Continuing on the construction theme, I mentioned that on some main streets they are putting the electrical lines underground here in Xico. With all the cobblestone roads and mass of humanity and traffic this is quite an undertaking.
Comision Federal de Electricidad, Mexico’s largest state power company known as CFE,Has been modernizing at the same time the Government is remodeling the fronts of the buildings fronting Calle Miguel Hildalgo. Additionally they have reconstructed the park, which has caused some discontent, as folks were concerned about Xico losing its historic face.
So far progress on the park does not look like it will detract from the overall quaintness and charm of our fair pueblo.
No one will argue the benefits of hiding those many electrical cables. Photographing the area will have better framing options without those many overhead lines – that in and of itself is worth all the current disruption.
Last night four of us, locals went to dinner. Acamalin was our destination – mere blocks from our friend’s casa. Upon arrival we found the restaurant closed with a notice of remodeling – bummer.
We proceeded on our scooters up to Calle Victoria and swung back down Hildalgo, which runs one way to the east a couple blocks to El Mesón Xiqueño at Hidalgo #152. Another excellent restaurant with a lovely invernadero (greenhouse) in its patio with squawking parrots (Lasguacamayas).
Here in front of the restaurant was the common red plastic tape sectioning off the work area that encompassed about a third of the width of the street. Our riding partners lifted the tape as we maneuvered our scooters under the tape parking in front of the entrance – ah those little scooters are totally convenient when it comes to parking
A fine dinner was had by all. El Meson’s mole is prepared in house and is a mouth-watering treat smothered on many of their dishes. At some point I mentioned how great it is to be sitting at a table outside on the patio at the end of January – “You have to love it!”
We ate; we gabbed and finally scratched Paco the large macaw’s head before heading off to our respective casas. The torn up streets were a mere distraction that promises to make our little side of paradise just that much better – come and visit, you will not be disappointed. Stay Tuned!
Mexico is labor intensive. This is a good thing for an aspiring country (developing nation). For some months now the Mexican government has had a work force remodeling building fronts along Hildalgo street. Calle Miguel Hidalgo is the main drag heading one way (west to east) through the town of Xico.
A week or so ago a project to place electrical wires underground was started along Hildalgo and a few other main roadways in town. How nice it will be to have those webs of wires removed from view. Signs of progress.
The other morning it was rainy and foggy; generally miserable. I was reading. I heard shrill whistling that silenced the birds and interrupted my moment. Across the way I spied a propane truck – common around here. But, when I saw what the two workers were up to I had to get a picture or two.
The big truck carried an extension ladder and rope. In the miserable weather one hombre climbed the fully extended ladder to the roof top of the two story casa across the way from us. He then dropped a rope down to the other hombre. He secured the heavy filling hose and nozzle to the rope. It was hauled topside in order to fill a 300 liter tank on the roof top.
The hombre aloft had whistled to his partner to secure the line and then release hose from the spool on the rear of the truck. As the tank was filling he continued to whistle while he worked.
I, like most U.S. laborers, might have been grumbling about having to be doing this in cold rainy weather; and adding the question out to the air and anyone within listening range, “WHY would anyone install a gas tank atop their house?”
Lot sizes are typically narrow and small in Mexico pueblos. Every square meter of property is utilized. Often a casa will cover every square centimeter of land space. Naturally building up – placing propane tanks, drying laundry, storing furniture and things you might find in a metal shed in the U.S. and walking the dog rooftop is common practice.
Propane gas is about half the cost typical in the U.S. There is no extra charge for hefting large tanks of gas or filling tanks on rooftops – just part of the job.
Occasionally when I see many hombres out doing work that might be more easily done with heavy equipment I scoff at the inefficiency; the labor intensiveness. But then I see that Mexico, a developing nation, has half the unemployment of the first world nation hovering a top their land. I think maybe those people up there have outsmarted themselves.
Today is beginning sunny. Dogs will be warming themselves at roofs edge. Clothes will be hung on rooftops to bask in the sun and propane hombres will climb to rooftops sans yellow rain gear. It will be a good day here reaching to the 70’s.
That hombre will still be whistling as he works I am sure. He has a job and happy for that. Stay Tuned!
Eat the cherries. Toss the pits. The bright red cherries of ripe coffee berries are tossed. The pits are toasted. Here in Xalapa, Coatepec and Xico it is coffee berry harvesting season.
