This civilized country gives the teachers a day off on Teacher’s Day. Hey! They even have a Teacher’s Day! Unlike us. In the middle school I was in yesterday, all the teachers got slippers, to wear today!
This is an English class I visited, (the teacher is in pink on the right.)
The day we went camping….
Can you see the raindrops on the water?
We actually had a wonderful time. We had already had much of the afternoon at the site, swimming and frolicking, when it started thundering and lightninging and then raining. I was convinced it would pass quickly, because the only rain we have gotten here lately has lasted about 5 or 10 minutes. Luckily we had just got the tents set up and we huddled inside and waited it out. ( Though it did chase one of the families that we were with away.) It was actually pretty lovely and wonderful, but I was worried at one point that it would just keep raining and we would end up packing up and hauling everything out in the rain. That’s what would have happened in Oregon. It stopped after about an hour, and we all had dry clothes to change into. It was a chilly evening, but we had time to cook dinner before the sun went down. There were s’mores and guitar playing around the camp fire. I just kept thinking about all the fleece and gloves and hats I didn’t pack because it was 90 stinkin’ degrees as we were packing to go.
Butch did great. She loved being outside and finding sticks and horse poop. The next morning, as soon as the sun came up it was warm and then hot. We took a walk and took frequent dips before
we packed everything up and hauled it out again. Butch got out on a log and dove in to try to follow us, but made a hairpin turn in the water and ran right out. So cute.
Just FY everybody’s I, Butch is pronounced Bootch, with a Mexican accent.
She is adjusting very well, playing and getting into the chewing stage with gusto. We invested in some good chew toys right away - luckily.
She came seeming to know to poop outside on the balcony, we are still working on the peeing though. Mikko has risen to the occasion nicely. He is very diligent about cleaning up after her immediately. This is the perfect time for a new puppy, because most of our lives revolve around home. Matthew and/or I are home most of the day. And we have gotten all of our trips out of the way and are happy to take a break from traveling, possibly until our big journey home in July.
The dog below is who we believe to be her papa. We call him Shy Dog because … he’s really shy. We hadn’t seen him for months until the other day when we took her out, he emerged from his hole in the bushes. We couldn’t get close to him, so they never really met face to face
She has the same pensive look.
Well, her second name anyway:
She does like to NAP!!
So a continuation of the story that led us to this moment- the Friends of Animals ladies just disappeared, the phone was disconnected and everything. So finally last week I went over to the neighbors to tell them that and that I was still interested in the puppy. She came running out, but the white one wasn’t there. She had been stolen because she was pure white. The fellow thought he knew who stole her, so he told us to come back in a week and if he could find her we could have the black one. I was planning to go by tonight. After my little afternoon nap I went out onto the balcony and the fellow was on his roof and he whistled at me to come over.
Here’s Mama Dog (Rasputina) a few days ago.
He looked so sad when we got there Mama Dog was very happy to see us, but the puppy was quite shy. We sat around for a bit and he told me that they couldn’t find the white puppy, but he wanted us to take the black one anyway - right away. She has huge paws and looks like she is going to be pretty big. So even though they like her, they decided it would be better to give her a good home, than it would be for them to have two big dogs. He even had a little bag of dog food ready for us. He decided not to get Mama Dog spayed yet so he can try again, for a white one, I guess. It was a sad farewell. I almost cried looking at his big sad face.
Butch is adjusting well so far - mostly sleeping and a little exploring and whining. I feel like I am covered with fleas, so we will do some basic maintenance and make some purchases tomorrow. I suppose a trip to the vet is on order as well. Yikes - what a big responsibility. But can you even stand how cute she is?
And handsome, yes?
We now have our own dog for our own balcony (we don’t have access to our rooftop.) Thanks all of you who sent puppy thoughts this way. Our neighbors just decided that we can have her and here she is in our house - all of a sudden. I have more to post but no time now, and some technical difficulties with the camera. Stay tuned.
The day after getting home we went out to Presa Mata to swim with our friend, Mary and her son Seamus. Matthew and the boys stayed and camped that night, while the moms got voted off the island and went back into town to do grown-up mom things.
The water has gone down a lot since January when we were there last. And it has warmed up considerably. It was the perfect temperature that completely cools you off, but you can stay in and play for a while.
