North America,  Mexico,  Travel,  Food

Puebla third week routine

January 8, 2023 /

On the first day of the new year, I met an Indian guy who lived in Mexico for a few months like me on the couch software. Like all the Asians I met in Latin America, he is also an atypical Indian. He should be the first Indian I met during my travels in Latin America. He has been studying and working in the United States for a total of 6 years, and he also lived in the Bay Area before. I quit my job as a programmer at Google in January last year, and even gave up the opportunity to stay in the United States for a long time. In February, I started riding a motorcycle for more than four months and visited more than 20 national parks in the United States. , and then crossed the border to Mexico, and has driven more than 30,000 kilometers so far. His ultimate destination is to ride to the southernmost tip of Argentina. Another reason why he is an atypical Indian is because he eats everything because most of the Indian friends and colleagues I know have dietary restrictions, either they are vegetarian or they only eat chicken and nothing else Meat. He said that since he came to the United States, he has eaten everything. When talking about food, I recommended him a few local delicious places, and found that he is also a foodie like me, and his eating style is also very similar: he likes to find affordable street shops frequented by locals . We are both budget travelers, but we are willing to spend money on food. We went to a bakery that I recommended. Like me, he couldn’t control the local desserts and the sweet bread sold by the bakery. He bought it and wiped it out. He also likes to share food, so I asked me to help him Share the calories. We sat on the benches in the downtown park and chatted, and the locals passing by would always look back at us, probably because Asians are rare, and it is even rarer for two Asians who look very different to be together Bar.

One day I went to visit the local specialty Talavera pottery. The Indian brother just participated in a city walking tour and learned how to distinguish the real from the fake. The prices of different shops are really different. He has only been in Mexico for three months, and he is surprised that his Spanish is really good, and he can carry out basic communication, and because there is a retroflex r sound in his mother tongue, it is easy to pronounce the retroflex sound in Spanish. After shopping with him, I gradually understood why he is good at Spanish. He really talks to everyone, asks a lot of questions, is very curious, and is not afraid of making mistakes or not being able to understand. I want to learn more from him. Because he likes to ask questions very much, in the process of buying pottery, the little brother in the store finally took us to visit the nearby pottery factory where they made pottery, learned more about the production process and process, and also got to know them who design all the pottery style boss. Passing by the local art gallery area, I saw an old man painting with concentration, and I admired it.

In the next few days, I went to share and eat various delicacies with this Indian brother. The hawkers selling food in the local market are really trying too hard to sell, and they can't wait to stretch their arms and drag you to their store to eat. Recently I ate sopa Azteca (Figure 3-6), also called sopa de tortilla. It is a traditional Mexican chicken soup with fried slender corn flakes. The ingredients of the soup include tomatoes, garlic, onions, small red peppers, epazote local plant leaves, quesilla cheese, avocado slices, etc. I finally ate chile en nogada in the birthplace of Puebla (Figure 3-7). Although it is not the season for this dish (August-October), local traditional restaurants have it all year round, but the ingredients in it are seasonal fruit etc. This is the first time for the Indian brother to eat it. He especially loves the white sauce on it, and he almost licked the plate in the end. But I don't know if it's because it's not the season for this dish, and the ingredients used in it are different, and it's not as delicious as the one I ate in Mexico City last time. I also ate mixiote de carnero (picture 3-9), which I only saw in the local market. The ram meat was wrapped in steaming paper and cooked slowly in a large pot. It was super delicious. Mole de zancarrón (Figure 2-8) is also only seen in the local market. The mutton soup is not as good as the previous one, and the mutton taste is too strong.

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Mexican festivals have been going on since December. Every January 6th is Día de Reyes Day of the Three Kings. This festival, like many other Mexican festivals, is religious and heavily influenced by Spain. Three Kings Day is a continuation of Christmas, and on the evening of January 5, children will receive gifts from the Three Kings (similar to Santa Claus). I saw a girl on the couch app on Tuesday organize a Friday celebration of Three Kings' Day at her house: eating traditional rosca de reyes bread and drinking hot chocolate. In fact, I really want to go to the local people's house to celebrate and learn about this traditional festival, but she lives in Cholula a little far away, and I don't want to come back late at night. So I planned to organize an event to celebrate the Three Kings Day in Puebla City. It was not difficult to think about it: post a post on the software, and then buy Three Kings bread and chocolate. The only thing missing is the location. My landlord's eldest sister's house is definitely not good, the place is not big enough. So I asked the owner of the sofa who lived across the street who hosted me for one night the next day I came to Puebla, if he would like to organize this event with me, and it is enough for him to be responsible for the location. He readily agreed, saying that as long as there are less than 10 people, it will be fine. Then I felt a little bit sorry for robbing the participants who had already signed up for the event organized by the Cholula girl. I also sent her a message to ask if we want to combine it together. She said that this is a party for her and many of her friends, and it doesn't matter to her whether there are extra people. So I posted on Thursday morning to organize a Friday night celebration. First, I asked the local foodies and Indian brothers I met last week, and they all confirmed that they would come to participate. The local foodie brother went to Oaxaca for a business trip and vacation this week, and he came back on Friday, otherwise he would have introduced him to the Indian brother, because he had studied and lived in India for half a year, and there must be a lot of common topics.

