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It’s been 5 days since I have returned to Cofradía de Suchitlán, so I am way overdue to write about my time at my cousin’s in Sacramento, California, where I visited from September 1 – 5^th.

She had predicted temperatures around 100 degrees, but they were only in the 80’s and 90’s.  Since it was the start of a long Labor Day weekend, we didn’t want to go too far and get stuck in traffic, so we stayed local, plus spent a day in San Francisco.

I went there never having spent any time in California except to catch a connecting flight, so the only thing I found on my internet search was the Crocker Museum of art. We did spend several hours there, which was very nice, but I was also anxious to do other things – and it certainly helps when the person you’re with lives there.

One day was spent exploring old Sacramento – the riverfront, the old (or restored) buildings, the old railroad trains and riverboats – it was a nice experience.  Some of the smells reminded me of childhood visits to the boatyard where my grandfather kept his houseboat – the smell of hot tar, the hot, dry sandy soil and the dry, unpainted wooden boards that would inflict splinters into your skin if you weren’t careful.

All this came back to me as we walked through the old town that had the appearance of the old “Gold Rush” era – wooden sidewalks, wooden buildings, including a reconstruction of the original Wells Fargo office.  There were also some men in uniform with their horses and tents with a sign that said “2^nd California Cavalry, Company F, Living-History on Horseback!1861-1866” Apparently there was also an event called Gold Rush Days which was going to be held for the Labor Day weekend.  However, we DID spend the day exploring and I felt we had seen enough and didn’t need to spend every day at the Gold Rush Days.

We also spent a day in San Francisco. Our first stop was the Japanese Tea Gardens. Got there about 10 minutes before they opened, and I was glad I had brought my windbreaker. It was chilly and my hands were freezing – or maybe my blood has thinned out from living in Mexico…  Comedians make fun of people who live in the state of Florida and bundle up and complain of the cold when the temperature is in the 60’s, and now I fear I have become one of them!!!!!

At any rate, the garden was gorgeous and very tranquil, and I took tons of pictures. Some of them reminded me of paintings, especially lily pads in the water.  I remember when I was still in nursing school in Brooklyn, my dream was that after I graduated in 1970, I would learn Japanese and then go to Japan, exploring on my own the parts where people did not speak English –  but then I went down a different path.

We stopped for hot cups of tea beside one of the ponds and then also visited the gift shop. So many lovely tea sets and sake sets – perhaps I will have some Japanese dishware when I move into my house. Very strange, when I lived in New York, I had a new set of dishes with Mexican-style patterns. Now that I am actually living in Mexico, those Japanese dishes and teapots are calling my name…

After the Japanese Tea Garden, we crossed the street to visit the botanic gardens.  Awesome plants, trees, lawns, fountains over so many acres. In the succulent section were maroon plants that resembled flowers made from wood that I had seen for sale in shops in the past.

My favorite area was a pathway that had descriptions of plant life from prehistoric times, with living plants that were examples of what would have been growing on the earth at that time.

We drove past the beach, hoping to be able to stop there. Perhaps it was because it was a weekend, or that it was Labor Day weekend, but everyone else seemed to have had the same idea. Every parking lot was full, and cars were parked bumper-to-bumper at the curbs. There was not a spot to be had, so we drove past it several times as I observed the Pacific Ocean from the car window.

We did find parking near Fisherman’s Wharf, however, and walked around, observing Alcatraz from a distance and the Golden Gate Bridge half-covered in fog in the distance.  It was initially wall-to-wall people and between that and the parking it felt as if I was back in New York City.

Meanwhile, on Monday morning we returned to John C. Fremont Park in Sacramento, where the “Chalk It Up” festival had been taking place for 3 days. There was music and food vendors and people creating works of art with chalk on the sidewalks surrounding the park.  There was everything from portraits of Frida Kahlo to cartoon characters and many other types of drawings in between.  Some people would draw freehand and some made grids on the cement and then drew from a smaller picture they brought with them.  A good time was had by all, and it was a very enjoyable experience.

And I have so many photographs, probably too many to include on this post, so I will try to narrow it down to a nice and manageable selection. In any case, it is getting late, so I need to finish up. We had a tremendous thunderstorm here tonight, lasting several hours, with the internet being very spotty the entire time, so I have been writing this as a Word document, which I will copy and paste onto my WordPress site.  Then I will add my photos, and thereafter say Good Night to You All…..

At the Japanese Garden. Reminds me of a Monet painting…

Alcatraz prison

Golden Gate Bridge

At the Japanese Garden. Reminds me of a Monet painting…

Nice tribute, but not quite sure why it said “Spleen”

The Recycled Insect

fountain in the center of the park – just like we have in Mexico!

