Oaxaca

OAXACA, Mexico -- Rows of poinsettias are rising along the zocalo, where police and protesters recently brawled. Fresh coats of paint are being slapped on buildings to cover up angry graffiti. Even though the barricades have been removed and the blood has been mopped from the streets, this colonial-era city is struggling to recover from a violent spasm that scarred its buildings, traumatized its citizens and left as many as a dozen people dead over a seven-month span. "It's a tense calm," said Francisco Toledo, the Zapotec Indian considered by many to be Mexico's greatest living graphic artist.

I live in Perry Hall, and last spring I vacationed in Oaxaca, Mexico. While there, I saw a Mexican woman walking past one of the many buildings that were scrawled with graffiti following a political conflict in 2006. Today, all is calm and back to normal. Oaxaca is so colorful, the Spanish-style architecture is beautiful and the people warm and friendly. The Baltimore Sun welcomes submissions for "My Best Shot." Photos should have been taken within the past year and be accompanied by a description of when and where you took the picture and your name, address and phone number.

There's nothing wrong with Spain's Costa del Sol. The beachfront is pleasant, the food is OK, the weather is generally pretty good. But for a truly enriching experience, to really get to know Spain, its people, its historic sites, its cuisine? For that, you go inland: Seville, Granada, Cordoba, Ronda, Toledo, Madrid. Which brings us to Mexico. Again, no problem with spending a week under a palapa on the water with a couple of good books, someone you like and a steady supply of icy Coronas.

OAXACA, Mexico -- Rows of poinsettias are rising along the zocalo, where police and protesters recently brawled. Fresh coats of paint are being slapped on buildings to cover up angry graffiti. Even though the barricades have been removed and the blood has been mopped from the streets, this colonial-era city is struggling to recover from a violent spasm that scarred its buildings, traumatized its citizens and left as many as a dozen people dead over a seven-month span. "It's a tense calm," said Francisco Toledo, the Zapotec Indian considered by many to be Mexico's greatest living graphic artist.

knew Mexico long before I ever visited it -- knew it from novels, and while that may be a strange way to know a place, it is not an uncommon one.I suppose I ought to tell you, too, that nearly all of my images of Mexico were from fiction by non-Mexicans: the whiskey priest in Graham Greene's "The Power and the Glory," the drunken consul in Malcolm Lowry's "Under the Volcano," the prospectors in B. Traven's "The Treasure of the Sierra Madre," which John...

OAXACA, Mexico -- Hundreds of federal riot police officers and soldiers took up positions outside this besieged tourist city in southern Mexico yesterday, poised to end an increasingly violent protest that has shut the downtown for five months and left a dozen people dead. Tension hung heavily in the air as night fell. Protesters appeared to be digging in at the barricades that they had constructed around town from sand bags, old tires, barbed wire and burned-out vehicles. The federal government issued a statement ordering the protesters to "immediately hand over streets, plazas, public buildings and private property" so that officials could "guarantee public order and adherence to the law, as well as preserve respect for the population's individual guarantees."

I live in Perry Hall, and last spring I vacationed in Oaxaca, Mexico. While there, I saw a Mexican woman walking past one of the many buildings that were scrawled with graffiti following a political conflict in 2006. Today, all is calm and back to normal. Oaxaca is so colorful, the Spanish-style architecture is beautiful and the people warm and friendly. The Baltimore Sun welcomes submissions for "My Best Shot." Photos should have been taken within the past year and be accompanied by a description of when and where you took the picture and your name, address and phone number.

Moves Baseball ATHLETICS: Optioned P Roy Smith to Triple-A Sacramento. Assigned C Jeremy Brown to minor-league camp. INDIANS: Acquired P Derrick Van Dusen from Rangers for IF Marshall McDougall. PADRES: Optioned P Michael Nicolas to Double-A Mobile. Assigned P Kris Keller, IF Chris Sexton and IF Mario Valdez to minor-league camp. Acquired rights to IF Oscar Robles from Mexican League Oaxaca; invited him to spring training as nonroster player.

OAXACA, Mexico -- The state capital remained divided yesterday, as thousands marched in defiance while many other residents praised government forces that dislodged a protest encampment from the city center this weekend. The recovery of the plaza by federal police late Sunday marked a symbolic end to the five-month occupation by striking teachers and an assortment of leftist supporters who have demanded the resignation of the state governor. But exactly when the tourist capital will return to normal remains in doubt.

It's `All Good' Everything is "all good" this weekend in Masontown, W.Va., as fans gather for the eighth annual All Good Summer Festival and Campout. The festival, which begins tomorrow , boasts three days of music, workshops, crafts and kid's activities. Performers include Keller Williams, the Disco Biscuits, Medeski Martin and Wood, Dark Star Orchestra, North Mississippi Allstars and more. Jah Works and the Recipe will perform early-arrival sets tonight. Family and handicap camping are available, and there will be ice, food and crafts from vendors, activities and a kids' play tent, but no babysitting will be provided.

