Hm

I wonder what I was thinking...maybe if I just ignore it, it would have gone away?

But, when I glanced up at my Bookmark bar, there it was, the link to my blog.

I promise to put something up here sooner than later. We've been busy here in Zacatecas, and far afield. Our stay is coming to a rapid close too, and it's been a bit hard to think about.

See you soon.

Oaxaca! part 3

One of the things that we were really looking forward to was a place called Monte Alban. About 15 mins from Oaxaca, it's an archeological site that has been excavated and is open for people to go see. About 2500 years ago, the locals (Zapotecs, I believe) sheared off the top of a mountain and built a massive temple/living complex on the resulting flat space. It served as a ceremony and living space for the upper class and priests. The working class people lived down in the surrounding valleys, going up the mountain for market days, religious ceremonies and protection in wartime. Up until sometime in the last 20-30 years, Monte Alban was overgrown, buried and barely preserved, though it had been excavated at various times throughout the 1900s. As our guide put it, "heepees" used to come camp out there all the time. These days, Monte Alban is a very well maintained site that is just overwhelming to see in person. Here's a photo that barely does it any justice:



The complex has a ball court, observatorium, sacrificial altar, carvings that are in amazing shape, statues and is on a scale that you just can't believe.

There's some more photos over there on the right of our Oaxaca trip, by the way.

Just a quick, positive thought...

A nice thing about being one of the few relatively long-term gringos here in Zacatecas is that once I've told my name to someone in the places I frequent, they always remember it: Starbucks, the laundry place, corner store, etc.
It feels good, like I belong.

Oaxaca, part 2

Like I said, we were staying in a great house, really close to the center of town. There's a good amount of stuff to see; the standard stuff, mostly - museums, plazas, churches, etc. The cathedral in Oaxaca is massive. Part of the complex houses an awesome museum that has lots and lots of neat stuff. There's a whole exhibit that comes from Monte Alban (huge archeological site about 15 mins from Oaxaca, more on it later), from one of the tombs that was excavated. There's a bunch of intricate gold artwork, beaded jewelry, and so on. Just really cool stuff.

The zocalo in Oaxaca, or the main square, is a beautiful tree and flower filled space with people sitting on benches, strolling around, or eating in one of the many cafes lining it's edges. Having a leafy plaza is truly one of the biggest things missing from Zacatecas. It was great to sit, drink hot chocolate (a Oaxacan specialty) and people-watch. It was a big shock, as it is every time we leave Zacatecas, to see how many foreigners there are around. Of course, it shouldn't have been that big a surprise considering it was over x-mas and New Years, but still. We also checked out the Ruffino Tamayo museum, which is a small, but impressive collection of pre-hispanic statues. It's interesting to me that Mr. Tamayo was very specific about how the stuff would be displayed down to every last detail. Worth a visit, at least because you get a really good overview of the stuff in a small space.

A cool surprise was when our host, R., told us about a classical music concert he was going to see with some friends. We headed down there to see if we could pick up some tix, and managed to get some - only 20 pesos! Seating was general admission and we got some great seats, towards the center-back of the pretty small theater. The orchestra was made up of musicians from the area who are now playing in symphonies all over the world, brought back to play a series of concerts in their homestate. Led by an Israeli conductor, of all people, it was a good evening of entertainment. We ended up skipping out a bit early to make it a restaurant that was closing on the early side. La Olla is a great place to eat, vegetarian friendly, and they use all kinds of good local ingrediants, cooked to perfection. Chile rellenos different from any other I've ever had, delicious salads, and so on.

There were lots and lots of awesome crafts, rugs, handmade everything to look at (and buy, to the great detriment of our bank account). A number of different outdoor markets were happening, and it felt we knew way too many of the people running them by the end, due to how much we bought. Oy. It's hard not to buy beautiful wool rugs, colored with natural dyes, soft as anything wool scarfs just being finished by the old Zapoteca, and shirts bursting with color and design like you just don't see elsewhere for so little. So buy them we did. One particular rug guy ended up being our go-to for such things. The two we bought, then the five others that our friends picked up the next week when we swung back through town. He gave us his contact info, and we had hoped to stop in at the workshop where his mother and aunt make the rugs in Teotitlan del Valle, but due to our rental car fiasco (more later), we didn't have the chance.

