One day this past week—or was it the week before?—a ceremony for handing out diplomas to students who had completed their language studies at the Centro de Idiomas was held at the school. After the diplomas were given out, the festivities began. A large band from the Universidad de Veracruz, assembled at the front of the largest salon in the school, began playing salsa music for the assembled students, teachers, and administrators.

I had been invited to attend, but I ducked into the faculty computer room to finish some work. I had a sneaking suspicion that if I went to hear the music, I would be invited to dance, something I have been hesitant to do here because I don’t know the dance steps to salsa and other kinds of Latin music. But I was curious to see what was going on in the salon, and the music was great. So I stepped inside and took a chair near the door.

There must have been about ten members of the band, two of them women who danced and sang. No one in the audience was dancing until a couple of teachers pushed back some chairs to make room, and they began to dance, some pressing students to dance with them and get the ball rolling. And sure enough, in no time, another teacher asked me to dance. I tried to resist, but there was none of that. Everyone at the school seems to want to make sure I have the full experience of Mexico, and that definitely includes dancing.

So I danced with several other teachers, thinking all the while, “Would that I had been so popular back in dear old Clayton High School!” back in the 'sixties. The music was fast and loud, easy to dance to (in my fashion), and I even enjoyed it. But after about fifteen minutes, I left the salon and went back to work. Still, I was glad I’d danced, recalling the advice from a song my daughter Shelley gave me a few years back:

When you get the choice to sit it out or dance
I hope you dance
I hope you dance
[Hear the song and see the video on YouTube.]

Have I mentioned before that most Mexicans love to dance? I’ve seen them dance on the sidewalk as they pass by a store with music blaring from speakers pointed streetward. I’ve seen them hum to themselves in offices and hallways to accompany their spontaneous urges to dance. I’ve seen them dance in the city parks and plazas and at home. Young and old dance here, and dancing seems to erupt whenever music does.

My Albuquerque friend Peggy Roberts came to visit me here in Xalapa on her vacation. She arrived last Wednesday, March 26, so she and I were able to do some traveling before I started back to school yesterday after a two-and-a-half-week break for spring vacation.

Today we walked around the Cerro (meaning hill—or, in this case, an extinct volcano) de Macuiltépetl that stands in the middle of the city of Xalapa. In the photo here, Peggy is standing in front of a sundial located at the top of the hill. (Click on the photo to enlarge it and see what time it was when I took the picture.)

After our walk, we went to the La Estancia de Los Tecahuetes, a restaurant, for a wonderful meal and margaritas.

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Last Sunday morning, Peggy and I took a bus to Papantla (pronounced Pah-PAHNT-lah) to see El Tajín (Tah-HEEN) , an extensive ruin with a number of pyramids, including the renowned Pirámide de Los Nichos, shown here. As its name implies, it has many niches—365 to be exact—built into its four sides.

El Tajín is hedged around by a forest of green and flowering trees. As we walked the length of this village of pyramids, we found shade under trees growing here and there along the way. For me, the green lushness of the vegetation made visiting this site especially pleasurable—added to the pleasure of marveling at the unique arquitecture and speculating about the long-ago builders and inhabitants of the place.

Peggy and I stayed two nights in the small city of Papantla, trying the local food, touring the mercados, and walking the hilly streets. One of our favorite places to eat was the Plaza Pardo Restaurant, which has wonderful fish dishes and overlooks Papantla's central plaza, as shown here. (Peggy is toasting you with her chelada).

On Monday night after dinner, we walked up a steep hill in the middle of town to see this statue of a volador at the top. Papantla is noted for its voladores and for its excellent vanilla, which comes from an orchid grown in the area.

You can read here about the voladores and the supposed origin of their ritual performed high in the air.

Here’s my view when I open my front door—geraniums blooming in the passageway that leads from my door to the stairs that take me down to the first floor and out the gates of my apartment building.

The door and windows you see opposite my door belong to the office of an acupuncturist. Here in Xalapa’s centro, homes, apartments, stores and offices sit side by side or one above the other, a jumble of commercial and domestic spaces.
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On February 2, Margarita, Joaquin and Miriam took me—as well as Elena and her daughter Gisela, whom I met then for the first time—to a small city called Tlacotalpan (pronounced—with difficulty—as tlah-coh-TALL-pahn) for the celebration of the Dia de la Candelaria.

