San Cristobal: La Casa de las Flores

It's not unusual to come across mission sponsored schools and community programs in Mexico, but in my experience, it's unusual to find a local non-profit that is successful and addressing local needs. One such program that impressed me on my first trip (in 2011) to San Cristobal was the ReadingTrain. But as often happens, the program got usurped by greed. On my return trip, the Reading Train program consisted of two tour guide "trains" (tour buses in the shape of a locomotive) making oodles of money for the owners. The non-profit that was supposed to benefit from all that money had been reduced to a single canopy tent with a couple of chairs and maybe twenty children's books. There were no volunteers helping the children read, no small peddle 'trains' as a reward for the kids when they finished a book, and no children! It was such a sad degradation to watch. The year before, the kids were excited and had a great time riding on the little peddle cars. Now there's nothing but a fraudulent shell so the tour guides don't lose their government grants.

Claudia

On the other side of the spectrum is Casa del las Flores. The brainchild of a local woman named Claudia, this non-profit gets funding for rent and her salary from a lawyer in Mexico City. Funding for one teacher's salary comes from Amigos de San Cristobal, a local coalition of foreigners and locals who raise money for worthy projects and non-profits.

Casa de las Flores is a day-home, five days a week, for children who live on the streets selling woven bracelets, stuffed toys, chewing gum, and shoe shines. Most of these indigenous kids have parents struggling to feed a large family, but some are orphans, and some are being raised by an older sibling. The children begin working at a very young age, some no older than four years old. Many of them are cute and win the hearts of foreign tourists. They may sell more than their mothers, who spend the bulk of their lives wandering the streets with textiles draped over their arms. For years at a stretch, the mothers also carry one infant after another in a reboso.

Learning to write and spell.

I first heard about Casa del las Flores from my friend Laurie, who has been coming to San Cristobal for a month or more every year. This year she and her partner Tom stayed for two and a half months. She volunteers at the center, teaching kids reading and English. Most of the children are also learning Spanish, as Tsotsil is their mother tongue. Very few, if any, have gone through the doors of a public school. Their lives revolve around their families, church, and selling on the street. For the kids, Casa del las Flores is a world of possibility, where they can learn, have genuine playtime, and practice real world skills in a safe environment.

Claudia told me, in an interview, that she originally envisioned a homelike atmosphere where there would be stable parents, rules, chores, good nutritious meals, and expectations. She is the constant "mom". For the first two years she ran the home almost single handedly, but then suffered from a medical crisis. She asked her friends for help, the word went out, and now she has more volunteers than she can use. Some of the volunteers are men who gladly fill the role of dad. About half the volunteers are foreigners who serve for short periods of time while others live year round in San Cristobal. The other half are local Mexicans. Claudia's role has changed thanks to all the volunteers and extra help. The vision for the center has enlarged to include training in sales, computer skills, and business.

Watering the plants in the rooftop organic garden

Recently, the front part of the home, with large doors that open to the street, has been turned into a store. On one side used clothing, toys, and household items are sold, on the other side they sell fruits and vegetables. The children came up with the idea of the store. They buy produce from a mayoreo (wholesale grocer) and sell organic vegetables they grow on the roof. The kids work in teams. The team running the store each week gets a salary which is probably better than they would make selling trinkets on the street. They learn math and business skills, and how to interact successfully with customers. Other children cut up produce for packaged fruit salads (topped with chile) that are popular all over Mexico.

Collapsed bathroom

Casa del las Flores offers showers two days a week. The center is housed in an older home with a small kitchen and one bathroom. The other rooms of the house serve as a library, computer center, classrooms, and a large play room filled with toys. There are two decrepit bathrooms in the far back of the property. The roof on one has caved in and the other has no door or running water. Claudia estimated about $10,000 pesos could bring both up to working order, but the need for money to buy food is more pressing. The school serves lunch for up to thirty children every day. They can plan the food quantities on a daily basis. It's easy to get a head count, the kids must do one hour of class and a chore before they can eat lunch. Keeping enough food in stock for the demand is a bigger challenge. Most of the food supplies are donated by local people and businesses but still, a lot has to be purchased. Feeding the kids is Claudia's biggest worry.

The school is home to two cats who serve a unique purpose. Most indigenous people have no use for an animal that does not provide food, wool, or work. Dogs and cats are often treated very badly. The children have no experience with a pet. They have no idea how to treat an animal with affection, or get animal affection in return. Most of the children have never been cuddled and have no idea how to pet an animal. Learning to love and take care of another living being is great training for getting along well in life, and it dovetails into Claudia's secret purpose for Casa de las Flores: to change Mexican culture.

There are flexible rules for the children about working, studying, and doing chores before they can eat lunch, but there are only two house rules: No drugs, and all must show respect for women and girls.

Everyone has some chores

The kids are allowed to come in off the streets if they are high (inhaling solvents is a big problem) but they are not allowed to bring drugs inside. If they do, they are permanently banned. They must also show respect for women and girls and that's a much tougher rule to enforce because it goes against the grain of so much Mexican culture. The kids have to be taught what respect is, what words and actions are not allowed. The girls must be taught to respect themselves, to stand up and not allow others to treat them badly. Claudia told me it was a lot easier to ban drugs.

