Our Mexican Adventure

Our apologies for not writing a blog entry for close to two months. Unfortunately, we do not have a good excuse for our silence. We’re not even going to say that we’re lazy this time! We’ve just been living our daily life. Here’s a brief update…

In the first half of December, we were racing around trying to make sure things were in order to go on a two week trip back to Chicago for the holidays. We had to make sure our business was in order, our bills were paid, and someone would watch our cat, Mindy, while we were away. Little did we know that we’d hear about a 3 month old kitten in need of adoption. Knowing that Mindy was lacking a playmate, we adopted little Nanu. (She’s kind of like a little alien, so we’ll leave the explanation of the name for you to figure out.) Nanu has lots of energy, which Mindy isn’t too pleased about, especially since Nanu’s favorite game appears to be “Attack Mindy’s Tail.” Otherwise, they appear to be getting along just fine.

The later part of December, we were in Chicago. During our two weeks there, we managed to see many relatives and just a few friends. Unfortunately, we had presents to buy, and work to do, so we didn’t get to enjoy the city as much as we would have liked. The next time we visit Chicago, we plan to leave our work behind and make it an official vacation. Our scale is happy to inform us that we apparently managed to eat our fill of Italian Beefs, Vienna Beef hot dogs, and Chicago style pizzas while in town. Ah, the food is excellent here in Playa, but how we’d kill for a Portillo’s!

For New Year’s Eve, we had some friends (with children) in town, and wanted to keep the night rather low key. We planned on eating at El Oasis, because we were told they would not be having an expensive, New Year’s Eve menu. Unfortunately, when we arrived, we discovered that they were only serving a fixed menu for $90 per person. After a discouraging look elsewhere for cheaper fare, we ended up a few blocks away at La Famiglia, where we spent about $70 per person for their fixed menu. We love their pizza, but their New Year’s offerings were just okay. Bummer! After dinner, we raced out to the zócalo, where we were hoping for a big fiesta and possible fireworks to welcome in the New Year. We’re sad to report that we must have been the only ones who thought it would be fun to hang out in the town square for this celebration. I guess we managed to have our low key celebration after all!

We’ve had a number of visitors over the past few months, which is always fun. It gives us a chance to get out and experience the city and remember why we moved here in the first place. We’d just like to shout out to …

Jenni, Kyle, Pete & Sandy – You guys are wacky and you definitely know how to keep yourselves entertained. We never knew grocery shopping in a foreign country was such a treat.

Jenny & Laddie – We’re happy you two managed to get out of O’hare after Chicago’s biggest snowstorm in years. We hope you can stay longer next time.

Jen, Dan, Lewis, Josephine, and Isaac – Thanks for spending New Year’s with us. You showed us, by your example, that living in a foreign country was not only possible, but rewarding as well! John will let you know when he breaks the 20 second Speed Stack mark.

Loni, Pat, Max & Ian – Playing hooky from our jobs and spending time with you on the beach was a blast. We sure know how to build a good sand mound, don’t we?

Anyhow, we’ve had our hands full with the legal, accounting, and immigration issues involved with starting our small Internet and Computer Consulting company here, which will hopefully be the subject of another post soon. In the meantime, if you have suggestions on a good company name, please leave it in a comment. We’re looking for something that sounds witty in both Spanish and English. Thanks for you help!

Let’s Go Chicago Bears! We hope you crush the Colts in Superbowl XLI!

Hope all you Americans had a happy Thanksgiving! Here in Mexico, Thanksgiving is known as Acción de Gracias (literally action of thanks). But it’s more fun to say Feliz Día del Pavo (Happy Turkey Day).

We spent this Thanksgiving at the Playacar home of our friends, Michele and Rob, with over 100 other guests, spanning the globe from the U.S., Mexico, Argentina, England, Holland, and probably a few other countries. Everyone’s got something to be thankful for!