Tlacotalpan is a colorful city that was declared a World Heritage City by the United Nations in 1995. It celebrates the Dia de la Candelaria in a big way over several days—with the running of the bulls through the streets, performances by jaraneros, musicians who play small guitar-like instruments called jaranas, and a procession of the statue of the Virgin from the church to the river, where a boat carries it along the river and thence back to the church. In addition, the center of town is filled with stands and stalls where artisans sell their wares.

By the way, you can see and hear a You-Tube video from the Candelaria fiesta last year that demonstrates the size and sound of jaranas here: http://video.aol.com/video-detail/guanabana-el-butaquito/267964436

I was walking along a Xalapa street the other day when I heard perfect Spanish being spoken in a wee little voice by a wee little girl walking hand in hand with her mother. I was amazed at her command of Spanish while I, on the other end of the age spectrum, struggle so hard to attain it. It’s disconcerting to know that I will probably never reach her current fluency and correctness.

Still, I enjoy learning this language—it’s one of my great pleasures here in México—and poco a poco, I find myself able to understand more and more of what I hear and read, and my spoken Spanish is definitely improving.

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I’ve been meaning to write about an experience I had at the end of January when Luz del Carmen Rivas invited me to join her and her husband Manuel and two sons—Manuel the younger and Eduardo—at their cabin in the country outside of Xalapa on a Saturday afternoon.

Luz is the director of the Universidad Veracruzana’s five Centros de Idiomas (Language Centers) and the related Centros de Auto-Accesso (Self-Access Centers) located in five different locations around the state of Veracruz.

Cabin” is too rustic a word for the charming two-story house where Luz and her family spend their weekends. The upstairs is one large bedroom with several beds, a hammock strung up in the middle of the room, and a massage table in an alcove in one corner. The downstairs, too, consists of one large open room divided into areas for the kitchen, dining area and living room, with lots of windows all around to let in the sun.

On the front porch, a chair-hammock hangs invitingly, while the porch on one side of the cabin leads to an outdoor kitchen with a large grill. The day I was there, beans were cooking in a tall clay pot placed on the grill, and there Manuel set himself to the task of grilling chicken, beef, and sausage for the afternoon meal.

Meanwhile, Luz started making tortillas on the comal inside the house. A comal is a flat pan for cooking tortillas, and Luz’s reminded me of a large oblong pancake griddle, which was heated by two gas burners below it. Sons Manuel and Eduardo also helped prepare the meal. I stood by watching, visiting and drinking a chelada, my new favorite drink consisting of lime juice and cold beer served in a glass rimmed with lime and salt. I was impressed by how round and tasty Luz’s tortillas were—and by the fact that she makes them herself.

When everything was ready, we sat down to a meal made especially delicious by the lively conversation and laughter around the table. I was touched by the show of affection between parents and sons and their obvious pleasure in spending time together at the end of the week. Luz tells me they go to their cabin nearly every weekend to get away, relax, and be together.

Spending time with Luz and Manuel and their family gave me another clear example of how Mexicans cherish and make time for their families—and how they generously include others in their warm circle.

At 7 o'clock last Tuesday morning, February 12, I was awakened by what I first thought was a strong wind causing the wooden door of my apartment to rattle and bang against its jamb. But then, when my bed began to sway slightly from side to side, I realized I was feeling an earthquake.

I don’t do my best thinking when I first wake up, so I continued to lie in bed instead of getting up and making for the door. And it turned out that the earthquake’s epicenter, which registered 6.4 on the Richter scale, was located far away in the state of Chiapas, so there was no danger or damage done here in the center of the state of Veracruz. I heard the door rattling for about 30 seconds and felt the swaying for about 20 seconds--and then it was over.

Last weekend, I gazed on this 500-year-old tree, a fig, in one of the gardens of El Lencero, an hacienda (the h is not pronounced in Spanish) that was once owned by México’s most-elected and justly reviled president, Santa Anna, of the Alamo fame.

Imagine! When this tree was a seedling, Cortez had not yet arrived in México to begin his conquest of the Aztec empire. Moctezuma, Aztec ruler was in power or soon to be.

I visited El Lencero with Cece Daniels, a Fulbright teacher living in Mexico City this year, and Margarita, who offered to be our guide. Miriam, her 10-year-old daughter, came along, too.

Taking photos of the interior of the hacienda is prohibited, but you can see some on this website.

Cece arrived for a visit by bus on Friday, Jan. 11, and left in the afternoon on Sunday. During the time she was here, we covered a lot of territory in Xalapa and nearby.