OAXACA, Mexico -- The state capital remained divided yesterday, as thousands marched in defiance while many other residents praised government forces that dislodged a protest encampment from the city center this weekend. The recovery of the plaza by federal police late Sunday marked a symbolic end to the five-month occupation by striking teachers and an assortment of leftist supporters who have demanded the resignation of the state governor. But exactly when the tourist capital will return to normal remains in doubt.

OAXACA, Mexico -- Hundreds of federal riot police officers and soldiers took up positions outside this besieged tourist city in southern Mexico yesterday, poised to end an increasingly violent protest that has shut the downtown for five months and left a dozen people dead. Tension hung heavily in the air as night fell. Protesters appeared to be digging in at the barricades that they had constructed around town from sand bags, old tires, barbed wire and burned-out vehicles. The federal government issued a statement ordering the protesters to "immediately hand over streets, plazas, public buildings and private property" so that officials could "guarantee public order and adherence to the law, as well as preserve respect for the population's individual guarantees."

There's nothing wrong with Spain's Costa del Sol. The beachfront is pleasant, the food is OK, the weather is generally pretty good. But for a truly enriching experience, to really get to know Spain, its people, its historic sites, its cuisine? For that, you go inland: Seville, Granada, Cordoba, Ronda, Toledo, Madrid. Which brings us to Mexico. Again, no problem with spending a week under a palapa on the water with a couple of good books, someone you like and a steady supply of icy Coronas.

It's `All Good' Everything is "all good" this weekend in Masontown, W.Va., as fans gather for the eighth annual All Good Summer Festival and Campout. The festival, which begins tomorrow , boasts three days of music, workshops, crafts and kid's activities. Performers include Keller Williams, the Disco Biscuits, Medeski Martin and Wood, Dark Star Orchestra, North Mississippi Allstars and more. Jah Works and the Recipe will perform early-arrival sets tonight. Family and handicap camping are available, and there will be ice, food and crafts from vendors, activities and a kids' play tent, but no babysitting will be provided.

Moves Baseball ATHLETICS: Optioned P Roy Smith to Triple-A Sacramento. Assigned C Jeremy Brown to minor-league camp. INDIANS: Acquired P Derrick Van Dusen from Rangers for IF Marshall McDougall. PADRES: Optioned P Michael Nicolas to Double-A Mobile. Assigned P Kris Keller, IF Chris Sexton and IF Mario Valdez to minor-league camp. Acquired rights to IF Oscar Robles from Mexican League Oaxaca; invited him to spring training as nonroster player.

At the end of every street in the city of Oaxaca, a mountain rises, a nubby tooth in the eternal smile of the Sierra Madre. If you look down from a balcony or window upon the central plaza of the town, the zocalo, your mind inevitably brings forth the analogy of an immense school of fish, an undulating swarm that defeats all efforts to focus upon any individual within the collectivity.It's only when you go down and get among them that you can see things in their particularity. A young woman rushes to work, her remarkably long hair flying behind her like the tail of a brown fox in flight.

TLAHUITOLTEPEC, Mexico -- She looks healthy now, laughing among two dozen other children in a rescue center run by Roman Catholic nuns. But when 8-year-old Catarina Hernandez arrived here, her belly was bloated and her legs swollen with water -- the final stage of malnutrition.The condition is so close to starvation that it normally appears only in times of famine, but Sister Alicia Estrada, who runs the center, says the nuns see it routinely. In the lush hills that surround this village in southern Mexico, hunger is day-to-day normality.

When we arrived in Mexico's Oaxaca City, we saw a man standing on the other side of the glass in the arrivals area holding a card with my name on it. So, I thought, Rene Cabrera really does exist and is here to fetch us, just as his e-mails had promised.My faith in the Net took a giant step forward.This was the start of a journey that had begun weeks earlier on my computer keyboard, a journey mapped out almost entirely on the Internet to see exactly how feasible it is to plan a vacation online -- and then take it.After a short drive, Rene pulled into Las Bugambilias, his bed and breakfast in the center of town; it was even more charming with its wrought-iron gate, chirping birds in cages and ceramic floor tiles than it had looked on my computer screen.

TLAHUITOLTEPEC, Mexico -- She looks healthy now, laughing among two dozen other children in a rescue center run by Roman Catholic nuns. But when 8-year-old Catarina Hernandez arrived here, her belly was bloated and her legs swollen with water -- the final stage of malnutrition.The condition is so close to starvation that it normally appears only in times of famine, but Sister Alicia Estrada, who runs the center, says the nuns see it routinely. In the lush hills that surround this village in southern Mexico, hunger is day-to-day normality.

When we arrived in Mexico's Oaxaca City, we saw a man standing on the other side of the glass in the arrivals area holding a card with my name on it. So, I thought, Rene Cabrera really does exist and is here to fetch us, just as his e-mails had promised.My faith in the Net took a giant step forward.This was the start of a journey that had begun weeks earlier on my computer keyboard, a journey mapped out almost entirely on the Internet to see exactly how feasible it is to plan a vacation online -- and then take it.After a short drive, Rene pulled into Las Bugambilias, his bed and breakfast in the center of town; it was even more charming with its wrought-iron gate, chirping birds in cages and ceramic floor tiles than it had looked on my computer screen.