A wonderful idea – handwashing stations outside the Port-a-Potties. Just having to use the portable bathrooms leaves your hands disgustingly dirty and full of germs. It should be required to provide something with which to wash up afterwards…

Nice tribute, but not quite sure why it said “Spleen”

I promise I will write a post about my time in California, but next week is Mexican Independence Day, starting the night of September 15th, so I will write a short post about returning to Cofradía, then tackle Sacramento and San Francisco before the holiday begins.

On September 5th, I boarded an AeroMexico flight from Sacramento Airport at 11:15pm and arrived in Guadalajara at 5:15am on the 6th. One bus ride and two taxi rides later, I was back in Cofradía de Suchitlan before 10am.

It was nice to be back, and there were things I had forgotten while I was gone that jumped back into my consciousness – the roosters crowing and the local bus blowing its horn before arriving at each bus stop, to let the potential passengers know that it was approaching. However the chicken who was sleeping on top of her babies in the street in front of my house was gone. The chicks must have grown quite a bit in the two months that I was away and they have probably all moved to a spot that was safer and more spacious for all concerned.

Everything was fresh, green and beautiful; previously dry stream beds now have flowing water, and at least one of my bat friends is back. Tons of butterflies are visiting our blooming hibiscus flowers, and it is not quite the end of the rainy season, as evidenced by a tremendous thunderstorm yesterday – but fortunately for me, I was taking care of business in Colima, where it only started to rain around7:30pm. When I got back here around 8pm, there was no electricity anywhere in the village, but it returned in a half hour. Come to find out, they had been without electricity for 4 hours, and had monstrous thunderstorms, also for many hours.

Our volcano of fire continues to be active, with two streams of lava flowing down its sides two days ago. I am including a photo of that, but since it was daylight, it just appears as two white lines on the sides.

Went back to Colima this afternoon to conclude some banking business, and had lunch at Starbuck’s. It would appear that either some of our odd behavior is rubbing off on the people of Mexico, or else companies which have stores in other countries are bringing their marketing to those countries. It isn’t even the first day of Autumn, and Starbuck’s is pushing pumpkin spice!!! I also saw a box labeled “pan de muerte” and bought it, expecting to see bread shaped like a skull, but it was only a soft square bread with two strips of chocolate bread crossing each other across the top of the it. Think I’ll save it for Sunday breakfast to have with my coffee. Yummmmm!

Also during my travels today, I noted more Mexican flags flying than usual. In front of the Soriana shopping center, someone had set up a display with flags, dresses, dolls and necklaces like you see for 4th of July, but red, white and green, instead of red, white and blue. Finally, I remembered Independence Day – beginning the night of the 15th.

Most people in the United States think that May 5th (Cinco de Mayo) is Mexican Independence Day, but it isn’t. Cinco de Mayo is the day the greatly outnumbered Mexicans won a battle against Napoleon’s troops.

On my walk this morning, I mentioned to my neighbor how everyone in the U.S. thinks it is Independence Day, but that it is only celebrated in Puebla, where the battle took place, and she gave me a bit more information, from the view of the Mexican people, and this is what she told me:

Mexico is and was a Catholic country, but Benito Juarez – the hero of this battle – created a separation of church and state. The pope was not happy about this, and created pressure to deter the entire population of Mexico from celebrating, and so it has been localized to Puebla.

I am sure that different people see the events differently, so all my dear readers, you can research and decide for yourselves which stories are most accurate, and I will merely report what I hear and state my sources.

So for now I will say “good night” and update my California adventures over the weekend…..  ¡Hasta luego!

Volcano of Fire with two streams of lava flowing down its side

Come on, Starbuck’s, it’s not even the first day of Autumn!!!

Can’t wait for my Sunday morning coffee and Pan de Muerto..

Love watching my bat friends – and I get much better pictures with my new camera. Thanks, Yvonne Capone!!!

Yellow butterfly on a hibiscus flower. You can see his proboscis reaching inside to drink the nectar. I absolutely LOVE my new camera!! ❤ ❤ ❤

Michael and me

Urn with Mom’s ashes in the niche

Roses and niche cover – Arlington Cemetery columbarium

famous St. Louis arch

Flat land and corn fields

outside Jack Stack BBQ restaurant

The food was definitely worth the one hour wait to get in…

People chilling in a nearby mini-park

Parking garage with interesting architecture

wind farm

wind farm

View of the Rockies from Jason’s Deli

third-spacing in Colorado Springs

When one thinks of a road trip, the usual vision is of male buddies or girlfriends driving down open highways in a convertible, wind blowing through their hair, and having a grand old time. This was a different type of road trip, borne of necessity, a tiring but still interesting experience.

