My daily habit here in Oaxaca has been to wander and explore from morning until night, then come back to the Casa Colonial at 10 p.m. to edit my photos and write the latest blog entry.
When I got home last night, there it was at last: An email from the person whose daughter, Luisa, I have been searching for since my arrival.
It was brief, a bit scattered, but cordial and hopeful. There was some good news … and some bad news.
The good news is that Fernando Limon (whose last name is no longer Limon, go figure) is, as his sister Rosita had insisted, indeed in Oaxaca.
The best elote (grilled corn) vendor in Oaxaca
The bad news is that he is in Oaxaca state, on business, in the seaside resort town of Puerto Escondido. The coastal village is a seven hour drive from here, and I don’t have the time to arrange a flight – but even if I did, well, Fernando is on business and only staying a few days himself.
More good news is that he, his wife Charleen, and their daughter Luisa—Ay, Luisa!—are alive and well.
The bad news (if you can call it bad news, compared to the false intelligence I’d received my second day here) is that they no longer live in the city of Oaxaca.
They live in the city of Denver, Colorado.
The view from St. Augustine in Etla
I’ll be making my arrangements to visit sometime after my return from Nepal in early Spring – if they’ll have me. And the good and bad news there is that Fernando has not yet responded to my request. There may be any number of reasons for this… Someone even suggested that, if Luisa moved to the U.S. as a child (read between the lines here), the story may be more complicated than I had imagined, and Fernando’s reticence to contact me may be understandable.
So I depart Oaxaca tomorrow on the scent of a fresh trail, with some very encouraging news. Not as wonderful and ending, perhaps, as meeting Luisa for a long-overdue ice cream at La Niagara—but much better than anything I’d hoped for during the long silence a few days ago.
All in all, on many levels, I count my journey a complete success. And there will be more to come—stay tuned.
