SUNDAY, DECEMBER 12, 2010 nova scotia from F4
RoseMacNeil proposed a picto- rial postmark that played up the holly-jolly appellation. The first one came out in 1994, featuring a wreath encircled by the letters of the town. A Christmas Island tradition was born. “We have different versions
each year. We make design changes — we may take away the leaves or add ornaments. We’ve had a Christmas tree coming out of an envelope and holly on a mailbox,” said Mac- Kinnon, a Cape Breton native who replaced MacNeil 12 years ago. “But we like to stay with thewreath. I like itsmessage of wishing for good health.” The post office stands alone,
a solitary box set back from a rural road, with unfettered views of Christmas Island pond and a small island overrun by nature. Occasionally, a car drives by. Frequently, that car stops outside the front door. In the absence of a diner, a bar or a barbershop, the post office has become a giant water cooler, where locals swap news and good wishes. The Christmas Island post
office serves 140 customers, but once the stamp is released in mid-November, business ex- plodes. (They keep it around until mid-January.) MacKin- non said she receives up to 10 times as much mail during the holidays. In a record holiday season (1996-97), she pro- cessed 23,000 cards. Once, the lieutenant governor dropped off 2,500 envelopes over two days. This season, she expects to hand-stamp 14,000 to 17,000 pieces. On the 23rd day before
Christmas, the morning count was in the low triple digits — a slow day, according toMacKin- non. To maintain some order, she kept the pile of envelopes addressed to the post office in a box, which contained numer- ous cards that needed the fin-
ishing touch. On top of that, visitors stopped by throughout the day to drop off their loads, often carried in multiple plas- tic bags. “Let me shake your hand. I
have always wanted to meet you,” exclaimed Cathy Finney, who had driven an hour south, her husband in tow. “Every year, we say we are going to do this. This year, we were deter- mined to do it.” Finney left behind 24 cards
and a warm handprint on MacKinnon’s palm. While MacKinnon tended to
customers at the counter, I nominated myself her elf and dug into the paper mounds. I ripped open envelopes, shak- ing the packages before placing the cards over by the worksta- tion with ink pads and two stamps (one red, one green). Often the senders include a personal note to MacKinnon, expressing their gratitude on decorative stationery or the lip of the envelope. “We really appreciate the
wonderfulwork you do and the joy it brings to the recipients of the cards when they see that they have been sent from Christmas Island,” read one note. In another, she received a gift of Year of the Tiger stamps, with the inscription: “A few stamps for your kindness.” “Maybe he thought I would
run out,” she quipped. Following MacKinnon’s in-
structions, I pressed one wreath on the actual stamp and another on a clean part of the envelope, in case collectors wanted a pure form for their books. Advance apologies to those whose wreaths turned out half-formed, too light, lop- sided or too smudgy. Before the post office closed
for lunch, I pulled out one of my own Christmas cards and slid it over to MacKinnon for a one-two stamp. I was going to spread Nova Scotia’s holiday spirit by first-classmail.
sachsa@washpost.com
KLMNO
EZ EE
F5 Into the mystic in Tepoztlan
DETAILS
GETTING THERE American Airlines offers connecting flights from Washington Dulles to Mexico City, with fares starting at $642 round- trip. Buses leave approximately every 45 minutes from Mexico City’s Benito Juarez International Airport to Cuernavaca for about $12 one way. From there, you can take a taxi (approximately 35 minutes) to Tepoztlan for about $12.
WHERE TO STAY La Buena Vibra Retreat&Spa San Lorenzo No. 7, Valle de Atongo 011-52-739-3951-491
hotelbuenavibra.com Luxury hotel with regular yoga classes in a quiet area east of the town center. Rooms from about $138 a night.
Posada del Tepozteco Paraiso No. 3, Barrio de San Miguel 011-52-739-395-00-10
www.posadadeltepozteco.com.mx Boutique hotel with 21 rooms, surrounded by gardens and gorgeous mountain vistas. Rooms start at $105 during the week, $208 on weekends.
PHOTOS BY RUTH SAMUELSON FOR THE WASHINGTON POST Inner and outer calm prevail in Tepoztlan, where quiet streets lead from the outskirts to the mountains. tepoztlan from F1
with magnets, without dieting.” “Whatever word you want to
DETAILS
GETTING THERE Continental and Delta offer connecting service to Halifax from BWI Marshall and Reagan National, respectively, starting at $578 round trip.
WHERE TO STAY The Mariner King Inn 15 King St., Lunenburg 800-565-8509
www.marinerking.com Historic inn in the center of town, breakfast included. From $98.