These lovelies were on the side of the road as Mary and I walked home.
Twice, there were metal detectors in the bus stations that we had to walk through. Both times I remembered (always at the last minute - same thing flying down from Tijuana,) that I can’t go through those with my pacemaker. Luckily it was hot and I was wearing tops that made showing my scar easy. At the first one the fellow let me walk through the second metal detector that was turned off. The second one, the woman just laughed like I was crazy and said it wasn’t on and had me walk through. Both times I got my little card out but they never looked at it. The scar was evidence enough, I guess.
We left Veracruz and headed for Puebla to break up the ride back to Guanajuato. Matthew and Mikko and all spent a month there when Mikko was 2. The centro is very sweet and beautiful, old and colonial, as you walk past the centro you get that mix of architecture that I talked about in Veracruz, (but didn’t get any good pix of it here either.)
We were just there overnight, so didn’t wander far. We stayed on the zocolo again. There was a band playing when we arrived.
One of the nice things about Puebla, is they have a pedestrian street where much of the downtown type shopping stores are. AND it rains.
It poured down rain, and I found a cafe that we used to go to when we were there 6 years ago. We called it Michelle’s cafe because there was a little girl named Michelle who was always there and was Mikko’s age. They played together a number of times while we were eating our delicious enchiladas and chiles enogadas. When we got there this time, there was an 8ish year old girl holding court at the center table, doing magic tricks with her hands, amusing all of the adults around. I went to email Matthew and Mikko and unfortunately she and her parents left while I was gone, but I know it was Michelle.
It was just drizzling when we headed back to the hotel where we sat outside and had some drinks and PLAYED CARDS. There is nothing better than a good drizzle, a drink and a card game. Tom hadn’t played cards in a while, notice how hard he is concentrating.
We left early the next morning and were back in Guanajuato in time for Mikko and I to have our traditional Friday movie night.
We left Tuxpan, and traveled south past orange groves and corn fields, through little towns and over hills that turned to mountains.
It was overcast all the way down and the air conditioning was going strong in the bus so it felt like a cool gray day - so welcome. When we arrived in Veracruz and got off the bus we were blasted by the wet, heat - I was surprised my glasses didn’t fog up.
I have to admit I was a little disappointed with Veracruz. I had seen a movie that I thought took place in Veracruz and I was all ready to be in this charming town whose zocolo was on the water. Turns out it is a great big city on a harbor. There is charm as there is in all of Mexico - but it wasn’t what I had expected. We had a good time though. We stayed in a hotel right on the Zocolo with a room that looked out over the harbor.
I was attracted to the mix of building types and their ages - modern buildings abutting colonial buildings, abandoned wrecks nestled beside fancy fresh facades. I don’t think I captured the mix very well, now that I see these, but here are some groovy buildings.
Below you can see the art deco PEMEX building in the distance. The big building in front of it is all torn apart. There were people using jackhammers up in the middle stories. We wondered if they were whittling it down and if so what it would look like when they were done.
We took the bus to the beach our second day. It was miserably hot so my first dip into the Atalantic Ocean was very very welcome.
The sleepy fellows below had had a few beers before we showed up and slept all day. Their families didn’t seem to miss them to much though.
That night we had a fancy dinner - here is my big bubbly pot of meat and cheese. mmmmmm
the zocolo.
from the hotel
I finally have some time to continue with the tale of our journey to Veracruz.
I learned from that fateful trip to Tijauna that super long days of bus travel are best avoided, so after Xilitla we decided to just go part of the way down the east coast to Tuxpan, which is actually inland a bit and on a huge river.
We got there in the early evening and left the next morning. It was hot and overcast and really quite lovely in a grungy modernish way. We had a good dinner on the zocolo and took a latenight swim in the pool on the roof of the hotel. That was fancy. But those pictures were all a blur.
In the morning we walked to the bus station and I went crazy taking pictures. It was all so attractive to me - not many tourists come to Tuxpan, it seems. Tom ended up having a good time watching the people watching me, the crazy gringa, stopping to take pictures every few feet. I had been completely oblivious to the stares until he pointed them out.
This was just outside a doctor’s office. We wondered how reassuring it is to feel that the doctor will put your health into Jesus’ hands (as pretty as he may be.)
