After work today, I needed to go to town to get something desserty for a potluck tonight as well as do a decent shop since I hadn’t done so yet this month. I decided to go check out the Soriana on Insurgentes.

I had no sooner bought my lancha ticket that it blew away in a strong gust of wind! The captain called to me to not worry about it and to just get on board. Upon disembarkation he told me to tell the ticket guy that the ticket blew away. He used a new verb that I didn’t know, so I just said to the ticket guy, “He perdido mi boleto en el viento” (I lost my ticket in the wind). He waved me away saying, “My God, I know you, go on!” That’s one lovely thing about living somewhere for any length of time, people start to know you.

But there’s another point to my telling this story. I said “he perdido.” I had dinner at Miguel’s last night and said the same thing about my old pendant to Angela when she commented on my new octopus pendant. She commented on the fact that I had a “new” verb tense and used it correctly. And today, I had a very long and involved discussion with my landlady and she also commented on my using this verb form, although I can’t remember what I said. Think about it, two people I speak with a lot both noticed in the span of less than 24 hours that I’d had a linguistic breakthrough. Fascinating!

Verbs in English are conjugated very differently than they are in Spanish. But Spanish and French verbs are conjugated similarly. So when I’m writing in Spanish, the best way for me to get verb practice, I always think about how I would say it in French and look for the equivalent verb tense in Spanish.

This new verb tense I’ve started using is called the “passé composé” in French and is in French the most common tense to use when speaking about things you did in the past. There is a more formal way called the “passé simple” that is very commonly used in Spanish and my teachers encouraged me to use that tense rather than the “passé composé.” Instead of saying “he perdido” I could have said “perdí.” Because it was drilled into me to favour the simple form, I completely forgot about the composed form that is much easier to remember. All this time I thought I didn’t have a past tense, it was actually locked away tightly in my brain! Perhaps now that I’m not having to search for so many words, my brain is able to focus on conjugations. Whatever is going on with my grey matter, I am really pleased!

From the embarcadero, I headed off to Juan Carrasco to get a bus. There was one marked “Ley del mar” waiting at a red light that I knew would take me to a block of Soriana. Perfect! So much more convenient than going to the Soriana on Rafael Buelna. Too bad it took me so long to figure that out! 🙁

The ride was long, hot, bumpy, unpleasant, and cramped. The seats on the “local” bus are so close together that I cannot sit normally in them as my femurs are longer than the space to the back of the seat in front of me. If I have a row to myself, I have to sit at a diagonal. If someone sits next to me. I have to half stand. Not the most fun way to ride across town.

We finally made it to the corner of Insurgentes and a game of Frogger later, I was in the mall. This is one of the larger Sorianas that has a food court outside (Mexican, sushi, pizza, Chinese), so I grabbed a slice of pizza before doing my shopping. As I started to wander the aisles of this Soriana, I once again regretted how much time I’ve wasted at the much smaller one on Rafael Buelna. There were so many more food products, on top of everything you could need for your home, similar to Mega, but with better prices. I did a really good shop and marveled as I piled meat, cheese, and even kale into my cart that I had $1,200 on me and wasn’t stressed about having enough money not only to pay for my groceries, but to take taxis home. Sure enough, my total was only about $800 (62CAD), and that included the $110 worth of pastries I bought for the potluck.

The lineup at checkout was interminable. The lady in front of me did a lot of justified sighing and eye rolling. I finally said to her, “I think we’re sleeping here tonight,” and she roared with laughter. The ice broken, we chatted a bit until it was finally her turn to get processed.

I was able to get a taxi right away when I came out, another improvement, and was quoted $60, but I was able to get the ride for $50. The driver did help me a lot with my mountain of bags, so I paid him the $60 and he was very grateful for that. He took me through the expected Juárez route that never fails to make me realise just how small my Mazatlán is. Most Gringos stick to the Golden Zone, Centro, and Isla de la Piedra (circled in red below), using taxis and buses to go between those areas. My Maz also includes, roughly, the area circled in blue, and I walk between it and the red zones in addition to taking public transportation. But even so, look how much more Maz there is beyond. I could have extended the blue circle a bit to the yellow line that is Mex-15, since I do shop along there the odd time I’m out with the truck. I’m always happy when I meet other Gringos who go beyond the red areas and know about the other grocery stores, the market in Juárez, and the local bus routes.

The package guy at the embarcadero was available to help me get everything to the lancha and I was able to get everything up to the road on this side, where I got a taxi.

Upon arriving home, the driver noticed my truck and asked if it worked. I said yes, but it’s so much faster to go to Maz with public transportation (if I take a taxi both ways on the other side and walk both ways on this side, I can get groceries in an hour flat round trip provided I don’t have a long lancha wait. It would be at least an hour and a half to drive to a grocery store round trip, plus add in the time to shop!). He then asked if he could make me an offer on the truck! That is two people who have wanted to buy Moya this winter! It’s too bad that I can’t.

One of the two guys making an offer knows about the temporary import rules and told me, “Don’t worry. I will  give you a piece of the windshield with the hologram on it so you can report that your truck got totaled and you won’t be penalised for leaving it behind!” Yeah. I’m just not the kind of person who would take that sort of risk. I really don’t want to jeopardise my ability to return to Mexico with a vehicle.

But it tells me that if I bring my truck to Mérida, my favoured plan at this point, I won’t have any trouble selling it, even if just for parts or scrap. As it turns out, the nearby state of Quintana Roo is entirely a “free zone,” so I would be able to turn in my TIP and then legally dispose of my truck near the Belize border. So that opens my options considerably.

This was a really good shopping run, very smooth and efficient time-wise except for the long wait at the checkout. I look forward to starting over with this sort of education when I get to Mérida next year. 🙂