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Today for our comida at 2:00 pm, we will eat these Chiles Rellenos, poblano peppers stuffed with a picadillo of meat with raisins, and smothered with a sauce of tomatoes. Agua de guayaba, rice and a salad will nicely complement this dish. We will, as usual, eat outside on the back portal overlooking the garden. Hummingbirds come to the Flowering Maple all year long..JPG)
In Mexico (as in Brazil, and as in most of Latin America, I suspect), hotels are for sleeping and motels are for, well....illicit dalliance. The buzz around Patzcuaro has been that the gringos have discovered motels. But the word is not that they are using them for clandestine assignations, but rather for very practical purposes.
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La Basílica.JPG)
Silvia.JPG)
Photographer Richard Geoffrion
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Personalities in Print.JPG)
Well-known and much appreciated musicians Diego (son) and Hector (father), of Patzcuaro added to the pleasure of the evening. Links
Artemio Rodriguez, Linocut & Woodblock Prints
La Mano Gráfica
Your Patzcuaro Home.
Artemio expressively talks about his work.
Artemio shows us some of his prints.
The Galería has a wall of children's art.
One of many such pieces, the colors and imagery of this child's painting
are clearly based in Mexican culture.
Links
Galeria La Mano Grafica, Patzcuaro
You can live in Patzcuaro.
The Biblioteca is an invaluable resource for the education of Patzcuaro's students of all ages..JPG)
Ibo, formerly of Switzerland, now of Erongarícuaro, makes fine breads. I have purchased the whole wheat and multi-grain loaves, which are particuarly good toasted. Ibo's little pizzas are also very tasty.
Shannon's almond-basil-cheese pesto was a treat on toasted Ibo bread. We had this for lunch with a green salad..JPG)
Some of the items available.
I have been crowned. After unexpectedly losing, in the middle of nowhere, a beat-up old gold tooth crown dating back to an unlikely time and place, I now sport a modern porcelain replacement. Adding to my enthusiasm over action I was forced to take is the total cost of the dentistry: 3500 pesos (USD$265.00).The whole process took about two weeks. I am grateful to a friend for referring me to her excellent dentist in Morelia--an easy drive from Patzcuaro.
This is about what my "nugget" looked like.
The economy must really be in the tank. I have been brought to trafficking in gold. First I must explain that I have an international mouth. Not because of languages. It is because over decades I surrendered to some rudimentary dentistry in out-of-the-way places. At some point I distinctly recall the use of a jackhammer.
The circumstances that brought me to trafficking started on a driving trip. We were in Bustamante, Coahuila, for the night of El Grito, on the eve of September 16 Independence Day celebrations. I was eating a tasty taco and bit down on a rock. It turned out to be a gold crown that I had gotten somewhere that came off. (Fortunately, this glitzy diente hid as a back molar all these years.) There was no dentist available in time or place until we traveled though the lunar landscape of the Altiplano Potosino and hit Morelia. I had a jagged stump lacerating my tongue for two days, until a sainted dentist worked me in for an appointment on the first business day after the holiday. At the end of my appointment, to my surprise, he deposited the beat-up gold crown in the palm of my hand. A nostalgic memento of some far-away place.
After arriving back in Patzcuaro, I noticed a sign that said Se compra oro near the Biblioteca. So I popped in, feeling totally ridiculous, and asked if they would buy a gold tooth. I can't believe I did this--or admit to it. The young man who attended me did not even blink. He tested my "nugget" to see if it was really gold (it was) and then he weighed it. I received 350 pesos, about $26 dollars at the current rate. Hey, I took a friend to a great lunch and have plenty left over.
Never underestimate the possibilities of commerce in Patzcuaro.
An unprepossessing exterior. One of Patzcuaro's good secrets.
These shrimp brochettes were as good as they look..JPG)
As part of the celebrations in Pátzcuaro for 16 de septiembre and the ten days of events commemorating the pueblo's 475th anniversary, we visited an exhibit of masks, one of several exhibits at the Ex-Colegio Jesuita. Entry is free of charge.
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Another excerpt from a folk dance performed by students of the Secundaria Técnica of Pátzcuaro, one of many free events scheduled from September 18th through September 29th, 2009, for the pueblo's 457th Anniversary.
Click arrow to play video.
