Nomadic Zen – A Vagabond’s Guide To Happiness

It was muy frio getting out of the collectivo in San Cristobal. At 2100mt elevation, it was much colder than the beaches in Oaxaca. We hailed a taxi to a hostel that was recommended to me by some folks on the road. It was 7am, but after ringing the door bell we were happily welcomed in and given accommodations. Seisenta pesos un noche and I had a place to rest my feet.

Most of the Mexican cities I have been to were fairly similar to one another. There are cathedrals located around the zocalo and heavy pedestrian traffic. The streets are lined with vendors and there is usually an outdoor mercado within a few blocks. At these you will find produce, crafts, xmas lights, food, assortments of tape, rope, and locks, and once I even saw a guy selling boxing gloves. San Cristobal is similar to other Mexican cities in all of these ways except the boxing gloves.

San Cristobal differs in the way this is represented. I think at its simplest it’s the diversity that makes the city unique from others in the country. It makes walking around the streets a bit more appealing when not seeing the same shop repeated over and over. I love the Mexican work ethic, but they sure suck at business. They will setup a taco shop between 2 others and sell you a taco for 4 pesos and I can’t help but wonder how they make a living. In San Cristobal they diversified and there were places selling felafel, vegetarian food, Italian, pizza, seafood. There were a couple nice super mercados within walking distance of the hostel. The streets had clothing shops that resembled a more boutique feel rather than the mass produced stuff that most cities sell in every shop. I walked around one of the out door markets and saw many more hand crafted goods than I was used to.

The city of San Cristobal is surrounded by indigenous communities. The residents come into the city to sell their wares in the mercados. They’re very traditional and for many, Spanish is a second language to their native tongues that have existed long before there were tourists coming into their communities. They rely on income generated from the tourists, but at the same time, I don’t think they’re keen on them being there. While not unfriendly, it’s obvious that the presence is changing their culture that is strongly rooted in tradition.

With these indigenous artisans selling in the market, it really added to the dynamics of the city. The area does well in keeping a culturally alive, yet progressively diverse environment. The culture was rich at the markets. More traditional and hand crafted goods were being sold instead of mass produced products I’d seen elsewhere. My favorite was the handmade Zapatista rebel dolls on horses carrying guns. The Zapatista are considered the good guys around here and you’ll see in the markets many shirts, dolls, and even ski masks being sold that represent them. There’s also Zapatista shirts showing the ski masked rebel with pig tails coming out of the bottom. This region was once controlled by a female Mayan ruler and it shows with a much less machismo attitude here. Part of the Zapatistas movement had to do with the oppression of women in Mexico.

All of this was lovely, but I was getting more and more interested in seeing how the people lived in their own communities. I was told by a Spanish fellow at the hostel of one that he went to. Tuliao explained that there are collectivos that run between the communities and the city of San Cristobal. A collectivo from as far as I can attain is a privately owned vehicle that runs a designated route like a bus, but runs when it fills instead of on a schedule. Collectivos are good when traveling greater distances than you would take a taxi for. At $10 for quite a long ride, they’re the most economic form of travel. Essentially this is how the residents of the indigenous villages commute to and from work. I went off to see where these collectivos were at so I could get a ride.

I went down to where the collectivo dropped us off from Tuxtla to begin my search. “Donde es collectivo de San Juan Chumula?” This is where the fun comes in. I understand more Spanish than I can speak. In this situation I know he’s either going to say where one is, or tell me “yo no say,” at which point I’ll repeat the question until I get to where I’m going. He asked, “Chamula?” He thought for a second and told me I could take a taxi for about sesenta pesos. Or he thought a bus went there which I could take from across the street. I asked, “collectivo?” and he started talking to his friend next to him. They told me I could walk down the main street towards the mercado and I’d find one. Mind you all of this was in Spanish but if you pick up a couple keywords, pay attention to non verbal communication, and listen to what someone is saying, you can understand quite a bit of a foreign language.

I started walking for a few blocks and I found a building with a couple restaurants, a tourist office, and the word mercado written on the top. There were trolleys outside so I thought maybe this was a possibility. I looked around and didn’t see any collectivos and I asked the woman inside the tourista officina, “Habla ingles?” She smiled and said no. I asked the question, “Donde es collectivo de Chamula.” She stuck her arm out into the air, gestured down the street and told me it was 8 blocks that way.

I lost count of the blocks I had been walking, but after walking through the different markets in the area, I started seeing more and more collectivos. I looked down one of the blocks and saw many of them parked in a line. They had the route on them, and it appeared each block was dedicated to a certain route. I asked the driver of the first one I saw, “Donde es collectivo de Chamula?” Again, to illustrate his point, he used his hand to chop the air to show me “uno, dos, tres cuadras.” He turned his hand 90 degrees to show me a left turn as he said, “escirda.” I walked 3 blocks, made a left, and found a collectivo that was driving down the street with the words, “San Cristobal San Juan Chamula” written on the side and front. The driver looked at me, said “Chamula?” and with nod and a “si,” he stopped to give me the last vacant seat.