The hills are alive with folks bearing buckets, baskets and bags of bright red plump coffee berries stripped from the vines of hundreds of thousands of coffee plants. A couple days after picking the beautiful red pulp will be stripped away and used for little more than fertilizer. The pit on the other hand or the seed or the bean will be toasted to coffee perfection.
These days on our roads we see many stake bed trucks with pickers packed like so many sardines. They are returning from the coffee plant fincas dotting our country side. Burros, mules and horses are packing sacks of red coffee berries. Driving by the numerous large coffee Beneficios (coffee processing plants) you can smell the rich acrid aroma of coffee in the air.
Our local friends in the Hood at Ursulo Galvan will not be found in the day time now as they are out on their small fincas “cutting coffee”; removing berries from vines.
It is a season of robust activity.
Side-walks, roof tops, patios, and cement drying decks of all kinds are heavy laden with golden coffee beans basking in 80 F (26.5 C) degree sunny warmth. A year ago we did a series of Blog entries on the coffee process from vine to cup.
Finished coffee is in short supply right now as last season’s beans are long gone and first crop is just getting into processing. It was high time for us to begin the search for good roasted beans as our supply had reached an untimely end. But good luck and the warmth of new friends brought us north and east to Coatepec where fine roasted Robusta and Arabica beans abound.
We had lunch at a 20 acre coffee plantation that included a tour of the facilities and grounds. Our host is an extranjero (foreigner) who has been in Mexico more than 20 years by way of New York City. His sun filled casa had stacks of 57 kilogram quintals (bags) of golden coffee beans waiting to be roasted to a dark brown.
Toasted beans were actually in short supply as a delivery had just been made. But, the two couples that came over from Xico each left with a six-month stash of dark roasted Grade A coffee beans – life is good!
There are plenty of pictures within the pages of this Blog of coffee in all stages of its growth, harvest, processing and liquid state. But, I wanted to share with you some beans in a rather unique state. As everyone was hustling about the kitchen where our host and the two mujers (women) of our foursome were preparing lunch I spied on the marble counter this:
On close examination you can see that a kilo or so of dark roasted beans is the ‘potted earth’ for the lovely colorful dried stalks in the crystal vase. A clever artful display – however unless you own a coffee plantation you might imagine the temptation to seize the ‘earth’ of that lovely display when your coffee supply has run out.
We live in coffee country where roasted beans become charm bracelets, necklaces, key chain bobs, folk art and even potting soil in crystal vases. I just plunged down the grounds of a dark roast in the French press – coffee time.
The other day we drove into Xico to pay our property taxes, check on our rental and have lunch at our favorite cocina economica, The Tias. During the drive and subsequent moving about the town of Xico we noticed a lot of new graffiti markings. I even saw a truck with the canopy marked by paint can graffiti.
It looks as if graffiti is endemic to Mexico, but then the U.S. certainly has its share. Here in our area I would suggest that graffiti is now at an epidemic level. This quite simply boggles my mind. In the latter part of the 20th and now into the 21st Century the earth is scorched with the markings of restless, mindless youth. The billions of dollars spent on education are doing what for society?
Across the street at our Casita in Ursulo Galvan a block wall and a wood door have been marked by the pubescent nina that lives there. The apparent plan is soon the door is to be replaced and the wall stucco’d. But in the mean time these areas have been tagged to provide entertainment for the restless young girl – all in good fun.
We know the circumstances because when we started to commiserate for the travesty the mother explained it is all in good fun. But do all the youth and parents for that matter here in the Colonia of 1700 know this is just good fun, or do the children see inroads to this trashy barrio identity crisis and their parents accept yet another insult to respectable living?
Why would a parent allow this activity as some sort of release because it will be covered one day – and perhaps not too soon as the wheels of construction over there run very slow? There are two casas in various stages of construction, and have been for the last five years. Is it not a training ground for future tagging?
Until they do get that wall and door covered we will be entertained by these barrio markings, as will the rest of the Hood. We and the neighbor to our east have long walls directly across from this barrio blackboard – ours are bigger and certainly more inviting.
Six months ago if you turned off the main road between Coatepec and Xico to head up to our Colonia and further in you would have noticed a distinct lack of barrio markings; but it started creeping up from the turn then and is now there in the Hood.
Have we adults all gone nuts? Have we given up on our neighborhoods to our children? Apparently the repercussions for such behavior are in no way a deterrent.
