[George occasionally wants to chime in on the blog, and now is certainly the time when we both need to vent! We are holding up despite all these gnarly decisions to make!]
Feeling odd. Our relinquished house, held by a handful of inspectors–one can’t see the sewer line, $600 of roots intrude; another can’t see the furnace and water heater, a sleeping skunk must first go. At first glance, our lovely young buyer must be worried about this and that. She was quite happy with it at first glance and pleased that we would patch and paint and leave the stove, marble-topped cupboard, etc. I’m afraid the inspectors may have spooked her. She’s a pleasant young woman who would soon come to love this house despite its handful of hundred-year-old bothersome issues. Still, while we’re in our house, I clear the foundation and sprinkle diatomaceous earth against the roaches that the staging gardener brought with some ill-applied mulch. Like everyone else locally, we’re setting out drops of Terro intending to stop the ants. I’ve put the clothes line up again and watered all the orphaned plants. The books off the shelves and, more, the art off the walls and the place seems a bit foreign. Our considerations seem legion, difficult to enumerate. Decamp to our friend Leslie’s village near Guadalajara while we wait for a good house to come on the market in Chino? Will such an arrangement be torturous to the gently failing black and white cat? Go to a friend’s here in LA while the exterminator deals effectively with the roaches, leaving the cats in the back yard or trapped in carriers for the afternoon? Will the young buyer be frightened away? If so, should we wait to sell the house in September or even next spring? If I buy a 4-lb bag of whole wheat flour, what can I do with the leftover in a couple of weeks? How about renting the house to some Cal Tech students and taking a place near our friend in Mexico until after the mid-term elections, until after the 2024 elections? This rambling intrudes most between 4:30 and 5:15 am. Every once in a while a useful itinerary item comes up, but mostly I patiently count my breathing and wait to go back to sleep. Erika’s sister Robyn assures me that the most healing sleep is between 5:15 and 6:15 am.
[Note from Erika: Prompted by our son’s critical remarks about Boomers, my husband George has spent a week or so ruminating on our generation’s triumphs and failings. As he says below, this is a good thing to consider at this point in our lives, and at this stage of world history. Take it away, George! ]
No generation is comfortable when called to account by a subsequent one. The call prompts a sting of guilt and disappointment and a wariness about collective guilt. To account, nonetheless, should be a positive act of self-knowledge and historical description.
Each generation has its own failures. The post WWII population boom, aka by younger generations as the Boomers, started well, particularly for those of us who were politically active. Coming into our 20s in the late 1960s, we were first shepherded by the people about 10 years older than us to demand civil rights and racial equality. This effort led to a related call for women’s reproductive rights and workplace equality. Simultaneously, a vocal opposition arose to protest against a nonsensical, imperialistic war in Vietnam and conscription to fight in that war. Finally, an ecological movement began in earnest, originating in Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring and groups such as the Sierra Club’s activism in the mid- 1960s. One cannot underestimate the impact of The Whole Earth Catalog, the ZPG (Zero Population Growth) movement, and those living in committed communes.
Response by the state and corporations was direct and effective. Our leaders and spokespersons were assassinated; JFK had been killed in 1963, when we were still quite young, but in retrospect signaled the end of an era of confidence in the American Way. Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy were both murdered in that astonishing year of 1968. The supposed peaceful gathering at Woodstock in the summer of 1969 was a blip; our disasters continued with the Altamont concert’s violence in 1969 and drug overdoses by Joplin, Hendrix, and Morrison in 1970 and 1971.
We were totally unprepared for the resounding 1972 defeat of George McGovern and the re-election of Richard Nixon (37% to 61% of the popular vote). Worse than the lopsided result, those of our generation who had been involved in the campaign were shaken by the recognition that “Everyone I know voted for McGovern.” American society had rejected our world view. We, or at least that fragment of our generation who were politically involved, took the defeat personally.