Oaxaca! part 1

It's been almost a month since I put anything up here, but for relatively good reason: we were away on an amazing trip down to the south of Mexico - down in Oaxaca.
You might be familiar with Oaxaca as one of the places that every would-be revolutionary/artistic type wants to visit when they come to Mexico (along with Chiapas). The people of the southern regions have always been all about not putting up with crap from the government (see E.Zapata, Commandante Marcos, 2006 demonstrations, others). It's also a center of rug-weaving, embroidery, pottery, and other textile-based art forms. The stuff they make is gorgeous, not to mention cheap.

We took the overnight bus to Mexico DF, killed a few hours in the city and then took another 6 hour bus to Oaxaca de Juarez (the city). I'm sure the scenery was nice, but I slept through pretty much the whole thing, so can't really speak to it.

We were super lucky to have a friend back in NY who's father lives in Oaxaca. R. had let us know that we could stay there anytime, and we took advantage. The small, but perfect house, is in a nice neighbourhood about a 15 minute walk from the zocalo. We had a bedroom with a bathroom that is right off the patio. It was great, because we weren't in his way (we hope) and we had some privacy too. The hospitality was just fantastic - breakfasts of fresh fruit, fresh yogurt, granola, locally-grown coffee (fresh-ground beans, of course), fresh eggs, and other fresh freshness. R. has a crew of friends who were all really nice also. The second night we were there, he had a holiday party and we met lots of good people both living and visiting Oaxaca. The next night, we were invited to a lovely dinner at another friend of his' beautiful house. Good times.

shades of last year

Well, here I am in Zacatecas (news alert!), trying to kill time while I wait for a backup to complete. One of the great, great things here has been that I've been learning spanish, as you know. Incredibly, I've been able to work out a deal with the spanish school so that I do computer work for them, and they give me a deal on classes. I don't think I'd have been able to stay in classes this long without such a deal, so it's been key.

And so, here I find myself, back aching, head dizzy from gas heating, occasionally frustrated from failed backups along the way, hating Windows with all my heart for it's virus-vulnerable self, and thinking about how a year ago, I was probably in a pretty similar situation. Arturo Jr's laptop has been limping along for some time with a nasty trojan living in his system, and no amount of utilities have been able to root it out. Finally, we decided to backup, format and reinstall the operating system. Boy, do I wish we could just install Mac OS. Does it have problems, sure. But, and I say this based only on my experience, not nearly as many.

I'll tell you though, I'm happy having something to do this afternoon that involves some slight skill that I have.

To Stare or Not to Stare...

Why the hell isn't that the question?? With the answer being NOT to stare!
Ok, I admit, I had been living in New York City for the past number of years before coming here to Zacatecas (google alert!), and NYC is one of the most culturally diverse cities in the world, if not the most. You can walk down the street in New York and see anything and everything, so after a while you get numb. Granted.

Still! What is it that makes people here stare sooo much? I really feel like I'm developing some sort of complex. It is literally impossible for me to walk more than 10 feet from my door without being stared at in an intense way.

Now - I understand that I'm a tall-ish gringo, and that there aren't that many around here, but it's not like I look particularly strange, do I?!?
(Please see 'complex, development of' above)
I mean, I don't have piercings, tattoos of any kind - much less something stareworthy on my forehead, a wacky haircut, or an extra limb. Yes, I have grey(ing) hair, but I just don't think that's it.

I walk along and folks just stop in their tracks - not in the 'hey, check out that stud' way, more like 'holy crap, you're not going to believe what I saw today - the craziest thing in the entire world' kind of way. It's not even like people try to be subtle about it either; No side-glance out of the corner of the eye, no quick turn-around right after passing me by, no effort made whatsoever to mask their open-mouthed and wide-eyed look.

