March 22, 2015 by Rae

A Great Day in Mazatlán

Even though I didn’t need to be up early today, I was wide awake at 6:00. I am absolutely exhausted, but it’s not the sleep deprived kind at all as I’ve been getting plenty of sleep. So I didn’t try to get another oouple of hours and instead read for about an hour.

I put on a load of laundry while the water heated for coffee, then I breakfasted on my leftover tacos. They were surprisingly good cold! I had planned to reheat them in a pan with cheese, but they didn’t need any work at all, besides the addition of a little avocado. 🙂

Laundry takes a while since the machine is slow to fill, so I did a little clothes mending before I left. I didn’t think to bring sewing supplies from home, but I found a very adequate little kit at Waldo’s for just 12 pesos that had everything I needed, even the right colour threads!

A surprisingly decent little travel sewing kit for just 12 pesos.

After finally putting the laundry on the line, I headed to town. I have a birthday coming up so my first stop was the dress shop to put in an order for a dress. 🙂 It was going to take a while since the seamstress wasn’t in yet, but I wasn’t in a hurry as I had some errands to run in the area. I paid and said I’d be back in about an hour.

I head to Panamá’s, where there was a lineup out the door and up the block for its mediocre food! I grabbed an almond croissant to go (no wait for this), went back to the Mercado to get a grapefruit juice, and found a bench in the square opposite the cathedral to have my snack. This was the first time a juice vendor asked me to confirm my order. It surprised me that it took this long since orange and grapefruit have the same last syllable.

Next, I went to the fabric/craft store as I have a craft project I want to do. I was looking for felt and completely struck out. I used Google to translate, describe what felt is, spoke to a clerk who is fluent in English, showed a picture, and still we could not figure it out. I found something else that will make do.

I then asked for ‘cinta de contact’, remembering that Velcro didn’t work last time, and the guy looked at me funny and said, “You mean Velcro?” I said yes, but that the last clerk I asked had no idea what Velcro is. He shook his head and said he knew exactly who I meant. Interesting.

He left me in the capable hands of the notions counter and I asked for black Velcro. They only had white left and I could have a whole metre or a rather wrinkled remnant a few inches long that was exactly as much as I needed for my project! Finally, I wanted ribbon and they had rolls and rolls and rolls of the stuff, but I quickly spotted exactly what I wanted and got a metre of that.

Total cost of my purchases at the craft store: 2.5 pesos. I love this country.

Then, I went to Waldo’s to pick up a few things and then I went back in search of the earring lady. There are tons other vendors in the Mercado selling 10-peso pairs of earrings, but they look really cheap and/or gaudy. She has the nicest ones and I found her again! I picked out a pair that she says is made of green quartz.

I finished my errands by getting some avocados, wandered around the Mercado a bit to continue getting my bearings in it, and figured out where I needed to catch the bus to the Golden Zone, my next stop. As it turns out, it’s on Benito Juarez, in front of Waldo’s and just outside the dress shop.

My dress was ready and the seamstress had remembered that I needed to have the straps shortened on the last dress, so she put shorter ones on this one. I tried the dress on the minute I got home and the straps on it are perfect!

My new dress. I don't like the fabric as much as it is going to catch and create runs, but the pattern was the prettiest they had.

My new dress. I don’t like the fabric as much as it is a thin jersey-type material that is likely going to catch and create runs, but the pattern was the prettiest they had.

I know I already have a purple dress, but there really wasn’t much I liked today in terms of patterns and fabric weight. I wound up making a compromise with a lighter weight fabric that I wasn’t sure would drape well (thankfully, it does!). I almost went with the orangey red dress in the same fabric as my pink dress, but the clerk said to me (in English), “I really don’t think that’s the best colour for you,” so that was that. I really like the pattern (flowers) and colour of this dress and the fabric feels very light and climate-appropriate.

My business in the area done, I wanted to head to the Golden Zone. It was frankly time to get over my annoying derision for the area and get to know it a bit better.

