Halloween Mexican Style

Halloween Mexican Style

Halloween is not a traditional holiday in Mexico; but the stores and the children seem to be embracing it. The number of children that we have gotten has increased each year. The first year we were here we maybe had 5 children and this year we have gotten at least 30. Instead of shouting Trick or Treat the way they do in Canada, they shout, "queremos Halloween"-we want Halloween.

The Sounds Of Garbage Day

The Sounds Of Garbage Day

Some months ago, honestly I forget exactly when it was and am too lazy to look it up, our garbage pick up service was privatised by the city of Guaymas. It was a big deal here and there were protests staged at the city hall. It went through regardless. We have always had our garbage picked up 2-3 times a week and although there were some problems at the beginning, with the new company, the frequency of pick up continues. The company, PASA, has nice new trucks and does a good job; although they are not as conscientious about putting back the cans where they got them from, etc. as the old workers were. The important thing to us, is that they show up and they do their job.

The new trucks also have loudspeakers that play a "garbage song" to announce to you that they are coming. The music is, of course, quite loud. The video clip below, other than showing you our other street dog, is to mainly let you hear the "garbage song". It doesn't sound as loud as normal as I took it when the truck was about a block away from us yet. Hope you enjoy some more of our early morning sounds.

Happy Halloween

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

Preparing For The Cruisers

Preparing For The Cruisers

The other day one of the newspapers had another article about the preparations for the cruise ships, I forget which paper I read the article in; but the photo below came from Quinto Poder . This is some of what the article stated.

They propose investing 90 million pesos (about 9 million dollars) in the construction/rehabilitation of a terminal for the cruise ships.

They will begin the first phase in early November with an expenditure of 40 million pesos (about 4 million dollars) and expect that phase to be finished in December/07 or January/08. They will then begin the 2nd phase with a projected cost of 50 million pesos (about 5 million dollars).

They will be able to accommodate ships of 311 meters in length and 115,000 tons in weight with a capacity of 500-3,000 passengers.

The pier (200 meters long x 10 meters wide) is scheduled to receive 3 cruise ships from Holland America in the fall of 2008; with a goal of 50 ships a year.

Some of the attractions the tourists can expect to see in the area are the giant cactus forests, (El Sahuaral) and the Nacapule Canyon.

The article quotes Ibarra Castro, who I think is the director of Port Administration as saying that Guaymas has everything needed to become a "destination" port and that we soon will be able to compete with the best tourist ports of Mexico.

Hmmm...we will see, I suppose.

Morning Sounds

Morning Sounds

Many of the blogs I read have been talking about the time change over the weekend. The time change is pretty much a non-event here, as we in Sonora do not observe Daylight Savings Time. Apparently NOB doesn't change for another week yet, so things will be out of synch across the borders for a week. Time for us is not a big deal anyway, as we don't get too excited about it. We don't usually have appointments and don't really need to be on time for anything much. We don't even have an actual clock in the apartment. We have the clocks on the computers and I have my wristwatch, Roys wristwatch battery went dead about 2 mths. ago and we still haven't replaced it and most of the time he doesn't miss it. I guess we will have to do that one of these days. Oh well, lots of time to do that.

We went over to San Carlos on Saturday and had a visit and lunch with some friends who have come down from Canada to spend part of the winter here. They were nice enough to bring me some things that I have been missing from NOB, the most important (in my mind), being craft paint. I have tried and tried using the acrylic paints that you can buy here; but just cannot seem to get used to them. M. very nicely brought me down a bunch and it was just like Christmas for me. Thank you M.. I spent yesterday fooling around with them; but after 2 yrs. of not doing anything with paints it was a frustrating experience. I guess I have forgotten everything that I did know, which wasn't much! Oh well, time to experiment I guess.

There is a school about 2 blks. from us and they quite often use the loudspeaker system in the schoolyard. The last few weeks they have been playing a lot of music over the speakers in the mornings. I assume that they are practising up for the Revolution Day Parade; but maybe not. We can't see what they are doing, we just get to listen to the music.

The only way I have of uploading an audio clip is by taking a movie clip with the camera. The clip below only shows you our favorite street dog, we call him Rojo, (red); but it gives you a taste of the music that we are listening to in the mornings lately. The music is quite loud and I don't think that you would be sleeping in too late with this blaring; but no one here sleeps in anyway, so it is not a problem.

Would You Buy This Product?

Would You Buy This Product?