On Saturday, we took a bus to Xico and from there walked a couple of kilometers to the Texolo waterfall. The cobbled road was lined on both sides with banana and coffee trees.


As we walked along the path toward the falls, I was amazed to hear someone holler my name several times, and then I saw Elsa Malpica, another English teacher at the Centro de Idiomas, waving at me from a faraway observation deck. We soon met up with her and her two handsome sons and took a few photos of the river before Cece and I decided to head back, thinking that if we hurried we'd have time to get to El Lencero before it closed.

But on more careful thought, we realized that we wouldn’t have time to take a bus back to Xalapa and from then on to El Lencero in the opposite direction, so we changed our plans and took a bus to nearby Coátepec for a leisurely late lunch and a look around before going back to Xalapa.

Coatepec is the heart of coffee growing in the state of Veracruz, and we came across many coffee houses while we ambled about. But the place that most captured our interest was a place whose coffee house led to a restaurant in a courtyard full of flowers, flowering trees and bushes, and a fountain.

Here, in the Coffino Caffe & Restaurant, Cece and I had a tasty lunch--I had espaguetti verde--"green spaghetti" and Cece had carne asado a tampico (I think that's what it was called)--and we both had cheladas—cold beer poured over lime juice (about 2 jiggers) and served in a frosty mug with a salted rim. I’m not much of a beer drinker, but I have to say I really enjoyed that chelada; I found it much tastier and more refreshing than plain ol’ beer.

Cece explained to me that, in Mexico City, chelada contains picante sauce whereas michelada doesn’t—but just the opposite was true at the Coffino, where the michelada had the hot sauce. Cece advises asking before ordering: Which contains the hot sauce here--the chelada or the michelada?

After lunch and a look around Coatepec's center, we took the bus back to Xalapa, cleaned up, and went to La Casona del Beaterio, a restaurant where we ate with Margarita, her friend Sylvia, and Miriam and then listened to a musical group play traditional Mexican music. I liked the lead singer’s voice so much, I bought his CD: “Elfego Villegas.”

On Sunday after visiting El Lencero hacienda, we took the bus to Xalapa’s Museo de Antropología, which is known especially for its fine collection of Olmec heads. (View this website to learn just how advanced the Olmecs were.)

Here's my crude translation of the inscription (written by Agustín Acosta Lagunes, a former governor of the state of Veracruz) at the entrance of the museum: “This is the root of your history, your cradle and your altar. Hear the silent voice of Mexico’s oldest culture, perhaps that of the mother civilization of our continent. The Olmecs changed rain into harvests, sun into a calendar, rock into sculpture, cotton into cloth, wanderings into commerce, hills into thrones, jaguars into religion and men into gods.”

We also made a quick dash to the Pinacoteca Diego Rivera to see what we thought would be paintings by Rivera but turned out to be paintings of Xalapa and other places in Veracruz as rendered by many different artists, including one by Rivera.

Before Cece took the bus back to Mexico City, we ate lunch with Margarita and Miriam at the Mesón de Alférez. Then Cece took a taxi to CAXA, the bus station in Xalapa, to catch the bus back to Mexico City.

Cece, I hope you come back! I enjoyed your visit and the time we spent touring around.

Confetti on my pillow when I got up this morning—mementoes of last night’s New Year’s Eve celebration at Margarita and Isabel’s parents’ home.

At midnight, we ate 12 grapes to ensure good fortune in each of the coming months. I was only able to get down seven of them before the clock stopped chiming, so I can expect rocky times in 2008—kind of like 2007 and all the years before that. Así es la vida.

After that came cohetes, firecrackers, but these—safe enough for 10-year-old Miriam to light—ignited like sparklers when we lit them and threw them into the street, and they didn't make any noise. But we could see the plumes of other celebrators' fireworks shooting into the sky overhead and hear their great booms.

And then Doña Guille, Isabel and Margarita’s mother, brought out a basket of eggs and passed them around. I watched as others threw them up to hit the ceiling. I didn’t quite understand, so Doña Guille cracked an egg over my head to show me that it contained confetti. Ahhhh! So then I cracked mine over her head.

Isabel explained how the eggs are emptied, washed, and dried, and then the shells are filled with confetti from the same hole used to remove the liquid part of the eggs. A bit of paper is glued over the hole to keep the confetti in, and the eggs are sometimes decorated to become lovely little confetti dispensers. (You can find step-by-step instructions here.) Isabel said that they're sometimes filled with flour and used in egg fights (similar, I suppose, to the snowball fights my brothers and I would have against the Cowger kids when we were growing up in the little town of Park River, North Dakota).