A favourite of mine has got to be when they're walking towards me. They glance up slightly, as always, just to make it's not the money-giving-away guy, and then let their eyes fall back down. But wait - this guy is the most far-out freakishly insane person - nay, thing - that I've ever seen! I know what I'll do...stop in my tracks and stand very, very still. Then, when it can no longer see me, because I'm standing so still, I'll focus my gaze on it in an incredibly intense fashion.

That's right - it's common theory here that if a person, A, is standing very very still with their eyes, E, focused on an approaching object, B, then they bend the accepted laws of physics and become invisible, I. So, in mathematical terms terms, that's A+E B=I
I wish I had the heart to stop and say, "hey there, I can see you, you know". Or maybe not...I'm not sure I want to be responsible for BLOWING THEIR FREAKING MINDS.

I'm sure I'll have more to say about this particular subject...it's definitely something I think about constantly...ARRRRGGHHHH

Juices, creative and otherwise

Yes, it's that time of year, when people start to wonder about many things: When did summer end? Why am I not living somewhere warm, like Mexico? Why is it, now that I'm living in Mexico, I have to wear thermals, a wool sweater, a fleece, and a jacket in order to be warm?

Well, I'm sure there are plenty of answers to these questions, but they are way parallel to my pay grade, so won't get a proper response in this forum. Suffice to say, not all Mexico is created equal. Just last weekend, we went to Guadalajara for a couple days - about 4.5 hours away - and the temperature was drastically different. Not drastic in a purely numeral sense, but drastic in a more holistic sense. That is, we not only didn't have to wear all the same cold-weather gear we need here in Zacatecas, but we didn't feel the same chill deep down in our bones, that no amount of warm clothing can banish. T-shirts during the day, sweater at night...mmm. It just feels more happy.

And now, tonight, Hanukah will be here. Festival of Lights. La Fiesta de las Luces, or something like that. I imagine we'll be the only people in Zacatecas lighting candles tonight, and that's a little sad-like. Who knows, maybe far up on the Bufa a small, flickering light will shine forth that will announce to all the world that long ago, in a land far away, there was a miracle of oil that lasted for 8 days. On the other hand, it would probably be interpreted as some kind of drug gang signal and get shot at, or something. I wonder if the Maccabees had to deal with such problems.

Oh yeah, don't see 2012, no matter how much I say that it could be ok with all the cool special effects and stuff. And that it (briefly) mentions the Mayans, so how could we not see it?
I listened to me, and was pretty disappointed.

Annoying thing

People here just don't want to stop for people trying to crosthe street. I get pissed about this multiple times each day.

Just saying.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

spanish, hombre

learning the spanish is rough.
5 hours a day for 41/2 months.
tiring and my head is so full.
worth it, though, when i communicate with someone.

Fashion! Ooooooh.....Fashion!!

That's right - last night we went to the world-wide premiere opening of the first ever Fashion Week Zacatecas, right here in our very own - Zacatecas!

Fashion TV decided to showcase the silver-designing awesomeness of Zacatecas (Zacatecas!) and tape a full-on cat-walking fashion show in the same plaza that has hosted a hunger-striking torero (he wasn't getting enough bull-killing time).

Our friend E, a local impresario, scored us the tickets and there we were, but 30 feet from...the models feet! The weather, cold, was not our friend. Time passed and finally, the flat-panel TVs mounted all around came to life, with shots of the showcase city of the night; the center of fashion for just a few hours...New York City. What!?

Turns out that they had a gala party/awards ceremony sometime in the last couple weeks in NYC and they showed clips from it for a good 15 minutes, cutting back and forth to scenic shots of Zacatecas. I was pretty sure what the point of the comparison was - they're the exact same level of awesomeness.

Anyway, that ended and weak DJ music started thumping out of the huge speakers. The (famous?) model who was in the video living it up at Rockefeller Center, strolled out to absolute silence. Not one person clapped and she was a bit surprised. It was obvious that this wouldn't fly for the broadcast, so she was all like, I'm going to come in again and this time cheer! Second time was only barely better and I'm sure they'll be getting an applause track from somewhere.

The show started and the women busted out one by one: butterfly wings of all shapes and colors, worn with very small underwear. It wasn't obvious when one was meant to wear this sort of outfit, but I'm sure they'll be all the rage sometime soon.