Each child coming in the door for the first time must be trained. They need to learn about honesty, social skills, what is expected of them, and the rules. Sometimes a child never comes back. Some return once a week, or once a month. The time spent at Casa de las Flores is time they are not out selling their wares. Women and children are often punished with beatings if they don't come home with a certain amount of money. About 40 children show up regularly. An average of twenty kids a day are fed and taught. No paperwork is kept as that would create a "government agency" atmosphere, and Claudia would lose the trust of the children. She has no statistics on how many of them are truly homeless, how many have families, or what their family circumstances are, though she has a pretty good idea from talking with them.

I have a feeling that Casa de las Flores will still be in operation, and probably with spin-offs by the time I return to San Cristobal. Claudia's integrity will see to that.

For more information about the school, and if you'd like to make a donation, the website for Casa de las Flores is:  http://www.casaflores.org/english.html

Two girls on the roof watching the antics of the other
children in the house's patio. 

The school's library and
computing center, housed in
the old living room

Three girls in charge of the lunch dishes

Last day in Mexico

I woke up this morning contemplating my last meal in Mexico, like a condemned prisoner. Will it be Cochinita Pibil at Dona Chayito's restaurant way up past the end of the Guadalupe Andador, across the street from the Chicken Ranch, home of the best roasted chicken in town? Or will it be the sheep barbacoa at that tiny place off the beaten path to Chedraui, Mexico's homegrown Wal-Mart?

I spent much of yesterday giving stuff away. My favorite red & black velour jacket went to Arunulfo, along with a blender, an iron, and a long piece of red, turquoise, and black material made into a reboso but used periodically as a curtain, table cloth, and wrap. All the girlie stuff: nail polish, combs, hair barretts, eyeshadow, and mascara, went to Yesi and Malena. Dishes, kitchen stuff, everything but the really good Henkle knife and knife sharpener that I brought with me stay here at Margarita's.

Arunulfo just moved into an empty house. He was house sitting for Theresa for almost three months, so even though he's been here almost as long as I have, he moved in one taxi ride with his rolling suitcase and a back pack. He plans to build a house, so he'll be buying everything shortly, to furnish his new place.  I loaded him up with food I know Margarita probably won't eat: canned soups, dried garbanzo and pinto beans, lentils, Cajeta sauce, soup bases and oatmeal.

A foot high stack of clothing has gone to Casa de las Flores, a day-home and school for street children. It was hard to believe that a suitcase full of clothes has almost disappeared to be replaced with scarves, handmade goodies, and coffee. Some things I brought with me, like a pair of old black jeans, simply wore out and had to be thrown away. Some were shabby to begin with, like an old sweat shirt I slept in, and a yellow tee that was anything but flattering. I purchased several pairs of pants and shirts that were more suitable for this climate at second hand stores, and then donated them on the way out. One beautiful teal shirt had to be modified. I shortened the sleeve and moved the pretty trim up. I couldn't get Margarita's sewing machine to sew that slick fabric well, so it was done by hand. No wonder clothes in the old days were so valuable! It took me an entire eventing to accomplish that relatively simple task. With a scarf over that shirt I look almost elegant.

And still it's iffy about getting the rest of the stuff packed. In the bag now are about 12 scarves, a reboso, clothes, some painted wooden objects, and a handmade pipe with Pakal's face for my son who says he doesn't smoke, a bag of coffee and another of chocolates. It weighs a ton and not everything is packed. Three boxes of books, clothes, and kitchen items are now stored at Malena's with all of John's junk.

The landmark cross
in the plaza in front of
the cathedral.

So in spite of my vow to keep life simple and not buy much, I bought stuff. The big money was spent on jewelry and I'm leaving none of that behind! Smaller amounts of money went to street buys. I bought a couple of little headbands, knitted by a Chamulan girl who used her sweet smile to lure in soft hearts like mine. One went to Sophia, Damian's daughter, the other to Violeta, Edith's daughter. Both looked very cute and seemed to like them.

It feels like it was a productive trip. I wanted to learn Spanish better and I made a lot of progress, though I'm nowhere near fluent. I have had some wonderful conversations with people. Like yesterday, while waiting for Malena in her little restaurant to give me a cooking lesson in making green mole. A man was there having breakfast and while he waited for his change, he struck up a conversation with me. He's a veterinarian who, like most Mexicans, has relatives in the states. One sister has become Mormon and lives in Utah. So that led us to discuss religion. He's Catholic, and I told him about my own Unitarian religion, which of course he knew nothing about. I understood him, he understood me, and we had a very nice chat. Neither of us were in the least interested in converting the other person, and instantly saw our shared values. When I left I felt a bit stunned. I'd just discussed religion, not an easy subject, and did it all in Spanish. Progress has been made on this trip, in spite of having American room mates, John, Derek, and Margarita, the entire time. I really have Edith to thank for that, and the multitude of opportunities to practice in this land of patient kind people.