The evening had begun with conversation over antojitos (appetizers) and ponche (a sweet spiced tea made from dried fruits) and rompope (a rum-infused drink similar to eggnog). Later, we sat down to a dinner with all manner of delicious dishes beginning with pasta in green sauce and ending with fruit salad and a mocha cake, savoring pork and little garlicky red potatoes in between.

Around 11pm, Miriam won her appeal for piñatas, so we all took turns trying to break two of them and then scramble for the candy that rained down.

At the end of the evening, Isabel drove the two guests—her Tia Rosa and me—home. After dropping off Tia Rosa, she took me home the long way so that we (Margarita and Miriam went with us) could see the holiday lights in the center of the city. She stopped near the cathedral so that I could take photos of the nativity scene and the huge Christmas tree nearby.

And as I walked up the steps to my apartment, I could hear loud dance music, shouts, and laughter coming from the apartment building just a stone’s throw from mine. It sounded like a lot of people were having a lot of fun. The music and the party hadn't stopped when I fell asleep--confetti still in my hair--at 2:00 on this first morning of new year.
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I’m listening to Mahalia Jackson sing gospel music this morning; makes me want to dance and shout. I’ve subscribed to Yahoo Music, so I can listen to any kind of music I want when the spirit moves me. Nice, except Yahoo doesn’t have a lot of Mexican music. Yesterday was Bob Dylan day; I listened to his songs all afternoon.

Of all things, I forgot my camera when I went home for Christmas, but luckily my son Shane and my (ex)daughter-in-law Carrie took some photos for me to share with others here in Xalapa and you out there in the blogosphere.

Shane and Diana, his significant other of many years, met me at the Albuquerque Sunport and took me directly to Cervantes, a nearby New Mexican restaurant, so that I could have New Mexican red chile, which is a different kind of chile from those I've eaten in México. As you can see from the photo, the restaurant was all decked out for Christmas.

While in Albuquerque, I stayed at my house. My good friend Sharon and her dog Allee are living there in my absence and taking care of my house and my cat Fred. (Sharon is trying to sell her house, but she could hardly have picked a worse time, given the housing slump in Albuquerque and the U.S. in general.)

I visited my mom everyday while I was in Albuquerque, and she and I spent Christmas Eve with my brother David and his wife Carmen, their sons Keegan and Kyle, and their wives Lyn and Elena and kids. It was so fun to watch them--Maiyah, Adan ("Boogie") and Layla open their presents, and--in the case of Adan and Layla--quickly return to playing with cups, glasses, and other simple things.

Two days after I arrived home, I drove down to Las Cruces--a 3-hour-and-15-minute trip south on I-25--to see my kids and grandkids there:

• My daughter Shelley, her husband Brooks, and their kids: Chris, Rick, Clay, and Haley. I didn't get a photo of Shelley, Brooks, or Rick, but here's a photo of me with Chris, Clay, and Haley.
• My son Sean and his kids Bryan and Caitlin.
• My former daughter-in-law Carrie and her husband Richard Rosales and their five kids, who include--besides Bryan and Caitlin--Andrew, J.D., and new baby Miguel ("Mikey").

Thanks for taking and sending me these pictures, Carrie! Click on them to enlarge them.

I flew home to Albuquerque on December 19 and returned home here in Xalapa on Friday, December 28. Since both flights—to and from—took a whole day, it was a whirlwind trip but warming because I was able to spend time with my mom, my kids, and my grandkids.

On the first leg of my return flight to Xalapa, between Albuquerque and Dallas/Ft. Worth, I met Muffet Foy Cuddy, my seatmate, who was on her way to Iowa as a volunteer to help NM Governor Bill Richardson in his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination. Muffet is chief of programs in the NM Department of Transportation and a belly dancer by avocation who will be going to Egypt soon for further study. It was fun talking with her.

Then as I was waiting in the Mexico City airport for my flight to Veracruz, a woman came up to me and said something like, “We meet again.” I recognized her as my seatmate during my first flight from Mexico City to Veracruz back in August. Teresa—Doctora Teresa Morales Guzmán—a researcher in neurobiology, lives in Querétero and travels to Veracruz to visit her family several times a year.