It was incredible to stand on the curb outside the Mercado with all the crowds and traffic, not be even remotely overwhelmed, and recognize the bus I needed as it pulled up. I have just about mastered the basics of this wonderful city!

I decided to ride the bus a good long way, just to see what was what and then either walk or bus it back to the Golden Zone to get coffee and lunch. I settled in and off we went. Traffic was light and there was almost no one on the bus. We passed the Golden Zone, hit the marina, and continued on to Nuevo Mazatlán and Cerritos. The only other passenger besides me got off near the Crown Plaza Hotel and I decided I was done, too, and got off as well.

Crowne Plaza Hotel

I started to head back the way I came, stopping at an Oxxo for a bottle of water. I used to carry a full 1L bottle of water with me at all times until I realised just how much weight that is. Yes, buying a small bottle of water at a convenience store is about 4x the price of the water I buy at home, but I walk a lot and my bag gets heavy! Plus, buying water throughout the day means I always get cold water. Even if I start with half a bottle of ice, I have warm water within a few hours.

I walked all the way from the Crowne Plaza Hotel to the Marina.

Another great translation — bottom of the sign, “Only registers.”

I appreciated the choice of sidewalk, choosing smooth, as it’s better for my bum leg. 🙂

I’m not sure what this plant is. It has very thick waxy leaves.

Looks like a new residential complex.

It’s rather in the middle of nowhere.

Mexicans use their roofs and I love how many houses use spiral staircases to access them.

This is a big mall with expensive stores like Liverpool. There’s a Walmart across the way that I have shopped at.

A marina.

I love the colour of the water down here.

See, I told you yesterday that there is always a toilet nearby in Mexico. 😀

Can you imagine mooring here?

This almost makes me wish I was a boater. 🙂

I was just praising the quality of the sidewalks and walkability of the area when the sidewalk just ended. Thankfully, there was more on the other side of the road!

At the Marina, I found a proper bus shelter with shade and waited for some time for a bus. A taxi pulled up and offered me a ride, which I declined politely, as I had declined all the other offers I’d been giving along my long walk. “Why not?” the driver asked me in English. I replied in Spanish, “Bus to the Mercado, 10 pesos, taxi 120 pesos!” He laughed and said in perfect English, “Yeah. Can’t argue with that! Have a great day!”

There were folks across the street waiting for a bus going in the opposite direction (no shelter) and they came running across the street to me, asking if I’d ever taken the bus before. Yes… As it turns out, the buses kept going past them. I told them to stick out their arm to as a signal to the driver. As I said this, my bus showed up, so I was able to demonstrate.

This turned out to be one of the smaller ‘local’ buses (as opposed to the ‘tourist buses’). There really wasn’t much difference in the comfort level, but this bus was only 7 pesos instead of 10! BTW, the bus drivers have change!

It really wasn’t very far to get to Rico’s from the Marina, but I was glad for the lift. I got up just after the El Cid Resort and the driver asked me where I wanted him to stop exactly. I said Rico’s and he dropped me off kitty corner from the café.

To my surprise, Rico’s upped their coffee prices significantly since the last batch I got, from 124 pesos to 147 for a pound of Veracruz! Still a great deal, though! I was happy to use their bathroom while I waited for my order, but was surprised that it was not very clean.

It was coming onto 1:00 when I left and I was ready for lunch. I wanted sushi, something I haven’t had since November 29th, but I knew better than to have my heart set on it. There are tons of sushi restaurants in Maz, but they never seem to be open when I need them to be!

I walked down the street towards Rafael Buelna, looking at my food options and doing a bit of window shopping.

See these little squares in the pavement?

Super cute tiles! This one’s a cat.

A fish. There were birds and loads of other designs.

A want a basin like this for the bathroom sink in my cabin!

I was nearly at Rafael Buelna when I found an open sushi place, Yoko’s! Heading south, it’s just after Panamá’s and before the Burger King on your left. The entrance is set back from the road, so it’s not evident that the place is open. I’m glad I investigated!