According to my experience of using the sofa-climbing software in Puebla in recent weeks, many people are very unreliable, saying where and what time to meet, and the result is either not punctual, or the pigeons, which is too much. When participating in an event organized by others or organizing an event with friends in the Bay Area, many people would click "join the event" on the software, but the probability of not showing up in the end is too high. Some activities are more casual, such as going to a restaurant or something, some people say they will come but they don’t come in the end, that’s all. But there are many factors to consider in organizing this kind of celebration, because after all, I have to buy food and drink myself first, and then finally see how many people participate before sharing, and I also have to decide how big Three Kings bread to buy based on the number of applicants. If you buy small bread, there will be enough people who come to eat it; if you buy large bread, if many people say they want to come but don’t come, everyone will have to share the cost. So when I went out to eat during the day, I stopped by several different bakeries to check the price and size (half catty, one catty and two catty). I wrote down in the event post about how much each person will share (depending on the number of people), and if you want to participate, you must send me a separate message to confirm, and I will send them the address of the specific sofa owner. In addition to the four of us who confirmed to go, another four people signed up in the afternoon, but only one person confirmed with me through a separate message. The local foodie brother said that he asked his friends for help, and after a while, four of his friends confirmed with him that they would come to participate, which was so awesome. So on Thursday night, it was finally confirmed that there were 9 people participating, and a Whatsapp group was built, in which they sent information such as specific time, place and precautions.

On Friday afternoon, I went to the bakery I used to go to buy San Wang bread with my Indian brother. There are no other breads and cakes on the shelves on both sides. They are all sold in big boxes. There are three different sizes of bread. . We bought the biggest two kilos of Three Kings bread. The two of us took turns carrying the big box of Sanwang bread back home, otherwise our arms would hurt. The senior girl who I met before this afternoon and was an intern at the tourism office in the city center suddenly sent a message to make an appointment with me. After meeting, I asked her if she would like to come to the evening party together, but she didn’t see my post. She has nothing to do at night so she will come with her. At 7 o'clock in the evening, I went to the sofa owner's house across the road with this little girl. He just came home from get off work. Of course, we were the first to arrive. The others arrived half an hour later, and after more than an hour, everyone came one after another. arrive. Mexico time! Because the owner of the sofa lives in a community with a gate, I have to go out and open the door for them to come in every time someone sends a message. One of them even brought a friend of hers, and didn't tell me in advance, it doesn't matter, anyway, I bought the biggest Three Kings bread, which must be enough to eat. While waiting for others, my sofa owner and I were going to make hot chocolate, and kept saying how I bought powdered chocolate instead of Abuelito's biscuit chocolate. I also said that the hot chocolate here is usually boiled with milk. I said that when I was in Oaxaca, everyone used to make hot chocolate like this, and hot chocolate without milk boiled with water is more common. He ended up making both hot chocolates.

When almost everyone arrived, everyone started cutting the Three Kings cake. You can cut as big as you want and where you want to start. If you cut or eat the small plastic doll representing Jesus in the bread, some people think it is a symbol of good luck, but some people don't think so, because on the day of Día de Candelaria on February 2, it is a treat to buy Tamales tamales and atole corn syrup or hot chocolate. One person cut it twice, and I ate one. Because this bread is the largest, so there are 8 small dolls in it, and the chance of winning is a bit high. Everyone broke up in the middle of the night. Before leaving, everyone thanked me for organizing this event. It was a very interesting cultural experience. Then I asked my good friends who went back to Spain for the festival last month how they celebrated the Three Kings’ Day. Her parents opened a bakery, so the family made the Three Kings bread by themselves and sent me photos. The appearance and tradition are similar to those of Mexico. Nothing is the same. Their Three Kings Bread is much smaller and flat, like a bagel, with a filling in the middle and other ingredients. Put a king doll and a bean inside, and the person who eats the king doll will have a crown belt and be a king or queen for a day. And the person who eats the beans will treat guests to buy this Three Kings Bread.

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