
Manuel explains that refrescos are key when a man wants to ask for a woman’s hand in marriage up in the villages. The father of the groom visits the father of the bride, bearing a hamper of beans, bags of sugar, meat, and fizzy drinks. He asks for the woman’s hand, and if it is accepted, they drink the refrescos together, and he leaves the meat and beans as a gift. Seems like everything important here is sealed with Coca Cola.
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