The drive went through San Cristobal and took us towards the mountains. We raced through the city and over the topes like only a collectivo driver could do. The Mexicans who own them also display the hard working mentality of the culture. They will drive you there as quickly as possible, weaving through traffic, getting airborne on speed bumps, and generally having no regard for life as they try hellbent on getting you there in one piece to collect your money. It’s quite exhilarating and a great way to see the country side. The ride was 40 minutes of pure adrenaline intertwined with moments of blissful clarity and a serene backdrop of lush green hills, grazing animals, and small stone homes constructed on the hill sides in no particular pattern.

We got dropped of at the mercado, which like any good Mexican city, is situated in the zocalo in a plaza near the church. Catholicism is quite strong in the culture and it’s clear the cities were always designed in that manner where the church is at the center, allowing the festivities to revolve around the faith. The market here I noticed had a lot more fresh food being sold. The produce isn’t as nice as the stuff I would find back home, but that’s because the nicest produce is exported to the states, and here they’re left with the ugly stuff. Not bad by any means, just not as pretty sometimes. I like my bananas a little soft anyways, so I’m glad the green ones get shipped to southern California.

On the other side of the market was the church overlooking the city. I’ve been to quite a few, and this one was probably the least remarkable of them all. It was a plain simple building that has stood there for generations providing a center of faith for the village. It wasn’t overly elaborate and it’s probably not recognized for it’s architectural brilliance, but that was fine for this simple community. I got to the door of the church and overhanging it was a sign that in several different languages said, “tourists wishing to enter must first go to the tourist office in order to get permission.” I was shocked that there was a tourist office here. I asked a man out front, “donde es tourista officina?” in which he responded with his finger pointing at the ground and the word, “aqui.” He pulled out a stack of carbon paper and asked some words I didn’t understand. “Que,” I asked hoping I could understand if he only repeated himself. A young boy was nice enough to ask in English, “where are you from?” I responded to the man “United States,” and he looked puzzled. The boy told him, “estedes unidos.” It was the 2nd time someone didn’t recognize the English pronunciation. This time I wrote it down so I can respond correctly in the future.

I paid him $20 and he gave me my ticket. He reiterated what it said on the ticket in 4 languages, “”. He even reiterated to me as he zipped up my jacket around my camera. I was a bit put off by this as every church I’ve been in prior to this had allowed cameras with no flashes and were filled my tourists, both domestic and foreign, walking around snapping pictures of everything they could. I complied and stepped into the dimly lit building.

As soon as my eyes adjusted to the darkness I knew why there were no cameras allowed. This place is sacred to the people. I looked around and this was no church I had ever been to. There were no gold ornamental decorations. There were no pillars with elaborate carvings to pay homage to the creator. There weren’t even any pews. I’m not sure the place had electricity. There was obvious no need for any of that for this simple culture. I walked in and noticed the floor was covered in pine needles. There were glass cases that lined the perimeter each housing a different saint. The cases were surrounded by local foliage that had been brought in as a gift to their saint. In front of those were tables that held the flickering of hundreds of candles in glass jars. When the space on the table was full, on the floor in front was a grid like pattern of candles the size of the ones you’d see on a birthday cake.

There were 2 tiny women walking around the church carrying bowls of charcoal in one hand. In the other was a large handful of a green leafy plant. They used the smoke from the plant to bless the saints one by one while saying a quiet chant. The smoke smelled almost like sage, but a bit more piney. I looked around and noticed the once white walls were covered in soot from the years of blessings.

The room wasn’t big at all, but I slowly walked around making sure I could take it all in. Many people were just sitting with family having drinks. A few women had chickens, and 2 of them were dead laying on the floor. There was an older couple standing near the front chanting. The indigenous people of this region are much shorter than average. I stood next to this couple who at tallest were 5 feet and I could hear them chanting. I closed my eyes and listened not being able to even decipher what language it was. I felt the man’s presence next to me. I could feel him holding onto the hand of his wife. He was holding on tight as he shared the love for God with her. They chanted together and I could feel the love they emitted for each other and their creator that brought them together. I felt it come from them as vibrations through the air that filled the entire room with warmth.

On the way out I felt the need to light a candle and place it amongst the others. I picked up one of the birthday candles that had been laying on a table. I lit it, heated the bottom, and stuck it on a pile that was once a bigger candle that had melted down. I watched as a man went around and scraped the melted remains from the floor into a dust pan. I looked up at my candle and the saint that stood behind it. It was Saint Augustine who filled the glass case and watched over my flame.

I walked towards the door and stopped as a group of people came through with plants, crosses, and smoldering bowls of coal. They gathered in a group and began to chant as one as they marched towards the front fanning smoke and raising their crosses in the air. I don’t know what they were saying, or what god they believe in, or what they think about my beliefs, but I understood the purpose of this church. I related to this indigenous community. They come together to feel it together and share it with one another. You can describe the feeling in probably more ways than there are languages on this earth. From cave drawings, to the holy bible, to a prince finding enlightenment under a bodhi tree, cultures will continue to describe it for the end of time. Today though, we all understood it together as it coursed from the skies into this sacred room. I could feel it in my nose with each breath I took. I pulled it in deep and felt it course through my veins. With each beat of my heart, I could feel the essence of creation surging within myself and using me a gateway to spread that feeling of pure love with those around me. I was alive.

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