My mother was interred in Arlington National Cemetery, next to my father, on the morning of August 5th. My son was one of the relatives who attended, having flown in from Colorado. Since I will no longer need my car, I sold it to him and we drove it back to Colorado together for our mother/son road trip.  I took lots of pictures, but unfortunately did not keep written notes, thinking that I could look back on my many Facebook posts to recall events, but, alas, Facebook would only go back so far, and not to the beginning of the trip. So – With what I could remember from the dates on my photos and a few other things, I have pieced this trip back together to the best of my sometimes-faulty memory.

My son Michael and I left Maryland early on the morning of August 6th, and throughout the day traveled through Maryland, West Virginia and Kentucky. It was a very long day, and what with construction and lots of traffic in parts, I would only drive when there was a straight road, no exits to worry about, but still had to deal some of the time with heavy traffic.

It was 5pm when Michael saw a sign for a distillery, and decided that we should pay a visit. After going down a long and winding road, we got to the gate, only to find out that it closed at 5pm! While we weren’t going to get real Kentucky bourbon from the source, he decided that we would have to buy it from a store instead – though we would have like to see how it was made.

We spent the night at the Hawthorne Suites in Louisville, Kentucky.  Noticed that the parking lot was full of sparkling clean very old cars. Turns out there had been a car show, and Michael had a very long conversation with one of the owners who had a Hudson, which I had never heard of.

Had dinner at a road house, way too much food for me to eat, so brought a doggie bag back to the room and into the refrigerator.  Breakfast buffet the next morning included biscuits and gravy – just had to turn my head away from that. So sorry, but gravy is not a breakfast food in my world…

On Sunday, the 7th, we drove through Kentucky to Indiana to Illinois and into Independence, Missouri, home of President Harry Truman, as many signs let us know. Saw the St. Louis Arch from a distance, which I was able to get a clear photograph of, thanks to a telephoto lens aspect of my smartphone.  Stayed at the Fairfield Inn which, unfortunately, didn’t have a refrigerator in the room, so my leftovers went to waste.  However, we did have a very nice dinner at the Jack Stack BBQ restaurant.

Somewhere during those two days and nights, I had fried pickles, I DID try mashed potatoes and white gravy (not bad when served later in the day) and some really good barbecue.

The next day, we traveled through the state of Kansas – miles upon miles of flat corn fields and quite a few amazingly large wind farms, which I had no idea existed out there. The sky was overcast in Salina (pronounced Sal-EYE-na), and fortunately we did not run into any tornadoes, though Michael was hoping that he would see one. Reached Denver in the evening, met his girlfriend and her family, had dinner at Wendy’s and then Michael drove home in his car and his girlfriend drove me to his house in my car. I’m purposely not saying anything about  his personal life right now, because I have not seen him post anything on his page.

So Tuesday morning our road trip was over, and it was time to register the car in his name. What followed was two days of grief and errors  and jumping through so many hoops, I felt like I was back in Mexico. We went to motor vehicles, were told that we needed a special form filled out to verify the VIN number. We drove to several places, who either didn’t do it, wanted to charge us for it or only did it at certain hours.  Drove to the Subaru dealer to get that done, drove back to motor vehicles and sat until we were called – around 4pm – only to be told that the dealer had written 0810 for the year of the car instead of 2010, and since no corrections were allowed to be made, a new one needed to be filled out and signed with no errors. So no vehicle transfer took place that day.

The next day, I had breakfast at a local deli, with a beautiful view of the Rocky Mountains. Every time I go out onto the road, the view of the mountains is just incredible, and I can’t think of how people might just get used to the view and not notice it if they live there.

After breakfast, I went to the police station, had the form filled out, Michael came home from work and we finally had the car transferred into his name, then put on the new Colorado license plates!  Yaaaaay!

So now that the road trip and transfer were taken care of, I could be out on my own while Michael was at work, and decided to have coffee at a place called  Third Space Coffee. As a nurse, I found the name amusing, as “third spacing ” to us medical people means fluid shifting from where it’s supposed to be, such as in your blood vessels, to where it shouldn’t be, such as in your abdomen causing ascites.  Anyway, went there, and the sign was up, but the inside of the store wasn’t even built yet – it looked dirty with no furniture or anything inside. So I settled for an Indian buffet at the Indian restaurant a few doors down.

