Day 6
Travel log
Oaxaca alternative
PINOTEPA DE DON LUIS
You arrive at Pinotepa de Don Luis, today a town of 7,000 inhabitants, on a paved road that never stops going up and down, looking for its way between hills and canyons.
Nothing in Pinotepa de Don Luis that the visitor discovers remembers its antiquity: "At the end of the Mexican Revolution, Pinotepa de Don Luis was devastated ... If it were necessary to change the name to this town, it could have been named the “Fenix” and when in 1968 an earthquake left the temple cracked - it had to be demolished and replaced by the modern-style building now seen-there was no ancient building in the village except for two or three houses from the beginning of the last century , hidden away from the down town.
But if the buildings of Pinotepa de Don Luis are modern, the visitor is surprised to hear conversations in Mixtec and discover that there are few people who still wear traditional clothing: shirt and blanket for men, blanket of white cloth on the head, apron like a blouse with crossed ribbons on the back and the very striking pozahuanco or entanglement for women the symbol of the people.
The Pozahuanco of Pinotepa de Don Luis alternates horizontal bands of garnet, purple and blue color, colors that were obtained in the past of natural dyes: cochinilla and purple snail. Today, the pozahuancos of daily use continue being made in the traditional waist loom made of wooden sticks, but with industrialized cotton threads stained with chemical dyes. However, for parties or weddings, women use the "snail" pozahuancos, whose violet color comes from the purple snail, the Plicopurpura pansa, a small mollusk that inhabits the rocky coast of the Pacific.
There remain "dyers" in the village, inheritors of ancestral knowledge about the cycles of reproduction of the snail, the places where it can be found and the best time to "milk" it, which depends on the tides that discover the areas where they live, rocks with difficult and dangerous access.
During the season, from October to March, the dyers "move to the staining area carrying the skeins of cotton ... select the snails and gently release them from the rock with a wooden stick to avoid damage them". The dye - a white secretion produced by the snail to immobilize its prey - is obtained by gently pressing the foot of the snail or blowing the animal ... (which) is placed on the skein and returned to the rock where it was at finish the extraction.
Mr. Habacuc Avendaño Luis, President of the Association of Dyers of “Pansa” Snail, proudly teaches visitors the skeins of handmade cotton with a refined and luminous violet color that still retains the smell of the sea.
A part of the dyed thread will be used by the weavers of the town, another part will be sold to weavers of the State of Oaxaca as San Pedro Amuzgos or San Mateo del Mar.
A visit to the market allows to discover another traditional activity of the town: the elaboration of engraved “jícaras” (bowls). Several stalls sell beautiful “jícaras” of all sizes decorated with designs of local fauna like: coyotes, snakes, badgers, birds, etc. All the people of the town have a relative or a neighbor who dedicates to this activity and invite the visitor to know his workshop an opportunity to get away from the paved streets and walk through cobbled sidewalks in the shadow of the great ceiba trees, among traditional houses made of interlocking canes covered with dry mud.
The engravers, seated in the doorway of their houses, chisel quickly and accurately the drawings on the convex surface of “jicara”. Some “jícaras” are true works of art and have been presented in national and international exhibitions.
Like all indigenous people, Pinotepa celebrates numerous religious festivals throughout the year there are 22 mayordomies in honor of the saints .... besides the Carnival, Easter and
Day of the Dead.
During the Carnival, several types of dances are performed, some was recently "imported" from neighboring villages such as the dance of the “mascaritas” or “los diablos”, other traditional ones such as the “Tejorones” a satire to the Spaniards.
The tejorones - in mixteco men poorly dressed according to some sources, men who dance according to others - they take small masks with European factions and a strange cornet covered with feathers of rooster in the head. Their costumes are imitations of the Europeans in the time of colony. Two men dressed as women participate, with pozahuanco and huipil wedding. The music that accompanies the dance of the Tejorones, a joyful and rhythmic music, is interpreted with violin. Each of the three big neighborhoods of Pinotepa de Don Luis has its own group of tejorones.
The Carnival day, after listening the speech of authorities that exhorts them to conserve their customs and expresses the sadness of not knowing if "God will lend them life to participate in another carnival", the tejorones go out to parade in the streets, at the end of their route, the three groups meet in front of the Presidency where they will perform different dances, the rabbit, the snake, the iguana, the pigeons some of the dancers carry valuable old masks.
Another notable feast of Pinotepa de Don Luis is the celebration of Good Friday. By three o'clock in the afternoon the people of Pinotepa de Don Luis begin the Calvary - a mound of rocks located in the highest part of the town - for the representation of the crucifixion.
Meanwhile, the "Jews" of the three neighborhoods are preparing. After covering the back, chest and the legs with white paint, they draw on it with purple paint: crosses, hearts with arrows, skulls, etc. The Jews then hide their faces in a bag of flour blanket pierced with two holes at the level of the eyes, on which they have drawn eyes and mouth. They are armed with a bow and arrows-a handful of brightly painted wands whose ends are covered with metallic paper-or with a long "lance", which cannot exceed 5 meters so as not to get tangled in the electric cables during the procession. The spear stick supports a trimmed and painted wood decoration with religious or pre-Hispanic designs.
At the start of the procession, a true forest of spears sets in motion behind the Holy Burial. Immediately the combat between the Jews start, the arrows attack the lances, they bounce against them or the facades of the houses. Some spectators take out their umbrella to protect themselves from the rain of projectiles while the children fight the fallen arrows in the middle of the street. When they arrived at the Presidency, the ammunitions were finished and ending the combat, the Jews are united to all the inhabitants of the town to participate to the Via Crucis.
A visit to Pinotepa de Don Luis offers the opportunity to witness beautiful, joyful and authentic parties. However, what the visitor will remember the most is the strength and vitality of a culture that has allowed a small group of people not only to preserve their language, traditions and high-level craftsmanship, but also to take advantage of modern media to disseminate it.
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