To my immense surprise, I was not only served in Spanish, but the menu was bilingual Japanese-Spanish with no English! I had no idea what half the Spanish words were and my Japanese was much needed and appreciated. 🙂

I ordered pretty much my usual, octopus nigiri and spicy tuna.

A lunch to behold! Non-spicy spicy tuna and octopus nigiri.

The octopus came with a sweet and salty sauce that I was worried would mask the delicate flavour of the flesh, but there was only a small dab of it and it wound up being very good!

The tuna was not spicy in the least, but was very fresh and generously portioned. This was a 10 out of 10 sushi meal! The bill was a bit shocking, 210 pesos with the tip, a very average price for this quality of sushi meal if converted to both USD and CAD, but quite high for Mexico! Totally worth it, though!

Looking out the window, I saw the Post and Ship mail service location. This is a great service for Gringos here long-term. You get a US shipping address in Texas and every so often, your items are brought to Mexico to be picked up at this location, with all customs processes and fees done for you. I couldn’t justify the cost of the service for just six months, but I bet the ex-pats love it!

Lots of gringos who live here long-term have a PO box here that uses a Texas address.

See what I saw? Burger King with HOME DELIVERY.

After lunch, I decided to go to Panamá’s for cake and coffee, something a few people have told me I need to do just once, even if I don’t eat a lot of sweets anymore. I ordered the ‘coffee and slice’ special, asking for a ‘cafe Americano’ to get real black drip coffee to which you can add milk and sugar (as per my friend’s tip). I was brought a huge multi-tiered tray on wheels from which I could pick any dessert I wanted. There was tons of choice, but I really wanted chocolate and found a slice that looked like devil’s food cake with caramel, which is exactly what it was.

The cake was really good, but I wish I’d had someone to split it with as I could have easily been satisfied with just half of the huge slab. The coffee was excellent! So now I know that I can use Panamá’s for coffee, too! I don’t know if they do take out coffee, but I always a mug with me when I’m traveling, so there’s that option.

I was quite tired by this point, so it was time to wrap up my day with a visit to the Mega supermarket that I have heard so much about. It wasn’t far from Panamá’s; one or two blocks to Rafael Buelna and then perhaps one or two blocks down.

It had a lot, but, really, I think it’s over rated. I didn’t see much there that you can’t find at Soriana and the bigger Leys and the prices were generally a little higher for everything. They did have more imported foods, though, I’ll give them that, and more English signage and staff, which explains why Gringos like them so much and think that groceries are super expensive in Mexico! But I did get a few good deals and they had hummus! Reader Sandy left a comment yesterday about Mega having hummus, so I knew I wasn’t going to leave without some!

The Maxi in Gatineau had a ramp like this for the people and carts.

This is the exact brand of olive oil I buy in Assiniboia. I buy a bottle half that size and it costs me about $6. I was told olive oil is expensive in MX. BS, once again.

A jar of Dijon like that is about $4 in Canada, again a better deal in MX.

And this is where I burst out laughing in Mega.

And then I saw more colours and I couldn’t stop giggling.

COLOURED rice!

All it is is sushi rice and colouring. Yes, I was tempted, no I did not come home with it.

500mL of Canadian maple syrup=OUCH pesos

This is the kind of jam my mother likes. I think it comes from France. The price seems similar to what I paid in Quebec.

Huuuuuuuuumus.

That should last me a bit.

At Mega, the expensive sweet relish is with the ‘gourmet’ imported stuff. The sweet relish of the people is with the olives and tuna. Ours not to question why..

Olives is a word that trips me up in Spanish -- aceituna. Aceite is vinegar and tuna is atún so aceituna makes me think of marinated fish. :)

Olives is a word that trips me up in Spanish — aceituna. Aceite is oil and tuna is atún so aceituna makes me think of sardines. 🙂

I know I just had lunch, but yum!

Now, this was a find! It’s no sugar added granola made with ancient (high protein) grains. It will be great with yoghurt for breakfast!