The insect-inspired walk-off turned into a medley of designers, each showcasing really tall, hungry, greased-up women that have "that" look and a messed up walk. Here's a question: The fashion is the height of fashion. The women are the ultimate ideal. Is the walk the best walk ever? It looks terribly uncomfortable and, I believe, really unrealistic for hiking.

The cold got to be too much, and we left, our fashion adventure behind us like last years wardrobe.

The beach - Sayulita

So this past weekend, we had a pretty cool adventure.

We got some tickets to see The Killers in Guadalajara on Thursday night. We figured we'd make a weekend out of it, since we already were driving 4 hours there. We ended up renting a car with some people from here and drove down on Thursday afternoon. We had made plans to stay in Guadalajara that night and in the morning drive down to somewhere on the Pacific coast. We figured we'd find a cool town on the beach to get some serious sun and sand.

We got to Guadalajara with just enough time to shovel down a meal that, sadly, was one of the best I've had since we've been here. Sadly, because I would have loved to have more time to savor it, but oh well.

Me and M went over to the concert hall, a large auditorium that holds about 11,500. The place was totally crowded with more Killers shirt-wearing people than I had imagined. Our tickets were for the standing room only area right in front of the stage, which was really cool. We were up close and in the thick of it.

After the last couple songs from the opener, The Killers came out, and, I'll admit, totally shocked me with how good they were. I've heard their albums and am familiar with their big songs, but the live show was totally great. A pretty straight-forward rock band with good presence, good live renditions of their songs and an audience that couldn't have been more into it - the ridiculously massive cups of beer could have helped…

It's fun to see people singing along with songs in english when there's a good chance that they don't know what they're singing.

After the show, we met up with the others at an overwhelming bar of Cuban descent, where the music was too loud, and I just wasn't that into it. We headed back to the hostel, which was a pretty nice place. By the time we got back there, I was basically ready to crash, and so we did. It was the first time in a while that I slept in a dorm-style hostel room, but other than the terrible pillow, it wasn't so bad.

We spent a while navigating the one-way streets of Guadalajara, trying to figure out how to reach the Starbucks around the corner, and then got on the road. The hostel guy had given us some info about a town about 30 minutes north of Puerto Vallarta, called Sayulita. He said they have a cool place to camp right on the beach and that everyone he has sent there was happy with what they found. Seeing as how we didn't really have any other ideas, we made that our destination.

We chose to drive what's called the autopista - a toll road that turned out to be freshly paved, straight and relatively empty of cars. It made for a fast, comfortable drive - or at least as fast as our crappy rental car could go. The road passes through some of the most amazing scenery that I've seen in a long time, if ever. Huge, beautiful, green mountains, lush countryside with fields of blue agave growing - at least in Jalisco, where tequila comes from, deep valleys with farms, small pueblos, large fields of black volcanic rock….and so on. Just awesome, especially coming from the high mountain deserts of Zacatecas. The weather also started to change in a good way. By the time we hit the last toll and pulled over for a bathroom break, I needed to change into shorts, tshirt and flip-flops - the temperatures were up close to 90 degrees. Definitely a welcome change from the 50s and 60s of Zacatecas.

After driving for a while after leaving the toll road, and being extremely excited to see the ocean after 3 months (longest I've ever gone without seeing it…) we finally saw the sign for Sayulita. Driving down a smallish, barely paved road, we pulled into town and immediately saw lots of surfer dudes and dudettes carrying boards, walking barefoot and spending lots of dollars.

Signs of it being a small town, no matter how expensive or full of USers: a road bisected by a stream that had to be driven through, no big hotels in sight, nor any condos that were obvious.

After getting a few beers to temper the long-and-crowded-car-ride jitters, we found the camping place and "checked in". It seemed that they were doing some upgrades to the place, so it was kind of like camping in a construction site, to some degree. It was right on the beach, however, so it worked out just fine. As we found out, this was no cheap town, but rather the prices were more on par with the US - they even had ATMs that gave out US dollars. Oy.

