Cooking despite the heat

Still too hot here - -our May HEAT has come a month early, thanks no doubt to global warming!!—but our nights remain breezy and cool. Last night we had friends come to dinner and went up on our roof terrace for drinks where we were quite comfortable. By the time we came downstairs to eat, it had cooled off enough to be quite pleasant. Our definition of “pleasant” has changed somewhat over time so that even Eva is comfortable at night when the AC is at 25 (77 F). She complains that it is not cool enough but by morning she is also snuggled under a flannel sheet that we use as a blanket.
For dinner, we served a fish soup as the first course. We had been to the big market a few days ago with a friend who had never been and wanted to serve fish as the main course for a dinner party we went to, so we acted as tour guides. Tom bought 3 beautiful huachinango (red snapper) and we took home the heads and spines. First, we made a fish stock and then created a clean-tasting soup with more fish, lime, ginger, carrots, bean sprouts, lemon grass (picked fresh from our kitchen garden) and cilantro at the end as a garnish. Bern was here to swim as we were concocting this so he chopped and helped, too.
The big market (Mercado) is a bit daunting. This is a new building opened within the last two years that some government official thought would be an improvement over the collection of dilapidated and run-down buildings which previously constituted the public market. It is grey industrial concrete, two stories of shopping with parking below, and finally is being used. For months, the locals boycotted this place since “their” mercado had been destroyed, but finally decided it was better to sell inside it and make a living than not to. Now, the whole area is so crowded with people who assume it is still a local market without traffic, that it is difficult to drive or park. There is a fish area with multiple vendors and a meat area and a poultry area (these last ones are just too much for Sandy whose sense of smell could not tolerate all of this) and many flower vendors and of course, vegetables, tortillas, bread, and eggs. In addition, you can buy pretty much ANY thing you think you might need from one of many small shops – clothing, shoes, cooking utensils, machetes, rope, and more plastic crap of every size than you ever knew existed.
We don’t normally go down there except for fish, since it is SO amazingly fresh – from the sea to the market in minutes and hours. We normally do most of our grocery shopping at Costco (our club) and Mega, which is a big grocery store that actually has co-ownership of Costco. Mega is a new market here, with a snazzy new building again with parking underneath (which is actually really nice when it is hot and sunny outside to be under a building where it’s shady). They have everything you’d expect a store to have in the way of items to buy, but are also a super-WalMart type of place with a smattering of TVs, furniture, towels, and gardening things.
There are things that we just cannot get down here – the locals are not asking for them and they are the main consumers. For example, we cannot find Chex cereals, except occasionally one with honey and sugar. There is no chunky peanut butter. Certain spices are hard to find or not here at all. None of this is earth-shattering or problematic, except that it seems when you cannot find it, you want it all the more. When I go north, I usually return with Costco-sized chunky peanut butter in tow, and it is often still in the pantry by the time my next trip comes along, but at least I know it’s there should I happen to crave some! However, there are so many things that we can get here that are unheard of in the states that we do not feel deprived.
Bern and Aidar, our friends from Seattle, were in our kitchen cooking recently – a wonderful Asian-inspired meal of Thai curry over rice with spring rolls first and a lemon, lime, orange curd over shortbread for dessert. Bern has been on sabbatical this term and is living in a small apartment without much of a kitchen in anticipation of their beautiful home here in Merida being completed. Since both Bern and Aidar are such good cooks and love to cook, they was happy to have a chance to be in a kitchen with windows == and plenty of helping hands!

See the pictures at http://picasaweb.google.com/necshs1/CookingWithbernandaidar

garden on calle 56, april 2007

We love to garden, so it's been tough to accept that everything we knew about gardening from our experience and classes and tutoring in Illinois was no longer useful. Gardening here in Merida is amazingly simple. You buy it, stick it in the ground, give it some water (but not too much because here things grow with water but bloom when dry), and presto a garden emerges before your eyes and before you know it.
The advice we heard most often, and have repeated now that we know it's true, is don't overplant. We thought our little garden was going to be so meager when we first put it in last June, but now not even a year later, we are pruning and chopping and finding uses for that machete. And still it is lush with all manner of flowers and colors.
We have daily visits from hummingbirds, see a huge variety of butterflies in and around the space, and most recently, have taken to prayer to keep the swarms of locusts away -- literally, Biblical swarms of black locusts that cover the sky. We don't know where they are landing but thankfully, it's not in our yard to munch away at things.
And all of this on a shelf of limestone that seems to suck the dirt down some place unless you buy the local tierra (sold off of horse-drawn carts) which is reddish and hard as cement when it dries so it cannot be absorbed (we didn't buy this stuff but brought in dirt created with the help of pig shit so it is black not red). Tropical things seem to grow without dirt and certainly without mulch (does not exist down here, cannot be purchased, and there is no translation to Spanish) and despite hot temperatures, sun beating down, and cloudbursts when they occur.
So here, are some current pictures of flowers that we have in our back yard, the new and improved look of the front of the house, and some amazing things that have happened, like cactus blooming. We are enthralled every day. http://picasaweb.google.com/necshs1/Flowers

If you want to go back to see what the garden looked like before, click here-- http://picasaweb.google.com/necshs1/HouseBefore

June 2005 thru July 2006 in Merida

Here are all the old emails I could find, the mass-mailings called Merida Monthly Report, which sum up the days of our lives down here from June 2005 through July 2006, when we first arrived and lounged around at the beach to buying and building and moving into our home on calle 56. The before and after pictures of this may be found with some of the other older blog entries.


Sent: Friday, June 03, 2005 5:18 PM
Subject: mass emails from Mexico are NOT junk mail!

Hello all --The Merida adventurers are hot (and we mean heat hot because this is the HOTTEST season for temperatures all year) since it's been in the 90s consistently and we have been in town most every day for various errands and enjoying the people down here. Eva is at this moment stretched out on a chaise under a palm tree with a bandana over her eyes, having just emerged from soaking her legs in the pool. We are resting up before we have dinner tonight with Vikki Frank and her business partner at Hacienda Xcanatun, and after we crash their event tonight at some fancy quinta on Paseo Montejo that is for sale, so of course, they expect we can purchase it and have a wonderful spa on the main beautiful street of town.This morning we walked and floated and shelled, showered, ate pitaya with our yogurt (pitaya is a hot pink colored fruit with lime green in the leaves and has a white inside with small black seeds like the seeds in a kiwi), and headed into town in search of WIFI. What we take for granted (the Starbucks on almost every corner which has WIFI access) is definitely NOT part of this world, but we found that a lovely hotel we'd stayed in last March had it, so we hopped over, perched on a chair in the breezy courtyard, ordered a cool drink, and plugged in the computer. AAAhhhhh access!
We took a tour of the newly renovated market which has underground parking (a real plus for those of us who don't much care for hauling bags of groceries on the bus or walking the hot streets) and we saw all manner of fruit, flowers, meats, fish of course, and things (and we mean any thing you could conceive of from jewelry to shoes to household appliances to well, any thing) and even pets. They had some baby parrots with lime green heads and gangly bodies that were pretty cute. Apparently, that is the age to get them so they bond to you but we are not quite ready for a dependent yet!We are gradually finding our way around town and have a pretty good command of the main streets and byways and are gaining ground on the many one-way side streets. This may be helpful since we learned last night that there has been an offer on the beach house we are camping out in and so we may need to move sooner than we'd planned to. This after we just had a cement block pathway put down so that we track in much less sand! The family has gotten all its documents to the notary and he apparently has gotten them to the bank and now we are awaiting our interview with the bank -- they met with us to tell us about fees for the bank trust and decided that they likes us well enough to take our money so now they have to find out more details about who we actually are. That should happen next week. Have talked to the architect and to a second builder and seem to be narrowing in on a plan for remodeling the house we almost own. We decided we do need to blow out the ceilings from 11 to about 18 feet in height. This is of course, expensive, but it will keep it so much cooler and be so much nicer. Means all of you heading to the guest rooms on the second floor will have quite a climb however!!!

Sent: Saturday, June 11, 2005 3:23 PM Subject: too darn hot


We have been sending some of our weather north so that those of you in Chicago could really understand what it is like to be in Merida during the summer. Marilla had a point when she said she would not consider visiting us here in the summer having spent a long, hot summer in Costa Rica a few years back. We have been busy this week. Left last Saturday for parts further south and east -- Mahahual and Baccalar -- since they are being talked about quite a bit for investment property. Mahahual is on the Carribbean and I do mean right on it -- the street, such as it is, is about 10 feet from the water at mid-day -- and of course, the reef that goes from Cozumel south is just off the coast 300 yards or so. It is barely north of Belize, biggest city in the area is Chetumal. This means that the water is shallow and clear and it is an easy walk to the reef! Baccalar is a fishing town right on a huge lagoon of fresh water that many fishermen from Texas have long enjoyed visiting. Both are primitive as far as resorts or even homes since the electric grid has only recently made it that far, but lots right on the beach are selling for around $100,000 for a 60 ‘(20 meters) piece of frontage and about 120 feet (40 meters) in depth. We wound our way through the mid-section of the Yucatan going down there (about 4-5 hours of driving and once was pretty much enough) and came back through Valladolid -- had a tough time getting Eva to leave there since we found a rather nice hotel with air conditioning and she hunkered down-- and Izamal (known as the yellow city since the huge monastery and church and much of the rest of the town in painted ochre). Once back, we checked our email to find that the bank was ready for our interview (which means all the paper documentation is in order but we are still about 3 weeks away from ownership). We are dealing with HSBC one of the biggest banks in the world and this was like going back to the dark ages. They needed payment from us to go to their attorney in Mexico City that would then go to pay the government for allowing us to open a trust to own property here of about $1300. This is more than I can get in one day from my cash station, so I called my bank in Glenview (the Northern Trust what else?) to have the funds wire transferred. The two bankers there who know me were both out of the bank and the woman I did speak with said she needed a signature so please fax her something with instructions. I wrote this out for the HSBC bank officer who said they could not fax to the US. I offered to open a new checking account in Merida but apparently I can not do this without additional immigration documents. I then offered to go online and open an HSBC account in the states and just get the money from one HSBC account to another, but Mexico is not yet connected to the worldwide HSBC network. So I was stumped -- smart Eva thought of calling my dad to ask him to get it done and that worked. We also found a small furnished apartment to rent downtown and will continue to use the beach house until the end of July (our friends sold it and that is the closing date). We are imagining that our house will be done around the end of this year, perhaps sooner, since we are hearing 4 months to do the work and expect that really means six! We had one architect whom we like very much but now have spoken with two others whose ideas are fabulous, so will probably switch if it does not slow us down at all. We have continued to meet some nice people both locals and Americans who live down here and are amazed at how many of us there are in the area. This morning we had the beach to ourselves and just floated on our rafts tethered to a concrete block so we did not float too far and it was just heavenly. Miss you all and think of and talk about you often.

