After work, I decided to do yesterday’s postponed trip to Centro and the Malecón. I was just stepping out of my front gate when some tourists asked me where to buy beer in broken Spanish. Yes, they mistook me for a Mexican!
Then, I wasn’t even off my street when I found this:
$5 (0.40CAD or 0.30USD) goes a very, very, very long way in Mexico! That’s nearly a week’s worth of tortillas for me, or almost my entire lancha fee, which is $8. By the way, I called the lancha the panga on the blog all of last winter because that’s what the Gringos here call it, but it is not a panga to the locals. They call it a lancha and that is the term I will use from now on.
Never mind that my knee is being bad, I still took Leandro Valle and its giant hill for the exercise. I used to rely on the La sirena sign to recognize my turn onto the street from Emilio Barragán, but thankfully no longer need it because it’s almost all gone:
The wall in front of the very derelict house has finally fallen:
Arriving at the Mercado was a real test of slipping back into my life as a Mazlateca, what with all the traffic and commotion, and it didn’t faze me one bit. I decided to stop in at my favourite dress shop for some skirts. I didn’t wear many skirts last year because I only had crappy tee-shirts to go with them, but having more tee-shirts this year that are presentable enough to go to Maz, I wanted equally nice bottoms! I’ve got the nice skirt I picked up in T or C (which I happened to be wearing today because, well, I’ve been living in it for months!), but a couple more were definitely in order.
The clerk at the dress shop remembered me and pulled out a bag of skirts that were all blech, with ugly greens, bright reds, and white. “I don’t want to look like the Mexican flag,” I joked and the gal burst out laughing and said, “How about the Canadian one, then?” “No red, no white, and not those greens!” was my firm reply. She told me not to worry and that she had another bag. This one looked more promising because there was some pink in it! She pulled that one out for me and it was a yes!
She then suggested ecru and I said, “No. I have no luck with food,” which got another big laugh. I pointed to the bottom of the bag where I thought I was seeing a charcoal or black one. She pulled it out and said, “Café.” Perfect!
This dark brown skirt will be a great neutral for me since I have a lot of tee-shirts that will look great with it, even more so than the pink one. It has some really nice embroidery on the hem.
The two skirts were $500 total. I don’t have to bargain at this shop anymore as I am now quoted their best price.
I then got very, very sad news. The seamstress has retired because of increasingly poor eyesight. 🙁 🙁 🙁 I was hoping I could hire her to make me some headscarves this winter. Dang. She recognized me from last year, too, and said I could have one of her last few smocked bodice dresses for just $200, but she wouldn’t hem it or make me straps, just so she could offload the stock. I picked through the dregs and found one I liked:
I know I can cut it to length myself and the material doesn’t fray and rolls up to make its own hem, so it’ll be very wearable. And I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but I really don’t need the straps. I like the base colour and the splashes of colour over it remind me of a Monet painting. I don’t like it so much that I would have paid last year’s price of $350 (including hemming and straps), but it feels like a bargain at $200!
Then, I headed across the street to Waldo’s to see about a plastic tablecloth for the office ‘desk’, just to be looking at something nicer than I did last year. I really didn’t like what they had in the kitchen section and had the brilliant notion of checking the party wares section, where I found what I wanted.
By this point, I was very ready for food, so I started to meander towards the water. I stopped partway to see if the nieve de garrafa guy was still on his corner, and he was! He even had guava, which is a rare flavour. I had that with cheese and prune. So yum. Yes, I ate my dessert first. It’s a perk of being an adult!
Since I’ve had octopus, pork, and chicken tacos in my first week back in Mexico, I decided to have the beef ones at Copa de leche. Still as good as ever, especially since I can handle quite a bit of hot sauce!
They serve Tecate, not Pacifico. I had Tecate at my friends L&N’s on Sunday. It’s not as smooth as Pacifico, but it’s good!
After linner, I headed towards Plazuelo Machado. There is a ton of construction going on in the area, with lots of roads blocked to traffic. This is on Sixto Osuna between the Plazuela and Panamá’s:
From there, I just wandered aimlessly, running into another couple that mistook me for a Mexican… I finally dead ended against Benito Juárez. It was getting late (ie. sun was setting), so I turned left and walked up to Constitución, took a right onto it, and went all the way up to Emilio Barragán, where I turned left to head to the embarcadero.
There was some sort of parade going on, most likely new Navy recruits. I took a discrete picture:
There was a lot of chanting as well as folks sitting on the sidewalk enjoying the show!
A lancha was leaving as I arrived at the ticket booth, but the skipper saw me and returned to shore. I always feel special when that happens. 🙂
A lancha going in the other direction passed us and an older Mexican lady was yelling, “Rae! Rae!” and waving her arms madly. I realised it was my landlady’s mother!
It was almost fully dark by the time I got to my front door! I don’t mind being out after dark in Maz, but my rule is that I have to take a taxi, unless I’m walking through the main streets around the Plazuela and Olas Altas, and especially to the embarcadero. I have no problem walking on Isla after dark.
Looks like I’m off work the next three days. I have no plans for tomorrow and will see if I crash. I do have plans for Saturday, however, but I’m not sharing those yet. It will be a new experience if I pull it off. 🙂