MeXscape

Cubans are everywhere! I had never seen one before in my life, and now they are all over. In the bars, in the shops, being sold by vendors on the beach. Cigars, that is.

We just moved in. We are the only foreigners on our street. Our neighbors keep their distance and watch us a lot. We know we are living in a fish bowl. We would like to introduce ourselves, but when we walk down the street, people go inside and watch out the windows. What are we to do?

I am pleased to announce the addition of a new author to MeXscape. We warmly welcome Bodie Kellogg, a natural born story teller. I originally came across Bodie's writing on the MazInfo list, and he has graciously allowed me to reprint them here.

Subtitled “Stuck”

The Monday before last, the cleaning lady was coming for our “move-in” cleaning. She is terrified of dogs, so we decided to pack them up and take them somewhere. We had been wanting to take them to the beach, so we opened up the map to look for a location that appeared suitably isolated.

One of the things you have to deal with in moving to Mexico is money. On the surface this is not too difficult. Mexico uses Pesos; the US uses Dollars. A fraction of a peso is a centavo. One hundred centavos make a peso. That's pretty simple. It gets even easier. The current exchange rate very roughly works out to 10 pesos make a dollar. Right now it is probably somewhere between 11 and 12 pesos to a dollar, but 10 is very easy and I'm not hurting myself. About now you are thinking about skipping to the next post. I would be. I mean this is easy stuff why bother writing about this anyway? I'm going to ask that you keep reading, but at the same time, I'm going to tell you it gets even easier.

Living in mainstream society in the US, it is not hard to decide how much of anything to buy at once. Everything comes prepackaged or in set amounts. If you like something typically you buy more of it at once because you get a bulk discount. Even produce is priced in groups. 5 limes for $1.00; 2 pounds for $1.89.

Summer has descended on Mazatlan like a fat, sweaty wrestler smothering his opponent with the sheer audacity of his presence. The heat and humidity seem to be in constant competition for the high number of the day and it’s still only June. The resorts are almost empty and the cruise ships are rare, even the time share and condo sales people have only themselves to converse with. Soon the spectacular tropical thunderstorms will light up the night sky with their piercing bright tendrils of lightning randomly stabbing the landscape. We have already had our first rain that flooded a few streets and flushed scattered pieces of trash and debris to who knows where. The deciduous jungle is starting to leaf out in anticipation of the coming monsoon, the vines are adding inches per day and the mangos are ripening nicely. The flowering shrubs and trees are starting to put out colorful displays that will never be seen by the seasonal residents. The perspiring Pulmonia drivers are vainly searching the streets for small herds of souvenir laden tourists and some restaurants are closed for the summer.

It's 5 am. Its 5 am, and I'm awake. Its 5 am, and I am awake and upstairs and writing. We moved to paradise, the land of no schedules, no alarm clocks, and I'm up, alone, in the dark, writing. What's wrong with this picture? Its the bed. I hate it. Actually, we have two. I hate them both.