I’m glad I went to Mega because now I know that I haven’t really been missing out on anything by going primarily to Ley and occasionally to Soriana. There were a few things that might make it worth popping into Mega occasionally, but going there won’t be a habit.

I’d promised myself a pulmonía for the ride home and was quoted 70 pesos. I talked him down to 65… but still paid the 70. 🙂 A panga was pulling out as I arrived, but came back to the dock for me!

The walk home from the panga was just about all the extra work I needed to do today as my bags were getting heavy. I’m cooked and beat, but what a great day off! Now, to decide if I want wine or beer!

March 21, 2015 by Rae

Today Was an Expensive Bust

I was up early to get L&N’s friend to the airport and was on the road heading to Maz by about 8:15. I had planned to spend part of the day at village called El Quelite a little north of Maz, but made an irreversible and expensive mistake: I got on the cuota (toll road) instead of the libre (free road). It doesn’t matter that it took me ages to realise that I wouldn’t be able to access the town from the cuota, I still ended up having to practically go halfway to Culiacán before I could turn around. This meant I had to go through the toll booth in both directions, which cost 109 pesos EACH WAY!!! 🙁

The Pole Palace night club sounds like a very classy establishment.

Mexican open top double decker bus… Yes, those are people poking out of the top of it!

When I was finally able to turn around, it was at an oasis along the barren road, a Pemex/OXXO combo, where I was very glad to have access to a bathroom (which had paper, water, and soap, but no toilet seat) and to be able to get a coffee (which tasted not great; I’ve been so spoiled by Rico’s!).

Turning around, I thought I could salvage the day by visiting some petroglyphs L&N had mentioned and the access road for which I had passed on the way north, but this being the first day of spring, there were massive crowds. I was almost 5KM down the dirt track to the location when a cop signaled for me to pull over. I did so and he spoke very quickly to me.

I said, ¿Mande? and he looked at a loss for words and managed to get out in English that he doesn’t speak English. I shook my head and said that if he spoke slowly and used simple words I would understand. He tried again and I repeated what I had understood: I had to go to the end of the road, go around the parking lot, come back up the track, and park at the head of a long queue of cars. The cop grinned and said exactly.

So that’s what I did and let’s just say I had no desire to park almost 6KM from the entrance and hike down to something I had no details about when it was obviously a special day and people were heading out for the whole of it, with parasols and coolers.

I made it back to the cuota and drove straight to the Soriana off Mex-15 that I went to in December. I actually wanted to check out Mega, but did not have the energy at this point to brave the traffic down Rafael Buelna.

Soriana didn’t have much or, rather, I’m not in the mood to cook, so I pretty much just stocked up on paper goods, crackers, sliced ham, and kielbasa. Something told me to check my email before going into the store and I had a tiny order from Contessa, that I was able to fill. I am always glad to do that for people! When I would do my supply runs to Whitehorse, I would often have full huge lists of shopping for people, hundreds of dollars’ worth… and I would have the favour returned when others did their supply runs.

I dropped Contessa’s things off and got in around 2:30. I had a beer while I read a bit, then I decided I was hungry and moved my reading to the El Velero restaurant where I made the mistake of filling up on chips (damn their awesome pico de gallo!) and limonda, not leaving me much room for my chicken tacos. So I brought most of the tacos home and will have a nice breakfast tomorrow.

Not counting any expenditures from Soriana onward, my day cost me about 500 pesos in tolls and fuel with absolutely nothing to show for it. Very disappointing. If I wasn’t driving such a gas guzzler, I would have enjoyed the drive, something I haven’t done much this winter, but all I could focus on was the gas gauge needle dipping lower and lower and lower. If El Quelite had had anything really remarkable to see, I might have made a point to find my way to the libre and gone there after all, but there was really nothing that spectacular to see to justify the extra mileage.

I wish I had a navigator. You can’t drive and navigate here, it’s too dangerous. A navigator would have been looking at the map for me and telling me to stay in the left lane while I worked at avoiding getting into an accident.