For Patzcuaro's 475th Anniversary, a number of dance presentations were scheduled at the Teatro Imperador on Plaza Gertrudis Bocanegra aka Plaza Chica. Students from the local Secundaria Técnica performed these showy folk dances.
This evening of folk dances was one of many dance and other
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The library needs donations of books and digital equipment. Their budget barely covers costs of operation and is not adequate for purchases. Spanish language books are put into the library. English language books are sold to the expatriate community to raise money, with a few being shelved for English-speaking borrowers. The Director, Gloria Blancas Lopez, has dedicated her whole professional life to the library. In order to obtain the software she needs to put the books catalog on computer, she has to show that she has a dedicated computer, which she needs to acquire.
The library fills a need great need for students in Patzcuaro. It is their only resource for books and research. The library also provides children with free computer classes as well as classes in the arts and crafts that are well-known and traditional to the region.
Many of our friends in Austin have been very generous. They provided us with a good load of books and other items which we took for the library in our pick-up. We hope to take items donated by Travis Country residents soon.Ricardo and Juanita Move to Mexico
They had lived in Houston for twenty-seven years where they led a conventional life. They raised three children, Juanita ran an interior decorating business, and Ricardo worked at a high-pressure job selling industrial packaging. He ended up having cardiac bypass surgery and he burned out. He may have been convalescing and vulnerable to suggestion when he came across the article that a friend had sent him some five years before. It had lurked quietly in wait for him, tucked away in one of his drawers. He happened on it, picked it up and read it again. It told about a town in Mexico where people socialize, have parties and their sex life improves.
They proceeded to Pátzcuaro to stay with drape-lady relatives who lived in a modest enclave behind the bus station. Their house was well-kept and very pleasant. A cousin generously drove them to Chapala and Ajijic. Juanita visited the house that rented for US$750 per month. Chapala and Ajijic were nice, but everything "was in English." Juanita wanted more of Mexico. They visited Jocotepec, at the west end of Lake Chapala. It was tranquil, very Mexican and everyone spoke Spanish. Juanita could not talk to anyone. Great, she mused. I like this pueblo.
They visited San Miguel de Allende. Here Juanita again found English everywhere. The people whom she stopped to ask about San Miguel were too busy to help her. Not promising.
When they returned to Pátzcuaro, the relatives showed Juanita a house for rent down the street from theirs. It was vacant and she peeked in the windows at dusk. Although she could not see much detail, even in dim light the colors inside looked bright. She called Ricardo. “We’re moving to Pátzcuaro,” she said.
“Patz-what?” said Ricardo. He examined his list carefully. “That’s not on my list.” He paused. “Where is it?” he asked.
“I found a house. You’ll like it,” responded Juanita.
“What does it look like,” he queried.
“I don’t know. I haven’t seen it in the daylight. But you drive on a three-lane boulevard to get there. And it’s in a gated community.”
This sounded good. Ricardo had high expectations.
When Juanita returned to Houston, she and Ricardo began negotiations and somewhere during the course of things their plans to rent turned into plans to buy. To surmount the language barrier, they telephoned the Drape Lady in English, who telephoned the cousin in Spanish, who called back the Drape Lady, who in turn responded to Juanita and Ricardo.
“Let me negotiate the house for you,” said the cousin. “I can get a better price.”To answer the cousin, they started through the translation circuit all over again.
“Send me money,” said the cousin. They did. He obtained the house for them.
“It needs paint, a sink and the water storage tank needs to be cleaned. My father and brother will help me. Send me more money,” said the cousin.
They sent more money.
The move was not too difficult because Ricardo and Juanita had already downsized their household once their children were grown. But they needed to downsize some more. They told each one of their children to pick out the ten things he or she would most like to have. If two wanted the same thing, a roll of the dice determined possession. They sold one car and loaded a U-haul to take to a freight forwarder in Laredo.
“By the way,” said Juanita. “We need to take a sink.” Ricardo said that should have been his most obvious clue.
“I still don’t know where I’m going,” said Ricardo. They called the Drape Lady. “I need directions. Ask your cousin how I get there,” Ricardo told her. One would assume the directions included something to the effect that they should drive south some distance and eventually turn right at Morelia.
The Drape Lady called. “My cousin wants to know what day you will arrive, so he and his father and brother can help you unload.”
“It will probably take a couple of days.”