Aside from the large number of guests, this Thanksgiving was like many other Thanksgivings — excess, excess, excess. Eight turkeys, cranberry sauce, 4 trays of stuffing, 16 pounds of corn, 8 pounds of peas, 5 trays of potatoes (sweet, not sweet, mashed, all kinds), salads, carrots, pickled onions, tortillas and desserts filled a ping pong table doing double duty.

Before	After

But this Thanksgiving will be remembered for the not-so traditional Thanksgiving events. There was the fire in the smokehouse (okay, that one might be a tradition for some). Then there was the pea challenge, where Tracy the tourist was challenged to eat the leftover peas (about 4 or 5 pounds worth) for $500 USD. She wisely gave up after about a quarter pound.

And the best part of this Thanksgiving was that our friend DJ (seriously injured in a recent motor scooter accident) was able to join us. He was released from the hospital a few days ago, and is well on the road to a full recovery.

We have much to be thankful for!

More Thanksgiving pictures here.

November 1st & 2nd in Mexico mark the Days of the Dead or Los Dias de los Muertos. Despite the somber name, the Days of the Dead are a time to remember and celebrate the lives of departed loved ones. The souls of departed children are thought to visit on November 1st, while adult souls visit on November 2nd.

To entice and please the souls, altars are set up mostly in private homes. Candles and incense are lit to guide the way for the souls. The altars are decorated with photos of those who have passed, marigolds (the traditional Day of the Dead flower), pan de muerto (bread of the dead), sugar skulls inscribed with names of the departed, and foods and beverages preferred by the deceased. We’ve seen Burger King burgers, plates of enchiladas, and bottles of Coca Cola and tequila. Once a visiting soul has enjoyed a favorite meal, he or she may wish to partake of a familiar pastime. So, you will often see cigarettes for a smoker or toys for a child on altars.

Another Day of the Dead tradition is the visit to the cemetery. Family members of the deceased come to clean and decorate their graves. Often November 1st is reserved for grieving at the gravesite, while November 2nd is reserved for celebration at the grave. Families will bring picnic baskets and booze, celebrating and toasting to their departed loved ones.

Globalization and NAFTA have brought an increased interest in plastic pumpkins and Dracula costumes, and, some think, less interest in traditional Day of the Dead customs particularly among Mexican youth. These traditions are a wonderful way to connect with departed loved ones, and we hope they will continue for a long time.

Hope all you Americans had a fun Halloween! Although Halloween is not traditionally celebrated in Mexico, globalization has brought the concept of trick-or-treating to Mexican children. What kid can resist free candy? We came across these cuties trick-or-treating last night.

As many Mexican adults have not embraced the American tradition of dressing in costumes on October 31, there are very limited costumes available for purchase. This forces adult costume enthusiasts to get creative. Being way more right-brained than left-brained, we were a bit intimidated. But thanks to some inspiration from our Halloween fanatic friend Heather (aka Marilyn Monroe), and the creative genius of Heather and Sarah (aka Carmen Miranda), we made some pretty cool pirates. As you can see, the pirate theme turned out to be quite popular!

See our Halloween gallery for more pictures.

You like us, you really like us! After we did some whining in our last blog entry, many of you left comments and sent private e-mails. Thanks, guys. We feel better now, good enough to finally finish up the story of our journey back to Playa del Carmen. It’s been dragged on long enough.

The next stop on our planned itinerary had been Laguna Catemaco, a lovely lake area in the state of Veracruz, mostly undiscovered by non-Mexicans. But after all we had endured on this trip – traffic jams, unexpected detours, getting lost in one of the world’s largest cities, unscrupulous policia – we just wanted to get home to Playa del Carmen as soon as possible. Can you blame us?

So, we set out for an eight-hour drive to the city of Villahermosa in the state of Tabasco, comforted by our familiarity with this stretch of highway and with our destination city. This would be our third time in Villahermosa, not because of any love for the city, but for it’s status as the only city on a very long stretch of road. Our first pass through this city set us off on a wretchedly desperate hunt for cat-friendly lodging and eventually ended in a wretchedly desperate room. However, in our second pass, we discovered the motor inns mentioned in Back in Mexico.