Once in awhile a store flyer gets delivered, usually it is tucked under the windshield wipers on the car, sometimes just laying on the steps. The other day I noticed one, so went downstairs to get it before the wind scattered it all over the place. It was from Soriana,
a grocery store. It was touting their 39th Anniversary and was a fair sized flyer. Lots of products inside. I sat down to look through it and noticed one advertisement that got me laughing, I just had to take it inside and show Roy.

The advertisement was for a hair gel. OK, so what is funny about that, you say. Well, the name of the gel is, "Snott Gorilla Gel" ,ewww, makes me want to run right out and purchase this product! NOT!!! The photo on the product container shows a gorilla with green "snot" coming out of his nose.

What is this company thinking of with the naming of their product and what age group are they gearing it to? Goofy teenagers/pre-teens? I can't see adults going to the store looking for Snott Gorilla hair gel. Can you? Would you run right out and purchase this?

Casa de Cultura-Exterior

Casa de Cultura-Exterior

When we finished wandering around the interior of the Casa de Cultura, we went outside. I couldn't get a good picture of the building from the front as the street is too close and the building is too big, to be able to get it all in. The best I could do was this side shot.

I love the look of this building, or maybe I should just say that I love all old buildings whether they are in good repair or not. I always think that they have such stories they could tell, if only they had voices.

Piano/Violin classroom off of the front verandah.

Window detail.

More Full Moon

More Full Moon

Casa de Cultura-Interior Rooms

Casa de Cultura-Interior Rooms

We viewed the art exhibit and then we wandered around the building itself. There are classrooms for the teaching of ballet, folkloric dance, piano, violin, arts and probably some that I have missed. There is also an interior courtyard that is open to the weather, meaning there is no roof over the central part of it.

Art classroom.

Piano classroom.

Ballet classroom.

Interior courtyard.

Casa de Cultura (Culture House) Exhibition

Casa de Cultura (Culture House) Exhibition

This morning I went to read the newspaper online and found out that today is the last day of an exhibit of art at La Casa de Cultural, loosely translated, The House of Culture.
I didn't write down the artists name and when I went back now, I realised that I had been reading yesterdays edition of the paper and now they have todays edition on. So, unfortunately I cannot tell you her name.
It was an exhibition of her renderings that she has done as her biography of Frida Kahlo. There were only maybe 20 drawings that were quite small in size but very rich in detail. It was interesting.
The photos are not very good as there was a lot of reflection.

International Space Station

International Space Station

Apparently last night we could have seen the Space Shuttle Discovery and the International Space Station go over us; but unfortunately I didn't read about it until this morning. They docked sucessfully this morning. I then read that we would be able again this evening to see the Space Station go over us. We were ready and waiting and sure enough we saw it. It was in sight for maybe 5 minutes before disappearing from our range of vision. Neat sight to see.
It is again full moon time, so of course out came my camera and even the tri-pod this month. I got some photos that may or may not be worth looking at; but I don't mind some of them so here they are.

Nauticopa Boat Races

Nauticopa Boat Races

The Nauticopa boat races are to be held in Guaymas on November 3 & 4 this year. Fox Sports will be here to film it and they are expecting an influx of 10 to 15 thousand people. I have been able to find a schedule of the events; Schedule ; but not an exact place where you can go and watch. Go figure. I will keep watching the newspapers, etc., as we would like to go and see some of the races.
Photo taken from La Voz del Puerto newspaper.

What Is Your Carbon Footprint?

What Is Your Carbon Footprint?

This is an interesting site to see how you stack up against others in what they estimate is your carbon footprint. You answer the questions about your life and then it calculates your footprint. You can also compare your footprint to other cities and countries with or without "goods and services footprints". The average footprint in Canada without goods and services footprint is 9.1 as compared to 3.1 in Mexico. With the goods and services footprint it rises to 17.2 in Canada and 5.1 in Mexico. It is interesting. Go ahead and try it.
Zero Footprint Calculator

Soil Problems?

Soil Problems?

Our internet provider has been having problems the last few days. I haven't been able to blog, upload any photos or read my email. The email came on for a couple of minutes and now has gone off again. This seems to be working so will try and post.

We went to the tianguis this morning and then walked uptown to an internet cafe and read some emails. We then headed over to the plaza and sat in the shade there for awhile before heading home.

As we are living on the second floor any gardening I do is in pots. When we first started buying plants last fall, we also needed to buy soil. We purchased a bag here and a bag there at various viveros (nurseries) where we were shopping.