I know trying to reason with teenagers is often a lost cause, but has anyone suggested some mass media programs to let these taggers know they are ruining their own inheritance. That the buildings and neighborhoods that they are defacing will one day belong to them; that the costs involved in cleaning up their mess eventually gets passed back to them via higher taxes and parents who have to buy $45.00 gallons of paint instead of those $300.00 sneakers they are wanting.
Might we suggest that by turning their neighborhoods into trashy looking slums might reduce the support and investment made by government and business? The houses they live in lose value as they convert their middle class neighborhood into the likes of a low end barrio.
It would seem that even if you have not yet enough sense to come out of the rain that you might be able to do the math that equals defecating in one’s own nest as not smart.
Here in Mexico they haven’t been able to stop littering – it also is at epidemic proportions here. We are enough generations into littering here that quite simply the adults seem to have no care to stop it – soon there will be second and third generation taggers. There seems to be no stopping any of this.
There are a whole lot of people on this planet now and seemingly few that care about the future of it. People here in Mexico are starting to go to the gym and exercise – they are running and buying jogging outfits – getting real first world ideas. But, they won’t do any deep knee bends, squats or toe touching to pick up the trash in their neighborhood; and they surely aren’t going to disrupt the happy family unit by beating the tar out of little Jose or Mary for defacing the neighborhood.
What do we do when we find something wrong, when someone is acting against what we believe is right, moral or ethical? More often, the answer is – nothing. And here in passive Mexico that is written in stone.
How long this can go on is anyone’s guess. Graffiti has increased by a magnitude in the short few years we have been here – there is no end in sight; quite the opposite. Now when I say this is paradise to a future resident I qualify it with when you look past the litter and graffiti. Stay Tuned!
When we were considering Mexico as a place to live Mexconnect, an Internet E’Zine was a source of information. That and “The People’s Guide to Mexico” were pretty much it other than the rather milk toast Frommers and Triple A travel guide books.
In those days you had to pay to be a member of Mexconnect – now with so many other Mexico information Internet options they have stopped the membership fees and taken to advertising – a good idea I think.
I occasionally go back to those roots and see what is up on Mexconnect. Yesterday, to my surprise right there on the front page there were lead-ins to two articles on Veracruz! Believe me when I report that formerly Veracruz was not on Mexconnect’s radar – now two articles.
And what’s more startling is one of those articles actually mentions this site as a good source of information – be still my heart! We have evolved from looking for information to a source of that in a mere five years – cool.
But what I really want to talk about is the article, “Expat living in Mexico: Xalapa vs. Ajijic.” Of course anything written about our area by ‘mainstream’ tourists/expats information includes how ignored the State of Veracruz is, and these days it is said that we are in fact a hidden jewel of sorts. I agree.
Comparing Xalapa to Ajijic or should I write doing battle with which is a good place to beam yourself to mostly bothers me.
On the Vivaveracruz Forum when someone downplays Ajijic and San Miguel as being gringo strongholds, writing how these places are not ‘real’ Mexico etc., I remind those writers that no one place suits everyone; and further that it is not necessarily a bad thing wanting to be with your own kind. But the controversy persists. Here on the Blog I write about The Good Life – with little direct defense against the likes of Ajijic.
While my readership meets or exceeds (thank you Global Post) that of Mexconnect these days (based on their readership statistics where they sell advertising) you will find on this Blog that I take on the deeper and controversial issues without fear or commercial trepidation. Although my own nephew, just the other day, suggested that perhaps my writing had become tamer? Perish the thought!
We twisted in the wind in the early days about exposing the value of being here – we’re here, now close the door.
Over time I have come to realize that throngs of foreigners moving here really isn’t a major worry as truth be known our little slice of paradise is not everyone’s taza of tequila. It seems almost as many people that have come here have left – some running.
Maybe we 200 or 300 expats in the area really do want to be alone? Attempts at expat social gatherings seem to have mostly failed. Makes me recall one of my favorite pieces of poetic justice written by Elinor Wylie:
Avoid the polluted herd,
Shun the reeking flock;
Live like that stoic bird
The eagle on the rock
Great that – somthing I wish I had written first, but then Elinor passed on way too soon and 18 years before I was born. Her words in the poem, “The Eagle and the Mole“ reflect my feelings on the need for seclusion.