To be honest, I wish I had done what I wanted to do today: come home from the airport and go back to bed with a book. 🙁

March 19, 2015 by Rae

The Cut and Paste Holiday

My current seasonal project involves typing up testimonies. I get a written copy of them and sometimes the stars align so that not only does the testifier read his/her testimony straight through, but the PDF is also OCRable, enabling me to cut and paste it into my document. This cuts down on my work load immensely and sometimes, like today, makes it possible to transcribe quite a bit of audio in a very short amount of time.

By noonish, I’d done two loads of laundry, Skyped my mother to wish her a happy birthday, cleaned the house, and done enough work to make for a large, but manageable load tomorrow thanks to the magic of cut and paste. I decided to take advantage of this and head to Centro, wanting to take full advantage of my last precious days in Mexico this spring.

Before going to the panga, I stopped at my landlady’s to pay the remainder of the tab for the electricity and also to tell her and her husband this, in Spanish:

“I’m having the same problem with my toilet as last time, that the water in the tank gets too high and the water gets all over the floor. I shut the water to the toilet and will be home tomorrow and all next week if you (to her husband) can come fix it. Oh, and by the way, here’s the 240 pesos for the light bill and when you’re over at the house fixing my toilet, can you please cut the palm frond over the clothesline?”

The pair of them looked at each other, burst out laughing, and clapped! When she could catch her breath, my landlady said that she was amazed by how my Spanish has improved since we spoke on the phone last fall and promised to get everything fixed for me and thanked me for making good on the light bill.

So off I went to Maz, taking Constitución since I wanted to have lunch on Olas Altas, unless Beach Burger at Plazuela Machado was (finally) open.

I found Maz’s red light district. I am not being facetious. The picture of a scantily clad woman on the door and the men coming in and out of said door pretty much confirm it…

I watched a man paint this proper, non-scary accessible entrance.

Plazuela Machado

This couple was wearing a pair of earbuds each and dancing!

Beach Burger was open! YAY! I keep hearing that they have the best burger in town and I wanted to know if that was true, especially now that I have a few comparison points.

I ordered a Tecate and a burger, making a point to tell the server NO MAYO. Mayo comes on just about anything with bred in Mexico and if you don’t specifically refuse it, your food will come slathered with it. I once made the mistake of asking if a sandwich came with anything and was told just lettuce, tomato, and onion… and it was drenched in mayo.

My meal took forever to arrive, close to if not a little more than an hour! I had my phone and caught up on some FaceBooking and reading. The server came by several times to give me an estimate on how much longer I’d have to wait (very accurate, might I add) and I decided, what the heck, and had a second beer!

When the burger arrived, it was beautiful:

INCREDIBLE burger. The fries weren’t worth mentioning, beyond the reasonable portion.

And it was delicious. I don’t think it’s possible to compare great burgers because they’re all unique. A burger, I think, is either good or not. This one was good. The bun was toasty, the meat fresh, generous, and seasoned with Montreal steak spice, which I adore. There was lettuce, tomato, onion, cheese, ketchup, and the mustard I’d asked for. At 70 pesos, it’s definitely pricier than the 30-peso burger I like in the Golden Zone, but it’s a heck of a lot closer. This was definitely a burger worth the wait!

The same super hot pickles that I get at Miguel’s here on Isla. I actually ate the carrot.

I like that I always know what my tab is going to be because taxes are included. Burger, 70MXN and 2x20MXN for the beer

Workers were installing bollards to prevent people from driving down Constitución along Plazuela Machado.

I then got some garrafa de nieve to cleanse my palate and tried jamaica (hibiscus) for the first and last time. Like the agua fresca, it was pretty flavourless. But they had guava again, which I haven’t had since the first time I had some!