The other goal was to write. Not just this blog, but a book. So far, two sections (7 chapters) down and two more to go. That's huge, and I need to focus hard on it when I get home. But that won't be for a few days. Tomorrow is all travel, then a few days in Albuquerque, then Monday - home to Lost Almost.

A couple of fruits

Summer in San Cristobal feels a lot like fall in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The days are cool and potentially rainy. The nights chilly enough for a jacket or warm reboso, and the bed has a down comforter year round.

But in the low country, it's now hot and steamy summertime. Interesting fruits and vegetables just keep pouring into the markets.

Papausas in a pile.

The latest one is a yellowish green color with brown marks, bright pink cracks and a creamy pink interior with rose colored veins and reddish brown shiny seeds. It's called a papausa. The texture is like a thick vanilla pudding (except for the big black seeds) and the flavor is a bit like vanilla ice cream with flecks of peach and strawberry. It's quite sweet and rots quickly.

The markets are now crowded with guayaba (guava), a fragrant fruit that also has a short shelf life. When it disintegrates, the smell becomes quite intent. The flesh is sweet and has many small seeds that are easily eaten. In some varieties the seeds are quite hard. Here the apple guayaba and the red guayaba are the most common. The taste can only be compared with another guayaba, it tastes only like itself, defying description. Plus according to Wikipedia and other online sources, the guava has many medicinal qualities, and the leaves especially contain cancer fighting chemicals.

The odd fruits stand: mamey zapotes in the foreground
guayabas in the buckets, papayas in the distance.

Guayabas (guavas) about 20 pesos per bucket

Mamey Zapote fruits

Mamey Zapote fruit and seed

Mamey Zapotes are in season now too, resembling rough brown avocados. Inside there's a rather large hard seed, the flesh is soft and buttery like an avocado, and comes out of the shell in the same easy-to-remove fashion. Most have a sweet vaguely pumpkin flavor, but if overripe it begins to take on a fishy salmon taste, which is not appealing in a fruit. The seed is so hard and durable that I've seen them carved and made into smoking pipes in the market

Papausa and seed

Learning English, Teaching English

So yesterday, later in the evening, but still before dark, I was wandering around the Guadalupe Andador. Two teenaged girls approached me and in Spanish asked if I spoke English. They were doing a project for school. They needed to video themselves interviewing English speakers. Except neither of them spoke English and I was to be their first victim. They had translated their Spanish questions into English with some dorky online translator. Well, dorky is a harsh word. It would be difficult to program a computer to know if a sentence should be translated from the formal 'you' in Spanish or with the pronoun him/her. So this was one of the questions they'd wanted to ask me: "What did he do in place before he come to San Cristobal?" Or my favorite "Size what give he family come with?"

The Guadalupe Andador, a walking street.

Here was a perfect teaching moment. I read their questions in Spanish, then translated into English and wrote it on the paper they were reading from. They still couldn't pronounce words like Why and Where and What, because the "wh" sound is a bit foreign, but not really. I told the girl who kept screwing up the pronunciation "You can say Iztaccihuatl, can't you?" She drew a blank. "The volcano, very famous, near Mexico City?" Then she snapped. I kept going: "Huatl, hua, that's the same sound as 'wh' in English." They both tried to say 'Why' but instead said 'Whee'. Another teaching moment:  "You can say pie  can't you?" (Pie is spelled 'pay' in Spanish but pronounced the same as pie in English, and means a pie too!) Why, yes they could manage that! "Now put the sounds together and you can say 'why'." One was filming, the other would try to say the word and then both would erupt into peals of nervous laughter. I gave up and laughed along with them and somehow we managed to make a few clips on a cell phone which I'm sure will be enormously entertaining to their teacher.

That little moment reminded me of my stepfather's teaching moment when he was in Mexico many years ago. A gentle polite boy who was bell-hopping at the hotel asked how he could get people to move out of his way, politely, and in English. So Jack told him, "First you always say 'excuse me', then you always say 'please' which is disculpame and por favor." So the kid practiced 'please' and 'excuse me' many times. Then my father said "Then you put that together and you say 'Excuse me. Please move your ass."

Belly Dancing

Katarina

Who would have thought San Cristobal de las Casas would be a hotbed of belly dancers? Sunday I went with Margarita and Marlu to a little house on the edge of the forest preserve, to a party put on by belly dancers for their teacher, a 71 year old German woman named Katarina. She will soon be joining her family in the US, gone forever.

Wednesday night I went to their class at a small dance studio near the Guadalupe andador. We all wore loose clothing and a scarf around the hips so we could see how well we shimmied, or swayed, or seductively rotated. Some women were very advanced and could do the jet speed jiggle. Others (me) had one roll of fat still on the upswing when the last roll was coming back, the waves cancelled each other out. It was a killer hour of lifting arms up or out, coquettishly flitting them hither and yon, swaying hips back and forth simultaneously raising and lowering, prancing around on tip toes, and dripping sweat. The teacher did everything she asked us to do, for the entire time, without a glisten of perspiration. An amazing woman. And the class was packed, probably twenty five women in a smallish room with a decent floor (wood not tile).

