I find her nestled in a niche behind the polleros. I’m surprised and fascinated. It’s a far cry from her pristine, ornate basilica. Chicken carcasses and parts line the table: feet piled on one side, legs, wings, breasts, heads, and viscera. Knives and scissors flash. Skin is ripped off and splat-lands in a bucket. After each order is prepared, the polleros quickly clean the table with a discoloured cloth that gets wrung out occasionally in another bucket, water now mixed with grease and blood. Hands get wiped on stained aprons, and those same hands then exchange chicken parcels for pesos.
Those same hands, weathered and strong, also choose the best avocados for us. The pollero is proud. These beautiful fruits have come from his own trees in his own yard, he tells us. And these avocados are divine. Far better than the ones we get in Canada. Less expensive, too, of course. Such treasures!
It’s Wednesday morning, and the tianguis (developed from the Nahuatl word tianquiztli, meaning public market) is alive with all the comings and goings of shoppers with their reusable bags full of treasures: fruits, vegetables, tortillas, spices, meats, and all the other things they’ll need for a week of sustenance. (To be sure, they’ll be back next Wednesday and the Wednesday after. This is how it is here.) There are also toys, clothing, and household goods vendors. Some stalls serve food, delicious smoke of grilled meat drifting out from under the yellow tarps strung together and running the length of four or five neighbourhood blocks. A busker walks the length of the market and back again, strumming his guitar and singing Mexican folk songs.
I immediately love it here. Canada has markets, but they’re not like this. This one is more down to earth. It’s crowded with people for whom this is daily life. The atmosphere is far different, far more unassuming, than summer markets in Canada where people go once a week to stroll and socialize with lattes while browsing expensive arts and crafts, organic wines, and gourmet soup mixes. Canadian markets are cleaner and more organized. More orderly. Wealthier.
And they’re lovely–don’t get me wrong. I’ve been to them many, many times in my life, and they’ve offered me some wonderful treats and memories.
But this place, this tianguis, is astonishing with its colours, its sounds, and its ingredients–some familiar, some foreign. The neighbouring houses, the backdrop for the market, are painted a variety of colours, including purple, orange, and pink. Rising up amid the colour are all the Spanish voices. I adore being surrounded by this gorgeous language but not yet understanding everything. I can enjoy the comforting hum of humanity all around me without being distracted with meaning. And this presents a delicious contrast: it’s as relaxing here as it is astonishing.
It’s not fancy. It has a sort of reliable ramshackleness. Handwritten signs, propped up by vegetables, advertise the week’s prices. There are no other signs–no logos or business names. People who’ve stopped to eat sit on whatever’s handy: there might be a stool or a bench, but also a box, an overturned bucket, the curb. Frayed rope ends dangle overhead where the tarps are tied together.
No, it’s definitely not fancy. But it has unmistakable warmth. A bright green house nearby plays some 1950s music from an old radio, and an elderly man dances in the street. The vendors get to know their customers and greet them warmly. There is always banter, time to talk, to find out how everyone is, to hear a brief story, to connect over the weekly shopping. Including over the avocados and chicken, as Our Lady quietly observes from her niche.
I’m still a stranger in most of this gigantic city, but the people here at the tianguis, having met me only once or twice, now remember me and greet me warmly. It’s the place most unlike Canada that I’ve experienced here so far, but the place I feel most at home.
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