Hector’s Arm B&B 2504 St. Columba Rd., Iona 902-622-1229
www.centralcapebreton.com/ hectorsarm/
index.html Homey Cape Breton inn near Christmas Island. Off-season room costs $110.
MacKinnon-Cann Inn 27Willow St., Yarmouth 866-698-3142
www.mackinnoncanninn.com Seven period rooms from 1900 to 1960. From $127.
WHERE TO EAT Trattoria Della Nonna 9 King St., Lunenburg 902-640 -3112
www.trattoriadellanonna.ca Homemade gourmet pizzas and pastas, from $13.
Satisfaction-Feast 3559 Robie St., Halifax 902-422-3540
www.satisfaction-
feast.com/contact.html Halifax’s oldest vegetarian restaurant. Entrees $11 to $14.
Merns Family Diner 82 Main St., Yarmouth 902-742-6071 Acadian specialities such as rappie pie, plus seafood. Dishes from $3.50 to about $25.
WHAT TO DO Yarmouth County Museum 22 Collins St., Yarmouth 902-742-5539 yarmouthcountymuseum.ednet.
ns.ca Old photos from the Grand Hotel days, plus nautical artifacts, Mi’kmaq items, etc. $3.
Kevin Veinotte’s U- Cut Farm 300 Mossman Rd.,West Northfield 902-543-1271 Balsam tree farm with horse- drawn wagon rides and hot chocolate by the fire. Free to visit.
Christmas Island Post Office 8499 Grand Narrows Hwy., Cape Breton 902-622-9627 Drop off your holiday cards for the special Christmas Island stamp.
INFORMATION
www.novascotia.com
—A.S.
add to ‘therapy,’ ” says Larry Prat- er, he’s heard it. Prater moved to Tepoztlan after retiring from his medical practice in Oklahoma a fewyears ago andnowownsa day spa called TepozSpa that caters to gay men. “I just got an e-mail about
‘hielo,’ or ice therapy,” he says. “As a psychiatrist, I’ve never heard of ‘hielo therapy.’ Until, I guess, yes- terday in the e-mail.” Of course, Tepoztlan also offers
more traditional therapies: Plen- ty of local hotel spas, some quite high-end, advertise a range of massages, yoga classes and vari- ous skin therapies. One day on the streets ofMexi-
co City, I met a businessman who also happened to be an enthusias- tic yogi. When I mentioned that I was heading to Cuernavaca, he immediatelyfumbledthrough his cellphone for the number of his favorite Tepoztlan instructor. For whatever reason, I accept-
ed the unsolicited advice of this adamant stranger and headed to his recommendation: La Buena Vibra Retreat and Spa. I didn’t need shelter, but a yoga class sounded good. And visiting the hotel provided
a glimpse of Tepoztlan’s highfalu- tin side (no aura photographers in sight). I strolled past Buena Vibra’s pristine grounds, the pool, the terraces with plush couches andadobesaunahuts so beautiful I half-expected to see miniature craft re-creations of them in the town’s market. Unfortunately, I’ve always con-
sidered yoga to be a workout rather than a path to enlighten- ment. When I’m in Mexico, my “happy place” generally means “the taco stand where I am now eating.” And “being in the zone” signifies the numbness I feel after leaving an outdoor market, over- stimulated by copious crafts, T- shirts, silver jewelry, Lucha Libre masks, etc. (Most markets have roughly the same stuff.) Luckily, Tepoztlan allowed me
to both go tomy happy place and be in the zone. Market stands line the streets
DEAN CASAVECHIA FOR THE WASHINGTON POST
Frost Park in Yarmouth, whichmay have inspired the song “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas.”
around the town’s central square, right behind which, down some stairs, there’s a maze of stands with tacos, quesadillas, mole, etc. The local ice cream chain Tepoznieves also attracts tons of people, even with such indeci- pherable flavors as “ofrenda a los muertos” (offering to the dead) and “oracion de amor” (prayer of
love). Beyond indulging my own
stomach-approved therapeutic preferences, however, I wanted to learn more about some of the older local rituals: I wanted to meet a curandero or curandera, a Mexican medicine man or wom- an.
Through a friend, Imet awom-
anfromAmatlan, just a fewtwists in the road from Tepoztlan. She suggested that I go there to find her uncleDonAurelio, a curande- ro.
