Couch surfing into Nelson

Alex Leal couch surfed her way into Nelson, cresting a hill with a “Holy Hell” of an exclamation as she laid eyes on the region’s sunlit coastline and mountain ranges. She had discovered a ‘mash up’ of the best parts of her early years living in North America, as told to Britt Coker.

I’m from Monterrey. It’s Mexico’s third largest city in the upper northeast. Monterrey, I would say, is the biggest industrial city in Mexico. Automotive is one of the biggest industries; we’ve got Kia and other big car companies. We have had massive events like Formula One there and we’re going to get the men’s FIFA World Cup games as well, because Monterrey has one of Mexico’s world-class stadiums.

There are two big mountain ranges across Mexico and one of them ends in Monterrey, so I grew up hiking since I was little. My dad is a hiker too. My mum is from Matamoros, so she grew up next to the coast and fishing for food and all that stuff, so I grew up with these two things in my life, mountains and beaches and when I visited Nelson 11 years ago, I was like, ‘Oh wow, you can have it all in one.’

Sundays you go to your grandparents, you hang out with your family. You cook with your family. I think we’re quite outgoing and we love dancing and all of this.

I think there’s still quite a lot of macho culture in Mexico. But because of the nation’s economy now everyone has a job, but women are still - you cook, you do everything.

My mum is one of seven and my dad is one of eight, my generation, we now have around three siblings, that’s a big reduction.

Mexico has over eight ecosystems, we’ve got the mountains, the desert, the jungle, the forests, manglars, the Caribbean. Every region has their own dishes, their own dance style and their own different forests and jungles and all this, even animals. The diversity is insane.

I tell people I’m a Mexican introvert. I joke and cook and host and do all that, but then I’ll go home and read my book for five hours. I think it’s quite rare to meet a proper introvert in Mexico. I think I have 30 cousins overall, so we’re definitely often surrounded by people and that’s another thing I’ve noticed here. Now that my dad and brother are visiting, I want all of my friends to meet them, but I haven’t met my friends’ brothers or parents which is, I think, a big cultural difference.

Mum’s got a second cousin that moved to New Zealand in the late 90s so I was aware of New Zealand before Lord of the Rings, which I think changed things
for a lot of people.

I chose to travel first and so I met a few people through couch surfing, and we did a massive road trip in the South Island, January 2013, the first time I came to Nelson and stayed a few nights and I was amazed, it was just beautiful.

The mash-up of having mountains and outdoors with the ocean, I was not expecting that, I knew New Zealand had that, mountains and oceans, but Nelson - the whole region - I just couldn’t believe it.

I did come to Nelson last April on a bike packing trip. Going over the Maungatapu Saddle and looking at Nelson just bathed in sunlight, I was like, “Holy hell!” and my friend said, “You need to live here”, and I was like [wistful] “Yeah…”

I have a dog here and I’ve had friends that live in Nelson with dogs and it’s so dog friendly, that was another main thing, and the mountain biking, that was probably the other main reason.

The local community, it’s so open, I’ve never experienced that multicultural openness [elsewhere], and the mountain bike community, they just became my friends immediately, whereas everywhere else it’s taken me quite a few years to properly integrate. They’ve been amazing.

Compared to other cultures [when living overseas], they immediately try and look for their own, Mexicans don’t. Every Mexican I meet, we want to make Kiwi friends, we want to fully integrate.

I love fresh produce and that’s my Mexican side of how important food is. In one of the small food stores in Nelson city I found fresh jalapeños and that opens up so many dishes. One of my favourites would be enchiladas, but real enchiladas, not Kiwi-Mex mix. It’s based off dried Mexican chillies, so you make this red sauce and then you dip the tortilla in, and then you fill it, and it’s a corn tortilla.

Lots of Mexican food is not about being spicy hot, it’s about flavour. So, most of our chillies are non-spicy, children can eat them. Mexican food is one of the first to be awarded the UNESCO World Heritage [Cuisine of Intangible Cultural Heritage]. There are still people making them the way they were made 400 years ago.

I feel Mexican food and family, it sort of feels like in the Māori culture as well - food brings people together. I had to learn how to adapt here, though I don’t buy bread, I buy tortillas. Some friends now have quesadillas instead of toasties.

Sundays were for barbecues and families. Monterrey is the barbecue capital of Mexico. Saturday with the friends, Sunday with the family, and just around the barbecue, talk with everyone, prepare all the food together. I have a little charcoal BBQ [here]. I got invited to a friend’s place for Christmas Day and I made Mexican corn on the cob which is grilled corn with Mexican spices and things, and they know how to do it now.

You guys are so open to learn how to cook other foods. The amount of friends that cook curries from scratch, it’s pretty cool to see how open you are.