Our neighbor Flash

A couple months ago one of the neighbors around the corner from us started parking a trailer and specially adapted pickup truck on the street. At first, the trailer was covered with graphics advertising a sea lion show. I figured they had bought a used trailer from an aquarium, since they removed the graphics pretty soon after arrival. My thinking was that no one would have a sea lion show in our neighborhood.
Well, I was right about the show, but wrong about the sea lion.    The special truck carries our neighbor “Flash” from his salt water swimming pool home to his job at the marina in Puerto Vallarta. Today I was walking home from Curves when Flash got home from work so I was able to see him close up.
After getting out of his truck, his handler had him wave to me, stick his tongue out at me, and dance. When I left to walk home, Flash waved good bye before walking up to his pool. He is “employed” by a local tour company and they take pictures of people with him and sell them, probably for some huge price. I guess he also does a few tricks for the crowd.
I’ll try to get a picture of Flash one day (and hope they don’t charge me big bucks for it!}

Tania

Kinder graduation

Celebrations!

Our friends Alex, Karena and Mirtha live in San Jose. It is a small town in the valley of the Ameca River. Mirtha finished kindergarten in early July and Alex wanted us to attend her graduation. He told us that the graduation was at 4:30 so we should get to their house around 4:15 to go to the school. We arrived and preparations were still being made. Alex’s sister Sandra was fixing Mirtha’s hair and Karena was getting dressed. Alex’s mother was there, too.
We walked over to the kinder school, about 4 blocks away. Some of the kids and families were already there, but others were still arriving. Nobody seemed to be in any sort of hurry. About 5:30 or so the graduation started. There are 3 years of kinder here, sort of like pre-K and kindergarten. Mirtha was finishing the 3rd year of kinder and will go to another school next year. There was a flag ceremony where the outgoing class passed the flag on to the next younger group. In the younger classes each child got a certificate for completing the year. Each class performed a dance. Mirtha’s class was very cute, all the girls had on white dresses fit for princesses and the boys were wearing their school uniforms and ties. There was even a short speech by the man who was “padrino” of the class.
After the ceremony, Alex’s sister and mother headed back to Vallarta and we went to a neighbor’s house with Alex, Karena and Mirtha. Two other girls and a boy from her class and their families were also there. We sat outside and ate snacks and drank beer. Even though Alex was the only one of them who spoke much English, we felt very welcomed by the whole group.
Apparently there had been some type of mix-up with school fees and the kids didn’t get their certificates. The parents were complaining about the school officials and Harold decided to teach them some English to help out. He told them that in the US, when something like that happens you say “Thank you very little.” They all practiced saying that, and Harold told them an alternate expression was F%#* you very much. They all seemed to understand that. And Alex told them another good saying to know was “Shut up.” So if you are ever in San Jose, Nayarit and here people saying Thank you very little and Shut-Up, you know why!

A couple weeks later we were invited to a quinceañera. It is a party to celebrate the 15th birthday of a girl. The quinceañera girl is named Tania and she and her sister Michelle spend a lot of time with our friends Patricia and Joann. We have met their whole family and went to their house for Christmas.
The first part of the quinceañera was a Mass at the church in the plaza in Bucerias. We had never been to that church before. The Mass was open to anyone and there are many people who attend church regularly there.
After the Mass was the party. It was held at an outdoor salon in Bucerias. Probably several hundred people were there. There were soft drinks and beer, music and videos, a special dance by the girl of honor and her escorts, and later dinner. It was a fun party.
A quinceañera is lots and lots of work by the family. Invitations were sent out; the dress bought and then spiced up. Little souvenirs were assembled for every guest in the color chosen, in this case orange. On each table at the party were decorated salt shakers, napkin holders and dolls. All of these were made, painted and arranged by the family.
Obviously this is a very big event for the girl and her family! We really enjoyed being able to participate in it.

So what do we do all day?

