News from (drumroll please) . . . Oaxaca!

Big news! Jo Ellen has returned to Oaxaca. Yay!

As you might recall, she had planned an earlier return but, due to medical issues and leading a U.S. missions group in a different part of the country, she was not able to return until the end of February. I am glad she is back and was anxious to find out how she found things upon her return. I will share part of her e-mail with you to give you a little update on Oaxaca as well. Enjoy! :-)

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I am really back in Oaxaca. I had a beautiful view of Orizaba almost the entire way home. Yesterday I went to check out the Zocalo. The Zocalo itself is all cleaned up--no graffiti, fountains are running, very clean, etc... All the hotels, restaurants, stores were open and cleaned up. A few stores had been permanently closed (a fabric store near Terra Nova, for instance). Banks and large businesses had totally cleaned their facades and repainted but small stores just painted over the graffiti…

At first glance things seem totally back to normal – and I think that is what a casual tourist would see. However, if you look close, you can see subtle (and some not so subtle) things that tell of the conflict this past fall. There are way more police present near the Zocalo--and they are all carrying long sticks. There are also portable street blockers that they could push into place and lock together (thereby making them permanent) in minutes.

APPO and the teachers are still very much in the news, but in reference to "repairing the damage APPO did", etc. There have been two strikes since I returned -- a taxi driver strike and a University employee strike. There is supposed to be another mega march this coming Thursday. Good old Oaxaca land of protests.

I came back to another cat! There is a yellow cat that has taken up residence. And the weird thing is that Henry(Jo Ellen's first cat) is fine with the cat. They even eat out of the same dish. I don't know if there was a big fight at one time and they came to a peace agreement or what...

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So there you go, another day in the life :-).
Please continue to pray for Oaxaca and Jo Ellen as she resettles.
Please also keep Cindy in your prayers as she continues to deal with medical issues here in the States.

P.S. To those who are still struggling with it, it is "Wah-ha-kah", "Wah-ha-kah", Oaxaca! ;-)