In our limited Mexican motor inn experience, Villahermosa’s “Motel Costa del Sol” is the best of its’ kind. The drive through registration and private garage attached to your room is designed to give the utmost privacy for your clandestine interludes or, in our case, for sneaking in pets. And for the low price of $30, we enjoyed a king-sized bed, cable TV with the … uh … premium channels included, tasty room service dinner at an added fee, and one … uh … protective device gratis. We vegged, watching a Tom Hanks movie and Desperate Housewives. By morning, we felt refreshed and ready to move on to the city of Campeche.

Campeche is a seaport town with many colorful buildings, giving it a bit of a Caribbean feel. But the first thing we noticed as we drove through Campeche was the stares — from men whose dress pegged them as laborers. We have traveled through many Mexican cities, eaten in local restaurants, hung out in local bars, encountered Mexican laborers, business people, students and others, but never have we been stared at like that. Despite being obvious gringos, we rarely even garner a second glance. Were they menacing stares? Curious stares? We never did solve the mystery. And subsequent Google searches for such phrases as “Campeche stares” proved fruitless.

Despite being the low season in Campeche, we found that the gringos with the cat were unwelcome at hotel after hotel. We would try one last hotel, and if they wouldn’t take us, we were moving on to Merida. As luck would have it, the friendly folks at the recently renovated Hotel Lopez decided to take a chance on us. We parked the car in the hotel’s lot a block away, and made several trips transporting our kitty and all her kitty stuff, John’s bike, and all the other stuff that was piled on top of our car back to our room. The hotel room that was on the third floor all the way in the back of the hotel! No elevator! Exhausted, we headed out for a relaxing dinner and then explored Campeche a bit.

We found the pleasant zocalo, but all the action appeared to be on the malecon (boardwalk). Stretching for two miles, Campeche’s malecon is clean and full of walkers, runners and bicyclists. Although Campeche fronts the ocean, there are no watersports, and signs warn water enthusiasts of the polluted water. But we were content to just stroll along people-watching and admiring the sometimes quirky sculptures.

Although we enjoyed Campeche, we were anxious to get this trip over with and get back home to Playa del Carmen. So, after one night, we found ourselves transporting all our crap from the hotel room back to the car again. Loaded up, we were so ready to exit the parking garage and be home in six hours. But things don’t always go according to plan. Crunch! In our hurry to get home, we forgot to make sure that John’s bike would clear the garage exit. Crap! What else could go wrong on this trip?! John said: “Bad things happen in threes.” 1. Mexico City debacle, 2. Puebla policia, 3. Campeche bike crunch

Instantly, about five or six men (the aforementioned laborers) converged on our car, clamoring over each other trying to help us. Honestly, we would have preferred to handle it ourselves, but they were anxious to earn a propina (tip). One of the guys un-wedged the bike from the roof, earned his tip, and they all ran off. But it wasn’t over for us. We were left with a damaged bike, a dismantled and partially damaged roof rack (with the roof rack instructions somewhere in Chicago), and a damaged garage roof.

When John asked the garage owner if he could reimburse him for the damage, the guy looked at him like he was nuts and adamantly refused. One problem taken care of. Upon further examination, only John’s bike seat sustained damage. His bike would survive. Yay! Problem two solved. Now, on to problem three — the roof rack. Viewing the mess we had created, we at first entertained the notion of just cramming everything into the back seat with our poor kitty who was now meowing earnestly in the 100 degree heat. Instead, John put his spatial relations skills to use, and patiently and methodically rebuilt our roof rack despite missing a few parts.

We re-loaded our stuff (bike temporarily left off) onto the mended roof rack, and cautiously left the garage. Six hours later, our roof rack and our sanity remained intact as we rolled into Playa del Carmen. It’s good to be home!

More Campeche Photos