Much to the frustration of a dwindling number of remaining activists, we ceded our influence on the national scene. Under a thunder of vehement criticisms, we abandoned big-issue activism and focussed our campaign on our personal lives. The roots of this withdrawal were well established: return to the land, communes, small is beautiful, gender separatism, be straight and infiltrate, and in many cases, seeking serenity or a cause under the greedy wings of opportunistic gurus or faith healers. The end of the Vietnam War and conscription a couple of years later facilitated this withdrawal. Our ethics were attuned to our nascent families and, where possible, our careers. There had been fewer of us to begin with than we had initially believed. By the 1980s we had retreated to SNL, Prairie Home Companion, and Sesame Street.
It’s worth a note that our entire generation lost financial footing as well. Our grandparents could save enough to buy their homes. Our parents’ wages could pay off home loans and buy new cars. We already had burdensome college loans. Outside of the rapidly dwindling manufacturing line jobs or interstate trucking, the unions were closed to us. Service workers gave no complaint when cheap imported goods became available. A 1971 Toyota Corolla cost $1,200, a Ford Pinto $2,000. Having become elitist, the unions also became inconsequential; then the most effective unions were obliterated once Reagan and neoliberals got into power.
So, we young folk of the 60s did good things but failed in two key areas. We should have spent less time on hedonism (a political issue, believe it or not), and much more time speaking with others who would not have voted for McGovern. Having lost the national agenda, we should have changed focus immediately to concentrate on the most modest of local governance: library boards, friends of the botanic garden and local history museum, weekly city council meetings. With polite, informed comments concentrating exclusively on the issue at hand, we could have had our families and professions while continuing to be politically involved. On this level, a few engaged people could have had an effect, and perhaps have solidified some sense of the common weal.
Our generation, the Boomers, and their largely societal activism were a spent force 50 years ago. Having set an agenda, we succeeded with none of its major points. Prejudice against Blacks and other brown people continues. If you are thoroughly middle class and educated, you can pass regardless of color, especially in corporate settings and buying in to that world view. The Equal Rights Amendment languishes and women’s bodies are still encumbered by waves of political manipulation. But women can now get credit cards, bank accounts, and major loans in their own names and have some leverage in the workplace, a real advance made possible by Boomers’ efforts. The military-industrial complex is alive and well, having moved the war 5,000 miles northwest, trading Communism for Islam as “the enemy.” Conscription is, for the moment anyway, a thing of the past. Ecologically, the news is dire. If we don’t quit burning things and switch to solar power very soon, our world will change irrevocably. Let’s not pretend that fusion is just around the corner.
On this last topic, the Millennials face a far more serious issue than the Boomers did. They must stop the corporate class from burning coal and petroleum. The survival of civilization is at stake. The necessary actions are well-known: replace subsidies of coal and petroleum with exceedingly high taxes, massively increase subsidies for solar and, if necessary, nuclear-generated electricity. Faced with the depletion of the ozone layer or the extinction of bird species, we must continue to fight to stop the production and use of the causative agents. Disgusted by apartheid, we did force the divestment of South African holdings. It is possible to act and to make a difference, but be prepared for an aggressive, dishonest, and possibly violent response from the people who are going to lose financially, as well as those who have been brainwashed into thinking that progressive thinkers are the enemy.
And to the younger generations: we of the so-called Boomer generation did make some real progress, but in the end, we were, on so many fronts, defeated. We do wish that we had left you a better world in which you can continue the fight.
What can we say about this year? The pictures above are about as good as it has been: there were more hilarious ones in the series trying to get a good family photo of us with the grandsons when we finally got to visit in April. We hadn’t seen them in person since December 2019. But we know that all of you have similar stories of isolation from friends and family during the continuing Great Pandemic. So let me just highlight some of our happy events this year:
End of January, we got the first of our vaccinations! Yay! We were among the first to sign up in the days when Dodger Stadium was overwhelmed with expectant vaccination clients. We went all the way to Six Flags Magic Mountain up the I-5 for our jabs, contemplating the roller coaster structures as we stuck our arms out of the car window. We returned there 3 weeks later for the second vax. All very well organized and professionally done. Here’s to first responders!
George, ever the optimist, set up a new beehive in February, in hopes that a swarm would appear to inhabit it. No such luck, but he’ll order a queen and entourage in the coming spring. Honey!