Since we planted everything last fall there have been a couple of casualties or near casualties. One of the roses has died and the Allemanda and Bouganvillea were not looking good. The leaves had turned yellowish/white and they had quit blooming some time ago. I thought that perhaps they were lacking something, so I fertilized them, didn't help. All three of these plants had been planted at the same time in the same soil.

When I was wondering about one day, I had the idea that perhaps there had been something wrong with the one bag of soil that we had bought. With this in mind I decided to transplant the Bouganvillea and the Allemanda (which by this time was almost dead).

Shortly after I transplanted them the Allemanda died a quick death. The bouganvillea on the other hand has perked up, the leaves are getting greener and it is beginning to bloom. Maybe it was the soil. What could have been in this one bag? Too much salt perhaps? Who knows, anyway hopefully it will continue to recover.

Internet Problems

Internet Problems

I am posting this from an internet cafe. We are having problems with our connection at home. Things were fine when we turned our computers off on Sunday evening. When we turned them on Monday morning we had trouble.

We cannot access our email to read them, I cannot post to blogger or upload photos to any of my albums such as Flickr or Webshots. It is almost as if we are being blocked from sending any information out. On my Yahoo email account I can read the email; but not respond to it. On my MSN email, I can neither read it or respond to it.

We can still surf the net and play games though, so we are not sure whether the problem is with our ISP or what.

So if you are emailing and wondering why I am slow to respond, or wondering why I am not posting much on here, that is the reason. Hopefully we will get the problem corrected soon.

Sunday Sunrise

Sunday Sunrise

We have been getting up earlier in the mornings lately for some reason, so we have been seeing more sunrises. There were a few clouds this morning, so it was pretty. My photos never do justice to just how pretty it is; but I keep trying. The mornings now are great, with cooler temperatures and lower humidity. This morning it was 18 C./64 F., all the windows are open and we haven't had the A/C on for about a week or so now. The highs are in the range of 32/33 C./91/92 F., so it is much cooler than a month ago. It also helps that the humidity has gone down.

Roast beef in the crock pot for lunch, sun is shining, life is good. Have a great Sunday, wherever you are.

Smoke In The Air

Smoke In The Air

Lots of smoke in the air this morning, not sure what it is from.

FM3's

FM3's

A couple of weeks ago we decided that it was time for us to investigate getting our FM3's. The FM3 is a visa that allows us to stay in the country for a year without having to head for the border for a new tourist visa. We emailed a friend and asked if it was within his scope to help us with this. He replied with the name of an accountant here in town, as he recommended her to us, we assumed that she could speak some english, not so we were to find out. One of the ladies in the office could speak a little bit of english and between that and our spanish we managed to do what we needed to do.

Thursday and Friday, October 4 & 5, 2007

I printed off some bank statements from the computer, took our passports, and a power bill with us, intending only at the first visit to ask exactly what else we needed to supply. When we got there, the lady looked at what we had, said it was good and sent us to get some photos taken at a nearby place. When we returned she helped us fill in the forms, took our thumb prints and took us over to a copy shop where we got copies of our passports done. Good she said, they should be ready in a week, phone us next Friday to see if they are ready. We walked out of the office, lighter in the wallet, feeling kind of stunned. That was it???? After all the stories of misery that I had read online, why was it so easy? What we were missing here?

Later that afternoon we got an email saying that they wanted a statement from the bank with the banks stamp on it. Hmm....what to do, our bank is in Canada. The bank was closed for the day by this time, so I had time to think about it. The next morning I tried by phone and email to get ahold of someone at the bank. When I finally got to speak to a human I explained what I needed and asked if they could print off a statement, stamp it and then email it to me. Naturally, they said they couldn't do that; but they said they could fax it to my Canadian accountant. I asked them to do this, then I phoned the accountant and asked them if they could then scan and email this statement to me. Yes, they said they could. By 9:30 AM Friday morning I had what I needed. There are some people who still do their jobs efficiently apparently. I then took this downtown to the lady and was told the FM3's should be ready by the next Friday.

The next Friday, October 12, 2007, I phoned the office and was told that they were not ready; but would be ready by the next Thursday. Yesterday, when I was downtown I went and checked and they were not ready; but was told that they would be ready by 10 AM Friday morning (October 19, 2007).

This morning we waited until 11 AM before leaving for the office, when we arrived at the office we were told to go straight to immigration to sign them and have another thumb print taken.

