Hotel Azucenas

As soon as I landed in Oaxaca, it felt right. I stayed at a small hotel that I just adore, called Hotel Azucenas. I discovered Hotel Azucenas when I stayed there with friends before the class we took in Oaxaca, two years earlier.

The class, on curanderismo, was an elective for my graduate studies in occupational therapy. We learned about ways of healing that were somewhat familiar, such as massage, sweat lodges, and medicinal plants, and also those less familiar, such as limpia (spiritual cleansing), sadness as an illness, and susto, extreme fright that can cause the spirit to leave the body resulting in symptoms described in the Western medical system as post traumatic stress disorder.

I loved being back at the Hotel Azucenas, with its rooftop garden and fountain right outside my door. For the next two weeks, it would be my home.