Everyone said good-by to Katarina, but it turned out she has decided to return and will teach again. Meanwhile, the more advanced students will continue the practices and they'll still be in good form when she returns.

Learning to keep the upper body still.

Outdoor practice

Katarina leading the group, Arnulfo, the only
male belly dancer, enjoying himself immensely.

Building a house

Arnulfo chatting with the owner
of a house Marlu built.

My German friend Arnulfo is about to take a huge step. He came back to Mexico in March after returning to Germany for about six weeks. His old life there had changed. The woman whose dog he walked had died and the dog went to a new home. Other things he'd been doing in retirement just didn't have the pull for him that Chiapas did.

His dear friend Edith asked him to come back and see if they could share a life together. Beyond that there were no promises, and from time to time, their relationship has been a bit rocky. Edith is very independent and protective of herself, and her children. Arnulfo is the kindest man in the world, loves those kids, and is a grandfather figure to them. He loves playing that role since he has no grandchildren of his own. Now, after a few months, the relationship has settled down. The man who owns property behind Edith has offered to sell a nice chunk of land to her. Arnulfo would like to buy it and build a house for himself.

So I introduced him to Marlu, a Dutch woman who has lived here for thirty+ years, and is an architect. I know of her because people I know live in her designs. I took Arnulfo to see Linda and Andrew's townhome, and he was very impressed. Marlu can turn the tiniest walled lot into a spacious airy and useful home, full of custom cabinetry and multi-use spaces. And she speaks Dutch, close enough to German, so the two of them hit it off royally.

The tiny house, an octagon, where 40 people
gathered to play music and dance. 

Marlu also takes belly dance lessons with my landlady, Margaret. Yesterday the four of us and Marlu's friend Pepe went to a friend's house for a belly dancing party. Arnulfo is almost as fond of Turkey as he is of Mexico, so he had a ball; belly dancing with all those women in their silky costumes to lively Turkish music, and eating hummus, baba ganoush, safron rice, home made pita breads, and halva. There were three houses in a row on that property, right next to a forest reserve, all designed and built by Marlu, so Arnulfo got to see some more excellent examples of her work. The homes are adobe with solar features and environmentally sound construction. They're tiny homes, but one could envision living in any of them very comfortably.

After seeing those little houses, and getting an idea of what it might cost to build one (between $25 and $50K US) Arnulfo was on fire. He was so excited he's already made a list of the features he wants, and how it might be situated. Now he just needs to purchase the land and the work will begin.

An even smaller octagonal house

Larger two bedroom home in the trio of houses

Weird food

Rambutans

What is most fun for me about traveling is trying new food, and new food combinations. In the local market some very strange hairy fruits are sold, called Rambutans. A couple months ago I passed by a young man with a wheeled cart full of hairy berries. They look like Ogalala strawberries, with soft spines. He opened one and inside was a white fruit with a squeeky bite. It was a lychee! I know lychees from the canned version served in Chinese restaurants. It tasted like a lychee but then again, not quite. So I thought the canning process added more sugar or something to account for the less sweet taste. And that "Rambutan" was the Mexican word for Lychee, even though it didn't sound at all Spanish.

Wrong on both accounts. It didn't taste like a lychee.....because it wasn't. It's related, and in the same family, but not the same thing. So today in the market, a man was selling the hairy Rambutans and a smaller nut-looking thing with bumpy brown skin which he called a Lychee. I bought a quarter kilo of each and brought them home. Inside the fruits look almost identical, but the seeds are quite different. The Rambutan seed is larger, softer, and cream colored, while the Lychee seed is shiny black. A taste of the Lychee leaves no doubt what it is, the canning process does not detract at all from its delightful flavor. The Rambutan is similar but milder and not as sweet.

At the Mercado Organico, I purchased some strange looking fruits and the woman told me the name, but I promptly forgot because I didn't write it down. I always assume someone else will be able to tell me, but back home Margarita said she vaguely recalled having once eaten something like it and didn't know the name. Pasqual the gardener had no clue whatsoever, and neither did Clara, the woman who comes to clean once a week.

Un-named fruit

I took photos, opened the fruits up and discovered they are filled with seeds, each one in it's own little fruity sack, like a pomegranite. It looks like a small squash in the shape of a banana, the skin is baby-face-furry, and the flavor is clearly fruit-like but sour and tart. The seeds are black and hard so I put the interiors of those fruits in the blender with some water and whizzed the seeds out of their fruity sacks. Fortunately the blades didn't tear up the seeds and it was easily strained. A little sugar added made a decent "liquado". We also had two of those mealy red bananas that have such intense flavor, so I added those and the juice of one lime to keep it from turning black. It became an excellent liquado.

Also sold in the market are small baskets of what look like fried rolly polly bugs. A photographer friend actually bought some and said they are giant flying ants. At the beginning of the rainy season, the flying ants come out to mate and swarm under street lights. The locals catch them in nets and then roast them on a comal, a large ceramic plate over a wood fire, the same comal they use to cook tortillas. It's a seasonal delicacy that I'm glad Jon tried and not me. He ate a few, just to say he did, but wasn't smitten. The only insect I've ever eaten that I would eat again, any time, are chocolate covered bees. Here in Chiapas, the birthplace of chocolate you'd think I could find some, but alas.

Close up of strange fruit

And of course the avocados. They're hardly weird, but there is one really weird variety. I am guessing, probably wrong again, that it's the ancestral avocado, before human beings took over and modified them. The big fat almost black bumpy avocados here are the best in the world. They are softly ripe and have relatively small seeds, so only one or two yields an enormous amount of guacamole. But in the market I saw a bumpy brown and green avocado, twice the size of the black ones, shaped like a crook neck yellow squash. I asked the seller if it had a large seed and she nodded. They were so cheap I went ahead and bought four. She wasn't kidding. The seed was as big as my hand and the avocado meat was a thin stringy ring around it. All of which might have been forgivable but they had only the faintest flavor, and two of them were black rotted.

Into the compost with those awful things!



(Post note - a few days later:  I asked my Spanish teacher who seems to be quite knowledgeable about everything if she'd ever heard of a fruit matching the description of the mystery one. She said maybe it's a maracuya. So good 'ol Wikipedia had several entries for different types of passion fruits, one of which was banana maracuja. They showed other Maracuya's, and I knew those as granaditas. They go by a dozen names throughout the world, including granadilla, which is close to what they call it here. So mystery solved. One more chink in the cultural jigsaw puzzle down, a million to go.)

Such odd shapes for avocados

Bizarre avocados with huge seeds and
almost no meat

The un-named fruit before cutting,
about 4 inches long (9-10 cm)

Slick Politics

Malena and I spent the morning cleaning out all of John's stuff from the casita, packing it into bags and boxes for storage. She has a couple of men who work for her, Mariano and some other guy I don't know. Mariano is the guy who sprayed water all over at the cabana I rented last year. Click here to read that story!  Safety&SecurityInMX The men took all the boxes and did the heavy lifting, we had time finally for a long visit.

While working, we chatted mostly in Spanish. I'm amazed at the number of Mexicans who understand English but don't speak it. They've seen hundreds of American movies with subtitles and have quite large vocabularies, without the structure to string all the words together. Malena, for instance mixes he and she, him and her, and so I sometimes have trouble following who she's talking about exactly. Gossip forms a large part of our conversations!

Marco at the podium.

Malena's husband Marco works (voluntarily) for Pancho (Francisco Pedrero), a rich hotel owner who is running for President of the Municipality, like mayor of a city. In Mexico, municipalities are both cities and counties, so the number of people voting is quite large here, probably close to half a million people. Malena invited me to a political party at a house that evening. I imagined hob-nobbing with the elite of San Cristobal, sampling little antojitos served by maids and sipping wine or margaritas. Malena was all dressed up with her hair painfully straightened, makeup, high heeled boots and a cleavage blouse. We got into the VW bug and lurched our way through Friday night traffic to what was essentially a staged political rally. Red shirts with Pancho's slogans and logos printed on them were given away at the door, a mariachi band played outside, then moved inside to play, while a guy on super speakers shouted slogans at deafening levels. The floors were thick with pine needles. In Mayan country this signifies a commitment to tradition and nature, it's also a nod to the indigenous communities. The three candidates for the PRI party were Pancho, and two others running for state offices. The master of ceremonies said wonderful things about the three candidates as they entered the massive warehouse packed with red-shirted supporters. I could not have understood much of the rapid fire Spanish anyway, but amplified to those levels made it impossible. However, Malena's husband got up and gave a nice speech that became more and more animated until the crowd began to listen and then cheer. I was impressed. Marco is a good looking man, but he never struck me as the personality type to stand up in front of a thousand people and speak. However, he knows, if Pancho wins, he'll be given a government job, so I guess his future is really on the line.

Pancho schmoozing
in the crowd, the only
bald head there.

The rally was all about Pancho. He's a medium height man, but very muscular and a bit fat. He's also bald, which is unusual in Mexico. He looks like a forty-something Telly Savalas. He hugged and kissed supporters all the way down the aisle. The electronic speakers were outfitted with pre-recorded clapping which added volume and static to the crowd. The whole thing was so slick it bordered on sleazy.

After an hour of speeches and promises the loudspeakers played Pancho's theme song which had lyrics referring to his hair-do, or hair-don't in his case. People queued up for hot tamales and soda pop. My skeptical nature wondered how many people would have shown up if there hadn't been free shirts and food.


(My apologies for the poor photo quality, all I had with me was a cell phone!)

Closeup of Pancho taken on the
street a few days later

Incongruity

How incongruous is this? A north Indian restaurant, owned by a Japanese woman, in Mexico

Reiko was a cook in a Mexican restaurant in Tokyo. She came, a year ago, to Mexico to learn more about Mexican food. She lived in Mexico City and made a living selling Japanese pancakes on the street in a pretty rough neighborhood. After getting mugged and robbed twice, she moved to San Cristobal, where  there is no "good" Mexican food in her opinion. Her new friends urged her to open a restaurant because they are so impressed with her cooking, but all she ever cooked for them was Japanese and Indian food.

Reiko, almost rhymes with Rico

She pulled together enough money to open a tiny restaurant. It's the size of a medium bedroom in the US. About 4 x 6 meters with a small bathroom at the back. On the right side there is an island with her cooktop and a sink. On the back wall, a refrigerator. Shelves behind the island hold dishes. Along the other wall is a bar with six stools. She's been open seven days and business is a bit slow but picking up.

She serves six curries. The sauces are premade and she adds vegetables and meats, heats up a single serving and serves bowls of hot curry with rice, a chapati, and onion pickle. She's made lavender lemonade, tamarind tea, chai, some cold desserts like rasmalai and coconut burfi.

I'm hooked. Been there two days in a row and took my Mexican family the second day. I'll probably go there again, at least once this week with the spanish class. We like to eat out after class but we've been going to dive bars and caldo (soup) joints. Now it's time for some really great food.

The coconut burfi is absolutely to die for. I handed a small piece to Mateo (18 months) and he stuffed the whole thing in his mouth. The look on his face was complete shock. He spit it all out into his hand and then took the smallest bites and savored each one.

If she doesn't make a go of this restaurant, I'm going to lose all faith in the Universe.

Meaningful Travel - The people!

A couple of months ago, when Laurie was here in San Miguel, she introduced me to all kinds of people, mostly English speakers.

There's Bela who owns the best B&B in town, catering to Americans, Brits, and Canadians She never seems to have an empty room, even during the rainy season.

Linda works at a bookstore. She is how I became acquainted with Laurie. She and her husband live on the same street in a lovely home they built from scratch. They gutted the existing house and put in a three story town home with a tiny garden in the back. The upper rooms have enviable views of the city and the constantly changing weather patterns.

Edith and Arnulfo

There's Arnulfo, the German that I met when I went to see a movie. He and I were the only customers so it only seemed neighborly to chat and have a meal afterwards. He introduced me to his tutor Edith and eventually I've met her children and one of her X's. We all celebrated his 70 +? birthday a week ago. When he came here, he was staying in a youth hostel. It suited him just fine, he had been a university professor all his life and hanging with young people was perfectly natural to him. But then he began to think about living here full time, and about that time, Laurie called to let me know another American friend needed a house and dog sitter. I recommended Arnulfo since I didn't need a place.

Derek was here then, so the three of us went to meet Theresa and Chucho. She accepted Arnulfo and he's been living in her house ever since. Chucho has been a great companion and a terrible liablity. He's a large and strong former street dog with a lot of emotional baggage. He is sweet and loving inside where he feels safe, and is toto-loco outside. He practically foams at the mouth with anger at other dogs, indigenous men especially, and cars. I watched him lash out at a passing taxi and get whacked in the side of the head. So far he's bitten two indigenous men, and the last time Arnulfo fell down onto his hip yanking Chucho back after he lunged out, bit a man, and tore his pants. Both times Arnulfo has paid the victims of the dog's attack. I think he finally found a muzzle for the dog. It won't stop him from trying to bite cars though.

Edith is my teacher too, and she comes over every Tuesday. We spend time going over verbs and parts of speech, ideas and phrases that make no sense to me, but when spoken get quite a reaction from others:  "Estamos hasta la madre". ("We are until the mother". Makes no sense right?) But apparently "hasta la madre" means something along the lines of God-damned fucking really pissed off.

And my friends from the previous visit, Malena and her children Yesi and Mateo are still a deepening part of my life. We go out on Sundays with her car to eat la comida in the afternoon, and to a park for Mateo to run around. Yesi is 16, so she is with us sometimes, and sometimes checked out and plugged in to her phone, a game, or her ipod. I'm used to that, I have a 21 year old son at home. Time with Malena is time for both of us to learn more language and about each other. She understands a lot of English but most of our conversations are in Spanish. She has introduced me to barbacoa, sheep cooked in a hot underground wood fired pit, green mole, and pickled nopal salad with chunks of squeeky new cheese.

Balom (Jaguar in Tsotsil) with avocados.

Laurie called one day to say her friend Margarita needed a house and pet sitter, would I be interested? At that point I had a place to live but having a much nicer place and some animal companionship sounded like a wonderful idea. Margarita's house is lovely, only a couple of blocks from where I was living, and she has a cat that reminds me of my all-time favorite animal Whisker. Uma the dog is of street dog ancestry, though Margarita got her as a pup. She has no street sense at all.

And as often happens when traveling alone, people take care of you in unseen ways. Sometimes the Universe does too. The casita where I lived is part of a three house compound. A couple moved into one of the other houses. It's only one bedroom and has no other beds, not even a couch. Since I'm over there a lot anyway, I met her and she asked about a place her daughter could stay when she comes for a visit. So I offered the bedroom and bath of my casita. I can put everything inside the living room/kitchen and lock it, since every room has its own door to the outside. We settled on a price, I moved out and the daughter moved in.

They say life isn't about what you know but who you know. It goes without saying that "who you know" probably also needs to like you. Social skills are learned the hard way, some can be taught, but all require constant practice and vigilance. The better you are at interacting with people, the more really great things happen to you. That's why I can't see just traveling, wandering from place to place, seeing this or that. Lakes, mountains, cities, museums, cathedrals, restaurants and bars....are all just physical things that anyone can go to and take a photo of. You could just sit home and peruse the internet. But people take some effort and in the long run it's the people who make all the difference in how meaningful a trip is. And people take time.