6/20/05

Guess what comes after all this heat?? The rainy season!!!! We have had some rain almost every day but lots of rain yesterday. As you can imagine, this causes some problems as it would any place -- like flooding in the streets since it has been dry for months and the ground cannot absorb all this water that quickly AND hatching of mosquitoes who are pretty much rampant -- but as my mother pointed out, what did we expect when we moved almost to the Equator. The sky gets black and it rains, usually only for about 15 minutes, and then the skies are blue again as if it had never happened. Our friends with the beach house had never gotten a water bill in the time they have owned the property, so it was finally turned off after over a year of nonpayment -- and nonbilling I might add. Apparently, here people are expected to be proactive about paying their utilities BEFORE they are billed for them. We paid the bill (and the electric bill while we were at it) but it takes several days for the cistern to fill up to be able to get water into the house, so we moved to a hotel for the past several days and will begin today moving our things to our downtown apartment which will be our new base of operations. Since the apartment has AC we are not concerned about the heat and since it is on the second floor we are not concerned about the flooding!!Eva has become one of the natives now -- last week she found a shirt she liked at a market and was asking the price, but felt it was too much, so said no, and kept negotiating until the price had dropped by about one-third, but then the seller asked her where she was from. When Eva said Merida, the lady dropped the price even further!! She was thinking Eva was American and was not willing to lower the price for an American. We find the same is true with real estate or many other purchases -- when the people see me, the price goes UP.Nothing new about the house purchase to report -- manana!! Had a wonderful dinner on Saturday night with some new friends-- six of us were sitting upstairs on a terrace under the stars enjoying a wonderful meal and there was a jazz combo playing below and the breezes were blowing to keep us refreshed. AAAHHH. So it all balances out.


Sent: Wednesday, July 06, 2005 5:53 PM
Subject: still too darn hot

Hello all --Despite our 100 degree temperatures on a quite regular basis, I have to admit that I am adjusting to it -- of course there is sweat pouring from me at almost all times, but I am not laid low by the HEAT. Cannot say the same for Eva who cannot wait to retreat back to her AC -- which thankfully has worked and kept us cool, as has our wonderful car which has performed so beautifully in some very tough situations.Bern and Aidar are here this week visiting from Seattle. We picked them up in Cancun (only a 2.5 hour drive after all), stopped in Valladolid and Izamal along the way, and got back to Merida on Saturday in time to have a cocktail party for them to introduce them to 20 or so folks we met here. We had heard about Mexicans and how once they are at your house, they don´t leave, and thought it was a joke, but apparently, these Americans and Mexicans whom we´d invited to our party took it seriously. We had the party at the Villa and didn´t get home until 3am having had a wonderful time. Since then, we have been to Uxmal (pyramids -- fabulous), the market, Paseo Montejo, and other local sights here, and dragged them to see lots of houses we are considering. Still have not found THE ONE, but have found one we may move to in the not too distant future if all goes well. Of course, there was a problem with the paperwork and measurements, but we are told that it should be solved fairly quickly, so we remain optimistic. Once we have it, will send all relevant details and even photos. Will head back to Cancun for the weekend and send off Bern and Aidar, then to the beach here to help out some American friends of our friends who bought a house by checking on some repair work they had done. They also kindly offered us the use of their beach house should we want it, so that was wonderful. Will help them out too to have people there since unoccupied homes can sometimes be the target of squatters-- and they are VERY hard to remove once they have moved in apparently. Just like we found out about the beautiful haciendas which look so appealing to buy down here. There is something called patrimonio which basically means that if people lived on the land or used the water rights or grazed animals there, they are ALWAYS entitled to do so, even if you now own the land. Land outside of the cities is considered to belong to the people.Went to hear the Yucatan symphony for its final performance of the season and it made us homesick for Ravinia evenings and the Chicago Symphony, but it was not too bad. Every woman had a fan with her to keep cool during the performance-- which sounds like some of the performances at Ravinia now that I think of it. The concert hall is quite beautiful with balconies all around and a gorgeous round fresco painted on the ceiling.We have tried a new fruit -- guanabana. It is green and about the size of a huge avocado with sorta spiky things outside. The fruit inside is sweet and tangy but tastes a bit like it is packaged in cotton balls or underwear. We also found a wonderful ice cream place where they have sorbets of fresh mango, fresh coconut, or other wonderful flavors and fruits. And we are loving the cocina economicas -- basically, cheap eats but often these are in the front several rooms of people´s homes and the mama cooks. It has offered us a great opportunity to sample lots of cooking styles and dishes very cheaply. The meals tend to cost about 25 pesos (around $2) and include rice, beans, salad, sometimes soup, and a main hot meal like baked chicken or pork chops or fish or meatballs. Usually only open in the afternoons, we find we are eating the Yucatecan way and having a big meal at lunch and then something very light at night, if at all. Breakfast is not a big deal here either. Tends to be yogurt and fruit and maybe some kind of pastry (pan dulce) or bread, which is just fine by us.

7/16/2005
hot, heck, what about a hurricane!!

We are hunkering down for yet another new experience here in Merida -- hurricane Emily, and no this is not my long-time friend Emily, but a storm heading supposedly right for us. The reports say it is due to hit tomorrow night, but today is as fine a day as one could hope for. Sunny, not too hot so far, and a nice breeze. Since we are on the second floor, we assume all will be well, but they cautioned us that it is not unusual to lose electricity so Eva would be without AC (and we all know what happens then...). So wish us well, please. We went to Ticul for the day on Thursday. This is only about an hour SE from Merida by car and is the home to many of the clay pots and clay chachkis that abound. You can order a pot made of any size and color. Friends of ours had a specific need for tall thin pots for a balcony and found exactly what they needed -- and at about 1/10 of what Chalet would charge! By way of thanks for our driving, our friends bought us a wrought iron swing with two painted frogs sitting on it, each about a foot tall. To keep it from getting broken, we put it inside the apartment where I knocked into it on a late night visit to the bathroom and now the lady frogs have no feet, but still have the flowers in their hair! We have almost great news about our housing situation, hate to mention it for fear of jinxing the deals, but we are about to own not one but two houses. We decided about a month ago not to buy the original house (and that was a good decision despite all the time we had invested) and have been looking. Found one which we thought would work, but was not ideal mainly since it didn't have a large yard, and have been pursuing it, but of course, the measurements were not correct so now we are just waiting for one signature from one neighbor and then we can get the trust going. We will put minimal work into this house (bathrooms and electrical and paint perhaps) and hope to sell it at a huge markup to some silly American who doesn't know any better. Then down the block from this, we found an absolutely perfect and wonderful house. It is in pretty good condition (here they say it has good bones meaning that the ceilings are high, the walls are not crumbling, and the room sizes are fine) but of course needs work (things like bathrooms and new electical service to start) and has a huge back yard AND 16' ceiings. The house was built around 1900-1910 (although the contractors here will tell you that construction really has not changed much from the 1500s to about 20 years ago when they started using cement block instead of rocks to build the walls). There is a 40' avocado tree right off the back of the house and a 30' mamey tree in the back corner (mamey pronounced mahmay, is a beautiful fruit, deep orangey with a pit, and the size of an avocado on steroids, however, it tastes quite a bit like papaya, so you either like it or hate it). For this house, the owners are three sisters however one runs the show and she claims all the paperwork is in order, so we will see what the attorney has to say once he gets a chance to look at it. When I say bathrooms and electric always need work, perhaps I should explain that it is not unusual here in the older homes to have 3-4-5 bedrooms and one bathroom for the house. It is also normal here to have the electrical wires attached to the outside of the walls, stapled down and painted to match the color of the room, but visible. A few other things that we gringos are used to like water softeners and some water pressure are not part of the deal and must be added. Some of us even require hot water!! Here in Merida, hot water is more a function of the time of day than anything else. There is a water tank (tinaco) usually located on top of the house where the water is stored after having been pumped from the city water or a well. Early morning the water is coolish but by late afternoon, no one would need a hot water heater to take a shower or bath since the sun heats it so well. And another interesting fact while I am on the subject of water - when people fill their swimming pools (which some do twice a week since they normally don't heat the pools or treat them with chemicals) they do so from a deep water source and the water comes in so clear and clean that it is amazing. They use the water from the pool then to water plants or lawns-- especially true at the haciendas. So, keep a good thought for us that these houses will soon be ours and work can begin and we can actually settle down in OUR OWN home in the not too distant future. And then, we can welcome guests!! Miss everyone but not everything about home.

7/22/05
we are hurricane-free!!