We had a punch list of what we wanted in a new location low those many years ago, about ten now. Being away from people of the United States wasn’t on any of our lists – the three of us each had his own. After a career in the entertainment industry you might imagine how one could develop a need for seclusion.
If in the eagle’s track
Your sinews cannot leap,
Avoid the lathered pack,
Turn from the steaming sheep.
The Mexconnect author writes, “A far more magical place is Xico, a few miles south of Coatepec. It has the feel of a pueblo, not a suburb. Its further distance from Xalapa has staved-off development.” This is arguable, but certainly holds true for its quantity of expats – there are but few.
You have but to mill around past entries of this Blog to understand why we are here. Mexico and most certainly its State of Veracruz are not for everyone looking to escape Canada and the United States.
Xalapa (Coatepec & Xico) versus Ajijic (San Miguel de Allende, Cuernavaca, Chapala and Puerto Vallarta). A silly debate really.
There was little in the article’s summation that explained the writer’s decision on the debate. The article goes on to say, “These self-anointed Jalapeños seem more independent than expats who settle elsewhere in Mexico.” Perhaps?
Different strokes for different folks will always be a fact. I find no need to defend or espouse the reasons why we are here. I will defend the rights of others to be someplace else in any debate on ‘what is the best place to live’.
In the mean time stick around to learn more about this side of paradise. It is going to be near 80 today and still warmer tomorrow. We welcome the sun and you with open arms. Stay Tuned!
Acamalin wins second place for longest operating restaurant in Xico, Veracruz (operating for 26 years). The Acamalin (AH-KOM-A-LEAN) restaurant gets its name from the prominent hill landmark seen southeast of town. Also sometimes called “Xico Mountain” or “Cerro de Xico”.
Acamalin Hill in Xico, Veracruz (Pico de Orizaba Reins Supreme on Rgiht)
Rafael Tomas Gómez Fuentes and his lovely esposa Doña Guadalupe Caballero Lopez, the proprietors, were having dinner together as we entered the eatery last night.
Acamalin Restaurant #40 V. Carranza Street, Xico
Senor Gómez a tall Mexican man with an infectious smile greeted us. He recognized us as we have frequented Acamalin a number of times over the last five years. He listens intently and took the time to answer all our questions completely.
Restaurant Acamalin was originally located on Hildalgo, Xico’s main street. A collapsed roof caused them to relocate to their residence at number 40 V. Carranza calle (street).
Three and a half years ago they built the restaurant addition to their residence creating a warm, charming homey atmosphere.
Acamalin Front Room - Senor Gómez Enjoying Dining at Home (The Acamalin)
We like to sit all the way to the back room of the several dining areas. There, you will find large glass windows opening to a lovely garden area.
Dining Room with a Garden View
This night Anita and I both had trucha (trout) entrées. Fish = brain food.
I counted a total of 6-ways to have trout. Anita had “Trucha Frita O Filete con Ensalada y Papas” (Trout fillet – fried with salad and French fries). I had “Trucha O Filete con Champiñones y Queso Manchego” (Trout fillet – with mushrooms and Manchego cheese). Mine included salad as well.
An empanada like hors d’oeuvre filled with beans was served as well as small cups of Verde. The green sauce served with the empanadas is scrumptious. The trout entrees replete with head and tail were very good. We agreed mine was the better of the two; we are not major fried food fans.
Complimentary Verde Liquor & Delicioso Green Sauce
The mushrooms and herbs as well as the Manchego cheese were a delectable combination with the tender white trout “meat.” Anita and I debated the fact that the mushrooms were canned. I thought for such a fine preparation natural mushrooms would have been tastier.
My one real criticism was the tortillas were the masa mix variety. You may have read my recent tortilleria entry. I am spoiled and much prefer the ground corn kernel tortillas. El Campanario Restaurant just down the road actually has a mujer making handmade tortillas on the spot. I would have been happy with the fine machine made tortillas made from real ground corn masa.
After dining Doña Guadalupe Lopez proudly showed us her well supplied cocina (kitchen). They were well set-up with a great commercial stove and lots of stainless steel. It was exceptionally clean and well thought out.
Doña Guadalupe Lopez in her Kitchen (ENLARGE HERE)
Don Gómez explained that originally his grandmother was the original chef. Both he and his wife had careers in business, but opted to be restaurateurs. Doña Guadalupe learned the trade from the grandmother and then later attended la escuela de cocina (cooking school).