The Mercado was next since I had to get an earring fixed. For someone who doesn’t wear a lot of jewellery, that’s a lot of jewellery fixing for me in one week! Unbelievably, one of the posts from the pair of earrings I bought at Yellowstone snapped right off! The jewellery repair guy did a good job on it, but unfortunately washed most of the patina off the leaf after, so now I have a super shiny leaf and a dark leaf. Hopefully, the patina won’t take too long to come back. The guy actually tried to give me back the 10 pesos I overpaid earlier this week, but I insisted that he keep it and I paid the full 40 pesos for this repair as well.

I finished up in the area by doing a Waldo’s and veggie run, then headed to Ley. On the way there, I came across a vendor selling 10-peso earrings and I picked up a pair with small seashells. I didn’t negotiate a lower price; that would have been ridiculous. I’m glad to be rebuilding my earring collection. 🙂

Ley has put my favourite yoghurt on sale before, but today it was especially cheap, only 15 pesos for the big size!!! I picked up two, one pineapple coconut and also the one with raisins, just to try something new.

At the panga, I was about to go down the ramp when a man called up to me to wait a minute. He was promptly berated by a woman behind me for telling me this in Spanish and that he was lucky I understood him. He retorted that he’s heard me speak loads of Spanish and to stop assuming that all Gringos don’t speak Spanish, it would get her in trouble! This rather made a linguistic bookend to my afternoon!

But the linguistic amusement doesn’t end there. I chatted in English with a couple on the panga when I heard a couple behind me discuss in québécois how much they loved my dress (the purple one I got in December). I turned and said, “Ben, merci. Je l’aime aussi!” (Gee, I love it, too!) The look on their face was priceless.

March 15, 2015 by Rae

Sunday Afternoon in Mazatlán

I went from having a reasonable queue of work from Client A this weekend and into the new week to having an “OMG, must type and not stop till I’m done, holy cow!” type of queue when my, “Definitely not going to have anything for you this weekend,” Client B pulled his, “Can you do about 50 billion hours of work for me by (impossible deadline),” stunt. Since I’m taking next weekend off, I agreed to take the assignment, but negotiated a more manageable deadline.

Everything was going well until this morning when I realised that there was a major issue with the second part of a project due for Client A that meant I could not proceed at all with it. Because it’s ultimately a government contract, there could be no answers till tomorrow, a business day. So that meant that I’d be scrambling tomorrow to do that project and should therefore start Client B’s project so that I wouldn’t be scrambling with it on Tuesday.

By noon, I had already done three hours of work finishing the first part of Client A’s project that I could finish and I’d done nearly three hours of work for Client B, enough to determine that this was a very rare easy file from him that I could easily complete between Tuesday and Wednesday morning.

Dale and I had made plans to meet downtown for one last beer today at 2:00, so I found myself going from, “Need to make this super quick!” to “Hey, don’t have to go back to work after!” Woohoo!

I left a little earlier than I needed to so I could run two errands before meeting Dale. I got to the panga and had only a 100 to pay for my 8-peso fare. Contessa had offered to loan me a 20, but I figured the panaga folks would have change or, worst case, I could run into the City Deli for a water. I asked the lady at the panga booth if she had change for a 100 and she said yes, but only because I asked her so nicely in her language and then winked at me as she pulled open a drawer with heaps of change in it. Hee!

The first errand in town was picking up some avocados and red onions. Avocados were easy, but I had to go to about six merchants before I found non-rotten red onions!

Then, I needed a jewelery repair shop because the chain on my pendant broke a couple of days ago. For some reason, I actually noticed and remembered that there was a jewelery repair kiosk on the exterior perimeter of the Mercado. I walked around until I found him on the side across from Waldo’s, towards Leandro Valle.

The man greeted me in perfect English, so I didn’t bother to look for the correct Spanish words. I pulled out the pendant, spread it out, pointed out where a link had broken, and asked if he could fix it. He confirmed that it was silver, then said, and I quote, “Absolutely! Take five minutes! 40 pesos!”

It indeed toook about five minutes and he showed me the link, explaining the discolouration was because of the welding process and that the colour would even out over time, none of which was an issue.