If you've been watching CNN (as we now can but were unable to last week) you know that Hurricane Emily missed us -- by only about 30 miles, but it was enough to leave us all ready for a big blow and thrilled not to have had to live through one. The traffic lights are now almost all back in place, the tape on the windows is pretty much all gone, and things are back to normal here, but because of past experience with hurricanes EVERYONE took Monday off since we were expected to be in the eye of the storm. Phew!!! We had gone over last Friday to help friends of ours from Canada and Australia who have a boutique hotel (where we were among the first guests last March) tie up their antique glass and wrought iron lamps and move some furniture around out of harms' way, but once we got the all clear, they invited us back for dinner with an interesting couple, both doctors who were originally from Rome but have been living in Boston for 15 years. We felt quite cosmopolitan! And tonight we picked up some loose-fitting but bright colored shifts we'd had made down here that we expect to wear constantly (they are cheery and fun prints and light weight) -- for 75 pesos apiece or about $7. Tomorrow we meet with our attorney to get the contracts to buy the two houses all ready. He has told us that we need one signature about the measurements for the smaller property which should be ready on Saturday and 5 signatures from all the 5 sellers for the larger property and then we are all set for both properties. What a relief and so much easier and quicker than before. Think we will start on the smaller one and get it ready and move into it hopefully by November, and then figure out the larger one since we have more at stake in a place we really intend to live and so need some time to get the design right. We went with some friends yesterday to the house of a man who is selling off his family furniture and art and objects, especially religious objets d'art, and is even selling the house. He had some interesting things and we bought a set of 6 coffee cups with coffee pot, creamer, and sugar that are clay pottery but also carved and painted and about 50 years old for $20. We also bought something which every house down here has -- a portrait of the virgin of Guadalupe. This one is quite lovely, done in oil and old and the other seemed to be just thrown in to make a set but upon closer examination is quite a wonderful head shot of a madonna and child. Also bought a dressing table which has been cleaned up and now houses our computer that FINALLY has its very own internet connection. We signed up for cable TV and internet service on Tuesday (mainly because we had felt so out of it with all the hurricane stuff and no easy access to CNN or up to the minute information) and waited all day on Wednesday and most of Thursday for them to come and install it. And once they came, you have to picture one man standing on a wall at the front of this 2-story building and one up on the roof hauling up the cable from an electric pole on the street while it is absolutely pouring rain and lightning. Then they didn't understand how to work with a Mac since they are used to windows so we had to pay for a computer guru to come and help them install the modem for the internet. It took him 40 minutes to get here and he spent about 30 minutes here and he charged us 100 pesos or about $10. Gotta love this country! So now we should be able to answer email more quickly and know what is going on in the world, although with yet another bomb scare in Britain today, I think perhaps ignorance IS bliss. Thanks for the emails, keep em coming and all the concern for us in what turned out to be no big deal -- Eva didn't lose power and kept the AC on for those of you who were worried about her comfort!


7/22/05
merida weekly report

No hurricanes or exciting travel or new fruit this week, but we are down to only pursuing one house (stop cheering Mom). We have had quite a bit of back-and-forth with the agent of the owners of the large house and things got all screwed up. First, the deal was set, a price agreed on, and a process accepted. They would deliver documents to our attorney and once he reviewed everything and said it was OK, we'd sign a contract to buy the house and give them 10%. After we'd gotten the OK from our attorney, they asked us to pay their inheritance taxes. We said no. A day later they said fine, they'd pay their own taxes. (By they way, this is a huge amount for taxes here in Mexico, about $4000 US.) Then two days later, when we had the appointment to sign the papers, they said they changed their mind and would not pay the taxes and we'd need to pay them in order to buy the house. We again said no. A day later, they said OK they pay the taxes but we could not use wire transfer because they just wanted cash and wanted no deposits to show up in their accounts since the IRS of Mexico would then be able to trace the transaction. We imagined ourselves on an airplane carrying valises filled with cash (since without an address or actually without an electric bill, we cannot get a checking account here) and realized that they would keep throwing up roadblocks to this transaction and it was not all THAT wonderful a house even with a 40' avocado tree to put up with all this stuff. So we said we would not buy the house after all. Now, we are down to one house and just as we were hoping all of that would go smoothly, our banker let us know that he'd be out of the bank for the last two weeks of August (which is just when we were hoping to close on this last house) and so, it is never easy.
We did swim at a friend's house this week, in a lovely round pool, and saw our first pigmy banana tree in bloom. This was a twig about 18" tall six months ago and now is a tree about 6' tall and had the most amazing blossom on it -- think of Audrey in Little Shop of Horrors and you have some idea. We were back a day later and several of the maroon and green leaves of the foot-long blossom had opened to reveal stacks of 3" long bananas each with a small white flower growing at its end. Once this stalk blossoms once, it will never again flower, so you cut it off, and crack the stem at the base, so that a new stalk will emerge for flowering next year.
Our other activity this past week has been waiting for the cable guy -- no shit! We ordered cable and internet a week ago. Spent two days waiting for the installation (we'll be there sometime between 8am and 8pm on Tuesday or Wednesday, lady) and once they came and wired, we had not gotten our HBO or CNN in English, so started calling them again as of last Thursday. Here it is now a week later and we are still waiting for our HBO! We have high hopes that today someone will come since now they have actually started to apologize for their bad service. We take this as a good sign that this week of waiting has significantly exceeded their normal levels of pretty-bad service.
Got so tired of waiting that yesterday we broke out and went to the Gulf beaches. It was indeed significantly more crowded than we were used to, but what we noticed most was that the water was actually too warm to feel good until it was deep enough to be over your head (too hot even for Miss Betty).
We also wanted to have some fish. We'd had whole fish here before, but found a place when our friends from Seattle were here, so we headed to Chicxulub (pronounced chick shoe lube) to have pesco frito. They take a whole boquinette and cook it quickly so it is crispy outside and so delicate inside. This fish has bones in the center but few bones, if any, in the meat so it is great eating. And since it is whole, you can eat whatever part of the fish you'd like -- tail, head, cheeks, eyeballs-- or just the filet parts. This week, we went to a Spanish restaurant and had another new delicacy called leche frito (literally fried milk). I have no idea how they get this to be this consistency, but it is like a custard with a skin and looks like a fat pancake. Tastes rich and creamy and is served warm with some cinnamon on it.


8/14/2005
house countdown

Well, the good news is that the bank "found" our money which they'd had since June and we are proceeding along the path to buying the house once again. The banker (and get this, no one takes your place while you are on vacation) will be away from the office for two weeks beginning on Monday so nothing will happen until the end of this month or early next. This works out for the sellers who wanted to clean out their house and have time to pack and it's OK for us, too. However, in the interest of not just sitting on our hands here and waiting, Eva decided to head to Texas to see her newest niece (Monica Eva and the Eva part is not just coincidence) who lives with her two-year old niece whose nickname is Jaxsie and who reminds everyone of Eva and of course, their parents, Eva's brother and sister-in-law.
Her absence has given me the opportunity to do some things I've been meaning to do but had not gotten around to like seeing the Anthropoligical History Museum here. Not as snazzy as the one in Mexico City, but a gorgeous building on Paseo Montejo with a two-toothed guide who had lots of interesting stories to tell. We learned what we think is the obvious secret of what happened to the Mayans who had left their fabulous cities and temples long before the Spaniards came to conquer. The Mayan rulers were increasingly born with things like harelips, crossed eyes, Down's syndrome, and heart defects. In order to continue to appear royal, the rulers made these things seem like good attributes, and the populace apparently accepted this. However, the rulers could only marry relatives of the other Mayan rulers who often were cousins or even closer relatives and we assume that so much inbreeding has to take its toll and you have to get beyond the smaller issues to the really big problems that would topple even a god-like ruler! The historians still seem to think it's a big mystery however.
We have started house remodeling plans and have a floor plan that we think will work pretty well without too much knocking down or building up. It will allow for a nice long lap pool and that is really what we are looking forward to having. We miss the beach and being in the water every day and although we've been swimming at the pools of friends, most of them are more like dunking pools than exercising pools.
We had the car washed. Now this may sound like no big deal, but the three times we have done so, we have found that it is a BIG deal. It takes about 90 minutes first of all and involves 3 or more people. Now some may call this full employment, but as many things are, this is done pretty much backwards so that even if one person had dried one part of our car, because another is using the hose on another car next door to us, it means that our guy has to completely dry our car all over again. And I won't even go into the vacuuming process -- it's a little like picking the individual grains of sand off the carpet one at a time!!


8/26/05
YAY!! We finally got our permission from Mexico City to purchase the house -- this is needed since we are purchasing in an historic district and are not Mexicans. This means the bank trust is all but done -- just a few more legal documents (of what type we don't know) are required, but we are definitely getting closer to finalizing this house purchase!! And best of all, the exchange rate has gone up just a little bit lately, too!! The notary says we could do this as early as this Wednesday depending on the wire transfer process -- an international wire transfer can take four days to show up in the other person's bank account and just as we don't want to transfer the funds without signing the papers, the sellers don't want to sign the papers without having the money in hand.
Went to a large cocktail party last night and met lots of new people. We have heard estimates that there are about 85,000 - 100,000 expatriates living here in Merida and we've barely scratched the surface. We met the head and manager of the Merida English Library which has been a wonderful resource for us -- we had Amazon send several books here but then caught a look at the cost of shipping and won't do that again -- and it's nice to know the people who started and have kept this library running and growing for over 10 years now. And met a man who says he is not a pianist but plays a mean "living room piano" and is having a Yamaha shipped in so he can have monthly salons/concerts in the home he is renovating. Met a woman who has been here 5 or so years from Vancouver BC and who is doing guided tours to all the typical spots and some not so typical -- like to a sweat lodge with a shaman who puts mud on you and chants and heals you.
I've been researching the Mayan calendar, the count of which ends in 2012 (after going back 5000+years and is based on astrological events that only occur every 5125 years) which means that the world will "end" on Dec. 21, 2012. We assume this is not an actual end but perhaps an end to the ways some things have been done (no more Bushes in the White House!! for example), but it is obviously a big deal in this part of the world.
And am now hooked (thanks to Marilla) on sudoku, a number puzzle that is in the Chicago Sun Times every day. Got some books with more puzzles -- it's Tetris all over again.
We look forward to getting to the Chicago area this month and are just debating whether to wait here to experience our first anniversary of the revolution which occurs on the 16th of September (Eva's birthday, too) or avoiding it altogether. The party apparently goes on for much of the month and we already have seen signs of it -- flags in the stores, lighted Viva Mexico signs on every street, and little chachkis in red, green, and white at all the vendors-- so we may have had our fill long before the 16th. We understand the "ceremony" involves thousands of people thronging in the plaza principal waiting for the Governor to come out on the balcony and say "viva Mexico" to which everyone responds "viva Mexico". Takes less than a minute and we imagine that participating once will be enough for us.


10/15/2005
balmy in Merida

Hello friends,
As you know, I am back in Merida and Eva remains in the cool north, but the joke is on her since it is quite pleasant here now -- 80s by day and 70s at night, and it will only get better so that the nights cool off even more. She lived through the brunt of the HOT and believe me, it was difficult, but fall is fall everywhere I guess.
Our friends here have taken pity on me and are including me in lots of things, so have been to two art openings, two benefits, and some meals out. I bought a painting at one of the openings, but won't actually get to hang it until December when the exhibit is over.
In between my social life (hahaha), I am watching the house construction. We have been stalled for a week due to bureaucratic interference but will start on Monday with a crew hard at work again. And they do work hard-- 9-10 hour days with little stopping except for a lunch/siesta in the middle of the afternoon when it is the hottest. I like my nap as well as the next person so I surely think this is a good schedule! The walls here are 16-20 inches thick and constructed not of wood or metal as ours in the states would be, but of rock and concrete, so tearing them down requires more effort and planning. There is lots of what is called escombro (some of which is resellable as fill like the rocks and some of which is garbage like the used rebar or hunks of concrete). Large trucks come by and pick it up during specified hours only. To pick it up, someone has scooped it into bags, carried it from the house to the truck on their back, and hoisted it up to the truck where someone else hoists it to a free space on the truck and goes through it to find rock and non-rock. The workers at the house put it into bags, but the escombro dealer lugs it out and takes it away at a cost of about $60-80 per 6 ton truckload!!!
Ate last week at a beautiful restaurant which was a home that has been restored for commercial use but kept some nice gardens at the back. It is Mediterranean food, which seems to be the craze everywhere, so had lamb cooked with apples and couscous. Hardly seemed like Mexico except for the margarita accompaniment.
We had a big rain yesterday mid-day and I got to see the Yucatecan ingenuity at its best. When there is lots of rain suddenly and there has not been any for awhile, things are dry and the water does not absorb as well as it might. Also, it runs down the side of the roads as it does everywhere, but here the sewers hardly contain it so it pools. Some Yucatecans love to splash in these puddles at the side of the roads as they drive by or are forced to drive through the puddles because of traffic, so I noticed one wily shopkeeper had found a way to keep people from driving through the puddle in front of her store and splashing the water into her establishment. She took two plastic chairs and put them in the road in front of her store so cars could not pass close enough to the puddle to splash her. When the water had dried, she took in the chairs.
I should say a word about the drivers here in the Yucatan. Most places in Mexico have driver education and require people to know how to drive before the cities give them licenses. Not so here. If you can afford a car, and more and more can, then you can get a license. So, the drivers here are pretty bad AND rather aggressive. A bad combination! We Americans drive VERY defensively and try to avoid the others driving wherever, however, and whenever they want.

10/23/05
Wilma Wanes

Wilma has left our peninsula and is heading for Florida and then maybe for the east coast with Alpha to drop some snow on places that didn't think they'd be seeing any so early in the year. However, in Merida, we had some rain showers, lots of overcast skies, an unusual amount of wind, but really no big deal. We had worse summer storms than this. And for that, I am most thankful. The hint of a hurricane however, does close down most things, so although I found WalMart open yesterday, it was among the few stores or places of business that has been open since Friday. The storm eye was hundreds of miles east of us in Cancun, where much of the hotel construction is designed to withstand hurricanes. Flooding is a problem because there are not storm drains or sewers. From what we've seen on Merida TV, an area south of Cancun called Playa del Carmen looks pretty much flattened.
This has been a quiet week. I began my Spanish lessons—I’ve depended on Eva's perfect Spanish and now must learn it myself. Have a tutor named Susi (hardly sound Yucatecan but she is) who plays games with me and I feel I am about three years old again, but it is helping. I am beginning to feel more confident in my pigeon Spanish and as my vocabulary grows, I am hoping my high school French will help instead of hinder my learning. In any event, I should be able to ask for things more clearly. Last week when I needed a new phone card, I went to a small store to get it and managed to make myself clear even though I asked for a ‘carte’ instead of a ‘tarjete’. Thanks to my imperfect Spanish, however, the salesgirl input the phone card information for me, thinking I'd never figure it out myself!
I purchased two new things this week for the house-to-be. One is a 3 foot plank of wood carved with the Virgin of Guadalupe or Virgin Mary or some saintly female, virgin or not. The other is a large limestone sink basin called a pila. This particular one is from the 17th century and it's very unusual to have something so large and not repaired or broken. It will take 4-5 men to lift it to move it to my house. I am considering using it as a kitchen sink, however, it is just not quite deep enough so it will probably be full of water plants somewhere in the yard.
Had dinner and our second meeting of a small group of us who are trying to create an eating club or possibly a restaurant down here. None of the three of us is planning to cook (there is a lovely woman from Canada who would do the honors) but we want to structure it so that we could get a table whenever any of us wanted it. Thus, one order of business was to vote that as the reward for being founding members.
Thanks to all of you who called and emailed with concern about Wilma, but once again the hurricane decided to go elsewhere. It is cool enough today that I put on a polo shirt (instead of my usual Old Navy wife-beater Tshirts) so fall is in the air.

Nov. 1, 2005

Another fun-filled week here in Merida of shopping and partying and learning more Spanish and such. The weather continues to be wonderful, much cooler than the summer, but not exactly what we think of as fall around Chicago -- highs in the 80s by day and low 70s at night. Still no need for air conditioning which must mean by blood is thinner, even if the rest of me is not!!
Starting yesterday is not Halloween here, but days of the dead. This is I am finding a wonderful custom during which members of one's family who have died are remembered. Houses set up altars (and the crosses that they use are now representing the Catholic faith whereas they formerly were symbols of the cieba tree, but using the same shape) with "inviting" cloths on the tables under the altars, usually white with embroidery, and then set out foods and drinks that the relatives would like (including always chocolate!!), and use incense and candles and the smell of food to "attract" the spirits back to celebrate with them. The food here is called a pib (peeb) which is really a giant tamal made with layers of corn and chicken, wrapped in banana leaves, soaked with bitter oranges, and cooked in an oven (one of the typical Yucatecan dishes is called pibil and this is a similar dish only baked under the ground in a pit whereas pib is cooked in an oven). Some pibs have beans also, but not our typical black beans, instead the beans from a large green bean that I don't know the name of. There is also a special bread made that is round, and has decorations on it with a sugar coating (gringos call it dead bread). The first day is for children, the second day is for adults, and the third day is for everyone who has died. There is a service on this third day at the cathedral and many churches. There tend to be more colors and sweet desserts used for the children. The pibs are cooked because since the banana leaves are tied around the pibs with a string, it offers the dead a way to "carry" their meal home. Last night a friend here had a party with pibs and altars and fruit salads (cut pieces of grapefruit, orange, and jicima with chile sprinkled on it for 'dressing') and helped all of us gringos understand the ceremony and purpose. The American consul for the peninsula was at the party and talked about Cancun and what a disaster zone it is. No trees anywhere, she said, and a new Marriott hotel called Aqua was almost completely destroyed since it was all glass.
Merida is hitting the mainstream this week for something besides a hurricane -- a TV crew is here shooting several different houses (not mine) for HGTV. This is exciting but many of us are wondering about the selection of the homes, since one in particular is a complete dump. Will be really tough to redeem that particular one!! Someone please look for the show and tape it whenever it's on.
As for new purchases, this week I found some lovely bronze sconces with crystals for the guest powder room and an armoire for one of the guest rooms. They were to be delivered this morning about an hour ago, but still have not seen the whites of the delivery truck drivers' eyes, so will wait just a bit longer and then head off for a haircut ($7) and pedicure ($5).
Am watching Rome here (both on our local cable station with subtitles and with friends who have US TV via satellite) and cannot believe HBO will make us wait until 2007 for the next season!!
Also, I made it into the society pages of the newspaper, the Diario de Yucatan, which is a pretty respectable newspaper!! Was visiting the bazaar that Roberto Guzman has twice a year (he is the one who sold me the pila above) with a friend, the newspaper photographer was there, and he asked to snap our pictures, and then actually ran the pictures. Since George and I had just been shopping at Costco and Mega, we were not really ready for a photo-op, but oh well.