After getting our tents set up, and our bathing suits on, we hit the beach for a couple hours, mostly sitting at one of the little restaurants right on the sand. M was about as happy as she could be, finally getting to eat some fresh whole fish, just caught that morning. The water was as warm as bath water - just perfect as far as I was concerned.

Once night fell, we ate again, walked around some and ended up chilling in the town square, beers in hand. The cops didn't seem to care at all, since they just mentioned it once and then didn't bother us again. We were talking to a couple guys we met who were about to open a restaurant in town and ended up going back to their place for some food and drinks. Cool. Most people we met were pretty friendly. It was weird - like in San Miguel - to hear so much english being spoken. It was even almost a bit annoying to go into a store and have the workers talk to me in english. I definitely prefer to try and deal in spanish.

The next day, we got up, hit the beach, and didn't leave until much later. I took a surf lesson (!) which was absolutely fantastic. I was up on my feet my very first try, and rode about 10 waves before my arms gave out. I had no idea just how arm-strength intensive it was. I'm probably really ripped right now, so watch out.

Surfing was really really fun, and I can't wait to do it again. It was slightly intimidating, because there's all these rules and stuff, that aren't exactly clear, and people can get pretty worked up about them. Oh yeah - dealing the US-woman who owns the surf place I went to was interesting - she was slightly racist-seeming, going on about these people this, and these people that…talking about their no-good work ethics, and low levels of morality.

Hm.

After the lesson, I spent a few hours boogie-boarding, which is a lot easier, and pretty fun too. The waves were good-sized, and allowed for some fun rides.

The next day, it was up, packing and on the road. I ended up driving most of the 9 or so hours, which actually wasn't bad at all. The weather got progressively colder, and by the time we were home, the warm was gone and the cold was back.

Next week, we're back to the coast of Sinaloa for work, so stay tuned...

Preguntas/Questions

Here's a bunch of questions I could have gotten from you, my listeners, but didn't:

How was Aguascalientes this past weekend? Has it gotten any better since the you were there last and declared it one of the worst places you've ever visited?

What's the deal with Dia de los Muertos down there in Mexico?

How's spanish school these days? Have you started any technical grammatical analysis yet?

Now, in order, the answers:

Aguascalientes - a city about 2 hours from Zacatecas - was ok, I guess. We went for the Festival de Calveras, or Festival of Skulls, an annual shindig to celebrate Dios de los Muertos. We had checked out the schedule beforehand and seen that there was going to be an Israel pavilion and some bands from Israel playing, so we decided to go. We stayed at a crappy, but clean hotel on a street that's just begging to have more happening but there just isn't enough...people, bars, restaurants...I don't know.

Anyway, Aguas is totally flat and pretty uninteresting. There's a very few cool things to see - the Palacio del Gobierno is a beautiful building with a ton of murals painted all over the inside, there's a big cathedral which looks like...a big cathedral, and the Sanborns has a nice awning, which may or may not be of Art Deco design.

Yeah, that's about it.

For shopping, there's a lot of stores to check out. It seems, however, that most of the stores carry the kind of crap that you see occasionally and wonder, "where the hell did they get that thing?" It turns out that Aguascalientes is just the place to go shopping for that crap. The shiny, the strange, the miniature, the fake-looking, the that-reminds-me-of-something-else. In short, the knick-knack, the tchochke, the chingadera.

They have it all.

As for the festival, well, it was ok. There weren't any stands set up selling stuff like at the big fair here in Zacateas, which was just fine. The Israel pavilion consisted of a bunch of pictures (clearly skewed Christian for the audience), some bottles of wine (to show up the crappy Mexican wines?) and some heavily pop-rock influenced klezmer band. They didn't even have any felafel or anything. Lame.

Highlights of Aguascalientes: Trees, fresh ground coffee from beans grown in the south of Mexico, a bakery that sells only whole-wheat products where they had a close approximation to the bread that my mom makes and I sorely miss, and the fact that it's only two hours to get home.

Wow. I hope I don't have to go back.

Dia de los Muertos is a holiday on November 2, preceded by All-Saints Day and Halloween. It's one of the indigenous holidays that was mixed up with Christianity when the Spanish conquered the area. They figured that if they could blend some indigenous stuff with Christian stuff, the natives would be a lot more amenable to converting. It seems to have worked.