He dug and dug for 10 pesos in change from my 50-peso note and I told him to not worry about the change. I was so grateful that the repair had been done so quickly and well, knowing that I would have had no idea where to have a repair like this done back home and that it would have cost me a fortune. He was so grateful for an extra what amounts to 80 cents for me that I think both our days were made.

I then went across the street and Dale arrived a couple of minutes later. We headed down to Olas Altas as I unloaded about my work day.

I hadn’t planned to have lunch because I thought Dale was having a dinner out with friends this evening, but I wound up only having more than some crackers, cheese, and fruit at 11:00. So when Dale said she was hungry and was only doing drinks with her friends later, I suggested we go to the Copa de leche restaurant for a proper meal.

There, I ordered the enchiladas mole like last time and Dale shocked me by ordering the beef tacos. Beers were two for one and so we had two each. The food was just as good as last time (although I didn’t have any sesame seeds this time and had to ask for extra tortillas for the sauce). Dale loved the mole sauce and one of her tacos, loaded with extra grilled onions, materialized on my plate…

We drank our first beers really fast and so hit the pair of them hit us pretty hard. Dale was in hysterics watching me try to figure out the tab, something I usually do effortlessly for us. We were stuffed with good food and just about rolled out of there. We were rather giggly walking back to the Mercado. 🙂

There, we stopped in at Panamá’s so I could get some sandwiches for tonight and a croissant for the morning. Dale didn’t have any change, so I made her pick out something for her breakfast as my treat. The cashier had no trouble understanding me when I said that I wanted two bags, but the fact that I wanted two sandwiches and a pastry in one bag and one pastry in the other made her scratch her head a little.

Then, Dale went, “Oh!” which told me she had almost forgotten something. As it turns out, she had gone to the fabric store before meeting me looking for Velcro. It had taken 10 minutes to get the clerks to even pay attention to her and then saying Velcro and pantomiming got her nothing but disdain from the young girl at the notions counter.

So she had me go in and I pulled up a picture of Velcro on my phone. The girl haughtily said that they had some in black and white. I checked with Dale and then asked for white. Then, Dale put her fingers apart to show how much she wanted. The gal shook her head and showed us the metre stick. It a minute of her just shaking her head before I exasperatedly told her that I might not speak Spanish well, but I understand it and what was the problem? Dale needed to buy a whole metre. Geeze, Louise! That wasn’t so hard, was it?!

But it wasn’t over. The gal cut the amount and then handed Dale a ticket, telling me that we had to go to the till and then come back to pick up. We got to the till and Dale handed over a 50. The cashier would not take it and kept saying, “No, no. Five. Five.” I finally clued in and said that neither one of us had change. Okay, fine, Dale gets her 45 pesos in change. She had balked at buying a whole metre but I had told her it would be cheap and I was right!

It still wasn’t over. We went back to the notions counter and the girl looked at us like we were nuts and pointed vaguely in the direction of the till. I have to say that she clearly told me, “Regresa aquí” (come back here), so nothing was lost in translation!

We went back there to the till and I looked around until I saw a sign that, while I couldn’t translate perfectly, suspected meant merchandise pickup, which is exactly what it was.

Whew! This was my second unpleasant encounter with a merchant in nearly five months here. I usually think I’m doing well if I only have a couple a week back home!

And then, it was time to go since Dale had to get back to not just the Golden Zone, but really far up there, past where she lives even, to meet friends. She thanked me several times for being her buddy this winter and I said the same to her. It would have taken so much longer to figure out this place without her.

She pulls out first thing Tuesday and if the fates allow, she’ll pull into Haven sometime this summer. We both refused to say goodbye, just, “See you later!”

March 11, 2015 by Rae

Back to the Beginning

I was running low on coffee, so I emailed Dale yesterday to see if she wanted to meet up today. As it turned out, she had a late morning meeting in Centro, so she suggested I give her my coffee order, she’d pick it up, and then we could meet in front of Waldo’s around 11:30. That worked!

