One of the things I need to get used to about life on Isla is that I cannot go to sleep past 10 p.m. because the absolute latest I can be guaranteed to sleep uninterrupted is 5 a.m. Seven and six do sometimes happen, but it’s rare. I didn’t get to sleep till about 10:45 last night and I’m feeling it this morning. 🙁

I woke up around five and gave up on going back to sleep around six. I decided to go for a beach walk before getting to work.

After working leads to no avail this morning, I decided to go for a walk on the beach in the hopes of lifting my grey mood.

I met Dale at the entrance to the beach and we chatted for a bit. We might go down to the docks later to check out the cruise ships.

In a bid (successful, might I add) to avoid vendors, I turned left at the beach and walked towards the other apartments I looked at on Thursday, hoping that Daniel, one of the French guys, would be there so I could touch base and make sure there are no hard feelings about my not taking one of his places.

He was outside painting, so we gabbed for a bit. He apologized for the suites being so dirty when I saw them. While, yes, that had bothered me, I knew that he was doing renos, so that was not the main reason I wasn’t interested. I came here to get some experience living in a Mexican community, early morning horn blasts and roosters included, and his suites are rather isolated. He was very understanding about that, especially when he learned that I speak Spanish.

I was beyond ready for lunch by this point (and am learning to move ‘lunch’ to somewhere between 10:30 and 11:30!) so I headed home. On the way there, I got stopped by one of my Mexican neighbours who wanted to introduce himself. I had him repeat and spell his name, but I don’t remember it. 🙁

He asked a lot of rather personal questions, but this is such a small place that I know people talk and that anything I didn’t answer he was going to learn from someone else, so I just answered him — renting alone, from Canada, working from home, here for the winter, etc. He was very friendly, but not in a creepy way, and we had a nice chat.

He said that he is delighted that I speak such lovely Spanish, with a good accent and pace. I replied that I’m enjoying the practise, but know I am making so many errors!

He then said something no one has said to me here yet (translating loosely): “We are having an interesting conversation in my language. I am understanding you perfectly and you me. When you leave, I’ll remember what we talked about, not the mistakes.”

This is exactly my theory of using a foreign language. Use it. You are going to get the odd jerk who will mock you, but, really, you’re the one who gets the laugh as you gain entry into another culture.

I am not going to stop rehashing all the mistakes I make in my interactions with people, because ‘good enough’ isn’t for me, but I’m going to try to stop being embarrassed by errors!

This morning, I awoke to a very heavy sky. It’s now almost 1PM and, sure enough, it’s pouring rain!

The surprise of the day was garbage pickup, which I was told was Tuesdays and Thursdays. I had a hard time understanding the garbage man, who seemed bewildered by me, so I’m not sure if today’s pickup was exceptional or not. I had a bag ready and the other tenant’s bags were by the gate, so I was at least able to get some of the trash out.

I finished off a work assignment, then went for a long walk around Isla. I stopped in at the Super Deli for an onion and some limes for tonight’s dinner and decided to get another container of panela cheese. The total for everything was 28 pesos. I can afford to eat cheese here!!!

The walk along the malecon this morning was lovely, but the beach part not so much. I hope the vendors start to recognize locals…

This was my first time walking at higher tide and I couldn’t believe how different the beach looked!

I came home and minutes later, Dale stopped in and asked me if I wanted to join her on a walk to the Super Deli! I had nothing better to do, so why not?

There, she asked me to find her some whole milk, so I spent some time squinting at labels (the print on food labels is TINY in MX!). I discovered that for a lot of the milk here, they remove the animal fat and add back some sort of vegetable fat. HUH? I found a bottle that said ‘entera’, which I took to mean as whole, and, sure enough, in super tiny print I found some English that said that I was holding a bottle of whole homogenized milk. Dale was grateful for my translation help. 🙂

On the way back, I showed her where the chicken lady sets up her stand and then headed across the street to the peanut guy, my target yesterday until I got sidetracked the smell of chicken. 10 pesos got me a whole big bag of small roasted peanuts in their shell.

We kept walking and eventually passed one of the vegetable men! I stopped and had a look at the wares, picking up a few potatoes, a carrot, a garlic, and a chayote for about 18 pesos. I had never heard of chayote before, but he said ‘es como un zucchini’, so I decided to give it a shot since I started eating zucchini this past summer. I described to him where I live (doing a very good job of it!) and asked when he passes in my area. He said that he is at the corner of my street between 9:30 and 10:00 every day and to listen for his chime.

The problem is that all the services have a chime and I’m starting to tune them out… 🙂

I’m starting to run out of bandwidth, so I have to be a bit more careful with my time online for the next little bit. I don’t want to go pay for a drink to pay for public wifi unless it’s for work purposes and work is not incoming for this week. 🙁 I am feeling very panicky about that and finding it hard to occupy myself because I’m so worried. So if I disappear a bit, I’m just walking around Isla trying to stay busy by soaking up the local culture.

I wrote this poem during the summer of 2002, while I was supervisor of boat rental operations for Gatineau Park. I spent an amazing summer on a lakefront beach, barefoot in the sand, getting fit hauling canoes and rescuing paddlers from the lake.

Sand
The curse of the winter lover
Sand everywhere
In your hair and in your crotch
Between your toes till it lays bare the skin
Sand
Dusty, gritty
Tired brown
For the same faceted crystals
Seek out a snowflake melted then refrozen
That snow that crunches beneath your snowshoes
Instead of those bits of rock
That grate beneath your desiccated feet.

While I am no longer a winter lover, now seeking out warmer climes, the bit about the feet holds! My feet are already rubbed raw from bad footwear, salt air, and sand. I’m making sure they’re just sore, not hurting, knowing that they will callus if I just endure this for a week or two, and that the pain will be worthwhile. 🙂

Tonight’s sunset on the beach, not retouched: