Mandoo (dumpling) Oaxaqueño

somehow, no matter where I go I manage to locate the Coreans. I´ve got me some Corean radar. Even if there is only one in all of Oaxaca.

I enjoyed my first day of classes. Trying to express everything in the past is an interesting exercise in living in the present. That and catching up on everything that my class studied this week because I decided that a Friday would be a good day to get started. I tried to listen and pay attention while reading over a classmate´s notes and asking questions about things that they had gone over. Being a student again is a real wonderful exercise in compassion for my students, particularly the ESL ones. In the end, I realized that I had learned some of what was being taught about the past tense and things seem to sink in without as much struggle and forced repetition of foreign sounds. It was cool to learn something and then immediately feel that a whole new realm of communication opened up to me. I can actually tell someone what I did instead of finding myself limited to comments about what I am planning on doing.

Following class, I followed a good lead to check out Mercado Pochote, which is an organic foods market. Sophy and I had wandered this neighborhood together with no luck as we later found out it is only open on Fridays and Saturdays. The entrance to the market is through a door under an ancient arch that was the foundation for aqueducts built by some of the early conquistadors who lived in Oaxaca... well, they were no doubt built by the indigenous people though it was during the time in which conquistadors had begun to wreak their havoc. it was a magic fairytale moment. bending down, passing through the arch and coming into a wonderful market on the other side. i continued following a lead for tamales oaxaquenas, steamed corn stuffed with mole negro con pollo lovingly wrapped in banana leaf.

i passed an interesting and busy stand which was selling tostadas with all kinds of interesting ingredients like requeson with red bell peppers, queso fresco mixed with chiles, beets, nopal salads, bell peppers and cream, and a few bowls of things that were already sold out. adjacent were piles of freshly baked bread and various other goodies but nothing that appeared wrapped in any kind of leaf or corn husk.

where o where were the tamales?

well, best to ask and I was directed toward another stand, but as luck had it they had sold out. in fact, usually they sell out by 12 noon and they are only at the market on Fridays. slightly disappointed, i looked around to see what else might fill by tummy and better yet fulfill my desire for gastronomic adventure. i spotted a classmate eating something. on closer inspection it appeared to be rice wrapped in seaweed. Rice?! Seaweed?! it was more judgment than suprise. he told me it was like Oaxacan sushi and laughed. Ha, i´m not eating sushi in Oaxaca, i thought to myself.

in the end I ventured to the offending stand and noticed that there were steamed dumplings there in addition to samosas, pizzas, freshly baked breads, and incredible other goodies. what was going on? I ordered a veggie dumpling that was stuffed with rice vermicelli, carrots, squash, soy protein, mushrooms, y mas. This was tasting all too familiar but different at the same time. I took a look at the women at the stand - two younger fair skinned women and an older woman with designer glasses and a face that looked for lack of a better description East Asian. I thought maybe she´s Japanese? Well, she was kissing all her regular customers and chatting with them in Spanish. I just kept on paying attention to this hybrid dumpling which presented me with some local Oaxacan ingredients but in a familiar package. I returned my reusable plate and gave my familiar comment "muy sabrosa." The older woman looked at me, asked where I was from. Then she asked again when I said Estados Unidos. I responded that my parents were Corean and then the verbal fiesta began.

We went back and forth in Corean for about 30 minutes while her usual friends, customers, and staff were bemused. One asked, "are you friends?" Well, it did not take that long for us to become connected. It was a Corean moment of finding a compatriot in a far away land. Immediate human connection. In the course of learning about her husband who bakes bread, pizza and other goodies late at night and who went to Chicago, bought a used school bus and drove it back to Oaxaca (he plans on building a moving kitchen), she gave me a closer look at her food - jap chae, kimchee jun, bi bim bap. I must have been blind to have missed it all. It was all too impossible... my mind could not comprehend.

I´m off to her house tomorrow for kimchee jigae and duk bokki. Two things I never thought I would be eating in Oaxaca. Not to mention the mandoo (dumpling) oaxaqueno.