December 5, 2005

Eva and I are back from an idyllic week in Cancun. It was bittersweet since, although the sun and surf are unchanged, the sand and most everything else were very badly affected by Wilma who stayed on the Cancun coast for almost 3 days. Our resort/timeshare was up and running very quickly with only landscaping and some glass to be repaired and replaced. Outside of our 5 resorts, however, only two hotels have opened up again. Some hope to reopen by Dec. 15, but most are shooting for the spring break crowd in March. The lush greenery and flowers are pretty decimated. No leaves on trees and many trees teetering at a significant slant. Most palms were topped. But this being a jungle, it will regenerate quickly and be just as lush as ever before we know it. We were happy to find many of our favorite restaurants were able to open. Unfortunately for Marilla, Zara was not open yet, even downtown, so she went home with money in her pockets instead of new clothes for her closet!The house has made progress in the week we were gone and is moving quickly now. The supports for the living room will all be done this week, so they can begin to build the roof on it. The roof is about 16 feet above the floor and is supported by three strong concrete headers from which will hang the steel beams on which will run the concrete block. All this concrete and rock is covered by a plaster coating so in about two months, no one will know how any of it was constructed. The roofs are all built at a slight slant so that water drains from the front to the back of the property. Hence, the height of the ceiling is lower at the back of the house than at the front. Seems so odd to us, not to have a pitched roof, but this slant allows the rainwater to run off effectively and since we don't have snow to worry about.... Looks like we will be moving into the house around middle of February, which gives me time to figure out the kitchen cabinets and furniture and other things without too much rush.I am sending photos of the plaza principal of Merida. This is the heart of the city, a nice square park filled with trees surrounded by some of the oldest buildings around. One is the cathedral which is built of rock from the Mayan temple that was originally on this site and is the oldest building of its kind in the Americas. Another photo is of the front of the current Banamex (owned by Citibank) which also dates to the 16th century. This area is where the noche Mexicana are held each weekend with performances and dancing in this square. I am also sending photos of some ads I've seen around that I found entertaining.

January 6, 2006 O ye of little faith

Well, thanks to amazing driving and maneuvering on both our parts (and in large part due to the Audi's dexterity), we made it back to Merida in five days. We drove hard to Monterrey and made the first 1500 miles in two days, including crossing a border where they make it almost impossible to find the place to get permission to bring in a car from the US. You feel as though you have crossed the border, but know you didn't do it right, when you spy a postage-stamp sized paper fastened to a street lamp on an alley heading apparently nowhere that indicates follow it for car info. The second time around, we spotted it and got to the end of the side street where again, there was no clear indication of which direction to take to comply with the rules. Fortunately, a car behind us honked so we had to make a decision and went straight into a large gate that had NO sign on it of any kind, Bingo, the promised land. We were VERY fortunate to have an old permission still glued until further notice to the front of our car, which indicated we'd done this before. It had of course, expired, but still meant we were not rookies. The red cheeked man who helped us with this removal of the old sticker also assisted us once we'd gone inside to pay and that meant we avoided a LONG line of cars who had also managed to find this forgotten place. We skated through and didn't have to be inspected -- or pay duty on anything we had in the car which was extremely lucky since we had a large computer tucked inside the back of the car and no paperwork to show it had been purchased a year before.We enjoyed our evening in Monterrey in a nice hotel and started off early the next day planning on getting past Mexico City, but then after an hour or so of driving, thought better of it and headed about 50 miles off the road to San Miguel de Allende. This town, as many know, is charming. Cobble-stoned streets, stunning carved wooden doors to impeccably-kept houses, and many galleries and restaurants for all the visiting gringos. We spent lots of Christmas money here however, realized we'd never be able to walk around this lovely city because between the rocks in the streets and the odd-shaped and sized stones on the sidewalk, we were practically lame by the time lunch was over. I did find a store that sold the coconut masks I've been collecting and we managed to squeeze in a few more to the car. Drove around Mexico City, dreading this part of the trip since there are 3-6 lanes of traffic, depending on how many cars think they can fit beside each other, and everyone is in a hurry and going too fast. Another Christmas miracle -- they had completed 2/3 of a road AROUND Mexico and we barely saw another driver on it since there was money involved (a toll road). We sped around the town and made it to Puebla. Sandy had visions of sugarplums or rather Talavera pottery dancing in her head for this town, but once it took us 3 hours of driving IN the town to find a no-tell-motel or a hotel of any kind, she knew she'd be buying her pottery elsewhere. Made it to Merida last night, tired, but glad to be home.Our friend from Seattle Bern is here and staying in the apartment next to us, so we've already had a wonderful visit. Went to see the house today and made some revisions to the plans for the second house, met with our garden designer, and now are heading out for an early dinner with some friends from here. All in a days' work. Happy New Year to all and to all a good night!!!

Feb. 4, 2006

We can now report firsthand on the medical care here in Merida. We'd heard it was good, with an excellent facility that exists and one more amazing one being built, but had not experienced it. Now, we have. After fighting for almost two weeks, Eva went to a doctor who put her in the hospital with a severe bronchial infection, raw trachia, and difficulty breathing. We went to a doctor, courtesy of a friend of ours who called to get Eva in on Friday without an appointment. We got to the waiting room at 9:15, saw the doctor at 10:15, and were in a hospital room having gone through an admissions process by 11:30 (they asked if we wanted a private room for Eva who could not speak at that point and barely breathe and I said yes, and they asked if I would mind paying so much for a room and I asked how much and it is around $90, so I said sure, go for broke). A swarm of little nurses appeared with ice, bottled water, an extra pillow, and a thermometer (taken under the arm). By noon, Eva had been wheeled to and returned from XRay ($25) and within a half hour, her oxygen treatments had begun. Her doctor came with a pulmonary specialist at 10pm to check on her and the specialist was back this morning around 9. She is breathing better, but will be in the hospital at least until Monday at which point, she needs to avoid all construction dust and paint fumes which means she won't be over at our house/construction site until she can move in. Eva had been running the crew to get the work finished since we parted company with our contractor -- a long and ugly story that is still not over but does not bear repeating-- and as a result compromised her lungs. However, she is on the mend and can talk above a whisper now even when hooked up to oxygen or humid oxygen through face masks.Other than that excitement, we are at a fun stage with construction and are picking out things like granite insets for the floors and paint colors and furniture. Some is being made like a desk and TV armoire, and some we will purchase at some point, like couches and beds.It is still cool enough at night to sleep with open windows (although it was easier for Eva to breathe with the AC on) and still gets up to about 85 during the heat of the day.I am headed over now to pay the crew and check on progress and appear as though I understand the Spanish that the guys rattle off at me about what is happening. We are in the final stretch for the first house with a week or two at most to go and then some additional painting time in all likelihood, but then the pool and phase 2 begins, so... Having this part in good shape will allow us to head north to organize transport for our goods, however, so let us know when it's warm enough up there to come back!! Take care, everyone.PS, got our first mail the other day from my newly married niece, so know it is working.

March 2, 2006

We have just finished with a week of Mardi Gras -- not just a day or a parade, but a whole week of celebrations. Parades, crowning kings and queens, concerts, and more parades and concerts. Something every day for a week. There was a darling children's parade last Thursday with 4 and 5 year old kindergarteners all dressed up and Sunday a fun parade of local "things" like women dressed in huipals (the native dress) and carrying embroidery or the men in their white guyaberas and white pants with hammacas (hammocks). And of course plenty of revelry but we didn't do much of that since we're working women.We have been running the construction crew for over a month now and seem to be making some progress with the house. Fortunately, we have friends and associates who are assisting us and whom we are paying for advice and counsel, but mainly, our workers have been loyal and very sweet. They call us "Dona Eva" which is a term of respect and "Patrona" also respectful, but with tongue in cheek too. These men work incredibly hard for incredibly little money, however, since there is a huge housing boom in Merida, they are making more than they were a year ago. Now the lowest paid person gets about $120 US for a 6 day workweek, up from $80 last year. We have also seen materials skyrocket in price -- got some 40 vigas (small wood pieces for our ceiling) in January and in February paid twice as much for 50 more. We are at the stage of painting inside but are also finishing redoing the roof (here normally roofs tend to be flat but each room going to the back of the house has a lower roof than the previous room, so the water can drain-- unfortunately our contractor didn't follow this rule of thumb and so we are putting Styrofoam ((here called nieve secca or dried snow)) on the roof to create a slant that is not there), digging out the construction muck (escombro which is lots of dust and rock and debris), and finalizing plans for a new facade and pool in back. It is exhausting just to watch these guys work so we come home each day tired and have not been socializing too much. Eva got anxious to move and so spent a night in a hammock at the house, but realized the value of indoor plumbing and came back to our little apartment. We have hopes to be in the new house in April.Since I realize it's March, I know up in IL you are paying the first installment of your property taxes. Wanted to share that I've just paid ours for the two properties for the whole year and it was slightly less than $120 US. We are paying this much because we put the actual price of our purchase on our documents. Most people, Americans included, say that they purchased the home for far less than the actual price to avoid paying these "high" taxes. We said "are you kidding??" when we heard about the tax rates and so elected to put down the actual purchase price so we paid more than most of our friends. And amazingly enough, if you don't pay your taxes as a Mexican citizen, nothing happens for at least 10 years, at which point, the government does make an attempt to collect the back taxes. For Americans who purchase through bank trusts, this leniency does not apply!We have had wonderful weather since January with balmy temperatures and lovely cool evenings, so there has been no need for AC -- imagine that!! Take care and hugs to all of you. Apologies for mass mailings, but.... Sandy and Eva

April 26, 2006

Not quite in the house yet..

