Way behind

Hi all. I'm way behind on posting because our Internet connection has been spotty, and I've been fairly busy. Last week was my last week of Spanish classes, and I decided to actually do some studying in the afternoons. As a result, I got a 90% on my final exam. The significance of this is minimal, but having spent most of my life as a student I would have been disappointed if I had received a low grade. This Spanish school offers one more level, which I may take, but not next month. I'm planning on spending the month of April taking art classes which, unlike these Spanish classes, do NOT start at 8:30 a.m.

There's so much I need to post on. We made a trip to Guanajuato, we are taking care of some incredibly cute little kittens, and we attended 2 exciting Semana Santa (Holy Week) events. Semana Santa is a very big deal here in San Miguel de Allende, and seems to start about 10 days before Easter. Schools are closed both the week before and the week after Easter, which our little munchkin is actually disappointed about. ("But I like school," she says.)

I'll go chronologically backwards and start with yesterday, Palm Sunday, which is called Dia de Ramos here. Palm Sunday, which all educated people know (I didn't), celebrates the entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem where He was welcomed by people carrying palms. There are two processions, although one of them occurs so early in the morning that the gringo newspaper we read doesn't even mention when, presumably because gringos are not capable of getting up that early. They're probably right -- I saw a sign about it on the bus which said that it started at 4 a.m.

It would have been nice to see, though, since that procession consists of a man portraying Jesus riding on a donkey followed by 12 apostles. Nevertheless, we chose to go to the later procession, which started at 10:30 a.m., and of course we took lots of pictures.

There were lots of palms of all sorts available. There were plain ordinary palm fronds, and all sorts of stuff made out of them:


Here's Indigo getting into the spirit of the thing:


The street that the procession came down was lined with palms, including these arches:


Almost every house on the route was decorated with palms and (mostly) red flowers, although these residents have taken some liberties with the color scheme:


The procession started with a guy setting off (very loud) fireworks. I suppose the cigarette is convenient if you've got to set off a rocket ever few minutes. Did I mention that occupational safety regulations were a little lax here?


Next up are the priest and altar boys and other palm-waving folks from La Parroquia, the main church here:


Apparently, it's traditional to throw rose petals all over the marchers:


One of the ladies with a basket of rose petals let Indigo throw a few:


The next few shots are of groups from various churches who marched in the procession, some with indigenous dress and swords and other exciting stuff:








The big event of the procession is this 18th century sculpture of Christ riding a donkey:




This priest is obviously one of those cool young priests whose job is to get the kids involved. You can't really see the group of kids in front of him, but he was exhorting them to cheer for Jesus, halftime-style, yelling (but in Spanish, not English) "Give me a J! Give me an E! Give me an S!," etc.


And, as in every parade, someone has to clean up afterwards:

La Comida

The food in Mexico, in general, is really good. The produce and the meat are much tastier than in the U.S., probably because it's not all bred to look good, be easy to process and be as cheap as possible. Of course, you can get an amazing variety of food in the U.S., but San Miguel de Allende, because it has so many foreigners, probably has a greater variety of stuff than anywhere else in Mexico except maybe Mexico City. There are lots of little gourmet and import grocery stores where you can get exotic foods like Thai rice noodles, brie, sesame oil, German ham, lox, etc.

This is one of the reasons we came to San Miguel de Allende -- here, you can be in a genuine Mexican city (as opposed to, say, Cancun, which might as well be in the U.S.) but not have to live without all the products that spoiled Americans like us hate to be without. Of course, there's no dim sum here, but there are compensations, like freshly squeezed orange juice on practically every corner. I am really getting spoiled by the OJ, which I buy for breakfast every morning. It's going to be hard to go back to Tropicana.

San Miguel also has stores all over town which make rotisserie chicken, and of course lots of tortillerias which churn out delicious fresh tortillas. So for lunch yesterday I had a piece of roast chicken with tortillas which were still hot and a perfect, sweet, yummy little avocado.

It's also going to be hard to go back to paying U.S. prices for food. The freshly squeezed OJ usually costs 10 pesos (80 cents) a cup, and there's even a little store near our house that gives you a whole liter for that price. A whole roasted chicken is $4, the avocados are about 15 cents each, and the tortillas are about a dollar a kilo. It's nice to be a "rich" American.

Today I found a place that sells pastes, which are descended from Cornish pasties. I bought two -- one was full of sweet, spicy, rich mole (the Mexican sauce that is made from chocolate, not the little weasely animal), and the other was full of melted cheese and sliced mushrooms. Pastes hail from the state of Hidalgo (which I visited once and remember as having absoutely nothing else to recommend to it except maybe a complete absence of gringos), so they are hard to find here.

Some Mexican foods are better to look at than to eat, though. I bought a box of these:



They are called obleas (wafers) and are pretty much tasteless except for the little bits of caramel and pumpkin seeds attached to them. I'm pretty sure that they're more or less the same as communion wafers. Brightly colored body of Christ, anyone?

More Cute News!