In March, we began a renovation of the back bathroom, having found an Armenian team of verbose workers. Many delays caused by supply shortages, but it was finished by April, with a gleaming glass shower door and fancy sink! We’re satisfied with it, although we settled for the flooring that the contractor suggested, since the flooring we wanted was not available. Another of many dilemmas caused by pandemic lockdowns!
End of April, we journeyed by car to Denver—we drove because we were to pick up some of George’s father’s art works, since we had not been able to visit when he died in October 2020. We drove via Tucson, where we visited with old Appleton friends Marti Hemwall and John Peterson. The house where they were staying had a resident owl, which seemed a very good omen for us. We like Tucson! Our visit with the family was wonderful, with trips to Golden, Botanic Gardens, and gifts of stuffed axolotls & unicorns, the boys’ obsessions of the week.
After not having seen the family in so long, in the space of a month we saw them twice! The whole gang flew to us in May, when we had trips to the beach and lots of grandparents’ reading to little boys.
Summer was spent in preparation for my knee replacement surgery which happened in mid- August. I also gave a Zoom talk for Art Muse on German women artists (which you can listen to here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qeSlyCmuP_0), and my book Three German Women came out in paperback! (PLEASE CONTACT ME IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO BUY A COPY AT A VERY REASONABLE PRICE!) As I write this, the knee continues to recover well, and I have been a good girl about exercises and walking, contrary to everyone’s expectations. I do moan a lot, though.
The highlight of the last month was a trip to the Hindu Temple in Costa Mesa for a celebration of Diwali. We were invited by our Indian neighbors to the colorful events; we hope to go back to the temple soon, to learn more about its elaborately decorated complex of buildings. That same weekend included a sad farewell to our friend Linda Frank. We attended her Quaker memorial service via Zoom. Ruminations on the contrasts of spiritual experiences prompted this blog entry: https://esauboeck.wordpress.com/2021/11/07/hindus-and-quakers/
So that brings us up to the beginning of December! The kiddos will come to experience the Rose Parade this year, which should engender lots of excitement. We wish ALL of our dear friends the best of greetings, with hope that families will be together and that friends can visit again. Thank goodness for social media, I say! It was a salvation this year, no matter its flaws and foibles.
SEASON’S GREETINGS, Y’ALL!
Write/call/email/text us! LOVE, Erika & George, 450 N. El Molino Ave., Pasadena, CA 91101, 626 644 2389, esauboeck@gmail.com.
The selfie of us on our March anniversary (46th!) seems an appropriate one to begin a holiday letter for this most bizarre of years: a little crooked, a little blurry, and kind of manic! What can we say about a year in which we had to stay home for most of it? Since I wrote last year’s letter before our travels at Christmas, I’ll include some tales of that trip first. Since Max & Dottie & kiddos planned to be in Austin with her family, we decided we would drive over to be with them. We managed to find a great home to stay in via HomeExchange (so it was free accommodation!), and en route made a detour to the famous little Texas town of Marfa–the site of artist Donald Judd’s projects, and a place I had always wanted to visit. Despite the cold and a lot of closed galleries, it was a fascinating place, better than my expectations.
Marfa Court House
George at the Marfa Store, and below, Chinati Foundation
It was great to see the kiddos in Austin, despite minor family illnesses. We were especially pleased to meet the kiddos’ new cousin Sonny, Dottie’s sister’s little boy, who looks exactly like his father!
Sadly, George’s 93-year-old father, George Albert Boeck, Sr., died on Halloween day in Greeley, Colorado. He was a real gentleman who prided himself on being curmudgeonly, and we miss him greatly. To whom will we now send articles about Sherlock Holmes and Abraham Lincoln? Here is the obituary I wrote for him that appeared in the Greeley paper: https://memorials.ncccremation.com/Boeck-George/4378810/
Finally, I gave in after months of not seeing the family, and flew via Southwest Airlines to Denver. A lovely visit, with Lyle, who wanted an axolotl, and Lou, who said his favorite animal was a unicorn.
About the only other event to report in this crazy year is that George has once again acquired a beehive! No bees yet, but it is a sign of his perpetual optimism that he’s waiting for a swarm to find the new digs to call home. So we persist in our hopes for renewal, regeneration, and lots of honey in the New Year!