Friday, the 12th, I flew back to Maryland, and thanks to the wonders of electronic media, I saw in time that Delta had rescheduled the first leg of my flight, so that I would still be in the air when my second flight was taking off. Looking at the flight schedules, I was able to book an earlier initial flight and still make it home to the Baltimore-Washington Airport at my originally scheduled time of 6pm.  I did notice at the Denver Airport signs not only directing you to the gates, but also to the tornado shelters, so I guess Tornado Alley extended farther west than I had realized.

So, that’s about it for now. Enjoy the pictures and see you next time!

Until I return to Mexico on September 6th, I will be writing about personal stories as well as general stories about life in the United States. Since my U.S. address is now Maryland, I just have to mention our famous Maryland crabs.

After I arrived, my sister and I had dinner with her son Andy, his wife Nathalie and dinner was two dozen crabs from the local crab house. Two dozen might seem like a lot, but there is actually very little meat in them.

They were cooked with Old Bay seasoning, a very popular spice here, and eaten on spread-out newspapers, since it is very messy. We did not have lobster forks to pull the meat out of the small legs, but we did have wooden mallets to smash the shell of the legs and claws. For the main body, you can just pull the shell apart.

Whenever I travel, I like to attend local Rotary meetings, if possible, both in order to meet new people and to see what kind of projects they are involved in. If I am lucky, there will also be an interesting guest speaker, and luckily all of these things happened yesterday.

I attended a meeting of the Towsontowne Rotary Club, just 5 minutes from where I am now living. They said I was the first guest from an e-club and had me get up and describe what our meetings are like. They also said they are a “hugging club” and after the initial pledge and 4-way test, each member hugged every other member.

The members were friendly and interesting and had a wonderful guest speaker, Steven B. Goldberg, MD – a psychiatrist who started Veterans Health Services, Inc., a 501 (c) 3 non-profit to help veterans with mental health issues. VHS is the provider with no middleman or additional overhead. It is separate from the military, because many servicemen are hesitant to go for help because they are afraid it will negatively affect their military career or other aspects of their life outside of the military.

Staff will have 80 hours of specialized clinical training before they ever see a patient. Care is based on need and staffing levels will be sufficient to prevent the wait times normally seen with the VA.

VHS owns the building in which they will be located and leases out 100,000 square feet of it to help with the cost of providing services. It will also have nice decor and furniture, so that the veterans will not be sitting around in a depressing, poorly maintained space. The project will be starting up in 6 cities.

You can find out more about it at Give5Drive.org  – the name comes from their request that whomever we tell about it is requested to donate 5 dollars to the project. Other links to this project are:

SGoldberg@VeteranHealthServices.org

and

VeteranHealthServices.org

     I was very happy to hear of someone doing something for our veterans and service members in distress, and the fact that he is a psychiatrist means that he truly understands their needs. I encourage all my readers to check out the sites that I have listed and consider donating, spreading the word, or contact people in your area who might be able themselves or know someone who might be able  to start developing a similar program, since I believe this VHS is local to the Maryland/D.C. area.

So that is all for now. Tomorrow morning is my mother’s funeral at Arlington National Cemetery, and then Saturday will be the first day of a 3-day road trip with my son to his home in Colorado Springs…..

Have a nice remainder of your week and an even better weekend….

Eating the famous Maryland crabs with Mary, Nathalie and Andy

Cooked Maryland crab, seasoned with Old Bay seasoning, wooden mallet at the ready…

Exchanging banners at the Towsontowne Rotary Club – Towsontowne Rotary and Rotary E-Club of the Southwest USA.

Towsontowne banner

Well, I am now safely ensconced in my sister’s house in Maryland – my new U.S. address and home in the summertime. I still have a few boxes of stuff in the basement of my old apartment, which I will retrieve before September, but they mainly contain paperwork and photographs.

About half the space of my car was taken up with photograph albums, about 40 years worth of photographs from before the digital age. Now all those photographs would take up small, thin CD’s, but I wonder if in the future, there will be newer forms of communication onto which these CD images must be transferred. We would be hard-pressed now to find a machine that could play an 8-track tape, though I still believe cassette players and phonographs are still available. I can’t wait to see what the next 40 years will bring, though with each new invention, it will be obsolete by the time I master it.

I am now in a nice suburban-type community, with brick houses that have wide front-yard and backyard green, grassy lawns.  I took a walk this morning, both to break in my new hiking boots and to explore the lay of the land. Sure enough, my lack of a sense of direction immediately came into play. I turned right on the main road instead of left, so instead of finding the light-rail station, I was going in the opposite direction. I truly believe that IF the Earth were truly flat, and IF I had been a ship’s captain before the time of Columbus, I would NEVER have found the end of the Earth and my crew would have been safe from that awful fate.