If we believed in fate, we would surely think this second meeting was fated: After all, what are the odds of running into someone you know in a city of 23 million people? We met only because the airline rerouted my flight through Mexico City instead of Monterrey, as stated on my itinerary; and because Teresa chose the same flight after vacillating for several days over the date and time.

Teresa and I weren’t seatmates this time, but we were able to visit a bit before we had to board the plane. She told me that she has been reading my blog from time to time, so now, Teresa, if you read this entry, please let me know if I’ve gotten any of my information about you wrong here.

The post below was written on December 4:

I’ve been under the weather for more than three weeks now with a malady that started out as a sore throat, which soon went away but then manifested as head and chest congestion, and finally morphed into a cough that won’t go away. I’ve solicited—from colleagues and students—and tried all kinds of cough remedies: herbal tea for cough, marshmallows melted in hot milk, Broncolin cough drops, lemon juice and honey dissolved in hot water, and Histocil cough syrup. And I’m still coughing.

Now, however, the coughing mostly bothers me at night, waking me up so I don’t sleep well and am tired the next day.

Yesterday I had finally decided to see a doctor when Pery mentioned that I could get antibiotics at the pharmacy without a doctor’s prescription. “Hey, that’s right!” I thought, recalling that here in Mexico antibiotics can be bought over the counter!

And so, dismissing the adage that rang in my head—"A physician who treats himself has a fool for a patient”—I went to the internet and investigated the names of the two antibiotics and the generic version that Pery told me her husband and daughter had gotten from their doctors for symptoms similar to mine.

I found a website (in Spanish) that contains information on prescription medications in Mexico and read the indications, contraindications, dosage, and warnings for on all three drugs. Then I went to the pharmacy and asked for the cheapest one, which was the generic, for which I paid about $25.

I will take Sinufin twice a day for seven days, and by then I expect to be cured of this cursed cough and back to my jolly old self in time to enjoy the season of the Jolly Old Elf.

For any ESL teachers and students who might be reading this blog: Here’s a version of “The Night Before Christmas” you might find useful for practicing reading comprehension in English.

And tomorrow is (oy vey!) my 61st birthday. Pery organized a get-together at her house last Friday that she said was a celebration marking the end of the blogging workshop, which ended the previous Friday, but this get-together turned out to be a celebration of my birthday as well.

Everyone sang “Happy Birthday” to me and then “Las Mañanitas” (click on the link to read the lyrics and listen to the song) before we sat down at the table to enjoy pambasos, ensalada de frutas, gelatina, and a wonderful marble cake with cocoanut in the filling and lemon in the frosting. Oo-oo-oooh! It was delicious!

I had planned to go later to see a performance given by a musical group that includes a student of mine, Nelly, who dances and plays la tortuga, but as we were getting ready to leave, someone started dancing, and soon others were dancing, and finally even I was dancing.

And so I experienced what I’d heard about Mexican get-togethers—that people start dancing spontaneously and then, before you know it, it’s dawn. Well, our party ended much earlier than that, but it was so much fun to enjoy the music and watch everyone dance the salsa, merengue, mambo, and danzón.
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December 9, 2007
I have taken half the medication so far and am coughing much less, but I still feel tired and pretty energy-less. I hope I get my pep back soon.

More about my birthday...
Last Wednesday, on the actual day of my birthday, the office staff lined up to give me hugs when I arrived and to offer me felicitationes on my birthday. And before I left, I was called into the coordinator's office for a celebration that began with the staff and teachers' singing "Las Mañanitas" and was followed by cake and geletina and gorditas and more hugs.

An aside: Here in Xalapa, gelatina goes with cake like ice cream goes with cake in the U.S. And in my experience, the gelatin called for is something fancy, like mosaico de gelatina (jello mosaic), similar to what is seen in this picture. At first, I was surprised at this combination, but it's quite good and supplies the cold, creamy sweetness cake seems to call for. (Well, okay, it's we--not the cake--who call out it.)

And then, Margarita, Miriam, and Joaquín picked me up and took me to Coatepec for a birthday lunch at a charming restaurant called El Charco de la Rana (literally, the puddle of the frog) that specializes in trout. And that's what I had: trout in a delicious tamarind sauce. At the end of the meal, suddenly "Las Mañanitas" began to play over the sound system, and the mesero (waiter) brought me a piece of cheese cake with a candle in it.