Please let us hear from you, by whatever means: EE & GB, 450 N. El Molino Ave., Pasadena, CA 91101, 626 644 2389, esauboeck@gmail.com. We both have Facebook pages, too! Thanks to all of you for making this year survivable! WE LOVE OUR TRIBE!
[No doubt many of you will recognize that this entry comes not from me, Erika, but from George, the other half of ESAUBOECK! He’s so sweet and earnest to have taken on this experimental project. –Erika.]
Just after the start of the year, I became impatient with the bland news reported in Google News and Huffington Post, the two aggregators I follow. I decided to aggregate news from left-leaning publications, then added a few “from the other side of the aisle”. A daily task undertaken at about 4:00 in the afternoon, it was really pretty interesting and only took a little more than an hour each day.
After a six week trial, it seems to me that RealClearPolitics.com does just about as good a job as I can with way better graphics, though being less selective. The conclusions: it is much easier to find positive, forward-looking articles in liberal publications than in conservative ones. National Review is particularly noted for preferring attacks on opposition figures over descriptions of efforts by conservatives. Selecting the appropriate publication from which to take popular stories was often a challenge.
Technically, finding current postings of classical music on YouTube is time consuming due to the incredible number of dippy “classical music for relaxed studying which will also put your baby to sleep”; they generally don’t give proper attribution. WordPress’s free blog function works pretty well, despite some odd layout editing, the most frustrating being an inclination to automatically run paragraphs together.
I have no idea if anyone found the blog.
Here is the list of the not particularly Rad publications I looked through for this post followed by a few weeks of the post itself, enough for you to get an idea of the coverage.
Feb. 9, 2018. On this day in 1950, U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy (R. Wisc.) said that the U.S. Dept. of State was full of communists which he considered a bad thing.
Feb. 8, 2018. On this day in 1575, Leiden University was founded; its motto, Praesidium Libertatis or bastion of liberty, while appropriate from the start, was coined in 1839.
Feb. 7, 2018. On this day in 1898, 1889 Emile Zola was brought to trial for libel for publishing J’accuse, a letter accusing the government of France of anti-semitism in the Dreyfus affair.
[George likes to make these little anecdotal moral offerings….ee]
As we travel Erika and I have shared and have had individual experiences. Erika stayed in Denver while I motored north from Denver to Greeley to see my father. After a long, slow bit coping with someone’s minor accident, I needed to pee. Eventually, after a patient wait, I exited to a gas station. The station’s men’s toilet was occupied, as was the women’s (“That’s the ladies’!”). Around the side and then the back was a fenced-in area protecting the air conditioning fans. Just inside the gate was a fledgling robin, perched on a bit of metal wire. I carefully slipped by. I relieved myself into the grass without attracting the attention of nutters, and again slipped by the young robin.
Here’s the problem. Not until some time on the highway did I wonder how would the fledgling’s minders find it to feed it? Shouldn’t I have shepherded it out of the enclosure? Was it only alive because it was protected?
That’s what happens when you vary from the protected forms of the norms. All up, if you worry about worrying about unexpected situations stop sooner and pee where you are supposed to.
[In frustration at not finding much easily available information–such as maps, bus schedules, or even directories of places to eat and shop–George has been accumulating all these bits and pieces while we’ve been in Ajijic. Most of what is written here is G’s work, and includes his interpretation of how things work in this little ex-pat town in Mexico–ee.]
Where is the stuff that we’ve needed since coming to Ajicic?
Water.
The next time you talk to a Republican who opposes government funding for private services like schools and public transit, agree and describe how Mexico does water supply. The city pumps filtered water to your house. You are expected to treat it against pathogens — elaborate filters and ultraviolet lights. Just think of the investment opportunity from selling these to every household in the U.S.!
When the home-treated water comes out of your faucet, it’s probably okay to use it to boil potatoes or pasta, shower or brush your teeth. You probably want to get bottled water for drinking water. To eat veggies (including sliced oranges and lemons), soak them in a basin of water with 4 or 5 drops of iodine solution for 5 minutes. Between the iodine and the water, you will get rid of the organic and chemical fertilizers. Drain, don’t rinse. The better restaurants have their own water treatment and will treat their veggies.