(If you are interested in house sitting as a supplement to travel, or as a lifestyle, there are several websites that specialize in matching house sitters with people who need one. Some like TrustedHouseSitters are international, others specialize in just one country like the US.)

Violeta, Edith's daughter

Geronimo, Edith's son

Coco, the renter's chocolate schnauzer

Uma and Balom. That cat puts up with such abuse!

San Cristobal: Saturday Night Red Light District

When I turned 15, my family lived in the Panhandle of Texas. The town, Dimmitt wasn't exactly the buckle on the Bible Belt, but it was definitely one of the holes. The city fathers, the powers-that-be, the standard bearers in that little town believed that dancing was a sin. Like playing cards and drinking alcohol. Playing cards leads to gambling, drinking alcohol leads to a life of debauchery and ruined families, and dancing leads to sinful unmarried sex and little bastards.

(I recently read that in North Carolina, high school teachers will soon not be allowed to tolerate kissing in the schools, because kissing leads to sex, and sex leads to.....but I digress.)

So my wayward father, who didn't care much for the powers-that-be, decided to use my birthday party as a venue for a jab at the status quo. And being the truly innocent person that I was, I happily let him.

Max, the kid next door, had a band. So I asked if he and his band would play in our garage for my birthday party. Of course they were happy to do that, it was their first gig, unpaid, but a gig nonetheless. They were pretty terrible, not that I remember what they played or how well, I was too busy dancing.

I invited everybody I liked, which was probably way more people than liked me, and a bunch of them came. A few parents called my parents to ask about dancing and when told there would only be dancing if the kids knew how, they pulled their kids' invitations.

The bulk of my friends showed up. And my father, to advertise the correct location (he told me) took out the regular yellowish bulb in the porch light and installed a red one. That flashed.

I thought, what a cool dad, he found a red light. I never even knew such a thing existed. (It was 1967....)

When the police showed up my father laughed his ass off. It meant some neighbor had turned us in for running a house of ill repute, and the party went on.

It wasn't till years later that I finally learned what a flashing red light means in the rest of the world.

A plate of Cochinita Pibil from
Dona Chayito's restaurant on Guadalupe

So imagine my surprise to discover that every Saturday night, many streets in San Cristobal de las Casas turn into red light districts.

Entire families are engaged in this business activity. The city condones it by ignoring the hygiene laws and not inspecting the premises. No license is required. Any family that wants to participate in this illicit and normally illegal activity simply puts a wood frame with red plastic panels over their front light, and they're in business.

Potential customers walk up and down the street and when they feel the urge, they stop in at a house with a glowing red box and get serviced. Each house had its own specialty. Some like it big, overstuffed and hot, some like it small and mild.

Tamales that is.

Steaming hot tamales, in banana leaves or corn husks, stuffed with cheese and nuts, or mole and pork, cochinita pibil, or red hot peppers and shredded beef. The varieties are endless and the sizes vary with the chef. All over this part of town tamales can be purchased for a late dinner or for Sunday breakfast. Some places have tables and chairs in the patios but mostly you buy it "para llevar" (take out).

Yum!

Indoors and out - the way Mexicans live

Steps in the garden leading up
to the neighbor's house through
that little gate. 

At this time, I'm house sitting for a woman in San Cristobal in her lovely home right on the curve of La Cola del Diablo, the local name for a sharp right angled curve on Calle Dr. Navarro. The street is so narrow, the sidewalks are barely 15 inches wide, and there is room for only one car. They come whizzing down this street. Sometimes there are drunks who've fallen asleep on the sidewalk and are lying with legs or arms flopped into the road. People get hurt and killed on this narrow section fairly often, hence the name: The Devil's Tail.

The street, and the homes along it, are typical of Mexico. The sidewalk is stone, raised above the level of the road by about 10 inches or more. Since it rains here so much, that's actually a good thing, but sometimes trying to hop up onto the sidewalk when a car is fast approaching can be a challenge. The sidewalk butts up against stucco walls made either of concrete blocks, stones, or adobe. Set into those walls are metal or wooden gates. Some walls have portals large enough for a car to pass through, as well as a sloping driveway into the property. A smaller people-door is then set inside the larger doors for the car. If the property has a large exposure along the street, there might also be a pedestrian door further down the wall.

Across the patio from my room, the oldest
building on the property houses a
studio and meditation room.

Walking along any street, one has no idea how wealthy or poor people are. What lies behind those walls and gates is any body's guess. The walls give clues....if they are covered with graffiti then probably the entire neighborhood is rather impoverished. If not, it means the owners are out every day checking and painting over the graffiti from the night before. After a while, the taggers give up and leave that home or neighborhood alone.

Some people have murals painted on the walls of their homes to keep from being tagged. For some reason, the taggers generally won't spray over a mural, especially if it's of the Virgin Mary. On the next street up the hill is a raggedy old house with paint peeling, rotted wood door, and crumbling stucco. It has an interesting and well done sprayed-painted mural of four women's faces set in curls of smoke and flowers. The house has been for sale for a long time, and may not even be occupied. But the taggers tag around that mural.

