Zapatista

Zapatista is one of the most memorable, charismatic women I’ve ever met. A tiny woman, she was strong and beautiful with a straw cowboy hat on her head and a rosary around her neck. I’m guessing she was at least eighty years old. Her skin glowed copper. Her brown eyes sparkled. Her smile was captivating. Ernesto and I met her one day in the town of Ayala in the state of Morelos, Mexico.

Neto and I went to Cuernavaca, near Mexico City, in late August, 2013. We stayed in a truly horrible Airbnb rental. The apartment was small and dirty with grotesque art on the walls. It didn’t even have a pot for boiling water.  After going to Walmart for basic supplies, we decided we needed to spend as little time in the apartment as possible and explore the surrounding area, instead. We ate at local food stands. We spent a day in the history museum. We climbed pyramids and visited the most beautiful botanical gardens I’ve ever seen. We took taxis to nearby towns. Because of that tiny, dirty apartment, we had one of our best vacations ever.

Ayala is an agricultural town, forty-five minutes from Cuernavaca. We wanted to visit a museum, have lunch and be home before dark. Our taxi driver warned us to be careful. “There are a lot of bad people living in Morelos.” 

We didn’t see any bad people. Instead, we met Zapatista, a charming woman selling homemade pulque ~ an alcoholic beverage with a taste as smooth as honey. Pulque is tough to describe. Here is the best description I could find, taken from Wikipedia: 

Pulque is one of Mexico’s oldest, iconic alcoholic beverages made from fermented agave. It looks like semen and has the texture of boogers, but it tastes like pure magic.

 

Neto and I were having lunch at a busy restaurant across from an old railroad station when Zapatista arrived at our table, carrying a large, leather-wrapped jug of homemade pulque. We invited her to sit down at our table and talk to us. She was tired. Her feet were sore. She was happy to spend some time sitting at our table. But first we bought a glass of  pulque.

We called her Zapatista because we never knew her real name. When we asked her who she was, she told us that she was the granddaughter of  Emiliano Zapata Salazar, hero in the Mexican Revolution. She started telling us stories of the Mexican Revolution. The more she told us, the more I knew her stories were true. 

Emiliano Zapata was a handsome man, with dark penetrating eyes and a bushy black mustache. A man of the people and a natural leader, he led the peasant revolution in the state of Morelos. He believed in taking land from wealthy landowners and returning it to the peasants. He later became the leader of the Liberation Army of the South and remained an important fighter of the Mexican Revolution until he was assassinated in an ambush in 1919.

We were captivated by Zapatista. I was in awe of  her wonderful sense of humor and her fascinating personal stories of her grandfather and the Mexican Revolution. We asked her to join us for lunch. She agreed to let us buy her lunch but declined to stay and sit with us. Instead she put her lunch in a plastic box, packed it in her knapsack and continued on her way.

After our day in Ayala, Neto and I left Cuernavaca two days early and checked into a beautiful, ultra-modern hotel in downtown Mexico City. That gave us time to spend a day visiting the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe and climb even higher pyramids. 

Our trip to Cuernavaca and Mexico City was an unforgettable experience. We agreed that spending time with Zapatista was the highlight of our trip, a once-in-a-lifetime experience. She is one of the most beautiful people I’ve ever met. Talking to her, we felt that we were in the presence of greatness.