On June 11, 2001, Ricardo and Juanita set out early on a fine day with their dog and four cats. They delivered their things to the freight forwarder and continued. Ricardo was committed to driving only in daylight hours, but by nightfall no hotel would take their menagerie at any stop, so each time they tried to get a room they went back out to the car and pushed on. By early morning hours of the next day the bedraggled pair arrived in Morelia. There they managed to check into a horrible hotel. Three hours later loud morning activity under the window of their room routed them groggy out of bed.
They finally made it to Pátzcuaro. Juanita could not remember exactly where the house was. “I know it was by a bus station,” she said. They eventually got directions. The Libramiento of Pátzcuaro that led them toward the house, before its current improvements, did not exactly match Ricardo’s mental picture of a three-lane “boulevard.” The two found their gated community in back of the bus station. Ricardo went into culture shock. The various houses on their street were painted a multitude of bright, happy colors. This was not staid U.S. suburbia. Ricardo suddenly remembered that Juanita had made him bring a sink. “Please tell me there aren’t dirt floors. Please.”
So on June 12, 2001, with help from the Drape Lady’s relatives, they moved into their house. The one installed sink worked more or less. The bathroom was a bracing purple. There were cement floors of a sort. The Houston apartment suddenly seemed palatial.
Juanita’s interior decorating experience kicked in. Construction began. They moved walls to make a larger kitchen. They added a downstairs bathroom. Juanita designed bathroom counters and picked beautiful Mexican colors. It was chaotic living in a jobsite, but the workers were willing and skilled, and finally the renovation phase was over.
The result was worth the wait. One walks through the front door into an oasis of tranquility in this two-bedroom, two-bath, two-story house. It is full of light and art and pleases the senses. The façade of the house is simple and understated; basically unchanged, it blends in with neighboring homes. Their finished house project cost them much less than it would have cost for a similar house in Houston. In addition, they can live comfortably on their social security income, something that would not be possible for them in the United States. Juanita and Ricardo certainly made an advantageous financial move.
What do they like about their life in Pátzcuaro? Three things top a long list. They like the people, whom they find to be helpful and friendly. They love the activity of the Centro of Patzcuaro: the market, the parades and the festivals. And they enjoy the small expatriate community. They comment that within a fifty-mile radius, there is much to do and see.
Ricardo and Juanita also enjoy their neighbors. On arrival, Ricardo walked their dog three times a day. The dog’s name was Happy, and the tall gringo and his dog soon became a familiar sight. Sometimes neighborhood children would call to him, “Hola, Ah-pee!”, addressing him by his quadruped’s name. 
Their neighbors all watch out for each other, including Ricardo and Juanita. And on September 11, 2001, three months after Ricardo and Juanita moved into their house, the neighbors in their area came over to express their sorrow at the tragedy that had taken place in the United States.
As for some practical considerations, Ricardo and Juanita study Spanish when they can make time. Juanita has a neurologist in Morelia, forty-five minutes away. When she suffered a stroke, she received excellent care. The initial cat-scan and two-hour consultation cost $2,000 pesos. Ricardo found a cardiologist and he had knee-surgery (different physicians for heart and knee, you will be glad to know). He also is very pleased with his medical care. Their dentist is conveniently located in Pátzcuaro.
Ricardo and Juanita feel comfortable and secure in their daily activities. They regularly drive to all the villages around Pátzcuaro. They go with friends to eat, sightsee, and look for arts and crafts. They say they enjoy life in Pátzcuaro more than in Houston, with more time for themselves and more social life. They acknowledge that this may in part be due to retirement, but largely it is because of the interesting variety of activities available, the friends they have made in the small community, and the lower cost of living. Their dog Happy is no longer with them. Today another dog, Buddy, and two cats keep them company. Guests visit from time to time.
What do they miss? Shopping in the U.S. for clothes and some favorite foods they instantly answer—coincidentally a favorite pastime for mexicanos, too, when they visit their neighbor to the north.
In magical Pátzcuaro, a colonial pueblo that nestles at 7200 ft. in the mountains of Michoacán, an area of lakes, oak and pine forests, and waterfalls, Ricardo and Juanita enjoy their lifestyle. For this they give thanks to the Chicken Bus—and to the kind and enterprising Drape Lady.
1. A Pátzcuaro site for expats http://www.lakepatzcuaro.org/
2. Join for community and practical tips http://groups.yahoo.com/search?query=michoacan_net
3. There is a house for you in Patzcuaro http://www.novinger.com/patz-homes.htm