In short, get locally delivered bottled water in 5 gallon jugs. Where we rent, we get two 5-gallon bottles delievered for about 40 pesos (about $2.00). Prefer bottled water and sodas at your eateries. As long as your house has a filtration system, don’t worry over much about your water.
Food.
Street vendors. We’ve bought quarts of quality locally grown blueberries and raspberries, and bunches of asparagus from vendors on the street, I hope for competitive prices. Why and how blueberries are being grown here now is a good question, but they’re very good, and the raspberries are sublime. We have not been brave enough to eat from the cooked foods at stalls at the markets, but in most cases, especially around here, that food should be fine.
Tiny groceries are on every neighborhood street. They are often dark and somewhat forbidding. I’ve bought milk and fresh cilantro from nice people at Tienamos, just down the way from us on Revolucion. Often you will see a simple table set out in front of a house, with a few things, like drinks or chips, for sale.
There are three regular grocery stores in the area frequented by the ex-pats:
Torito, on the Carretera at Revolución a bit east of the town proper, offers pretty much what every modest grocery store in the U.S. does. Some fruit and vegetables, beer, wine and spirits, a butcher (I’ve bought chicken wings to boil for broth, but prefer Tony’s as a butcher, see below), and all sorts of normally needed goods. Excellent local coffee, both whole bean and ground, can be found here, too.
Super Lake, in San Antonio a few kilometers east of Ajijic, caters to the U.S. and Canadian residents. It’s the ex-pat market par excellence. Clabber Girl baking powder, Schar digestive biscuits, McCann steel cut oat meal, Wasa Brot, bottled herbs, proper mayo and mustard, cilantro, wine, yogurt. One pays through the nose for the privilege of having these items available: a box of granola that would cost $2.50 at home costs almost $5 here. It’s also best to check the use-by dates as well.
Soriana Híper is a comprehensive grocery store in Chapala, just north of the city center, with good prices and a good variety of products. And if you would rather shop in a Mexican supermercado than succumb to WalMart or Costco–both of which are in easy distance from Ajijic–Soriana is the one to go to.
Fish mongers and butchers.
Las Playas Fish shop, next door to SuperLake, closed Sat. after 3:00, open Sun. morning. Good fish, filleted to order, bones and heads for broth, lots of frozen shrimp.
Pescaderia Pacifico. Fish market in West Ajijic. Again, good fish, filleted to order, bones and heads for broth, frozen shrimp.
Carnicería Tony’s. Butcher next door to SuperLake on Carretera. Really nice pork loins and beef. The intelligent and well-spoken butcher (who speaks perfect English) is a gem and the young woman cashier is a quick wit if she shows it. Note, in most shops you order and get your food from the provider and take it to a cashier to pay for it.
Bread. Hmmm. There’s reputed to be a good French bakery in west Ajijic. I’ll try to check. That said, I have found pretty good multi-grain loaves at SuperLake. [Found THE bread shop: Panadería Escandinavia, in the mall across the Carretera from the Wal-Mart. Excellent Nordic-style loaves, and good sandwiches as well.–ee]
Helados Bök. A terrific goat’s milk ice cream shop on the west side of the Plaza. We’ve been able to order goat’s milk and goat’s milk yogurt there, too, but you may have to wait a few days to get it, while the owner pasteurizes the milk and sets the yogurt! (Note, too, that although the shop name includes an umlaut, the real German word for goat is BOCK!)
El Granero. South side of Carretera just west of Javier Mina. What a nice herb and grain shop! Excellent quality, and pleasant people, too.
Open air markets, called Tianguis locally, are held weekly:
Monday: Chapala, near the Soriana just north of downtown. Lots of stuff!
Tuesday: West Ajijic, in La Huerta Hall starting not a minute before 10:00am. Everything’s supposed to be organic, quite a lot of homemade foods, as well as good fruit and vegetables. Entirely geared toward the ex-pat market, you would see more Mexicans at any market in California than you will see here.
Organic Market, La Huerta, Ajijic.