I went through the motions of making a wish and blowing out the candle, but as I've been trying to explain, I already have my wish. I'm living it this moment, here in México.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Today, Thursday, November 22, is just another workday here in Mexico. But this afternoon after our morning classes, Pery took me to a great restaurant--Estacion de Tecahuete (to be honest, I'm guessing about the name)--where we had a fine meal, and I called it Thanksgiving dinner.

And this Sunday and the Sunday after that, I'll be cooking Thanksgiving for some friends, so then I'll be able to enjoy turkey and dressing, cranberries and sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes and gravy, apple pie and ice cream (I'm not a big pumpkin pie fan) and--best of all--leftovers the next day!

I have much to be thankful for this year. After the health of my family and friends, I am most thankful for being able to spend this year in Mexico.

If you're interested in knowing more about the history of Thanksgiving in the United States, you can read, see, and hear about it on the History.com website.

I wrote the following entry last Sunday, November 9, but just now finished editing it:

This morning, as on every Sunday morning, I heard the deep voice of the newspaper vendor calling loudly in the street, “Diario! Diario!” Only it sounded like this, rendered in monotone: "Deee-Ahhh-riO! Deee-Ahhh-riO!"

In Xalapa, there are no self-serve newspaper stands where one can pick up a paper, nor can newspapers be bought at the 7-11 stores (called miscellaneas here) that dot nearly every block. Newspapers are sold at manned—or womaned—newspaper-and-magazine stands around the city, but there are none close to where I live.

During the week, I buy a newspaper or two—the Diario de Xalapa and the A-Z—at a stand near the school. On Sundays, I often buy one from the street vendor when his path and mine collide.

But this morning I heard his call at the ungodly hour of 9:15. I’d only been up for 15 minutes, was still in my pajamas, and had had only a few sips of coffee, so I wasn’t in any shape to run down the stairs and chase after him to buy a paper.

It doesn’t really matter though: I have yesterday’s paper that I’ve barely touched. Reading in Spanish takes me a long time, but day by day, poco a poco, I’m reading faster and having to look up fewer words.

And I have to say I’m impressed by the frankness of many of the editorials and articles I’ve been reading related to the politics and political figures here in Mexico. Some journalists don’t pull any punches in pointing out corruption and unseemly behavior on the parts of politicians.

For example, headlines in the national section of the A-Z for Nov. 9 pointed out that “Secretarios atienden emergencia entre lujos” (Secretaries [of governmental departments] attend to emergency in luxury). The accompanying article showed photos of two high-level federal government officials who had traveled to the state capital of Tabasco to help bring aid to the flooded state while they themselves stayed at five-star hotels, enjoying canapés, wine and other luxuries, which the article went into great detail in describing. Meanwhile, it was pointed out that many of the flood victims were suffering without water or food.

Another editorial blamed the governors of Tabasco and Chiapas, the two states suffering from the recent flooding, for not having used funds available to them before the fact to have prevented the flooding in the first place. (The flooding in Villahermosa, the capital of the state of Tabasco, has been compared to the flooding in New Orleans after Hurrican Katrina.)

So I was startled to read a recent report by the French-based nonprofit organization Reporters Without Borders that said in 2006 Mexico was the second-most-dangerous country in which to be a journalist, after Iraq, based on the fact that nine journalists had been murdered and three disappeared here last year. But the report says the danger to journalists comes not from a repressive government but from drug cartels that don’t want their activities brought to light by the media.

Today I went to one of my favorite restaurants, El Restarancito de Mamá Belem, and had something new on the menu: ropa vieja. Translated into English, ropa vieja means “old clothes.”

"Why that name?" I wondered. One look and I knew. Here’s a photo to help you understand, too.

Ropa vieja at Mamá Belem’s is made from shredded chicken and beef held together with egg and some tomatoes and onion thrown in for flavor.

What you see here on my plate is the ropa vieja--edged with fried platanos (bananas, which are grown here)--and some refried black beans with cheese sprinkled on top. It came with piping hot fresh corn tortillas and one of several aguas (“waters”) that customers are served there. Today, I had jamaica [pronounced hah-MIKE-ah in Spanish], which is an infusion of jamaica flowers (hibiscus) to which sugar is added. Here’s a recipe you can use to make yourself some agua de jamaica. It’s really very good.