Mind you, I had Google Maps in my hand while I was making this mistake. I finally stopped and asked another pedestrian where the station was after I had been walking about 40 minutes. This man had what seemed to be an Australian accent, said he had only been here a few months, but indicated that the station was “miles” in the other direction.

However, my walk was not a total loss. I came upon a Barnes and Noble store, several banks, a CVS and a Latino market, where, perhaps, I can buy chayotes and purple tomatillos if I am lucky. Maybe I will even be able to practice my Spanish.

And while we do not have a jardín with a fountain, I did come upon a small park with a statue dedicated to Olympians and Paralympians. There is a statue of a boy and girl holding a globe, tables and chairs and small concrete pillars with plaques inscribed with the names of Olympic and Paralympic athletes, mostly for those who earned medals for swimming.

Either later this evening or tomorrow I will go out again, this time making sure I turn left so that I can eventually find the light-rail station. It was about 76 degrees Fahrenheit when I returned at 9am after walking for 90 minutes, and I was dripping with sweat from the humidity, so I’m not sure when I will go out again.  So – please enjoy the pictures and have a good weekend!

I returned to the United States on July 2nd, so I have been back for a little less than 2 weeks. I’ve been very busy trying to pack up my apartment, give away as much as I can, and plow through the piles of paperwork to update my change of address for social security, insurance, etc., etc. Maryland will be my official state of residence as of the end of this month, and once I am back in Cofradía, I will also obtain my residency in Mexico.

People ask if I have experienced culture shock since returning, and honestly the only thing I had to consciously remember was that I could drink the tap water and run my toothbrush under the bathroom faucet to brush my teeth.

The weather is about the same right now as it is in Mexico, so light clothing is fine, and my huaraches are perfect on the paved roads – I don’t have to switch to thick-soled shoes or carefully step from cobblestone to cobblestone to walk in the streets.  There is also a distinct lack of chickens and street dogs, and no children and men riding in the streets on their horses.

One very obvious difference is my accessibility to cash – my bank is 5 minutes away. In Cofradía it is a one hour bus ride to Villa de Alvarez to get to an ATM, along with numerous bank fees and international fees, so I would make the trip only about once per month and take out 7000 pesos, which would last me a month or more.

One pleasant surprise was stepping on a scale when I entered my apartment – I lost 11 pounds when I was away! With the change in diet, exercise and having to walk everywhere, plus the heat causing a decrease in my appetite, I am not surprised. However, since I was losing it slowly, I didn’t realize it until I put on a windbreaker as the rainy season started and noticed it didn’t fit as snugly as it had when I first arrived in January.

I am determined to stay healthy and fit, so I am making a conscious effort to eat as I did in Mexico. Once you have lived in both places, it is easier to see why other people gain weight once they are here in the U.S. I can stop in any one of hundreds of gas stations, coffee shops, diners, etc. to grab a coffee, a roll, a danish or doughnut loaded with sugar and calories. You can drive everywhere here, though in some places that is a necessity due to lack of sufficient local public transportation. As a result, you are eating more calorie-laden, unhealthy food and not burning off those calories through exercise.

In Cofradía, there is an abundance of fresh fruits and vegetables, and you can walk everywhere. Yes, the small tiendas do have things like individual servings of ice cream or packages of cookies, and you can get bread, or sweet bread (pan dulce, conchas, etc.) from the tiendas or panadería, but not in the overwhelming quantities you have here. The good weather also lends itself to increased exercise. While it can be brutally hot during the afternoons, it is cool early in the morning and late in the evening. I was walking 6 km (3.6 miles) 5 or 6 mornings a week with my neighbor Lourdes and going to exercise class at the albergue 4 evenings per week.

I am trying to keep my diet as Mexican as possible, and am lucky that here in the Goshen/Warwick area I am able to find familiar fruits and veggies. I bought chayote at Price Chopper in Warwick, and found some good yellow Mexican mangoes at the Indian market in Middletown. So I made a pot of carrots, zucchini (calabacitas), chayote, tomatillos and red tomatoes cooked up in tomato sauce with some baked chicken.  My refrigerator also contains cheese and eggs, and I have oatmeal in my cabinet, so even with less exercise, my intake should be roughly the same as in Mexico, and I will stay away from processed food and things like bread as much as possible.

In between packing, I am catching up with old friends and with family, and happy that most of my things are going to a good home – people that care about them and will take care of them, and many things will be kept in the family.