I left early since I wanted to go to the bank and also stop in at the dress shop and have the straps adjusted on my new dress. Feeling lazy, I took 21 de marzo from Emilio Barragán to avoid the giant Leandro Valle hill. The ATM for the Santander bank is on 21 de marzo anyway, one block past the cathedral.

After my withdrawal, I walked the few blocks to get some nieve de garrafa. For the first time, they had lemon. I haven’t had lemon since I got to Mexico! It was so good, like frozen lemonade, and a perfect compliment to the sweet prune and mandarin scoops as well as being very refreshing.

Since there was a cruise ship in port, Maz was thrumming with people, but it wasn’t overwhelming the way it would have been when I first got here. I know my way around now, so I can easily avoid crowds and most of the places I shop and eat at aren’t places the casual visitors would frequent.

Refreshed by my sorbet, I hit the dress shop, which was empty. The seamstress said she had been expecting me. The straps on the dresses are stretchy, so everyone who buys them gets at least one adjustment done. I had brought another dress to change into while she fixed this one, but she preferred to do the sewing by hand with me in the dress to make sure she got the straps perfect. The adjustment was, of course, free and she said I could come back in five years with the dress and she’d still repair it at no cost.

Then, I hit a few produce vendors and bought two kinds of mangos, to do a taste comparison. And then, it was time to meet Dale. She had only one thing on her mind, a cold beer, so I suggested we go to Olas Altas and have one last beer by the water.

You see, Dale’s meeting was with some RVers who are headed east on Tuesday towards Texas and Dale is going to tag along. She’s leaving. It’s official. I am so sad. I hope that she makes good on her promise to come visit me this summer!

By the time we got to Olas Altas, it was only 11:45. I used to order beer in Scotland from 11:00 a.m. onward, but people were still eating breakfast here and it felt way too strange to order beer! So I suggested we double back and get some pastries at Panamá for later.

When we returned to the restaurant, it was noon. We ordered beer and after perusing the menu for a few minutes Dale confessed that all she really wanted was nachos to share and that we could have chorizo on them, too. That was fine and like the last time we ordered the chorizo nachos, they came with a side of chips and salsa. So two beers, ‘lunch’ and a generous tip came to total of 150 pesos!

A well balanced Mexican diet. Hey, pico de gallo more than counts as vegetables. 🙂

We both marveled at how far we’d come since our first forays into Maz. We both know our way around now, have favourite haunts, and are much, much browner than when we arrived. We both know that we are forever changed by this experience, but we have yet to understand how exactly that will translate into our lives back home.

After we rolled out of the restaurant, I insisted that we both had room for a tiny scoop of gelato since Dale had never been to the little gelataria off of Machado. She agreed and off we went. The place was packed with cruise ship tourists. One of the servers was doing a good job with her English, but the line was moving slowly. I may have done a little translating to get some people out of there more quickly…

My favourite flavour there is Ferrero, as in Ferrero Rocher, the little wafer balls filled with Nutella. I knew that Dale likes Nutella, so I told her that I was going to order and that it was on me! I got us each a scoop in a cup. She loved it, thanked me a couple of times for pushing her to go, and agreed that there was indeed just enough place left after lunch for such a yummy and tiny treat. 🙂

She needed to get home to her dogs, so we headed back to the Mercado, where she would catch the bus. I continued on to Ley to get a few things that were on sale, including some sliced ham I discovered at Soriana that is quite good compared to the brand I find at the City Deli.

Now, I need to get to work! I thought I’d get the whole day off, but my client apparently lost leave of her math skills and sent me a huge job that I am going to scramble to do well if I don’t at least start it today. I didn’t want to refuse since I’m taking a few days off soon to go to Durango.

At least, I’ve got tons of coffee to get me through the next few days! 🙂

Turkish proverb: Black like night, strong like sin, sweet like love, hot like inferno. Used by Rico to describe their coffee!

A Life By Design

"Sometimes in life, we reach to a right place by departing from a wrong port with a wrong ship!" ~ Mehmet Murat Ildan

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Sunday Afternoon in Mazatlán

Back to the Beginning