As much as we'd like to be living in our home, we are not quite there yet. We do however, have a working swimming pool, filled and not leaking, and feels absolutely wonderful at the end of the work day. We have fans and air conditioners that keep us reasonably cool despite the HEAT (it's been over 100 degrees for as long as I can remember). We have appliances sitting in my office and now have internet there as well. We have a giant satellite dish which gets 5-6 porn channels all day every day but is hazy on reception for other things we'd like to actually watch and so are waiting for that repairman as well. We have granite in our kitchen and just need some windows which will be here within a week (so they keep saying). We have beautiful wrought iron doors across the back of the living room, however, the man could not install the mosquitero (screens) so we had to get someone else to do that and it will occur we hope this weekend since Monday is yet another holiday. They brought the sink for the powder room the other day. It is gorgeous and will be divine once they remake it to actually be centered under the faucets instead of slightly to the left of them. Yes, there is good news and bad news. The good news is we are making progress -- the bad news is that it is just not fast enough to suit me!!Will send along a couple of the before photos so you all can discuss what we were thinking when we took this on. However, you should know that what the "after" pictures will show is a dramatic resuscitation of a home.... one of these days!!We also had an amazing natural event here the other day-- a corona around the sun. Apparently it is caused by frost and clouds at a certain atmospheric level, but it was awesome. A giant perfect circle around the sun, with the sun at its center, and light from the sun at it's edges and miles upon miles of darkish clouds in between the center and the edges. It lasted about an hour, normally these last a matter of minutes. We saw a film that some friends took of this phenomenon and the center sun light was pouring down like a laser beam, straight down. A little scary at first and then absolutely awe-inspiring!! Don't know what it means but I am thrilled to have seen it.

May 4, 2006 We are IN!!

I would not say the house is finished, but we could not take the teeny apartment for even one more day and so here we are. Having 9 workmen around to move stuff and carry and lift and pack made the location change a breeze. Now, we are slowly unpacking -- slowly because the boys are still digging up the back yard. Seems we had several floors under there and what we thought was yard used to be house so we need them to dig down through concrete and old floors to try to find dirt and so there is LOTS of dust. When I say that none of you can imagine how much dust there is, trust me, you cannot. Actually had some friends over for dinner last night since even before we have our automatic chlorinator for the pool or the screens on our doors or doors in some cases, Eva has her giant grill hooked up (they had grill envy, believe me!!). We are beginning to work on the second property which is primarily the garage but also will have an apartment and mozo room above. A mozo is someone who works 6 days a week for you doing whatever you ask of him or her. Many people here prefer men to women since they can do more heavy work and don't mind climbing on roofs or cleaning pools. There is no particular pay scale since the minimum wage here puts weekly earnings at around $42 but an average price for this is $150 per week. You can find someone to live in or come and go for the same rate. I mention these prices but they still amaze us, even after almost a year living down here. On the first floor, in addition to the garage, there will be a closet connected to the master bedroom and a laundry room of gargantuan proportions. We were going to take out the floor to the second floor and have a high-ceiling room left which would have been an exercise room, but now will do a giant laundry/utility room instead.The heat continues to be HOT. Yesterday was overcast and so was much cooler -- 88 degrees according to the thermostat in our car. And the days just go by with things moving along and lots to do. We find the time goes quickly even though some days we cannot account for what we've accomplished.Tomorrow is cinqo de Mayo, a big holiday here, so we are looking forward to experiencing it for the first time. We arrived here in Mexico on May 20 a year ago and it feels like yesterday == and some days, like a million years!! Take care.

June 16, 2006 garden at long last

Hello all!Well, we are beginning our rainy season, so it will rain once a day normally for a few minutes each day which will make watering the newly planted garden much easier. We put in 2 Washingtonia palms, 3 date palms, 5 heliconia of various sorts and colors (SOOO tropical and stunning), 3 gingers of various colors, a bird of paradise, some jasmine to grow up and around the terrace and make it smell great, 4 bouganvillia which everyone tells us will take over the place in about a month (2 fuschia in one area and 2 coral in another), 5 gardenia bushes (which are not native here and so may not work out), one lime tree, one stalk of bamboo so we can hear it rustle in the wind, some native vines (one called yoch ob dzimin with blue flowers and another called copa de oro or cup of gold with wonderful yellow blooms), a de rigeur tequila cactus, and 2 galen de noche (a bush that flowers and smells so sweet and wonderful but only at night). This is the backbone of the garden and we can add to it daily if we choose to, and as many of you know, we probably will do just that!! We also constructed a large kitchen garden which is like a very large cement planter up on legs that will be surrounded by water so that the ants don't eat everything we plant, especially the tender new herbs and vegetables. And we have a fountain to be finished up and will hopefully have a water garden of some sort since I am longing to grow different types of papyrus.The construction is almost complete. We are done with plumbers and electricians, hopefully for a long time, but do have our washer, dryer, stove, and all bathrooms operational. We're doing the details now like patching holes in the walls, having the floors polished, and making the outdoor pool and outdoor grill terraces. We have screen windows and doors and have the "real" ones on order which we don't expect to really use except during severe weather but need them for that very purpose. We will paint again -- need to change the color in the kitchen because as much as we like using bright colors here, orange is too much with our granite. So it is coming to a close at long long last, just a few more weeks. Because labor is so cheap probably, they still prefer to do things the old way which usually involves building something only to break it later and then patch it up. We have objected to that and tried to explain the idea of thinking ahead to do it only once and not waste effort, but it seems to be lost on most of the guys. However, some of the old ways are pretty damned clever -- for example, we built a terrace and small house for pool equipment near the pool. During the process, we needed to find a level for the floor of the house before the terrace had been constructed, however, there was a place about 15 feet away from the house where the future level of the floor was clear. So they took a long but narrow piece of hose, filled it with water, and held the ends of the hose in the two places, and then measured using the water. When the water didn't spill out one end or other of the hose, it was level and they could measure down or up from that point. Pretty smart and really accurate!!We are beginning to repeat our fruits so we have had lychee and rhambutan again and the pitaya should be ready any time. Fortunately, the mangoes are back in season and we are really enjoying those.Just got our first garbage bill. They pick up every day and anything you happen to have. There is no limit apparently to what or what shape or size or weight or anything. Of course, this is good and bad since there is nothing like recycling here. For three months, we paid 51 pesos or under $5!!! Also had a pool technician here to check out our pump and clean the pool -- he was here about 3 hours and the bill was under $15. I love telling these tales of spending no money on things. We got our electric bills a few weeks ago, too, and they were not such a bargain, but still pretty reasonable -- $100-150 per month.Greetings to all of you.

July 23, 2006 so close we can taste it!!

Hola all --
Well we really ARE so close we can taste it now -- FINALLY -- and to be honest, we have felt so close for about a month now, but really we are just days from finishing.
The painters have touchups on the facade and inside to do and that's it. The workers have some small tasks to do which should not be more than one day and that's it. The electricians have to rewire the main electrical box in the guest rooms and that's it. The carpenters need to bring glass for the doors and windows, some kitchen cabinetry, and some bathroom shelves and that's it. We have a sofa ordered and well, that's not it, but then we can come north to get some of our stuff that's been stored for over a year now and truly settle in. And for anyone who has ever done construction or lived through any of it, you know what we mean when we say it is long past time to reclaim our space and just live here for now. We'd planned a fountain but are settling for a small pond because we just cannot suffer more construction for now. And we'd like to be talking about something else besides how we are almost done with this!!!! Can't imagine what that will be, but different.
We do have a flock of wild parrots who fly over most mornings around 6:30 and jabber. We have hummingbirds who come and click as they try to get nectar from our orange flowers called pico de gallo. We have many different moths and butterflies who swoop in and out and are just a joy to behold. We have dragonflies who partol the pool for any mosquitoes and who are welcome to any they find. Our plants have visibly grown in a month's time (our friend Bern was here from Seattle and could not believe the growth in the basil in the two-week timeframe of his visit. He was sure it was on steroids.) so the bamboo has lots of green around it and everything has settled in.
We had some dirt brought in last week. This may not seem like a big event, but it is very tough to find black dirt or anything of the sort here. There are men who ride around on horse-drawn carts selling "tierra" or earth but it is the red, clay variety that dries hard like rock. So through a friend, we found a source for good composted dirt and had 150 bags, each weighing about 50 pounds, brought in, spread on the ground where we wanted it, and raked out. This took 4 men about 4 hours to accomplish and cost 18 pesos (or under $2) per bag. We were talking to the foreman and learned that here it's not just a nice thing to offer someone (who is breaking their back for you) a refreshment, but that's it's quite an insult if you do not offer them something. Of course, we always provide refreshments and most times, the people are very surprised when we offer them not just a hose to quench their thirst but rather a cold Coke or icy purified water in a glass.
We finally hung up the mask collection in the kitchen. I've been finding these wonderful smallish masks made from coconut shells, rope, seeds, leaves, and other materials that are dried, decorated, and painted. They are made in another state here (Michoacan) and I have grown to love them. Some are animals, some mythological, and some just wild.

