Xalapa-Enríquez, capital of Veracruz

I spent one week with Juan, whom I met at the carnival of Veracruz, in and around Xalapa. We went to his little village Cerro Gordo from Veracruz together and he took a lot of time to show me Xalapa, the capital of the state of Veracruz. We not only visited the city itself but also two Pueblos Mágicos, a lot of waterfalls and rivers and we cooked together Salsa de Chicharrón and Chayotes Rellenos.

The remaining afternoon and evening we used to walk around the city centre of Xalapa: We passed by the park Los Berros, headed on to the university area and finished our walking tour at Los Lagos, some city lakes. In comparison to the Puerto de Veracruz, Xalapa is a very green city offering a lot of parks and wooded areas. Nevertheless the city has grown tremendously within the last decades so that the forest was strongly pushed back and the once typical fog in the valley of Xalapa is mostly missing today.

On my second day with Juan we went to visit the waterfall and small river Nace el Río (the river is born). It was once called El Descabezadero ("the beheader") as there died a lot of people in the currents and waterfalls. Nowadays the area around the source of the river is prepared as a small ecological tourist zone. There are specific swimming and bathing zones and areas for picnicking and the zone of the waterfalls is visible by crossing a few little wooden walkways. At the entrance of the zone there is a little orchid and butterfly house.

On the way back to Cerro Gordo we passed a lot of chayote plantations. The chayote is a climbing plant of the subtropics and tropics, whose fruits are also called chayote and are cultivated as vegetables. It belongs to the pumpkin family. So we decided to buy some chayotes and prepare them as chayotes rellenos, chayotes filled with chicken or tuna and some vegetables.

The next day we visited another waterfall, Xoltepec - Río Grande, and after that we went swimming in the same river a few kilometres down the river course. I also climbed the little rock face on one side of the river and jumped down into the river basin a few times. Some villages close to the river are pumping their water out of the river so we saw the water pipes and pumping systems that made a strange clicking sound.

On Sunday we made a little excursion together with Oscar and Tere to the Pueblos Mágicos of Coatepec and Xico which both lie very close to Xalapa. Coatepec is known for its excellent coffee. So obviously I had to try the coffee of the region as well even if I am not the great coffee lover - and in fact, the coffee was pretty delicious. In the surroundings of the city there are a lot of coffee plantations which are mostly combined with banana plantations to protect the coffee plants from the strong sunlight. In Coatepec there are a lot of coffee roasting houses, all the cafés and restaurants sell local coffee and we also entered an old farmacy which was transformed into a café. In Coatepec we furthermore entered the Museum of the Orchids where we attended a tour through the orchid garden. I learned that there exist tens of thousands different forms of orchids, most of them originate in Asia but many also in Mexico and Central America.

Before heading on to Xico we went to the Cascada de Texolo, a waterfall close to the town of Xico with an altitude of approx. 20 metres. Unfortunately the river had very little water so it wasn't that impressive. Furthermore the waterfall is very strongly developed for tourism, actually there were more people than water. Nevertheless the nature around the waterfall was very beautiful with its trees and plants like bananas and coffee. What I also liked about Texolo was the fact that it was very clean everywhere, I couldn't find waste lying around. However, this was not due to the fact that the visitors of these waterfalls do not leave garbage lying around in the area, but that the garbage is collected again. Small donation boxes were set up where support was asked for the preservation of the waterfalls. All the other waterfalls and rivers I visited with Juan were much more idyllic and natural apart from the fact that we found trash like plastic bottles, packagings or cans everywhere.

This Sunday was furthermore the first day I was finally able to eat more balanced food again after my week of antibiotics caused by the street food of the carnival in Veracruz. I fully enjoyed it with a lot of antojitos mexicanos, Mexican street food. This day I tried three tamales I haven't seen so far: One with coffee flavour, one tamal de libro con mole, a tamal covered with mole and filled with thin layers of bean paste so that it looked like the pages of a book and a tamal canario. The dough of this yellow tamal contains rice flour, baking powder, sugar and egg yolks. Besides I had a agua de zarzaparrilla, flavoured water by the berries of the rough bindweed, a climbing shrub which mainly grows in the Mediterranean, Africa and Asia.

In Xico we were walking around the small city centre and we visited the Museo de Vestidos de Santa María Magdalena, a museum which shows hundreds of dresses of María Magdalena, the patron of the city. During the month of July the whole town converts into a place of folklore and spirituality. On some days bulls are released into the streets like it is done at the festival of San Fermín in Pamplona, Spain. Also virgins and ladies move through the city, first and foremost the statue of Santa María Magdalena, every day and every year dressed newly with clothes specially designed for this occasion and donated from people all over Mexico. Xico's main street is beautifully decorated and many people slip into costumes of all kinds.

In 2008, the designer Cristina Pineda created the dog figure Xico. It is inspired by a Chihuahua as well as the dog Xoloitzcuintle, who, according to Mexica tradition, was in charge of guiding souls at the moment of death. The name of the mascot also alludes to Mexico, from where it obtains the words xi (fire) and co (heart). Of course, the city has existed for a much longer time.