This main dish was preceded by tortilla chips (called totopos here); a salsa of jalapeños, onion, and cilantro; and some dinner rolls. I was also served a wonderful soup—sopa de fideos (somewhat similar to Lipton chicken noodle soup only with a mild tomato flavor and real chicken in it)—and a small portion of coditos con crema, or elbow macaroni in a cream sauce (codo means “elbow” in Spanish).

And after I’d finished my entrée, I was given a tiny portion of dessert: a layered gelatin concoction, the kind that is very popular here in Xalapa and perhaps throughout Mexico. I actually like the small portions at Mama Belem’s because I like a little something sweet to end a meal, and the few bites served at Mama Belem’s are just enough. I always leave full but not stuffed.

Last Thursday, November 1, I stopped to look at some altares set up under the portico of the Palacio Estatal (“state palace” of Veracruz state) after going to the cajero (ATM) in downtown Xalapa so that I could pay my rent, which was due that day--more about this later. Crowds of people were moving from altar to altar to view the differences between the altars from different cities in the state of Veracruz.

At one point, I encountered an old man holding out his hat, asking for money from passersby. He managed to maintain his dignity nevertheless, which showed in his calm demeanor and the way he looked people in the eye as they approached him. I stopped and began looking for coins at the bottom of the large canvas bag I was using for a purse. I fished and fished for my coin purse but couldn’t find it. As I was fishing, I assured him I had money to give him but it was taking me some time to find it. Then the old man said to me, more or less: “No te preocupes. A veces se puede, y otras veces, no se puede.” (“Don’t worry. Sometimes one is able [to give], and at other times, one is not.”)

At that point, I gave up looking and thanked him for his understanding, walking away feeling that he had shared his abundance with me.
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Directly across from the Palacio Estatal where the Día de los Muertos altars were displayed is Xalapa’s cathedral, whose congregation is deep in celebration of a former bishop, Rafael Guízar y Valencia, whose body is entombed in a crypt within the cathedral and who was beatified on January 29, 1995, by Pope John Paul II. Margarita tells me he is expected to be granted sainthood soon.

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I mentioned above that I went to an ATM (automated teller machine, or cajero in Spanish) to draw out money to pay my rent. (I pay $400 US for a two-bedroom apartment here in Xalapa.) I discovered that I could only withdraw $3,000 pesos ($280 US) on a single day here in Mexico. I tried going to a cajero from a different bank, but I got the message that I'd already withdrawn my daily limit.

I ended up going to my landlady, Doña Atala, explaining to her daughter Samantha the problem I'd encountered, and paying my rent a day late.

Yesterday, I went with Margarita, Joaquin, Doña Tere, and Miriam to Naolinco to see how the people in this small city celebrate the Day of the Dead.

We went to the cemetery first and walked around the crowded grounds, observing the decorated graves and "houses" built over many of them. Many of the dead in Naolinco are well-housed, as you can see from this photo. The cemetery was full of people decorating their loved ones' graves and visiting with their neighbors who were there to do the same.


After that, we went to the downtown area and happened on a cultural center that had a great display of calaveras, Catrinas, and altares.

Here's a photo of me with La Catrina, a female calavera dressed elegantly with a Victorian hat. (I only pretended to take her hand. I'm not interested in taking a walk with her any time soon.)

After that, we went to a restaurant where I had some great enchiladas. Here's a photo of the large altar located in the dining room where we ate.

Yesterday I spent the afternoon at Pery’s mother’s house. (Pery is my Fulbright mentor at the Centro de Idiomas here in Xalapa.) She invited me to join her and her mother in making tamales for El Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead), November 2.

Making tamales is definitely not a project undertaken lightly. They take a lot of time, effort and skill to make but—boy, oh, boy!—they’re worth it! And Doña Estela, Pery’s mother, is a good one to learn from because of her many years of experience and her high culinary standards. She said she doesn’t make tamales often any more, but she really went whole hog yesterday, making four different kinds with the help of Pery and her household helper Nay and my meager contribution:

• tamales de chile con pollo (chicken in a delicious sauce made of several different kinds of chiles, tomato, and other ingredients);


• tamales de queso (two different kinds of cheese, in this case) with epizote and chiles jalapeños;


• tamales con frijoles gordos (similar to lima beans), pepinos (pumpkin seeds heated in a pan until they puff up and turn golden), y cilantro; and


• tamales de verduras (vegetables that in this case included carrots, green beans, potatoes, and chayote).

It was such a pleasure to spend time with Doña Estela in her kitchen, watching her work, listening to her explanations of how tamales should be made, and basking in her warmth and her dry sense of humor. Pery clearly takes after her.