We headed down to immigration and at first they couldn't find them, told us they were not ready and some other stuff that I didn't understand. I then mentioned that the lady at the accountants office had told us that they were ready. Oh, OK, then they looked in a different spot for them and there they were. We signed the FM3's and another paper and we were done. Out of the office with our brand new FM3 booklets in our sweaty little palms. Exactly 2 weeks start to finish! Wow!!

We walked down the street to a restaurant to celebrate with lunch and a beer. When we walked into the restaurant, we noticed that our landlords son, Ciro was sitting in there eating. We sat down and enjoyed having our lunch with him. When we told him we were celebrating and showed him our FM3's, he insisted on buying our lunch for us. What a nice thing for him to do.

A fairly painless procedure compared to what I had expected, and now we are good for a year.

Don't Laugh

Don't Laugh

According to the weather reports it has been going down to 18 degrees Celsius or around 64 degrees Fahrenheit for a low here the last couple of nights. The air conditioners are off, the bedroom window is shut; although the other windows are open. By the middle of the night it feels chilly and don't laugh but I have gotten out my flannel pyjamas and have been wearing them for the last two nights. Fall is here.

Today I meet some friends at La Barca Restaurant for lunch and we had a ladies afternoon. After lunch we went shopping.

They have just arrived from Canada and one of the ladies suitcases mysteriously disappeared on the trip down, so she was in need of some clothes and shoes.

There is definately no lack of shoe stores down here so we began to stalk our prey. We kept encountering the same problem at all of the shoe stores, her foot size was just in between the adult sizes and the childrens sizes. The clerk at one store told us of another store off of the main street that might have something to fit, so with directions we headed off to find that store, unfortunately they were closed for siesta.

There was a very funny incident as we walked down the street looking for this store. I have to tell you that the lady who was looking for the clothes and shoes is an octogenarian, as we walked down the street an older man sitting on a chair on the sidewalk, was really giving her " the eye". The other lady and I noticed and we tried not to giggle. As we drew closer to this fellow he said, "hi, Americanos?", we told him that, "no, we were Canadian", and he smiled and sagely nodded his head. He continued to "check out" the older lady as we walked past. She was oblivious to all of this as she was intent on finding the shoe store. The other lady and I made it to the next corner before we were unable to contain ourselves and burst out laughing. When we told the older lady what we were laughing about, she just grinned and said, "well at least I know I'm still breathing". I suppose it was one of those things where you just had to be there to see the humor; but it was definately very funny and cute.

We returned to the main street and encountered the same size problem at several other stores. Finally at one store, one of the clerks, sent another clerk out to yet another store and asked us to wait for just a few minutes. At this point I decided that I should go and do some business that I needed to do and told them that I would meet up with them in a few minutes. Sure enough when I returned, the other clerk had returned with the same pair of shoes in yet another size, and they had fit. So she bought them. Talk about wonderful service, only down here would you find such helpful people.

She also picked up a couple of items of clothing before we took a break for a cold drink and then headed home. A nice afternoon.

Tianguis

Tianguis

This morning I decided to head downtown to the tianguis, the weekly open air market that is held every Wednesday. Roy didn't feel like going so he stayed home and rested up from yesterdays fishing trip. I caught the bus down there and then wandered around looking at everything. You could certainly tell that the weather has cooled off a bit as it was much busier today than it has been the last couple of times I was there. After poking about in the stalls there I walked uptown and then caught a bus home. I remembered a couple of things I needed at the grocery store so went there before going home. Naturally after I got home there were some more needed items so ended up going back to the store, before relaxing before lunch. Note: we don't eat our lunch until 2 PM.

Here are a couple more photos that I took while we were fishing yesterday. Just thought I would show you how uncrowded the beaches are during the week days.

Gone Fishing

Gone Fishing

This afternoon we decided to get out of the house and go fishing. We asked Ciro and his son Ciro, who is on holidays right now, if they wanted to go with us. They did, so we headed out to San Carlos at about 3 PM. We decided to try out a different fishing spot today that Ciros friends had told him the fish were biting in. It was certainly easy on the eyes, as you can see in the photos below. We didn't catch a whole lot; but we did have lots of fun. I get as much enjoyment out of looking at the scenery as I do out of the fishing. Roy caught the first fish and then after that we all caught some. A great afternoon. We were still there at sunset so I tried to get a photo as the sun set behind Tetakawi mountain.

