Saturday Market in Coyoacán

Saturday is market day in our neighborhood in Coyoacán. During the week, the street América is just an ordinary arterial that runs through the area, but each Saturday a couple of blocks are transformed. One lane is closed off, and two rows of stalls are set up...from the corner all the way to the fountain in a tiny plaza.

Probably fifty vendors set out fruits and vegetables, bulk frijoles (beans), mole, quesadillas hot off the grill made with blue-corn tortillas (more about them in a second), wrist watches, CDs, clothing for children and women...and I'm sure I'm missing something.

Vegetable vendor. The idea of a roof cover supported by
poles goes back over a thousand years; the metal poles
and plastic tarps are modern innovations!

We caught sight of blue corn tortillas prepared a mano, by hand. Tortillas prepared a mano are thicker and far tastier than those prepared in a tortilla press! So naturally, we stopped.

Family selling blue-corn tortillas hot off the grill—a method
undoubtedly practiced in this family for more than a millennium.
Reed had a quesadilla stuffed with huitlacoche (corn fungus);
I had mine stuffed with a bean filling and topped with spinach and cheese.
¡Muy rico! Absolutely delicious!

Reed took their son's picture, then at the hijo's request, snapped photos of his papá and mamá as well!

As we sat enjoying our quesadillas, Reed caught sight of two boys playing in the fountain:

Notice the stalls set up on the other side of the fountain
which, not incidentally, the vendors use as a source of water.

Moving on, we bought an almond-chocolate mole. When later heated and thinned with chicken broth, it was delicious over chicken with brown rice and vegetables. I looked longingly at fresh cherries, the first I'd seen, but before I could make my way to the puesto, it started to rain. Actually, it was a downpour typical of this time of year. First it rained hard, then harder, followed by hardest.

Then it rained Hardest+1, Hardest+2, and Hardest+3. Monsoons in India come to mind.

We sat out the storm sitting on a stool at a second taco stand, under the plastic tarps. We watched fascinated as the vendors kept their eyes on the tarps—periodically pushing up a broom to lift the tarp and drain the water. In this drought-stricken country, where the campesinos, country people, say, el agua es vida, water is life, one vendor captured into an ice chest the water draining off the tarp covering his stall. Reed had his third quesadilla.

While we waited for the storm to stop, I asked the vendors what they do the other days of the week and learned that they set up the market at three other locations on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday. So this is a mercado ambulante, traveling market—clearly part of the 'informal economy' that makes up about 40% or, if household help is included, more like almost 55% of Mexico's economy.

This market could be in Pátzcuaro, Michoacán, where we lived for three years before moving to Mexico City. It could be anywhere in Mexico. I recently asked a long-time Mexican friend about her memories of the mercado. Here's her description of El Bazar de los sábados, Saturday Market:

El Bazar de los sábados is a wonderful place. I love to go there. There is a difference between a mercado and a tianguis. A tianguis is like a mercado ambulante, traveling market. The tradition comes from the Aztecs and all the other native cultures. The vendors put their merchandise on the floor, on blankets or mats, for sale to their customers.

Tianguis was usually held on a specific day of the week. Nowadays these tianguis are still mercados ambulantes, but they have puestos—stalls, like at a fair. What's wonderful about tianguis is everything is fresh, like at a farmers' market.  

In some tianguis you can still find very, very old traditions, like the man with a stack of mini-cages selling canaries and other kinds of birds (sometimes illegal species). 

Reading my friend's description brought back memories of the mercado in Pátzcuaro, where every Saturday the birdman stood on the corner selling birds in tiny cages, and where three or four Purhépecha woman sat in a line, selling fresh herbs and vegetables from their gardens.

Following age-old tradition, this indigenous woman in the
Coyoacán tianguis has laid out herbs and vegetables, most likely
from her garden, on a mat surrounding her. In a nod to modernity,
she uses plastic bags and is sitting on an upturned plastic
ten-gallon paint bucket. 

As I write these lines, I realize that Pátzcuaro's mercado is a blended tradition. In addition to the birdman and the Purhépecha women, there is also a superb, modern fish market. And I'm reminded of the family of another Mexican friend. The family owns two puestos in the mercado, where they sell men's, women's and children's clothing purchased wholesale once a week during a predawn trips.  