As for Rotary, thanks to e-clubs, I can still be a Rotarian and still be active, even though there is no physical club where I am in Mexico. A few days after arriving here, I was the guest speaker at my old club, the Monroe-Woodbury Rotary club, and discussed what it is like being in an e-club and all about my volunteering and life in Mexico. My e-club, the Rotary E Club of the Southwest USA, does have a banner, which they sent to me, so I was able to exchange banners.

Through modern technology and social media, I can still stay in touch with everyone in a timely manner. I thought it would be nice for my grandchildren to get a paper letter from Mexico, so I sent two to them and one to a friend, and it took a month to reach them. One former co-worker sent me a letter, and it took 3 months to reach me! So while I mourn the loss of paper letters, this is so much more efficient, and you can still make it as personal as necessary.

I remember my friend Victor having to be away from home for two years, but being able to talk with his family via Skype. I remember him telling me how his toddler son tried to feed him through the screen, so technology can be a wonderful thing to help families stay in each other’s lives.

So on this note, I will close, and probably not write another post again until August, after I have moved. I really must find time to write to my three students whom I am sponsoring and start a post about GROW, the organization of banana growers that provides immense support to our students at Project Amigo. I am so far behind that everyone must think I have forgotten them, so I will apologize profusely once I am caught up.

Meanwhile, enjoy the pictures, and I’ll speak to you again next month…..

Exchanging banners – Sue Ketterer and Patricia Green

I have had a very good two full-day visit here in Tlaquepaque and will be catching a taxi at 4:45 tomorrow morning to go to the airport and catch my flights home. Since I am going to end up in Stewart Airport, it should surprise no one in the Hudson Valley that I will be going via Los Angeles to Philadelphia and then to Newburgh/Stewart. I leave Guadalajara at 7:15am local time and finally arrive at Stewart at 10:30pm local time, or 14 hours total. But that is OK, and I will only be bringing a carry-on and my laptop case, so I don’t have to worry about customs, immigration and passport lines after having to go pick up my checked bag when landing in LA, which will shave off  a lot of time and stress.

My Casa Tlaquepaque hotel is very nice and a short walk to the Centro where the Feria de San Pedro – Feast of Saint Peter – is taking place. The roads are all paved, which is great as I only brought my huaraches and no other shoes, and as citified as this town is, I never expected to hear roosters crowing in the morning, but there it was. I will be including 2 or 3 photos of a hen from Cofradía.

When I first saw this hen near my house, she was sitting in the street next to the curb, and not moving. At first I wondered if she was dead, and then if she was sick, but upon closer inspection, I could see that her feathers were puffed up and tiny chicken feet were underneath her. As I approached closer, she got up and walked to the other side of the road, with four tiny chicks following her. Apparently she sits on them at night when they all go to sleep.

After getting situated in my room, I decided to do some exploring. I still get lost finding my way around this hotel, even though it is rather small, but finding my way to the Feria was quite easy – right turn out the front door, go to the traffic light, make a left and after one block turn right onto the Calle de Independencia.  No mistaking it as there are pilons blocking traffic from going down that street, so you can walk for many blocks and not have to worry about oncoming traffic, except at the crosswalks to the side streets.

On this plaza – for lack of a better word – there are many shops, museums, restaurants of all types, stores selling clothing and artesanal wares, food, sweets and alcohol of many types. There were street musicians and many statues ranging from commemoration of historic events and people to the abstract. Also tables set up all along the street with handmade wares of many types, including beaded jewelry.

I decided to have lunch at one of the fancy restaurants, the Casa Luna. The interior was amazing, with blue walls that reminded me of the blue in Frida Kahlo’s house, the Casa Azul. There was a huge fake tree with enormous glass raindrops hanging from its bare branches, and large glass decorations scattered throughout the room for which any words I can think of would be inadequate.

There was also live music, including a female singer singing in French. It gave me the feeling of being in France rather than here in Mexico. After spinach salad and lasagna with panela, and a piña colada that I probably shouldn’t have had, I had a bit of a buzz on, and made my way down the street to where the musical entertainment would be.

They had quite a variety of musical entertainment, from a quartet, to an orchestra that played classical music to folkloric groups. I attended last night and the night before, but had to cut it short last night before the big band music started. It was something that I had really wanted to hear, but between the heat and the drink, I really needed to lay down in my air conditioned room.

This morning the first thing I did was confirm my reservation for tomorrow and print out my boarding pass.  Quite different from the U.S., where the airlines won’t allow you to print up your boarding pass ahead of time for international flights.

Afterwards I went for a walk and explored another block parallel to Independencia,visited a museum and came back to pack, just to make sure everything would fit in my two bags, and they do, just barely.

