(Mientras escribo esto, Bethra y yo estamos en el primer autobús de la mañana a la Ciudad de México. No tengo wi-fi, así que probablemente voy a publicar cuando lleguemos al hotel.)
I usually feel right at home in Oaxaca's vibrant ex-pat population, but this trip it
was hard to not feel like an ugly American with the swarm of tourists who
descend on the town for la Dia de los Muertos. I’ve been spending a lot of time
with Bethra, so the last two days consisted of a lot of markets and eating, and
we had to wade through the sea of people to get to our favorite food spots.
Friday, after the markets, we headed over to la Galeria
Gorilla. Jason, from
Gorilla Glass, played host for visitors from all over for this year's festivities. Many
stayed at the Gorilla Glass factory, while a few of us bunked
off-site at one of several hotels. I saw many of my good “traveling friends”: people
from the body-modification industry and around who I only see a few times a
year, but who I still consider friends—and several of them good friends.
Bethra, (from Atlanta), Adam (from Brooklyn), Corey, Lysa (and Todd),
and Andrea (from San Francisco and the Bay) Autumn Swisher and Shon (from Nomad in San Francisco), Kevin (from Phoenix), Jimmy Buddha
(from Austin), Ron Garza and his wife Nakota (from Long Beach, California), and
a few others I was meeting for the first time. While we waited, Corey, Meno,
and Luna worked on the traditional alter in the courtyard in back of the
gallery.
After dark, about ten of us followed Jason over to a group
show (where he had a piece on display) in an amazing space that was basically a
courtyard inside an abandoned, decaying building. After this, we headed back to
la Galeria Gorilla for the performance scheduled for later that evening.
Around 8 p.m., we
were led into the gallery for the evening’s performance: “Bridge of Mud and
Feathers.” It was performance piece Japanese-American Shibari bondage
practitioner and educator Midori and suspension artist Samar. In the small
space, Midori, in Butoh-inspired costuming, adorned a rope-trussed Samar with
flowers, and then Jimmy Buddha and Muffe, both gilded, attached red chord to
Samar’s already-inserted hooks and suspended her off the floor. As she spun, Midori smeared ink over parts of her body, than
pressed paper to her body, creating crude paper prints. It was quite beautiful.
Afterward, Bethra and I headed over to the Panteon Antiguo. It’s a cemetery fully-enclosed by a sort of mausoleum wall, and inside it’s a party as
people visit graves and socialize, both in and out of costume. We’re both early
risers, so we were in bed before midnight.
We visited the Gorilla Glass factory the next day for stories
of the insane, all-night drunken march through the Oaxacan hills for the
traditional celebration of mescal and food. Part of me wishes I could have seen
it; part of me knows I wouldn't have survived it. It seemed like everyone else barely did.
(En el autobus, la pelicula “Spider-Man” in playing—en
español—mientras Bethra y yo estamos viendo “Fuego” con Isabel Sarli en mi
computadora. La turistas que estan detrás de nosotros estan dormiendo, y esta
bien porque Sarli esta desnuda por mucha de la pelicula. Es un viaje estraño.)
When I was at the museum, I almost walked past it. It’s much
smaller than the painting I told people it was: the Internet lists it as 171.3
x 122.3 cm (about six by four feet). The
green color of her skin is there, but definitely not as garish as I remember,
and she didn’t look like the monster that I’ve been describing to my friends. 
Her mouth had the sexual sneer I remembered—the lips painted
red and open, with a wanton, teeth-exposing part to her lips—but there was
something else there too… a kind of pained grimace. I kept looking at her eyes:
why are her eyes so ill defined when everything else is so vibrant? They look
clouded, or like… she’s crying. 