chiapis trip march 2007

We left Sunday morning and drove 335 miles in about 6 1/4 hours to Palenque—via Campeche, Campoton (the place to eat shrimp), Escarcega, and Catazaga—and stayed at Chan Kah resort near the ruins. The hotel had some of the hardest beds we’ve ever encountered but a nice bungalow room with a porch with rocking chairs, clean, hot shower, a three-pooled swimming area, an adequate restaurant, and plenty of plantings for privacy which completed our sense of sleeping in the jungle. In the pool, we met a fun couple from Michigan and their 26-year old son who’d had a car accident that left him badly damaged, pretty much unable to speak, with difficulty moving named Sean. Sure put things into perspective!
Monday we drove up to see Palenque and were wowed. There was a very Asian feel to the buildings, with the Temple of the Inscriptions and the Governor’s Palace more like what we expected. Climbing up higher above these we found another plaza (Cruces) with several temples and then more still above those. Saw quite a few partial buildings as we walked through the jungle. We were charmed by the rivers (Bat and Otulum) and the Queen’s Bath, huge trees, and green. Decided to see what else there was nearby and found Misol Ha, a waterfall with a pool near it (and some cabins where we thought we might stay some time). There are lots of vendors everywhere selling mainly Mayan designs painted onto leather. We bought a toucan painted on a bird feather from Raul Ballnar, who was shocked when we asked him to sign his work.
Tuesday we went to Agua Azul (about 35 miles from Palenque no matter what the kilometer markers try to tell you), an amazing set of falls with green clear water. We left Sunday morning and drove 335 miles in about 6 1/4 hours to Palenque—via Campeche, Campoton (the place to eat shrimp), Escarcega, and Catazaga—and stayed at Chan Kah resort near the ruins. The hotel had some of the hardest beds we’ve ever encountered but a nice bungalow room with a porch with rocking chairs, clean, hot shower, a three-pooled swimming area, an adequate restaurant, and plenty of plantings for privacy which completed our sense of sleeping in the jungle. In the pool, we met a fun couple from Michigan and their 26-year old son who’d had a car accident that left him badly damaged, pretty much unable to speak, with difficulty moving named Sean. Sure put things into perspective!
Monday we drove up to see Palenque and were wowed. There was a very Asian feel to the buildings, with the Temple of the Inscriptions and the Governor’s Palace more like what we expected. Climbing up higher above these we found another plaza (Cruces) with several temples and then more still above those. Saw quite a few partial buildings as we walked through the jungle. We were charmed by the rivers (Bat and Otulum) and the Queen’s Bath, huge trees, and green. Decided to see what else there was nearby and found Misol Ha, a waterfall with a pool near it (and some cabins where we thought we might stay some time). There are lots of vendors everywhere selling mainly Mayan designs painted onto leather. We bought a toucan painted on a bird feather from Raul Ballnar, who was shocked when we asked him to sign his work.
Tuesday we went to Agua Azul (about 35 miles from Palenque no matter what the kilometer markers try to tell you), an amazing set of falls with green clear water. Spent the morning there, swimming and Eva blessing her rocks, and had lunch – 5 empanadas for 10 pesos -- then drove to San Cristobal, 200 kilometers of driving that took every bit of 4 hours to climb over 3000 meters with knuckles tensed on the steering wheel and legs helping with the brakes. When Eva said “this must be a bad curve, it has its own cemetery,” we knew we’d had about enough. This was an absolutely gorgeous drive through not-quite-mountains of GREEN, with breathtaking views around every hair-raising curve, and fabulous trees, especially pine and cedar which are so unfamiliar to us in the Yucatan, but you will rarely drive over 20mph.
We passed through Ocosingo, where the guide books said to stop and taste the cheese, but we could not find any place we cared to stop.
About three hours into the drive around 4pm, we went over a bit of newly laid gravel that had been tarred but not smashed down smooth. We had no choice but to drive over it, but unfortunately, a piece of gravel got caught somewhere in the area of the driver’s side wheel. We stopped when we could safely pull off and Eva and I both explored under the car, but she got her hands dirty looking for the source of the screeching noise we now had. Passers-by looked appalled as I stood in the road so cars had to go around Eva on her stomach under the car. Unable to see anything, she tried braking and then swerving to dislodge whatever it was. No luck. So we kept going (we were virtually in no man’s land with very few huts or towns of any size) until she got really worried and she pulled off to the left side into a place with several cars parked in front of two buildings in a “town” named Pob. Tzajala. One building was a shop that turned out to sell good amber inexpensively while the other was a mechanic – no sign or indication of what it was but it was a mechanic!! He raised up the car, took off the wheel, and voila, there was a piece of glass stuck. He got it out, charged us 40 pesos (we gave him 100), put it all back together, and we bought an amber necklace to remember the adventure.
Along the drive throughout Chiapis, we realized there was a certain hierarchy about houses, really huts since they tend to be one room. From being made with palapa and sticks, they move on to logs, then milled wood, then lamina roofs, then block, then stuccoed block, then painted (VERY FEW) stucco over block. It appears that in some areas, a government is supplying block for the villagers to build better homes. This seemed especially true in the pueblos right next to the ones where we saw signs of support for the Zapatista rebels. We saw bananas galore, corn in very unlikely places, and palms. Women wore and sold blouses with hot pink and green embroidery – Lilly Pulitzer eat your heart out. One could buy corn, many types of fruits like peeled oranges, jicima, and even popcorn along the road without ever leaving your car.
We stayed the first night in San Cristobal de las Casas at the Parador San Juan de Dios which was fabulous. We had the place to ourselves, our own fireplace in the room, wooden floors, ancient-looking tile roofs, linen bedspreads, lovely gardens, and a romantic dinner. We loved it despite the barking dog and fireworks that banged every hour on the hour.
The next day, we moved to the Flamboyan Espanol, which turned out to have been purchased by Holiday Inn and was so ghastly that we only stayed one night, instead of the two we’d planned. We did make the most of our day in town however, seeing churches (LOTS of gold leaf) and the Zocalo, shopping at artisans (the “multi-talented” Kiki Suarez was well represented in her shop, but could not find anyone who had more than postcards from Beatriz Aurora), having foot (good way to spend a half hour after lunch) and body massages (horrible way to end a long day with a man walking on Sandy’s back who looked a lot like Santa Claus in pink corduroy cutoffs), and ending the day with room service since we were just too tired to continue. Meant to see the Chamula villages, Tonina, Chiapa de Corzo, and Socoltenango, but will have to save those for next time since we could not stand another day at the Holiday Inn.
Drove out to the east so we could stop and see the place where the jaguar barro pots were made, Amatenango de Valle. Through perseverance, we found a woman who makes the best ones and bought two and a jaguar from her and her daughter – overpriced but she said she sells cheaper when the big buyers come since they buy everything she has. Found two more pots and an armadillo at a cooperative of artisans that was right by the highway. This was a LONG day of driving but not horrible—some through very dry land, but mostly lowlands like the Yucatan. There were places with no homes to speak of but there was always a bar with a nice door. The drive took longer than it needed to since we tried to see Yaxchilan and Bonampak but were too late for either one (we thought we could tell people we saw them both since we had legitimately stopped, but…). Stopped briefly at an eco-lodge near Yaxchilan dock but the fans were noisy and didn’t work after about 10 minutes so no way Eva would stay there. So we pushed on to Palenque and arrived back at Chan Kah around 8 that night.
As we drove throughout Chiapis, we saw : boulders IN the road, road that had just fallen way, children on the road, horses grazing and with riders, turkeys, sheer drop-offs, trees, landslides, topes of every description, firewood, a tunnel with a tarp ceiling, bananas lining the roads, and even a SNAKE (unfortunately, Sandy was driving and what looked like a stick moved, causing her to scream and almost run off the road).
Friday, Sandy decided to actually “see” the two ruins while Eva spent a delightful day by the pool reading and relaxing. So 6am found her awake, dressed, and waiting for a van. There was then about a 3 hour sojourn including a stop for breakfast to get to our first stop. Because Sandy sat in front and had limited conversation with the driver about Vicente Fernandez before they picked up the others, the two German tourists who subsequently boarded the van decided she could be their translator!! Fortunately, they spoke enough English so she didn’t have to try to summon up German as well as Spanish.
Yaxchilan requires a 30-minute boat ride to even get to on a wide river with Guatamala on the other side, so 7 of us headed off with an English-speaking guide we borrowed from two Scottish folks. We began with a labyrinth filled with bats and spiders. Ugh. This site was only discovered in 1981 and has a ball court, some well-preserved carvings on the lintels of doorways, giant 50 meter ceibas in the grand plaza. About half of it has been excavated and it sits above the river, even higher than the river would rise during the rainy season – this being the end of the dry season now. We saw the famous carving of a man bleeding his penis and on the back, seen with the help of a mirror, is a carving of a woman whose tongue has been pierced with an obsidian knife and is now using a rope through the hole to let blood flow (it’s tough being royal, after all, or at least it was). There is also an acropolis with a combed-top building high up above the tree tops. Back at the boat, we waited and waited for the two Mexicans who were part of our group and ended up leaving them after waiting 45 minutes. Got back to land, ate lunch, and they showed up, not apologetic or even understanding that we’d been frustrated by them.
On to Bonampak which was never a place people lived, but rather was a ceremonial site. The Lacandon Indians live in this area and had been hidden in the jungle since the time the Spanish came until recently. The men wear white dresses and the women wear colorful ones. To benefit this group, we had to stop our van outside the park and allow one of the Lacandon to drive his van in. We drove on a piss-poor road of white gravel like a modern-day sacbé, with potholes, ruts, rocks, uneven grading, and loose gravel as hazards. Decided this man’s parents must own a concession for axles, struts, tires, and not just locally, but for the region since he drove like a bat outa hell. Bonampak has a largish plaza with ruins around it, amazing 10 meter stellae and a building with two small houses atop, then even higher up 5 more small buildings (acropolis). About half-way up the stairs, the three-roomed building still has some frescoes on the walls which are marvelous to behold and carved lintels which are still very much intact.
The road to Yaxchilan and Bonampak is being torn up to put in potable water, much like what we saw happening around Calakmul. Apparently, the government has a program to be sure every hut has clean water == a good plan for the 21st century! We also saw men sitting outside on chairs with a view to a door in the bar where the TV was housed. And many topes of all descriptions – understand that the indigenous folks can ask for a tope anywhere they want one and the government will put one in.
Agua Azul’s water is hardly blue, but it is clean and beautiful!! It is worth a climb to the top to look back down the falls. Spent the morning there, swimming and Eva blessing her rocks, and had lunch – 5 empanadas for 10 pesos -- then drove to San Cristobal, 200 kilometers of driving that took every bit of 4 hours to climb over 3000 meters with knuckles tensed on the steering wheel and legs helping with the brakes. When Eva said “this must be a bad curve, it has its own cemetery,” we knew we’d had about enough. This was an absolutely gorgeous drive through not-quite-mountains of GREEN, with breathtaking views around every hair-raising curve, and fabulous trees, especially pine and cedar which are so unfamiliar to us in the Yucatan, but you will rarely drive over 20mph.
We passed through Ocosingo, where the guide books said to stop and taste the cheese, but we could not find any place we cared to stop.
About three hours into the drive around 4pm, we went over a bit of newly laid gravel that had been tarred but not smashed down smooth. We had no choice but to drive over it, but unfortunately, a piece of gravel got caught somewhere in the area of the driver’s side wheel. We stopped when we could safely pull off and Eva and I both explored under the car, but she got her hands dirty looking for the source of the screeching noise we now had. Passers-by looked appalled as I stood in the road so cars had to go around Eva on her stomach under the car. Unable to see anything, she tried braking and then swerving to dislodge whatever it was. No luck. So we kept going (we were virtually in no man’s land with very few huts or towns of any size) until she got really worried and she pulled off to the left side into a place with several cars parked in front of two buildings in a “town” named Pob. Tzajala. One building was a shop that turned out to sell good amber inexpensively while the other was a mechanic – no sign or indication of what it was but it was a mechanic!! He raised up the car, took off the wheel, and voila, there was a piece of glass stuck. He got it out, charged us 40 pesos (we gave him 100), put it all back together, and we bought an amber necklace to remember the adventure.
Along the drive throughout Chiapis, we realized there was a certain hierarchy about houses, really huts since they tend to be one room. From being made with palapa and sticks, they move on to logs, then milled wood, then lamina roofs, then block, then stuccoed block, then painted (VERY FEW) stucco over block. It appears that in some areas, a government is supplying block for the villagers to build better homes. This seemed especially true in the pueblos right next to the ones where we saw signs of support for the Zapatista rebels. We saw bananas galore, corn in very unlikely places, and palms. Women wore and sold blouses with hot pink and green embroidery – Lilly Pulitzer eat your heart out. One could buy corn, many types of fruits like peeled oranges, jicima, and even popcorn along the road without ever leaving your car.
We stayed the first night in San Cristobal de las Casas at the Parador San Juan de Dios which was fabulous. We had the place to ourselves, our own fireplace in the room, wooden floors, ancient-looking tile roofs, linen bedspreads, lovely gardens, and a romantic dinner. We loved it despite the barking dog and fireworks that banged every hour on the hour.
The next day, we moved to the Flamboyan Espanol, which turned out to have been purchased by Holiday Inn and was so ghastly that we only stayed one night, instead of the two we’d planned. We did make the most of our day in town however, seeing churches (LOTS of gold leaf) and the Zocalo, shopping at artisans (the “multi-talented” Kiki Suarez was well represented in her shop, but could not find anyone who had more than postcards from Beatriz Aurora), having foot (good way to spend a half hour after lunch) and body massages (horrible way to end a long day with a man walking on Sandy’s back who looked a lot like Santa Claus in pink corduroy cutoffs), and ending the day with room service since we were just too tired to continue. Meant to see the Chamula villages, Tonina, Chiapa de Corzo, and Socoltenango, but will have to save those for next time since we could not stand another day at the Holiday Inn.
Drove out to the east so we could stop and see the place where the jaguar barro pots were made, Amatenango de Valle. Through perseverance, we found a woman who makes the best ones and bought two and a jaguar from her and her daughter – overpriced but she said she sells cheaper when the big buyers come since they buy everything she has. Found two more pots and an armadillo at a cooperative of artisans that was right by the highway. This was a LONG day of driving but not horrible—some through very dry land, but mostly lowlands like the Yucatan. There were places with no homes to speak of but there was always a bar with a nice door. The drive took longer than it needed to since we tried to see Yaxchilan and Bonampak but were too late for either one (we thought we could tell people we saw them both since we had legitimately stopped, but…). Stopped briefly at an eco-lodge near Yaxchilan dock but the fans were noisy and didn’t work after about 10 minutes so no way Eva would stay there. So we pushed on to Palenque and arrived back at Chan Kah around 8 that night.
As we drove throughout Chiapis, we saw : boulders IN the road, road that had just fallen way, children on the road, horses grazing and with riders, turkeys, sheer drop-offs, trees, landslides, topes of every description, firewood, a tunnel with a tarp ceiling, bananas lining the roads, and even a SNAKE (unfortunately, Sandy was driving and what looked like a stick moved, causing her to scream and almost run off the road).
Friday, Sandy decided to actually “see” the two ruins while Eva spent a delightful day by the pool reading and relaxing. So 6am found her awake, dressed, and waiting for a van. There was then about a 3 hour sojourn including a stop for breakfast to get to our first stop. Because Sandy sat in front and had limited conversation with the driver about Vicente Fernandez before they picked up the others, the two German tourists who subsequently boarded the van decided she could be their translator!! Fortunately, they spoke enough English so she didn’t have to try to summon up German as well as Spanish.
Yaxchilan requires a 30-minute boat ride to even get to on a wide river with Guatamala on the other side, so 7 of us headed off with an English-speaking guide we borrowed from two Scottish folks. We began with a labyrinth filled with bats and spiders. Ugh. This site was only discovered in 1981 and has a ball court, some well-preserved carvings on the lintels of doorways, giant 50 meter ceibas in the grand plaza. About half of it has been excavated and it sits above the river, even higher than the river would rise during the rainy season – this being the end of the dry season now. We saw the famous carving of a man bleeding his penis and on the back, seen with the help of a mirror, is a carving of a woman whose tongue has been pierced with an obsidian knife and is now using a rope through the hole to let blood flow (it’s tough being royal, after all, or at least it was). There is also an acropolis with a combed-top building high up above the tree tops. Back at the boat, we waited and waited for the two Mexicans who were part of our group and ended up leaving them after waiting 45 minutes. Got back to land, ate lunch, and they showed up, not apologetic or even understanding that we’d been frustrated by them.
On to Bonampak which was never a place people lived, but rather was a ceremonial site. The Lacandon Indians live in this area and had been hidden in the jungle since the time the Spanish came until recently. The men wear white dresses and the women wear colorful ones. To benefit this group, we had to stop our van outside the park and allow one of the Lacandon to drive his van in. We drove on a piss-poor road of white gravel like a modern-day sacbé, with potholes, ruts, rocks, uneven grading, and loose gravel as hazards. Decided this man’s parents must own a concession for axles, struts, tires, and not just locally, but for the region since he drove like a bat outa hell. Bonampak has a largish plaza with ruins around it, amazing 10 meter stellae and a building with two small houses atop, then even higher up 5 more small buildings (acropolis). About half-way up the stairs, the three-roomed building still has some frescoes on the walls which are marvelous to behold and carved lintels which are still very much intact.
The road to Yaxchilan and Bonampak is being torn up to put in potable water, much like what we saw happening around Calakmul. Apparently, the government has a program to be sure every hut has clean water == a good plan for the 21st century! We also saw men sitting outside on chairs with a view to a door in the bar where the TV was housed. And many topes of all descriptions – understand that the indigenous folks can ask for a tope anywhere they want one and the government will put one in.
see our pictures of this trip at http://picasaweb.google.com/necshs1/Chiapis