As I think about it, Pátzcuaro actually has both a mercado—a seven-day a week operation in a roofed building—and a tianguis de viernes, Friday tianguis, an open-air market where Purhépecha people still arrive early Friday morning to barter fruits, vegetables, cheeses: all kinds of goods are exchanged with nary a peso changing hands.

At the Saturday tianguis near us, there is also a blend of traditional and the modern. We could hardly believe our eyes when we caught sight of the meat market.

In the same tianguis where the herb lady has spread her wares,
this butcher shop sports a light bulb! México — where
traditional and modern reside side by side. 

But it is my friend's words that capture the true spirit of tianguis:

I remember going there on Sunday morning with my mom or with my grandma. We'd take the carrito, small cart, and walk to the tianguis. I was in charge of neatly putting in the carrito everything we bought...and God help me if I dared put the tomatoes under the watermelon!!!!  

We knew everybody, the viejita, little old woman, who sold the aguacates, avocados (sorry, this has to be in Spanglish, otherwise it wouldn't have the flavor of a mercado), the man who sold jícamas con limón y chile—would you believe that he was so strong, I still remember his arms? 

There was, of course the señora with the canasta, woven basket, of handmade tortillas, quesadillas de papa, potato, and gorditas. That was also wonderful.  

And there was the man who sold pork, and the man who sold tostadas, queso y crema. His puesto was one of my favorite spots in the market. He had a huge bucket of cream, thick as yogurt, and  dipped a tostada in the cream, then it went directly to the queso rallado, grated cheese, and he gave it to you as a snack (1000 calories, of course) while you ordered what you wanted to buy.  

That's where my grandma and my mom taught me how to select fruits and veggies: "Nunca escojas las calabacitas más grandes porque son desabridas y pueden estar amargas, mejor chiquitas porque tienen más sabor y siempre tienen que estar muy firmes, no aguadas" ("Never choose large zucchini because they are tasteless and can be bitter; the little ones are better because they have more flavor, and zucchini always has to be very firm, not soft").  

I also learned there that some vendors were dishonest and would try to distract you to include bad mandarinas, mandarin oranges, among the pretty ones. Others had stupidly high prices for the same product you would find at a better price if you just walked a little farther.  

I also liked the section where they sold flowers. It always smelled wonderful and my mom would let me buy some. In general I'd choose nube con claveles rojos. Nube is a little white flower...it stinks if you don't change the water every day. 

Sometimes my mom would buy roses, red roses, and she taught my sister and me how to make a coronita, little crown, with the thorns. She put the roses in a transparent vase, then we inserted the coronas made of thorns on the sides, and it looked nice. 

Long story short, I think the mercado means company, good food, family, color, smiles, fresh produce, support, happy farmers, tradition, and a happy nose because OMG those places have a million different scents.

It's funny, but I was telling my sister in San Francisco about our trip to the Saturday market, and she started to chuckle.

"I don't believe it," she said, "it's just like the Farmer's Market here in San Francisco. The big one is in the Ferry Building, but on Tuesday it's at the Civic Center, and on Thursday, it's just a couple of blocks from my office.  The produce is so incredibly fresh...and it smells so good."

Traveling markets all over North America, on both sides of the line in the sand that seems to separate us. But markets don't stop here. Friends who visited us in Pátzcuaro are extremely well traveled in China. When they visited the Pátzcuaro mercado, their comment was,

"Oh, it's just like China."

Markets are universal.

Still Curious?

Before we moved, we visited this mercado held outside a pueblo near Pátzcuaro, Alternative & Organic Fair in Arócutin—yet another twist on an ancient tradition.

Anecdote: In our search to replace a crashed laptop, Reed and I visited a Centro de Tecnología in downtown Mexico City. Our expectation was something along the lines of Office Max (where we eventually ended up), but instead we found ourselves in a traditional mercado—tiny puestos with vendors aggressively hawking their wares and cartons of merchandise stacked in the aisles. New technology being sold in a highly traditional manner!

During a trip to visit family in Chicago, I dragged Reed along on a shopping trip. He made best use of his time by photographing the shopping mall, then writing this post, which includes a lovely description of what mercado means in Mexican culture:

Mexico Culture: What Makes It So Different from U.S. Culture?