More in the Kitchen – A Pot of Mole (ENLARGE HERE)
In summary the comfort food is very good to excellent. The ambiance is warm and the owners and help are cordial. Street parking is ample. Overall I give the restaurant 4 out of 5 stars. It gained a ½ star for its very reasonable prices (Menu Here) and very gracious owners. Anita had a glass of mora (blackberry wine) and I had a Negra Modelo beer as well as the entrees for 200 pesos ($16 US) plus propina (gratuity). HIGHLY RECOMMENDED. Buen Provecho – Stay Tuned!
Old and macho hardly resonate. I am some of both; more the former than the latter. Hypermasculinity runs rampant here in Mexico.
The charm, if there is any to be had and the repugnance of Mexican machismo are ambiguous and while an identifying characteristic of this nation it certainly is not exclusive to Mexico. The other side of this is hembrismo which breathes life into macho conduct; are both characteristics obtained by way of inheritance from one’s ancestors?
The real man seems vital and necessary in times of crisis; no time like the present. We seem to be living in a time of cowards – terrorists and drug lords are certainly that.
Macho and coward resonate when I think of a man beating a woman – a more cowardice act does not exist.
There are aspects of the Mexican machismo character I can overlook.
When my Mexican friends are demanding this and that be brought to them by their wives and mothers – I write this off to bad habits passed from father to son for many generations here in Mexico. I know these hombres possessing such behavior truly love their wives – they simply know not better.
However nothing legitimizes or excuses the oppression of women in my book. I continue to argue bad behavior does not have cultural boundaries.
The other day the Guapa Esposa Senora Calypso reported a disturbing story about one of her friends in the Hood. As you must know by now here in Mexico it has been unusually cold – record lows are being recorded.
Anita encountered a friend that was wearing socks and flip flops (or are they thongs – not ropa interior. She asked if other more suitable zapatos were perhaps wet from all the rain. She went on to remarked how very cold her feet must be.
“I have no other shoes” replied her friend.
We know her husband well – a very macho hombre. After a six-day work week on any Sunday he can be found up the street drinking aguardiente with a cast of characters – passing a bottle in a plain brown paper bag to share with his homeboys.
“At least you have a warm scarf” Anita suggested heating up conversation beyond the sadness of being virtually shoeless.
“It is not mine. I borrowed it.” The young mother of two replied.
I recalled her husband had recently bought a fancy blue wheelbarrow. And I remembered seeing him the other day in new shiny black shoes – the one’s squared off like someone had taken a machete and hacked off the space beyond the toes – stylish barrio attire.
I grumbled, “Machismo so and so…”
I said at the beginning of this I am not without some macho qualities. Anita feeds me and does my wash. She mothers me a bit when I am feeling sick or a little low.
I fix the car and light the water heater in the cold and empty and wash the compost toilet bucket. Our tasks are not equal – they are very male/female sorted – different. There I am still my father’s son and perhaps can do better (note: possible New Year’s resolution here).
I am not an admirer of macho behavior. I am angered at my friend who has new tools and shoes while his wife’s toes are purple cold in thongs.
I had another friend who beat his wife; something his daddy had taught him. She left him with their two children for a year. She has returned and is pregnant with number three. I pray he has changed his ways.
Like Mexican men, Mexican women have their own culturally dictated ideal to follow. Hembrismo, or extreme submission by females to males, is at work at the same time machismo urges men to seize power and show off their Mexican virility.
Hembrismo describes the moral and spiritual superiority of the woman over the man. “If the male is motivated by conquest, the female is motivated by honor and reputation. Her place in Latin society is defined as upholding such honor and reputation”.
The hembrismo is supposed to be submissive and very patient with her husband. She is known for the kind intercession that she makes between her son and the cruel father. When the husband engages in extra marital affairs, this moral superiority is demonstrated when the wife looks past the moral failure of her husband. We see this played out amongst our Mexican friends.
There is a classic Joni Mitchell line “I know you don’t like weak women/you get bored so quick/and you don’t like strong women/’cause they’re hip to your tricks”
OK nothing you would attach to an e-mail signature in hopes of exuding profundity, but if the shoe fits….Macho Man are you getting this?
Here in Mexico there is a sense of the world as a jungle where friendship is transient, danger is everywhere and one can never have enough power. This is the classic rationale for macho conduct. Sadly this quickly extends to ugly selfishness and care-less behavior.