cuernavaca trip november 2006

Flew on Aviacsa to Mexico City and bussed from there to Cuernavaca, our home for the week. Easy bus, a little less than 2 hours, about 110 pesos each person each way, and not too much walking from the baggage claim all the way down the terminal to the floor below where the bus leaves, Krispy Kreme at the corner where you make a left to the bus at the airport!!

Stayed at La Nuestra, B&B, hosted by Andy and Nancy, mainly Andy. Four guest rooms, no frills, but OK for $70 per night per room. Hard beds, quiet except for barking dogs down the street somewhere. Filling breakfasts with raspberries in the fruit each morning, eggs often, bread, usually some type of breakfast meat, juice, and lots of coffee.

Cuernavaca is built around 7 ravines so there are not any straight streets, many hills, and almost no charm. Ate VERY well however!!
El Madrigal (SONORA 115, COL. VISTA HERMOSA, 777 100-7700) -- newish and quite nice
Terrarium
Gaia (new and in the former home of the old movie star, Chintenflas or something like that)
Las Mananitas (my new favorite restaurant any where – 4 hour lunch)
Caprichio (lunch looking for Ibiza bar on Morelos Sur)
Provence (French, a bit odd, and rich food)
Didn’t get to the Indonesian place, Matahari or the pretty Indian but there is always next time.

Saw Robert Brady’s house, Palacio Cortez, and Jardin Borda. And saw the new art museum, Muros, containing the art of Natasha and Jacques Gelman—lots of Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo, and others we didn’t know, plus a whole ultra-modern floor.

Since driving was so worrysome, we'd hired Felix to be our driver for several days, mainly for sightseeing but ultimatly, we had him take us everywhere. Taxco is a city on the hill, very steep, cobbled streets, pretty renovated cathedral Santa Prisca, and innumerable silver shops, most containing what we’ve seen for years in Cancun but some with more interesting things. Nothing worth buying for us. Almost took a ride down the hill on a cable car but it just looked too dangerous and we decided to keep our lunches in our stomachs and not try to be brave.

Saw Parque Nacional Grutas de Cacahuamilpa == amazing caves with 40 foot ceilings and no end in sight, along the way.

Tepoztlan – hilly, about an hour drive from Cuernavaca, wonderful market, interesting old cathedral, felt great there, rustic, with good clean air. Ate lunch on the far side of the church and a little down the hill from it, nice garden spot. Then Felix drove us hours to see some pots and finally home.

Gardens everywhere in this part of Mexico are fabulous, due to clement weather all year long, good dirt, and enough rain or watering. Wonderful spring (city of eternal spring) feel, but no soul.

We came back to Merida with a very large lizard made from paper maiche, which proved a bit troublesome on the plane, but he now safely guards our coffee table.

our pictures are at: http://picasaweb.google.com/necshs1/Cuernavaca2006