A double dose of cuteness today, you lucky readers! First, today was Dress Like a Pirate Day at Indigo's school. Of course, the school didn't actually tell us this until yesterday, so we had only limited time to prepare. However, with a little creativity and some black plastic, aluminum foil, cardboard and tape, we created a costume that spread fear into the hearts of the people of Mexico, as you can see from these folks who are shaking with terror as they innocently wait for the bus:



Well, maybe not. Anyway, Indigo and all the other little pirates at her school were extremely cute. I was amused by this collection of swords in the area where the school puts all the kids' possessions at the end of the day:



Our other cute news is that we are going to have kittens! We will be fostering 4 little newborns and their mama. The local animal shelter likes to place kittens with a family until they are old enough for adoption, mostly I think so that the mother doesn't go nuts locked in a cage with all those little sucking beasts (Moms among you can relate, I'm sure.) In about a week, when they're sure that everyone's healthy, we will get to take care of them for a month or so. Are they just the cutest little bundles of fur or what?

Estoy Leyendo

I have been reminded frequently of late that the best way to improve your vocabulary is to read. Since my Spanish vocabulary is rather lacking, I've been trying to read in Spanish, but it is slow going. I love to read; in fact it is my favorite form of entertainment, so it's hard to read something that feels like work. And reading in Spanish is definitely work, since I have to stop and look up every tenth word. BUt anyway I'm reading what was my Valentines Day present from Amy -- Harry Potter y el cáliz de fuego. I'm learning a lot of vocabulary, but some of it is not going to be very useful. For example, I don't think that anyone in Mexico will ever offer me any branquialgas (gillyweed), nor am I likely to run into a colacuerno húngaro (Hungarian Horntail). But, hey, you never know.

Una Fiesta

We were awoken at about 6 this morning by people shooting firearms and setting off fireworks. Today is El Dia de Los 33 Credos, one of a zillion holidays in the Catholic calendar here, in which Catholics are supposed to either pray about 33 beliefs, or else pray 33 times (I didn't quite get that part straight). Anyway, apparently it also means a fiesta with lots of dancing and tons of noise. And, because this is Mexico, it means that people get dressed up in Indian costumes and dance like the Aztecs presumably did. This is what it looked like:





It's fairly typical in Mexico that a Catholic religious fesival is also a celebration of indigenous culture. And so you find, in the midst of the feathers and animal heads, all the traditional Christian symbols:



There were 6 or 7 different groups of dancers in various parts of the plaza, each I think associated with a different church. All kinds of people were dressed up and dancing -- young, old, fat, thin, male, female, and several woman carrying their babies:


A few more images:








Here's a close-up of a costume:


And of a couple of dancers:




This group all wore those green pants and carried Mexican flags. And yes, that really is a Starbucks:


Here's a few more images of dancers:

Soy estudiante

I seem to have become something that I never intended to be again -- a student. I'm taking a Spanish class 3 hours a day, 5 days a week, for 4 weeks. It's exhausting, but I'm learning a lot.

There are a lot of Spanish schools in San Miguel de Allende, and I visited 5 of them and sat in on 4 classes before deciding which school to enroll in. The one I picked, the Academia Hispano Americana, seemed to be the most "serious" of them all. The other schools had classes in 3 levels -- beginner, intermediate, and advanced, whereas the Academia has 6 levels. The other schools are also a lot more flexible -- you can mostly join the classes anytime, you can take any number of hours per day, and the classes seem to focus mostly on conversation. However, the Academia only allows new students at the beginning of the month, you have to attend for at least 3 hours a day, and they spend a lot of time on grammar.

I can see why some people would like the flexibility of the other schools, but I decided that it was time for me to be more serious about learning Spanish. I've been trying to learn since I was in college, more than 20 years ago, and I'm still nowhere near fluent. I've taken umpteen conversation classes, and I think I do pretty well at talking to people, but I'm sure I'm saying everything incorrectly. So, a heavy duty focus on grammar is in order.

After several days of testing and experimenting, I am in the Level 5 class, which concentrates on the subjunctive tense. If you've ever studied Spanish, you know how confusing it is, since it's a tense that's rarely used in English. I think I'm getting the hang of it, but I'm glad I've got a month to work on it.

If you've gotten this far, I'm sure you'd like to see a photo. This is the Parroquia, a famous and oft-photographed church in the center of town. Like everyone else who has ever passed through this city, I felt obligated to take a picture of it:

Feliz Cumpleaños

Yesterday was Indigo's third birthday. They had a big party for her at school, which Amy and I attended. It was great, but I think I should let the photos do the talking:

First, the starlet waits for her party to arrive:


And the pizza and juice feast begins:


And then, the cake:


Afterwards, the toddler train heads outside for the piñata festivities:


Everyone waits (mostly) patiently for the piñata:


The birthday girl gets the first crack:


Others continue:


And, finally, the piñata breaks open and all dignity is forgotten in the scramble for candy:


Spiderman, his duty done, tattered, limbless, and broken, breathes his last.


Then, after presents:


And (somewhat grudging) hugs, the party is over:


Happy Birthday, Indigo!