The door and window of "my"
room. On the other side of the far
wall is the busy Cola del Diablo.

Once in a while, a gate will be open and you can get a glimpse of the interior. Most of the time the view is into a patio and garden space. Homes typically are built with multiple rooms side by side surrounding the patio, each with its own door. Many homes will have a second level, often accessed by an outdoor stairway and sheltered by overhanging portales or porch roofs. Since the lots are small, the actual living spaces share walls with the neighbors without much sound-proofing. In theory, when you build something new, you're supposed to put up your own wall, but many people just use the neighbor's existing wall and build out from there. That's why, in the little casita I've been renting, I hear the neighbor's son practicing with his band as if they are in the next room, which in fact, they are. I'm grateful they're actually pretty good!

My Mexican friend Malena, who has an uncle in Florida, came over for a little visit at my house-sitting gig, and was impressed with the house and it's beautiful garden. She asked me a question. "Why is it that Americans have big houses with beautiful yards but then they put curtains over the windows and use electric lights inside, even in the daytime?" I wasn't sure I could answer that, but after more discussion, the answer finally dawned on me. It's a question of control. We like to control the climate, so we build these homes that are so contained you don't even have to open a window for light or air or temperature. The temperature inside is maintained so perfectly you never have to put on a sweater or take off any clothes. You never have to interact with the real world.

In most of Mexico, there is no heat in the homes aside from a fireplace or a freestanding electric or gas heater. People wear layers of clothes and sleep under many blankets and together, for warmth. In the summer, when it's hot, you go inside those block and stone houses where the temperature is cooler and go out after the sun sets. People here live with the natural world and it's fluctuations. The idea of controlling it never occurs to them, and if it did, they'd see right away how expensive that can get.  It costs far less to keep just the body warm or cool than to try to keep an entire house at a certain temperature. As a result, the homes here are open to the world and whatever it brings in. Security is provided by those tall walls and metal gates; inside, it's open and free.

Into the bathroom, from the patio.

Years ago I heard a talk by an anthropologist who had studied the culture of the Pueblo Indians in New Mexico. In the days before electricity and indoor plumbing, when people built homes that were adobe brick rooms with a single door, people lived and worked mostly outside. They worked when it was cool and rested in the heat of the day, a custom still practiced throughout Mexico with the afternoon "la comida" or 2 hour siesta. In the winters, people gathered around the fire and told stories, sang old songs, visited with each other, and in this way passed on their culture.

In the 1950's the American government began a plan to upgrade these poor people by supplying them with new houses featuring indoor plumbing, forced air heat, and running water with modern kitchens. The result was that all of a sudden, families had their own homes; gramma and grampa had theirs, kids had their own room, or at least shared with other kids away from where the parent's slept, and there was no longer a need to sit for hours in the one warm room in the evenings. The kids were being taught solely in English at school, and quickly, in just a generation, the culture began to fade away. Many of the tribes have worked very hard to reinstate their native languages in school, and bring people back home, who have moved away, for the annual dances and in some measure preserve what they were in danger of losing forever.

Through the dining room window.

What struck me about that man's talk was how architecture makes all the difference. If your home is such that you live indoors and outdoors at the same time, you adjust to that with your clothing. If you have only one heat source and it heats only one room, then everyone hangs out in there. Social skills are honed, people learn how to deal with each other and their conflicts can't last as long. Nobody would want to leave and be "out in the cold".

So many of the American ex-pats I meet here say they love Mexico because they feel so much more connected with other people. What they were missing is the sense of being part of a community. There are ways to achieve that in the US, of course. But the way we live physically fosters an environment in which isolation is the norm, not community.

A jaguar plate from the village of Amantenango.

Every few days I take my large zippered shopping bag and I walk up the hill to the Mercado.  I see the same people every time I shop. I interact with them, and since I stick out as a foreigner, they remember me too. The potatoes are still covered in the wet dirt from which they emerged that very morning, the eggs still have goo and crap on the shells, the lettuce leaves sport an occasional friendly slug, and the carrots have tops. Almost anything I might want to buy is available in a stall there, I only have to ask and I'm pointed in some direction. It's smelly, dirty, noisy, and crowded.  In contrast, we Americans get into our little "living rooms" on wheels and drive to spotless shopping malls where we buy things (we have no idea who made them or where) from a person we will probably never see again. We buy fruits and vegetables already scrubbed in sterilized Styrofoam packages covered in shrink wrap. Much of our food (grain especially) has not even been touched by human hands. It was grown, harvested, processed, and packaged entirely by machines.

We value that control over the dirt and chaos, we value the total privacy and safety of isolation. We see it as independence. The isolation is certainly no illusion, but the idea that we are independent is.

Living room with ceramic fireplace,
called a chiminea

Back yard with drainage channels for all the rain.

Mural the taggers ignore. Note the
tags right next to it, but not over it.
This house is abandoned and almost
completely covered in grafitti.