Husbands love your wives! Men love your women! Being a real man includes caring and protecting your loved ones – first and foremost. There is something very macho about having a secret decent streak I think. It is way past time to combine probity with vitality.Stay Tuned!
Anita was looking out the window while doing the mornings dishes when a bright yellow bird zoomed past and banged into the block wall separating us from the neighbors. The song lyrics say, “Yellow bird up high in banana tree.” – Not today.
Immediately thereafter two or three large black birds in hot pursuit landed in the yard.
Anita called to me rapidly firing off a description of the scene through her window. I hurried out to see if I could save the yellow bird.
Quickly on the scene the black birds scattered; the yellow bird hovered close against the bottom of the block wall.
Yellow Bird
Before Space Music there was Exotica and before that faux-Polynesian. These musical genres all had a common thread, that of taking you off to mystical places – sunny beaches and blazing sunsets to soaring through puffy white clouds on flying carpets, somnambulant rhythms – the boundaries were only within the mind.
For those of you under 60 years of age stick with me – a little music appreciation here. I know school budgets don’t allow for such classes any longer.
I started my music career professionally in 1961-62 working at Mad Man Muntz’s 4-track cartridge company in Beverly Hills, California. My father was vice-president. For a couple summers I worked first installing stereo players in cars and then recording the duplicating master for the production of four-track cartridges.
In July of 1961 Arthur Lyman’s biggest pop single “Yellow Bird“, originally a Haitian song, peaked at #4 on Billboard. At Muntz Auto Stereo Lyman’s recordings, along with Spike Jones and Enoch Light albums were used to demonstrate and amaze – the broad spectrum sound stage of Stereophonic Recording.
I retrieved the bright yellow parakeet, easily nabbing it between my hand and the block wall – it bit at my fingers furiously – however its tiny beak could not dissuade me from my effort. I took the yellow bird in the casa and we found a box to place it in hopes it would calm down – you can imagine how disoriented the little yellow bird was at that point.
Born in Hawaii, Arthur Lyman in the fifties was the vibes player with 4 mallets in Martin Denny’s Exotica combo that played Honolulu’s Halekulani Hotel. After their chart topping success of “Quiet Village”, Lyman soon struck out on his own and became a musical star in his own right. He was a vital part of the tropical tiki trend, with his signature mellow marimba and echoing bird calls. Yellow Bird. Those vibes and marimbas along with the bongos, birds and jungle calls were scintillating – think the Tiki Room at Disneyland or dining at Don the Beachcomber’s restaurant.
Anita recalled that a family on the adjacent street had birds in cages along the wall high atop their second floor. She walked over to ask if they were missing a bird.
“How do you know we have birds?” the young woman asked.
“I can see the bird cages on the upper level of your casa from my cocina (kitchen) window.”
“We have lost no birds.”
An older woman appeared from the living quarters behind the counter of the tiny tienda that fronted the property. She said she had lost a bird. “I had three now only two in the cage.”
“What did the lost bird look like?” Anita asked.
“It was a mostly yellow bird with perhaps a few green feathers.” said the older woman – apparently the mother of the younger.
The two women accompanied Anita to our casa where they confirmed our now resting yellow bird was indeed theirs. I handed them the box. The asked if they should return the Bohemia Beer cardboard (only if it returns full I thought) “No that isn’t necessary.” said I.
I started thinking about how much I liked that Yellow Bird tune by Arthur Lyman and that I should try and find a copy since it was an integral part of my musical past. On a rainy day like this that exotic Polynesian music would be just the ticket out of here.
As the two ladies were leaving the older said with a smile to Anita, “I heard you were playing the part of a Magi passing presents around the Colonia.” A Magi refers to one of the three Wiseman that bore gifts to the baby Jesus.
“Yes.” Anita replied. We had distributed gifts in the neighborhood on Dia de Los Reyes.
The older woman pointed out that she had two young boys at home. Anita explained she was giving out gifts to the poorest of the poor that lived in wooden casas with dirt floors. This woman had a store front and a rather grand two story house. We think she understood.
They took the yellow bird home.
Thanks to Wayne and all the folks that contributed to The Warm Hearts Project. It certainly helped make it a more feliz Dia de Los Reyes (Three Kings Day) around these parts. Stay Tuned!