People often ask us what we do all day, now that we are retired and live in Mexico. That’s a hard question to answer since it can vary so much! For example, here is what happened one day recently.
It was a Saturday morning and there was a meeting scheduled for the Amigos de Bucerias civic group. Harold is the vice president so he was going to the meeting for sure. Manuel, the contractor who has been working around our house was due to come over and work, also.
I stayed home from the meeting because Manuel wasn’t here yet. After Manuel arrived and had been working for a while, some friends of ours, Dennis and Jeannie, stopped by. They had been in PV for an errand and wanted to know if we were interested in going out for brunch.
I told Manuel where we were going and also left a note for Harold. As it turned out, that isn’t where we went. The Red Apple is a nice breakfast place in Bucerias but it is on the 3rd floor. Dennis hurt his knee last week and can barely get around much less climb to the 3rd floor. So we went to Bambu which is right across the street.
While we were eating breakfast, we talked about Dennis’s injured knee. He thought crutches would be good to have. Patricia lives near Bambu so we went to see if she had any crutches. She looked and did not have any at her house. She was fairly sure there were some in the Friendship Club closet at the Regional Hospital. We visited with Patricia for a while and she gave Dennis some suggestions for doctors.
After stopping by the house to see if Harold wanted to ride over to the Regional Hospital (he did not) off we went to Pitillal. It takes maybe 30 minutes to drive over there. Jeannie, Dennis and I went to the hospital and parked in the (dirt) parking lot. Despite it being Saturday afternoon, the hospital was pretty busy. Since it is where the cleft palate program takes place I am familiar with the hospital. We found the closet and took a look inside. Plenty of stuff for sure, but not crutches. About that time I remembered that last year our friend Monika hurt her foot pretty badly. I thought that perhaps she had used crutches. Her husband Luis has a lot and bodega neat the Regional Hospital and he is often at the bodega when not at work.
We piled back in the car and went to the bodega. It is maybe 6 blocks away from the hospital on another dusty street. Sure enough, Luis was there as was his brother Eddie and friend Rafa. They were watching the World Cup. We sat down to see the end of the game with them. Of course, beers were offered and accepted. Rafa was busy making ceviche so we also sampled that. Luis showed Dennis and Jeannie around his shop, bodega and party yard. But no crutches were located. Luis said Monika is a hard-headed German and refused to use them. The yard has several fruit trees and they had bunches of ripe bananas so we each took a bunch and headed back to Bucerias.
Harold was home when we got back. He was talking to our friend Alex who is a Bahia de Banderas fireman. Dennis and Jeannie stopped in to visit for a little while before heading back home to La Penita where they live. Alex had brought over some photos from a course he taught at the Vallarta Palace hotel. It was a week long class held each morning covering life saving, CPR, fire fighting and first aid.
Alex asked us if we have a Sam’s card, which we do. He and his wife Karena wanted to go shopping at Sam’s but don’t have their own card. We didn’t have anything else planned so off we went to San Jose del Valle to pick up Karena and their 6 year old daughter Mirtha Zarai, who is also called Mirzai, pronounced Mere Zye Ee.
But first, dinner! Mirzai wanted to go to KFC because she likes to play in the Chickylandia play area, and Alex and Karena like KFC too. The locals refer to it just as Kentucky, pronounced Ken-tooky. We were surprised when Alex insisted on treating us to dinner. The chicken was very good and Mirzai had fun playing. Harold and I were the only gringos in KFC at the time and it was fairly busy.
Sam’s was really busy. Alex explained that payday had been the day before for many people, including him. They are paid on the 15th and 30th of the month so right after that the stores are full. They stocked dup on some household essentials and a couple treats. Karena, Mirzai and I went to Walmart to look for something while the guys checked out at Sam’s. Walmart was also packed! Mirzai was like every other kid and saw many things she liked. But unlike most American kids, she didn’t ask her parents one time “can I have that?” We took them back home and then returned to Bucerias, put away our few things we bought at Sam’s, and crashed in front of the TV.
So, now you know what we did that one day. Every day seems to bring something unexpected.

On the road again!

When we moved to Bucerias in October we came down in one car, our Mazda Tribute. The Dodge Dakota pickup truck stayed at my brother Tom’s house until we came back to get it. A tentative plan was to come get it in June, around our daughter, Ann’s 30th birthday on June 20.
We were invited to a wedding in Atlanta on June 3rd. Originally we didn’t think we would be going, but as the time drew nearer we came up with a plan. What if we went to Atlanta for the wedding then got back to Waco in time for Ann’s birthday?
I found a great airfare round trip PV to Atlanta, changing planes in Dallas both ways. So, we would fly to Atlanta for the wedding, and then use only the Atlanta-DFW portion on the way back. Then drive the truck back to Bucerias.

We flew to Atlanta and spent 2 nights there. The wedding was very nice. The bride and groom both were Georgia Tech coop work students at M&M/Mars while I was there. It was fun to see them again.
After Atlanta, we drove to Asheville, NC to visit my brother, Rick. It was pretty chilly in the mountains especially when it rained. We stayed there for 4 nights. Rick’s house is very secluded on several acres and has lots of trees and a stream. He has seen bears in his yard
Besides spending time with Rick and his girlfriend Forrest, we also visited with our former sister-in-law Kathy at her house. She has added on to it since last time we were there and it is really cute. She teaches English as a second language and school had just gotten out for the summer.
Harold’s cousin Nancy also lives in Asheville. Her husband is an architect and was extremely busy so we just had a chance to say hi to him. We went out with Nancy and her son Zeke for pizza. Harold had a chance to catch up with what’s happening on that side of the family.!

After Asheville, we drove back to Atlanta and returned our rental car. We flew to Philadelphia to visit Harold’s sister Debbie. We stayed 5 nights with her. They hadn’t been able to open their pool yet due to wet and cold weather. But we went out to eat, and shopped! We also went to their aunt and uncle’s house for a cookout. His Uncle Len is 80, and Aunt Doris is “a little younger” and they both still work 3 days a week The attorney she has worked for the last 20 years is retiring soon and she says she will also. Uncle Len is an attorney and has no plans for retirement yet.
After Philadelphia, we flew back to Atlanta, then caught the return leg of our PV-Atlanta round trip. We flew to DFW and then told American Airlines we would be unable to complete the trip. Didn’t want to get on anyone’s black list by just not showing up.
My brother Rick decided to fly to DFW as well, to surprise our parents. As we greeted Mom in the baggage claim area, Rick snuck up behind her. They were both surprised he was there.
While we were in Waco we did some shopping for things we needed here in Bucerias, and for some hot weather clothes. We were able to visit with several of our friends in Waco, too. Cyndi and Matt, some of my former coworkers, had a pool party which was nice since the temperature was hot! We ate dinner with Susan and Paul, just like we used to do almost every Friday night.
On Father’s Day weekend, my sister and her family and my younger brother Tom (keeper of the truck) came to Mom and Dad’s. It was really nice to have everyone together!
We visited the Masterfoods (M&M/Mars) plant and ate lunch with Kitty. I used to sit next to her and we became good friends. She told us that there is going to be a Masterfoods USA 30th anniversary dinner dance/casino night in September. We may have to make another trip north for that!
Finally it was time to drive back to Bucerias. I’ll recap our trip in the next installment. Also, I’ll answer the question – what about Ann’s birthday?