So now, I will post pictures, hit publish and try to get some sleep and get up before dawn…  Enjoy!

Mama chicken sitting in the road. If you look carefully, and enlarge the picture, you can see the tiny baby chicken feet under her.

In front of Casa Luna restaurant

statue outside of the Sergio Bustamante gallery

I am now in Tlaquepaque and will be here until the pre-dawn hours of Saturday – two days from now, so I will wait to describe all that is happening here and tell you about my final 24 hours in Cofradía.

Tuesday morning started out with a brisk 7am walk. The weather cooperated as far as no rain, but it was still cloudy. The volcano was visible, but it was still cloudy enough that it was not optimal for taking photographs of it. We went up past the bull ring as far as the Temazcal sweat lodge and then back again. No one fell or was injured, so it was a good outing. At the end of our walk I put my shoes into a plastic bag and donated them to Project Amigo. I’m definitely looking forward to getting a really good pair of hiking boots when I get back to New York -hopefully something with good foot and ankle support, so that if I should fall again, torn-up muscles and tendons and broken bones will be avoided as much as humanly possible.

PS – I never did make it to the sweat lodge this time, but hopefully when I return I will. With the local one, there is a ceremony before going in to prepare you to be in the proper “zone” and the heat is increased slowly, so all should be OK.

So, back to Tuesday. I am no expert on anything, but having lived here for almost 6 months, I have learned a few things. One of the volunteers is staying on for an extra week, and we were talking about things like buying clothing and pottery and cooking on your own. I introduced them to Doña Meche, and afterward suggested they bring along a student or maybe Stephanie since Donña Meche speaks no English and they would need someone to translate exactly what they wanted to buy.

Also, the volunteer who is staying has specific dietary needs, and was asking about restaurants. I suggested that she would be better off cooking for herself, as there are not restaurants or luncheonettes like they have in The States. They are small establishments, many right out of the person’s kitchen in their home, and the food is purely traditional Mexican, so there are no substitutions if you have food sensitivities, except for maybe no bread or no hot sauce.  That is why, when my friends back home asked if I would want to go out with them to a Mexican restaurant – or was I sick of Mexican food – my answer was that 95% of the time, I have been cooking for myself, and the past 2 or 3 months, I have had very little traditional Mexican food.

I spent most of my day doing laundry and packing up my things. Two large suitcases will stay here, and I will only be going home with a carry-on bag and my canvas bag with my laptop. It is amazing how much stuff you accumulate in a place, and living in one room, it really wasn’t that much, but did fill an extra suitcase.

At 6:30pm we all left for a Project Amigo fundraiser at a cervecería called Jardín Trapiche in Colima. It is a very nice micro-brewery. They actually make beer there and there was an oven outside where they made food (the two choices were a hamburger made with meat and a vegetarian burger made with mushrooms).  The only choice of alcohol there was beer, so I had mineral water instead. I used to like beer, but after my son was born, I haven’t been able to tolerate the taste of it. I guess the pregnancy hormones did something to my sense of smell or my taste buds, which makes it a bit difficult in places like Mexico or Cameroon when the beer is safer to drink than the available water.

Anyway, the food was delicious, and a band called Colorado Felix played as part of the benefit. I bought one of their CD’s and had a nice conversation with one of the members, Jaime, yesterday, since we rode together in the Project Amigo van to Guadalajara, a 3-hour trip. They live in Guadalajara and it was a short taxi ride for me from GDL to here in Tlaquepaque.

They named the band after the Colorado River and an “old-time” actress – Jaime’s words, not mine – (I think from the 1950’s) named María Félix, who apparently is very famous here in Mexico. As an aside, I can’t believe I just wrote “old time” regarding something that happened around 1950. I was one year old then, and I also can’t believe that it was 65 years ago. It just seems so recent in my mind… And for any of you younger people laughing at this, some day, if you’re lucky and live a good, long life, you will be in the same position – feeling in your mind that you are the same person you have always been, but when you look in the mirror, it begs to correct you.

Also attending were 4 members of the Rotary E-Club of the Southwest USA, also known as RECSWUSA, and a future member, who I like to refer to as our presumptive nominee in honor of our crazy U.S. election this year. The current members are me, John, Jenna and Sandy. Jenna’s husband Alex will be a member when the membership process is completed. So we basically had a mini-Rotary meeting.

In addition to customers, Rotarians, Project Amigo people and staff, there was a poor dog walking around with one of those plastic shields on his neck. I presume it was to keep him from biting his tail, which looked like it had been shaved and had a wound on it. Whatever happened to the poor thing was memorialized on the chalk board at the restaurant.