The next day, I took a 20-min-
ute bus ride from Tepoztlan to Amatlan. I went to his house, but he wasn’t home. So I walked back up a small hill to the main road, wheretherewasa little quesadilla stand, and waited around for about an hour. Just as I was about to give up, a truck pulled up and a small man carrying a bag of eggs hopped out and set off down the hill. It was the curandero, some- one said, so I ran after him. Luckily, this did not unnerve
him, and we started chatting.We strolled through the stone arch- way to his property, and Don Aurelio showed me his temazcal- li, a traditional sauna chamber. In the center of Tepoztlan, there are temazcallis for tourists, too. But they’re mostly billed as purifica- tion and detoxification saunas rather than medicinal ones. Don Aurelio, on the other hand, advis- es people with knee pain and skin rashes to use his temazcalli, which resembles a brick pizza oven big enough for humans. Before he treats, he diagnoses.
That’s where the eggs come in. When people visit Don Aurelio, he often assesses their problems with what he calls a “limpia,” or cleansing. He passes an egg over the person’s body, just above the
skin, and when he feels the yoke rattle inside the shell, he knows there’s a problem. Then he cracks the egg open, drops it into a glass of water and “reads” the bubbles and the white mucus in the yoke. As Don Aurelio got up to show
me the procedure, he suddenly reached over and started groping the back ofmy head. Apparently, I had a “susto,” a word I didn’t know. I figured it meant a cyst, which
got me momentarily worked up. (Way to kill the good times, Don Aurelio.) I told him that when I was a toddler, I’d had a little bumpon the back ofmy head that had had to be operated on. It had turned out to be a non-threaten- ing cyst (but a scare for my par- ents, who’d been worried that it might be cancerous). Henoddedandflashedanaffir-
mative smile that seemed to say, “So it was just as I said.” Soon after, Don Aurelio went
inside the house, and I scrambled for my Spanish-English diction- ary. Susto, susto, susto. It didn’t mean “cyst.” It meant “fright, alarm.”
Hmmm.Yes, just as he’d said. I never tested out the full-on
limpia procedure because, frank- ly, I felt quite healthy. But I had a separate brush with superstition on the Tepozteco pyramid. After climbing atop the struc-
ture, I headed toward the edge, where people were leaning against a short wall, and pon- dered what to do about water, since I’dnearlyrunout,anditwas hot.
Eventually a friendly woman
from Mexico City, in Tepoztlan with her husband and three kids on a day trip, awoke me frommy
WHERE TO EAT Tepoznieves Av. 5 de Mayo 21 011-52-739-395-3813
www.tepoznieves.com.mx One of several locations of this popular ice cream store. A “nieve” is a cross between ice cream and Italian ice. The smallest size costs about 80 cents.
El Brujo Restaurant-Bar Ave. 5 de Mayo No. 2, Plaza Torres, Zona Centro 011-52-739-395-4695 One of Tepoztlan’s more sophisticated restaurants, offering salads, lasagnas, savory crepes and dishes with Mexican flourishes, such as chicken stuffed with mushrooms and cheese with a sauce made of “flor de calabasa” (pumpkin flower). Entrees start at around $6.50.
WHAT TO DO The strenuous but worthwhile hike up to the Tepozteco pyramid is roughly a mile and a half and takes an hour to an hour-and-a- half to complete. The entrance to the path begins at the foot of the mountain at the end of Avenue Tepozteco. The pathway is open every day except Monday. Admission is about $3.20, except Sundays, when it’s free.
INFORMATION
www.visitmexico.com
—R.S.
stupor, and we began chatting. Pretty soon, the whole family chimed in. Then, out of nowhere, another man nearby passed me a small turquoise stone. “Tomela, guera,” he said, which
roughly translates as, “Take it, pale girl.” (The term is used fre- quently here, without offense.) He’d given the family stones,
too, and told us to place them on the ground, which would some- how help with the whole “cargar energia” attempt. A few of the family members stood near the rocks with their eyes closed and their arms stretched out, waiting for the good vibrations. When they were done, I re-
trieved my stone. It was time to turn around,my battery hopeful- ly powered-up. A hiker bottleneck plugged the
narrow top of the trail. Local police officers orchestrated traffic control. “Make way for your friends
carrying lots of new energy,” said one cheekily, as he paused the upward-journeying line to allow people down. Idon’tknowwhether itwasthe
stone or that oft-mentioned ener- gy, or my lunchtime sandwich (probably) or newly purchased bottle of water (wonderful deci- sion), but I felt great on the walk down.
travel@washpost.com
Your psychemay take a hit when kids and seniors pass you on the way up, but the viewfrom the Tepozteco pyramid might restore you.
Samuelson is a reporter living in Mexico City.
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