The whole complex process of making tamales reminded me of preparing Thanksgiving dinner: the women working in the kitchen (it lacked the men watching American football on TV); the wonderful smells emanating from pots and pans covering every burner of the stove; and the chopping, shredding, beating, cooking, steaming, and assembling of ingredients into wonderful dishes that we wait the whole year for.

El Día de los Muertos is about more than just tamales, of course. I encourage you to read this webpage to learn about the idea behind El Día de los Muertos in México. As it explains:

The celebration goes through the night, when ‘throughout the cemetery, there is a grand family reunion of huge extended families, alive and dead, as one by one, through stories, memories and dreams, the dead return. On this night, those who wait realize the importance of living to be well remembered, working to be well respected, and loving to be well missed.’

I especially love the idea that the aromas of the tamales, chocolate, and other favorite foods and drinks of deceased loved ones tempt and guide their spirits back to their families for this one day of the year. These foods and drinks are placed on altares erected in most homes and many businesses. In this photo, you can see the altar in Doña Estela's home. (Pery told me she was a little dismayed that her niece had included a border with a Halloween motif--jack-o-lanterns--above the altar, but her niece failed to see a problem. Speaking of Halloween, I think the Hollywood spin on Halloween as a night of terror has changed the character of that U.S. holiday in unsavory ways since I was a kid back in the mists of time.)

I think this is a holiday my gringo family could easily embrace because we love our father, Murray King—who died at 54 in 1974—so much. If we could entice his gentle, humorous spirit to be with us even more vividly on this day than he is on other days, what wouldn’t we do? I for one would build an altar in the Mexican tradition and place on it his favorite foods (which, to be honest, only our mother could make) and drink and lots of books.

Ah, and then there are our grandparents and other dear relatives and friends we don’t want to forget and would like to draw closer to us.

I can see why this holiday is so well loved and carefully observed by Mexicans.

I've been to Teotihuacan [tay-oh-tee-whah-KAHN] to visit the Sun and the Moon--pyramids, that is. I took this photo of the Pyramid of the Sun in the background from a "plateau" on the Pyramid of the Moon. (Click the photo to see a larger view of this scene.)

We--the group of Fulbright teachers living in Mexico this year who met for the previous three days (Oct. 29-31) in Mexico City--climbed both pyramids on Tuesday. I can still feel the effects of the climb in my leg muscles.

Before we went to the site, we were given a short demonstration of how indigenous people used--and still use--the agave plant to make pulque, mezcal, tequila (a particular kind of mezcal), needles, thread, paper, fiber for making clothing and for other uses, and I forget what else.

I was fascinated to learn about this versatile plant and the ingenuity of the indigenous people who made use of every part of it. I have an agave plant in my front yard in Albuquerque, and now I appreciate it even more.

Saturday, October 20, 2007.
Weather: 63°F 17°C) and cloudy in Xalapa

A leisurely morning: I slept past 8, made myself some coffee, and sat down to get caught up on my blogging.

Last Sunday, October 14, I went with Margarita and Miriam to the Teatro del Estado (state theatre) to see a show of folkloric dance by the Ballet Folklórico de la Universidad Veracruzana in celebration of its 43 anniversary. The show, “Homenaje a Veracruz” (homage to Veracruz), featured folk and modern dances from several regions of Veracruz, a state that stretches north and south along the Gulf of Mexico.

The range of dances spanned eons as well as geographical regions, depicting dances and costumes from prehispanic, colonial, and modern times. The production was so well done—directed, staged, costumed, and danced—that it reminded me of Broadway productions I’ve seen.

One of the dancers, Elsa Malpica Muñoz, is an English teacher at the Centro de Idiomas. In fact, she was the one who told me about this event, and I’m so glad she did. As I watched, I felt like I was getting a Mexican history-and-culture lesson in the most enjoyable way--through dance and music.

One of the dances that most fascinated me was the “Danza de los moros y españoles”—dance of the Moors and the Spanish. As near as I could tell, the dance reenacts fighting between the Moors and the Christians in Spain. The “Moors” and the “Spanish” dancers clacked long sticks together in ritual sword-fighting—art imitating life and transforming it into beauty.

The dance of “la bruja” (witch) was particularly beautiful and--well...bewitching--to watch: the lights were turned down, and the women in long white jarocha dresses danced gracefully by the ghostly light of candles balanced on their heads and held in their hands.