They celebrate by having lots of skulls and skeletons around, eating sweet bread and candy and visiting the graves of loved ones. They go to the graves to clean them, adorn them flowers, and basically hang out with the souls of those who have passed on. One of the ideas is that death isn't the end, but rather passing on into another stage of existence. The go to put food, drink, flowers, play music, etc so that the souls come back to visit and are stoked to see their favourite stuff waiting for them. I think it's a nice thing to see whole families doing all this work around the graves, adults and kids alike. It seems like it fosters a good relationship with the idea of death - that's it's not necessarily something to be scared of, but just another part of the big picture.

Good stuff.

Spanish school is good, and yes, we have started in on some technical grammatical analysis in fact. Kind of weird/creepy that you knew to ask that, as we just started today, but whatever....

I'll have to get back to you on what it entails - I'll keep you posted.

weekend weekend

what a weekend of cultural experience.

I bumped into our friend Shirani and he said that he was going to a concert of this band, Infected Mushroom. Turns out, they're Israeli, so we obviously had to go. I mean, the Jewish population of Zacatecas would be at least double what it normally is on any given weekend, and we had to be there.

The show was called for 8pm, but with some openers, so we figured if we got there at 10pm, the main act would be coming on. Showing up at the Dome (or whatever the concert venue is called), we see a really long line wrapping around the parking lot. There must be some mistake...it's close to 10:30 and all these people haven't gotten in yet??

We get in line and we don't move more than 20 feet in about 20 minutes. After a quick reconnaissance mission, we realize that there's literally one guy at the entrance who's patting everyone down. This was inefficient, slow, and we should have known.

Finally getting inside, there's a decent crowd of people milling around. There was a VIP section right in front of the stage, fenced off and filled with tables, chairs and couches. I think this was not a good idea for a show at which people are meant to dance, but ok. There was a DJ going through his set - decent, but definitely not great. It really seems that it's just too easy to be a mediocre DJ. I mean, beats dropping, crowd energy wasted...just not that great.

Weird thing #1: On the big projector screen on stage, behind the DJ was playing massive advertisements the whole time. Why not have trippy video instead?

After the first few DJs, and close to midnight, we finally asked someone working there when the main act would come out. Oh, after 7 DJs, he said. Probably close to 1:30.

Oh.

At that, I went to the bathroom - again. The beer was running through me at lightning speed and with each trip to the urinal costing 3 pesos, I ended up spending almost as much on that as I did on Coronas. The wall towards the back of the venue that everyone else seemed to be using looked pretty nice by the end.

Awesome Idea #1: We wrote a note in hebrew and gave it to the security guy by the stage entrance to pass along to the band. We told him that we know them from Israel and wanted him to pass the note on to their manager or something. In the note, we wrote that we told the security people that we know them. We said we're the only Jews in Zacatecas, and because of that, they should call us and do some partying. Awesome Idea, no phone call. Oh well.

So finally this Israeli band comes on, and they're decent, at least. Not sure if they were worth waiting 3 hours to see, but good enough to get some dancing done. It was cool, for sure, to hear some hebrew being sung right here in good ol'Zacatecas.

New York, New York

That's right folks, we were in the Big Apple for about a week - sorry we didn't have the chance to hang out. If you saw the post below, you'd know why.

It was definitely interesting going back there, even though it'd only been about 3 months since we left.

There were a bunch of things that stuck out in my mind as part of the culture-shocking. Here's two of them:

First, there is nothing like drinking water straight from the tap. Down here, we use purified water (delivered weekly in big jugs) for absolutely everything from drinking to tooth-brushing to cooking. It's just such a luxury to walk over to the sink and fill up a glass of water (or put my mouth under the tap, as I'm wont to do). I really didn't miss the feeling of "damn...no more water and there's no where to buy any now, so I won't be drinking anything until morning..." or kicking myself for rinsing my toothbrush off in the sink, rather than with the bottled water. I mean, I did have typhoid and all, and they did tell me that even just that little bit of water from the sink could have caused it...

