Mazunte Breeze

Mazunte Breeze, a set on Flickr.

I spent Semana Santa watching people get knocked over by waves on the beach of a hippie commune in Oaxaca.

Mazunte is quiet. The roads leading to the beach were just paved with stone last year. I can imagine the dust from what would have been my bare feet commutes to the French bakery but, instead, have the memory of stone, so cool in the shade of exotic green branches. I prefer to forget the same path in the midday sun.

We stayed at the Architecto, run by Guido Rocco - that is, “the Italian” or “the architect” - well known for his eco-friendly cabins designed to blend in with the landscape of seaside rocks. Our room's construction materials consisted of palm fronds, adobe, bamboo and wood. No window contained glass and, therefore, when it rained you knew it. It had a distinct Swiss Family Robinson feel from the outside that only grew once I stepped through the bamboo door. The kitchen area and its wooden table with four chairs, two electrical outlets and one sulfurous sink was separated by a hammock strewn across the middle of the room so that is neatly divided the sleeping space of mosquito-netted-bunk-beds and a queen-size bed attached to twisted rope. After three nights on the bed, which swung with the slightest repositioning, the sensation of perpetual movement, the one you get when you step off a boat that has been home for more than a few hours, stayed with me throughout the day.

Our porch, half concrete and half cliff so close to the ocean that during high tide waves would crash on its face, became home to dominoes, cards, Mazunte breezes (a full coconut plus unmeasured alcoholic additions) and endless hours of watching the ocean and the people and the glorious shit-eating wedlock of the two. Past the porch one found exposed steps, which if followed led to the bathroom - an outdoor shower with one temperature water (cold and lovely) and facilities that overlooked the ocean and beach once you pushed aside the dried palms used as a window cover.

It was, as Jose called it, camping for the bourgeois.

Mazunte is, however, not luxurious in the traditional sense of the word. The little place is trying to make a go at eco-tourism after centuries of being dependent on the now illegal turtle and turtle egg trade. The place still relies on the turtles for income but has traded its slaughterhouse for a museum and sanctuary, funded by the federal government after the official ban of the turtle trade in 1991. At the same time, the community is cautious as it slowly expands: it has building codes that stipulate all constructions must blend with already existent structures; there are strict rules about how, where and what to build in the community, partially to discourage land speculation and over development.

So what are these current structures, you ask? Currently, the beach pueblo is home to
two bakeries, a juice store operated by quarreling lovers, one tortillaria, an astonishing 7 or so internet cafes, four tiendias de abbarrotes, a number of hostels and hotels, a few houses pretending to be hostels, various mediocre restaurants, Cosméticos Naturales de Mazunte - that is, a cooperative of fifteen families that produce and sell their own line of cosmetics founded by the owner of the Body Shop - and shops selling hippie made clothing/wallets/earnings from beer caps/etc.

While the ocean may cover your body in golden specs, Mazunte is just like any other old Mexican beach, in that locals will still attempt to sell tourists food, jewelry, hammocks and the like. The difference in the case of Mazunte's peddlers is that they are all beautiful, dreadlocked hippies. I can only assume Argentinians.