More Photos From Yesterday

More Photos From Yesterday

Here are some more of the photos that I took yesterday at Miramar beach. We walked from the end of the beach where we got off the bus to the other end where there is a restaurant and another bus stop. We decided to sit at some chairs under one of the little palapa shades and have a nice cold coke. This didn't last very long as a fellow came along and wanted us to pay to sit there. I guess they charge the families who come and spend the day there, which is reasonable as they get a nice shaded area to call their own and set up their coolers and all of the paraphenalia that they have brought with them from home. As we were only going to be there for a few minutes we said no, and decided to go and sit inside in the restaurant instead. This restaurant used to be rather dingy and grubby looking and I think was more of a bar than a restaurant. Well, they have changed things around, cleaned it up, added tables and chairs and a menu, since we were there last. It looks quite nice now. We got our cokes and sat down at one of the tables to drink it and wait for the bus. After finishing our cokes we went outside and in a few minutes the bus came and we were on our way home.

Nice shady spots to sit and relax.

Enjoying the water.

Coco stand and some "jungle gym" type things for the kids to play on.

Inside the restaurant.

The menu. Hmm..... shrimp for 60 pesos (around $6.00), we may have to stay and eat some day.

A Walk On The Beach

A Walk On The Beach

It didn't feel too bad outside this morning so I suggested to Roy that we head to Miramar for a walk on the beach. We haven't gone out there for what seems like a long time, as it has been so hot.

We decided that as we were going to be gone over our lunch hour, we better stop first and have shrimp tacos at our favorite taco stand. As usual they were delicious and with our tummies full we caught a bus uptown and then another bus out to Miramar.

The temperature wasn't too hot and there was a nice breeze coming off of the water. We walked along the beach from one end to other and then stopped for a drink before catching the bus back into town. A nice relaxing couple of hours.

While we were sitting here having an ice cold coke, I couldn't help but think of my sister who at this time is sitting in a hockey arena in Grande Prairie, Alberta, Canada. She is probably drinking a hot chocolate and trying to stay warm. Gee, I really miss that!!!!

How Time Flies

How Time Flies

I just realised that our 2nd anniversary of being in Mexico has come and gone. We first arrived in Mexico on the 10th of October 2005, planning only to spend the winter and return to Canada in the spring to continue our lives there. Our plans changed quickly once we arrived and spent some time in what was to become our new home. We just loved it here and didn't miss our Canadian winter whatsoever. We knew that the summers here were something less desirable though; but felt that we could handle it. We returned to Canada for 3 months, which is how long it took us to sell the property and all of our possessions or at least 99 % of our possessions. If it didn't fit in the car to make the return trip to Mexico, it got sold.

I have to say that we haven't regretted the decision yet. Yes, it is incredibly hot and humid here in the summer; but with the air conditioning it is bearable. Yes, there are times when we miss not seeing family members; but everyones lives are so busy that times to visit were becoming harder and harder to schedule anyway. We stay in touch via computers and internet telephone systems and find that it works well. It is not the same as actually sitting down and visiting with them in person; but it is better than nothing. Neither one of us are group or club joiners so we are not missing anything in that area. At times we miss conversing with people in english; but then we head over to San Carlos for a couple of hours and we are fine for another couple of weeks. Basically everything is different here when it comes to living, shopping, eating, etc.. It is a totally different lifestyle and one that takes some getting used to; but for us it was a good decision, it may not be for everyone; but we are happy.

It is cooling off here now and we are looking forward to spending our 3rd winter here. We have been able to turn off the air conditioning for longer periods of time and are looking forward to resuming our fishing and beach walking activities. All in all life is good.

La Barca Restaurant

La Barca Restaurant

This afternoon we headed for La Barca restaurant for our lunch. We were to meet the people that we had missed last week. This time we all managed to get to the same place and we had an enjoyable lunch.
I often mention when we go to eat at La Barca Restaurant; but I have never posted any pictures of it. I usually don't take my camera with me when we go. Today I did, so here are some photos.

The advertising.

Part of the exterior.

The rest of the exterior.

Part of the interior. The little roof in the center of the photo is over a wishing well. It shows up better if you click on the photo to enlarge it.

Another area of the interior.


The last couple of evenings we have had a fellow coming down our street with his cart selling elote (corn). I tried to take a photo of him tonight; but it was getting too dark so it didn't turn out. As the weather cools off I am sure that we will see more vendors again. Over the summer about the only vendor other than the usual water and gas men has been the ice cream man.