Second (and this is an interesting one) is the total lack of diversity in Zacatecas, if not all of Mexico.

I mean, you walk around New York City and you see someone from literally everywhere. Every color, every accent, every everything (not to mention all their food too...mmm). Here, we are the diversity. Everyone is Mexican and us gringos provide all the "different" there is to see. Of course, I am discounting to some degree the huge variety of different peoples in Mexico - there's a lot of indigenous people here - but it just seems like we're the ones who look different.

Other things: english, while strange to hear in Zacatecas and definitely worth turning around to see who's talking, is common in many neighborhoods in NYC. It's rarely worth turning around.

Celebrities in New York I saw: Mario Batali with his trademark orange crocs and Chelsea Clinton, whom we sat next to at a restaurant.

Bagels, pizza, coffee, vegetables, etc. Yes. Yes. Yes.

We walked through the farmer's market in Union Square the other day and one thought kept coming to me. If there's no typhoid in any of the produce, where does the excitement come from?? I mean, without that risk every time you take a bite, is eating even fun? I hope I'm not ruined forever on food that doesn't carry at least a small chance of getting me violently ill.

a week

so here's what's up -

Last week, we were trucking along here in Zacatecas and got some sad news that M's grandmother would likely not live much longer. While not sick, per say, she was about 100 years old and just not able to keep going. I will say that I have only met two people of that age that were as with it (or more so) than people half that age - strangely enough they were both M and my grandmothers. Reading the NY Times everyday, watching TV, movies, sports, keeping up on current affairs...wow

We decided to fly home (?) to New York to see her and be with the family. Luckily we were there for about 5 days before she gave out and were able to spend some time with her. It was just amazing how

aware she was of everything and everyone around her. She knew perfectly well that we came from Mexico to see her (she asked if were learning spanish and offered to teach us hungarian) and couldn't have been happier.

She also knew exactly what was happening with her and seemed very well prepared. This was a first experience for me in that there didn't seem to be a tragedy in death - for some reason it just didn't seem like the same sadness you would expect. The sadness was there, of course, because a wonderful woman wouldn't be with us anymore; because her family would miss her terribly; because she had a particular way of being that is rare to see - especially in a woman who lived through so much and who lost so much. She just seemed to have an incredible sense of clarity and dignity about the process.

It was truly an inspiring thing to see. She will be missed.

Today

We went for a walk today, to a part of Zacatecas that we'd never seen. Called La Encantada, there's a small man-made pond, trees, a jogging path, zoo, bbq picnic areas, concert stage, geodesic domes, ducks, and...lots lots more. It was so great to hang out on a grass lawn under a bunch of trees.

The zoo is kind of depressing, however. There's a lot of animals in small cages who would definitely be much happier elsewhere - much like zoos many places, I imagine.

We also found a sports center that has an awesome pool. We want to think we're going to join. Go team.

Tomorrow, the plan is to climb one of our local mountains. Root for us, and assuming all goes well, we'll speak then.

Love,

Z

And now, for something completely different

Different because, for the first time, we were told someone would show up to do something and IT ACTUALLY HAPPENED.
Now, we have Internet. Got my wireless set up and, baby, we are online.

Things are coming together...though why havin Internet signifies that in my mind, I don't know. I'm sure it's a sign of something unhealthy.


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Mexico City

Some things that struck me about our visit to Mexico City last week...

Stop signs and red lights are to be taken as suggestions, nothing more. Do not assume that any prior knowledge you have about traffic patterns and rules will apply here. They do not. Or they do. Assume at your own risk.

Every house in the admittedly wealthy neighborhood where we were staying had 20-foot high fences with massive electric gates and high-voltage fences. Not only this, but they have gates at the end of each block manned by private security guards. This seems like a stressful way to live. I found out that I have a cousin that moved their family to Miami a couple months ago because they were too worried about getting kidnapped constantly.

That also seems like it would be a stressful way to live.

We, as gringos, get stared at constantly, even in the insanely huge city that is Mexico City. This is different than New York City. I could walk around looking crazier than all get out in NYC and not get a second glance. Here, all it takes is slightly less melatonin and a Lonely Planet guidebook to feel like a freak of nature.