One morning I had breakfast with Raquel, a sister of Ana (whom I got to know end of January when I was travelling in Pachuca, Hidalgo). After that she showed me a little bit around the city. We passed by some Araucaria trees, a genus of the evergreen coniferous trees, which are very common in the region of Xalapa. We visited the Callejón del Diamante, a small street which is filled with a lot of stalls and sellers of all kinds of things, mainly handicrafts. Back in the drivable roads I was once again amazed at how many taxis there are in Xalapa. Therefore the city is probably the cheapest place to move around in taxi within Mexico. The unregulated oversupply is so great that taxi drivers queue endlessly at the main arrival points such as the bus station to be able to take passengers.

One day I visited the Museo el Lencero which is situated in the Ex Hacienda del Lencero, a few kilometers outside of Xalapa. The hacienda takes its name from Juan Lencero, a soldier of Hernán Cortés. In the 19th century it was the property of Antonio López de Santa Anna. Santa Anna was a Mexican general and politician. He was eight times - even eleven times, if you count the constant changes of office with his vice president in the first term of office - president of Mexico. He's undoubtedly the most controversial Mexican person of the 19th century.

The Ex Hacienda also has a chapel and huge gardens surrounding the property which include a sculpture by Gabriela Mistral, a Chilean poet and diplomat, who left her country and came to Mexico for some years in order to avoid the pressure from politics and authoritarian governments. Today the Hacienda is a museum which displays furniture and items dating from this period. During a guided tour we learned data about the origin of all the furniture like e.g. a Persian tapeta, a German piano, a French desk, an Italian corner post, a Netherlands trunk, some Japanese lamps and also furniture and items from different Mexican states like a desk from Yucatán or vase of Talavera from Puebla.

Later during the day we visited the Museo de la Antropología de Xalapa. In comparison to the antropology museum of Mexico City, which is one of the most impressive museums of the world as it contains objects of a lot of different cultures, the museum of Xalapa is dedicated to the Olmec culture and the indigenous civilizations of the region. The Olmec culture was the civilization that developed during the Preclassic period of Mesoamerica. Although traces of its presence have been found in large areas of Mesoamerica, the Olmec metropolitan area is considered to encompass the southeastern part of the state of Veracruz and the western part of Tabasco. The Olmec culture can be traced from around 1,600 to around 400 BC along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico. Its most typical attributes are findings of huge statues of heads. The museum also includes some open-air areas with a lot of beautiful plants.

The jade was the most valuable stone for the Olmecs, in the museum artfully decorated jade stones are exhibited, which served different purposes. Furthermore the museum maintains horseshoe-shaped stones that served as gates for the juego de pelota, the Mesoamerican ball game that was a sport with ritual connotations. It was practiced both in everyday life and in religious celebrations. Besides, some deformed skulls are exhibited. Artificial cranial deformation is a form of body modification by which the skull is intentionally deformed. This is achieved by distorting the normal growth of a child's skull by applying force. In the post-classical period this method was applied to the rulers of the people. Cranial deformation was not only applied by the cultures of Central America but also by the East Germanic tribes who were ruled by the Huns and many other tribes around the world.

Another day we were busy cooking and preparing Salsa de Chicharrón. Chicharrón is a dish that generally consists of roasted pork belly or roasted pork rinds. Salsa de Chicharrón is a dish that consists of bathing pork rinds in red or green sauce, consisting mainly of tomatoes and chiles. As a dessert we had jícama, also called Mexican turnip. This root bulb is eaten mainly as a snack, street vendors everywhere offer the jícama cut into strips with lime juice, salt and chili sauce. The consistency of the jícama is similar to that of a radish and just like that, the consistency of the jícama ranges from woody to juicy.

In additon, my trip to Xalapa was characterized by some concerts. One evening we spent listening to the Orquesta Sinfónica de Xalapa. It was founded in 1929 and is considered the oldest symphony orchestra in Mexico. This night they played some excerpts from "Der Ring des Nibelungen" (The Ring of the Nibelung), a cycle of four German-language epic music dramas composed by Richard Wagner.

Another evening we watched the movie Mirreyes vs Godínez, a Mexican comedy. A "Mirrey" is a child of the Mexican elite, the "mirrey" lifestyle can probably be compared to that of the popular culture celebrities of the Western world, based on glamour, consumerism, excess and despotism. A "Godínez" is one of the many clerks who work in government offices or in large corporate enterprises. They are characterized by their wardrobe which consists of wearing a suit and their company badge on sight and many of the actions they perform during their daily life at work. They try to avoid all kinds of responsibility, they are the first ones to organize parties and distractions of any kind during working hours. The movie tells the story of Genaro, an alpha "godin" who has dedicated much effort and work to grow in the world of work and move up in Kuri Shoe shops. When he suddenly meets Santi Kuri, the owner's son, a "Mirrey" who is now trying to impose his vision on the company and get the "Godínez" out of the game. But in this tribe they are fighting to keep the place they have earned within the company.

The last day I spent with Juan we climbed down a little path in the valley right next to his village and enjoyed some hours at the small river. We were swimming in a little part of the river course, I was flying my drone which had a little fight with the leaves of a mango tree as the sensors did detect the small leaves wrongly. Luckily it were just the leaves and not the growing mangos. We also ate some mangos and passion fruits and we played memory with a card deck which showed prehispanic symbols of animals. All in all it was a fantastic week with Juan with a lot of different impressions, many Mexican songs I added to my playlist and Mexican sayings I have learned.