So that’s about it for now. Time to go to the Festival of San Pedro which is going on this week. I’ll probably write up about my stay here either tomorrow night or Sunday, as I have to leave this hotel at 4:45am to get to the airport on time for my 7am flight on Saturday.

As always, if you click on my photos, you will see explanations, and if you still have any questions for me, please feel free to comment.

¡Adiós!

Sandy, Pam (a Rotarian), one of the becarias of Project Amigo and me

students, volunteers, Colorado Felix and staff at the Hacienda in Cofradía

Menu for the Cervecería, along with the ticket to the fundraiser

el perro – pobrecito… 😦

students, volunteers and staff

Putting up our sign

Brewing the beer

The band Colorado Felix

John Wittenstein, Jenna Saldaña, Alex Saldaña, Pat Green, Sandy Leathery – hey, could this be considered an official meeting or makeup of the Rotary E-Club of the Southwest USA????

The rainy season has started in this part of Mexico. Lots of rain with periods of sunshine and clouds. The temperatures are somewhat cooler, the air is fresh and the landscape is becoming a beautiful green.

We need to become careful where we step, not only because of puddles, but also because of the wildlife.  In New York, the sidewalks would be full of earthworms after the rains. Here, it is huge brown toads. About a week or so ago, we saw several dead brown toads in the road, one of which was ever more bloated each passing day. I don’t see it anymore, so I am sure it must have exploded at some point…

My foot has healed and in the mornings Lourdes and I have been walking on the paved road – about 6 km per morning (3 km in each direction), and I have again been going to aerobics class in the evenings.  My windbreaker is not quite as snug as it had been when I first arrived here, so I imagine that I have lost some weight. When I go back to New York, I will get myself a good pair of hiking boots with good support for my feet and ankles and hopefully avoid becoming incapacitated again…

The time is fast approaching for me to leave Cofradía. In 2 days, I will catch a ride to Tlaquepaque, and on July 2nd I will be flying home. The 2nd of July will be a long day, with my flight leaving Guadalajara Airport around 7:15am, landing at Stewart Airport in Newburgh at 10:30pm, with stops in Los Angeles and Philadelphia. The price was right, and it was close enough to home that no one minded picking me up, so it was worth it to me to fly all over the country to get there. Also – only a 2-hour turnaround in Los Angeles, so I will have no checked luggage, as I don’t want to take a chance on missing my connection because of the extra time it would take to collect checked bags, go through customs and immigration and security, re-check my bag and get to the departure gate.

Since I have so little time left here, I am trying to make the most of it. Recently I went with a friend to a restaurant in Jalisco that had been owned by Germans. It was also a hotel and had beautiful grounds, very old rooms with loads of antiques, including cabinets and jars for herbal medicines, fascinating sculptures and photos of the famous people from the area.  One thing I also learned while having lunch there – always taste the food and condiments before diving in.

There was a serving dish resembling a small gravy boat that had a green pureed substance in it. I incorrectly assumed it was guacamole and proceeded to pour liberal amounts onto my food. One taste and my mouth and throat were on fire – it was 100% pure, pureed hot chili peppers. I was able to scrape most of it off my meat, but the beans were a lost cause, and I had to have them bring me another plate.

Last night I had dinner with Richard and Magda, and then coffee with Lourdes and her family. One last morning walk tomorrow, one last Spanish/English class this afternoon and one last aerobics class tonight. One last visit with Doña Meche tomorrow.  So many “one last” things to do here, and then two full days at Tlaquepaque before going back to the States.

Nos vemos……

Esperanza hotel and restaurant in Jalisco

First governor of Colima (I think)

Bananas forming on Ted and Susan’s banana tree. Leaves peel back as each bunch begins to grow

View over the railing on Ted’s patio. We are close to the tops of the very tall trees

Two nights ago, a bunch of us went to the final night of the Gastonomia Festival with Ted and Susan. We had a delicious outdoor dinner, multi-course, prepared by the chefs and some great entertainment. Finally got home around 11:30pm, I think.

There were several groups of dancers, including three men doing the Old Man’s Dance (a dance from Michoacan) and at the end of the dance, they took off their masks and we could see that they were not old at all. There was also a mariachi band, and I am amazed at the powerful voices of the singers in these bands each time I hear them.

I could see way past the many tables of diners three men on horses in the street. They were too far away to get a good video, but these were the “dancing horses” which would dance around to the music. You can see a little bit of it in one of the videos as I pan from the musicians to the horses.

Not much else to add right now, so I will let you enjoy the

videos…