Two years ago about this time we wrote a Blog entry (Theory of Relativity) about how cold it was:
“The relative temperature here is COLD. At 8 AM it was 49 F or 9.5C
Surprisingly it is almost the same temperature in Pueblo, CO. although at night it is in the 20’s (-4 C)
46 F (8 C) was the coldest it got here overnight.
But 50 F / 10 C and colder is bone chilling ‘round these parts.”
That weather report was two years ago. Now in January 2010 we are experiencing a cold snap expecting some sub 50F temperatures tomorrow through the weekend.
A Yahoo headline this morning read, “Frigid weather hits Midwest, -52 wind chill in ND.” So we are not alone in all this. But for us living in Mexico, take away that “-“ and utter 52 F or 11 C and shoulder blades close, necks sink below collars and faces grimace. “That’s cold!”
Obviously not a lot of people in North America will have sympathy for our cold plight. Somehow even knowing that there are others suffering in far colder regions, I was unable to feel better about the current 60 degrees Fahrenheit (15.5 C) as I sit here with cold fingers tapping still colder keys.
Most have no heat what-so-ever here in the tri-city area (Xalapa-Coatepec-Xico) so sub-60F inside temperatures is common place this time of year. But for us sissy extranjeros we will retreat to our nine foot Lance camper blocked up on our Casita property in Ursulo Galvan and crank up the little forced air heater to 65 as the temperature goes low (maybe even 67F and live a little!).
I remembered that during my courting of Guapa Senora Calypso I had promised to always keep her warm – this vow was reiterated while we snuggled in front of a fireplace in Bend Oregon where we spent our honeymoon skiing and things.
I can tell by the look on her face when we got up to 57 F in the house that maybe I was slipping on that promise. So tonight we will head to the Lance camper and warm up – with our 20th anniversary not even cold I am bound and determined to back up that promise; and my butt to that force air heater. Stay Warm and Stay Tuned!
Our last entry asked Carlos Slim if he could hear me now after describing some difficult circumstances relating to our getting a phone line and dsl Internet installed. Well I am here to testify someone from Telmex was listening. I have to bring flowers and candy to get as much attention from my Guapa Senora.
Slim has been quoted as being unfazed by criticism: “When you live for others’ opinions, you are dead. I don’t want to live thinking about how I’ll be remembered.”
And yet Monday morning following my Sunday Blog entry I received comment from Jaime Duran working at Telmex in México City. Per his request I sent an email and by late afternoon I had an email from Telmex’s Head of Unit Quality in Customer Service in Mexico City. She asked me several questions which I stumbled through replying in Spanish via email. She emailed back:
“Mr. Calypso,
We thank [you for your] attention, your Spanish is very good….”
Thank you Google Translate.
Tuesday, our friend and neighbor in Xico SKYPE’d us in Ursulo Galvan to let us know Telmex was on the phone wanting to meet with us at our casa in Xico. We had given our friends phone number as a contact point when we were visiting the Telmex office in Xalapa.
We set up a meeting for 11 Am Wednesday at our casa there in town. A snazzy Telemex service truck pulled up in front at around 11 am. Two very serious, well dressed in Telmex uniform, employees came to check our line and connection quality in our casa.
After some checking they changed out the micro filter that the telephone and modem plug into (the dongle). They also changed our line down the road from a secondary feed to a primary in order to assure a clean signal.
It was pointed out that our two newly purchased Emerson telephones were noisy and should be returned to where we bought them in the U.S. – not sure about that since they sell essentially the same phone “Telefono Trim Class” in their Xalapa office.
Two Telemex Professionals in Our Living Room
The two men answered my Internet speed questions and seemed to be checking our connection carefully. Later someone called to ask about connection quality and still later one of the two fellows came again to check on things. He said they were calling and there was no answer. We explained we were out. And that we didn’t realize there was a need for us to be here. We had been distributing Three Kings gifts to some ninos in the Hood as today January 6th is THE day for gifts to the Mexican children.
The serviceman called and was called back and all was good. We had been showered with attention. In all instances the Telmex people we encountered have been professional and polite.
All this checking of lines and equipment was a surprise as our complaint centered on the details of the process of acquiring a telephone line and a WIFI modem in hand.
The questions that had been emailed were in fact all related to that process. I am in hopes we will hear more about that. But, we certainly got Telmex’s attention. We now know they are listening – or at least reading this Blog Did you know Carlos Slim is dating Queen Noor the Queen Mother of Jordan? I think they make a nice couple. Stay Tuned!