Time, as Einstein figured out, is relative. We tried to go to the Palacio Belles Artes in order to see one of Diego Rivera's murals. The guidebook, signs, and other literature all said that it closes at 6pm. We arrive shortly before 5:30pm and are told that we can't come in because it's closed. Pointing at the signs and sputtering in barely intelligible Spanglish doesn't seem to help. We walk away, frustrated.

In 1978, underneath a section of the Centro Historico, they discovered partial ruins of a massive Aztec temple structure. In order to excavate the relatively small area that they dug up, it was necessary to destroy a number of colonial-era buildings and infrastructure. I believe this was a good idea. Of course, it led me to fantasize (yes, to have fantasies) about all the other incredible things that must be under all the other buildings they left standing.

For those who don't know, Mexico City used to be a large lake, in the middle of which sat an island city that the Aztecs built. It was reached by a series of roads they made from the shore, like a bunch of bicycle spokes. Over time this lake was filled in and built upon. This has caused the cities buildings to sink over the years, and is a constant issue. Mexico City is sinking.

Frida Kahlo's house is pretty cool. The walls are painted a blue that I would use to paint everything, if I could. We were only able to see a small sampling of paintings due to the refurbishing of much of the house. This seemed to be a pretty standard excuse for a number places we wanted to see.

Still, her garden was (kind of) worth the visit.

Fact: Leon Trotsky lived out his days (until he was stabbed to death with an ice pick) in Mexico City, first staying with Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, later, in his own compound a few blocks away. His house is curiously preserved, almost creepily so. His towel hangs on a rack, his toothpaste on the sink, clothing in the closet, toilet left unflushed. Not really, but it wouldn't have been shocking the way the rest of the place was kept. His ashes are there, in a monument with the hammer and sickle carved into it and the soviet flag flying overhead. He's the only one of the original Russian revolutionaries never to have been "rehabilitated" by the USSR. Seemed like a nice-enough guy. In the end, as you know, Stalin got to him.

The subways in Mexico City are pretty great. Very cheap (20cents a ride), very fast and very efficient. They are all color-codeda and each stop has a symbol associated with it. This is because back in the 60s when it was built, there was a shockingly high percentage of the population that was illiterate. The illustrations served that portion of the population. This was a good idea.

A lot of people seem to blurt out different things in english, almost like a burp or a fart, only without saying "excuse me" afterwards. An example comes to mind.

We were standing in front of a building that contains more Diego Rivera murals but was closed due to more mysterious refurbishing, trying to decide what to do instead. A man came up to us, and with no introduction or encouragement, declared, "Mexico! Mexico City!" and then walked away. Obviously, we agreed with him, but couldn't figure out the proper reply in time. Clearly, this was a missed opportunity for bridging some sort of cultural divide

Yom Kippur in Guadalajara

We just spent Yom Kippur in Guadalajara, the closest place to Zacatecas with a synogogue. M and I came down here with friend Ben, who is visiting us for a few days while on assignment as the Wandering Jew (blogs.jta.org/wanderingjew).
He arranged for us to attend a couple different synagogues in the community. These visits, and subsequent interviews with community members and rabbis, would form the basis for some of the stories that he would be writing about Jews and Jewish things around the world.
The fast went by well enough and Yom Kippur ended with a blast by about 12 shofars, which was cool. We were invited to break our fast at the home of the president of the larger congregation, a woman named Fanny.
We drove over there with her and sat down at a large table with a few other people. The food was...food, and definitely good enough to eat after a lomg 25 hours. By the end, it was us, her husband, her mother, sister and brother-in-law, son, and various cousins.
We were talking about where we were from, what we were doing in Mexico and so on. It came up that I am a Rubenstein and I mentioned that I have family in Mexico City. Fanny's mom asked, "oh? What Rubensteins? Jackie? Annette?"
"Actually, yes!" I exclaimed.
I proceeded to explain that we had met them for the first time over Rosh Hashana.
"Then" she said," we are cousins too!"
Turns out that she's a cousin of the cousins we stayed with, and, yet again, the world grew even smaller.

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