Wednesday: Ajijic, on Revolución south of the highway. Trinkets and clothes above, vegetables, fish (filleted open air for you!), and meat farther south. A very happy place!
Thursday: Jocotopec. We haven’t been there yet, but it is said to be extensive and right on the Carretera, filling the road.
Housing.
We’re staying in a house at the corner of Prof. Lázaro Cárdenas and Revolución, about 2 km ENE of the Ajijic’s town center for about $1,200 a month. Our friend Leslie says that for long stays the price break is about $700 per month to get a nice rental; she has a two-story, beautifully appointed house at that price. We’ve seen a very presentable house near us–with all the mod cons and a garden–for $950 per month.
My suggestion is to rent something short term while waiting for something long term available through a local real estate agent. Our experience has been limited to Michael Rosenblum, a thoroughly pleasant ex-pat at Fenix Real Estate. Once you relax here, it’s easy to buy quality real estate for surprisingly modest prices. (See Erika’s upcoming blog on immigration procedures!)
You will find that the town is divided first between areas above and below the Carretera (the Carretera is the main highway, and very busy and dangerous to cross). North of the highway is seriously up hill along quite cumbersome cobblestone streets. Our street, in Upper Ajijic, is the only paved street in the entire town–that is, paved with smooth, walkable tiles, rather than chunky, volcanic-rock cobblestones. West of the town center are many prosperous properties, some in gated associations, still on cobblestone streets.
Locks, etc.
Household security is quite like that in Europe — lots of locks, bars on windows, and keys. Screens, windows, screen doors, garages, gates, back doors, front doors, they are all locked even when you are in the adjoining room.
That said, we have never felt the least bit endangered. We walk through sections of town where poor people live and don’t have the heightened street sense that comes on walks past rougher apartment buildings in Pasadena. On the other hand, I am careful not to show off my money or cards, pocketing both before leaving the ATM. We close the first floor curtains and stash the computers in a kitchen drawer before leaving the house. Like sensible tourists everywhere, we take only the money and credit cards we expect to need on our forays and always leave our passport at home.
Stuff.
Money. Currently the peso is almost 20 to the dollar, so to figure a cost, divide by two and drop a decimal, e.g., 120 pesos: divide by two=60, drop a decimal=$6.00. It’s not exact, but close enough to convince you that things are surprisingly inexpensive. ATMs are numerous, but always ask for a receipt just in case the machine charges your account but doesn’t give you the money. If it happens, just call the number on the back of the card. You will be one of a number of people to whom this has happened. Sometimes the ATMS run out of money, too, and many of the ATMS in grocery stores are broken or eat your card without giving you money. And be aware: very few places here take credit cards! We haven’t even tried. Some of the more touristy places will take a card, but as far as we can tell, the place runs on a cash economy.
Post office. North side of the Carretera just past J. Encarnacion Rosas. As you can see, it’s a hole in the wall, and word is mail will take anywhere from three weeks to two months to get where it’s supposed to go. Most ex-pats here use services such as IShop Mail, which actually mails things via a Laredo, Texas, address. Prices are a bit high, but these are the only reliable ways to get and send mail.
Super Farmacia. Pharmacy. Carretera and J. Encarnacion Rosas. Celebrex, over the counter 10 for 280 pesos (ca. $1.40 each). (See Erika’s blog post on Mexico and meds)
Total Body Care. Ocampo and Benito Juarez, t. 766 33 79. World-class massage, acupuncture, pedicure & manicure, and the like. Very reasonable prices,e. g., full-body deep-tissue massage costs about 400 pesos, or $20.
Diane Pearl. Colon and Constitucion. Folk arts. Some books about the Chapala region are also available here.
Creaciones del Lago. A women’s embroidery cooperative. Ramon Corona above 16 de Septiembre, cattycorner from LCS. Four women sell their stitchery-decorated blouses and other finery. Lovely, inexpensive products from very pleasant women. They will do custom work too. The blouses and textiles are hand woven for them.
El Perrito Sabio Librería/Bookstore. On Colon across from the Plaza. Modest selection in Spanish and English, run by a well-informed gentleman named Ricardo with two small dogs. The ONLY bookshop in town.
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Leather. Excellent handmade leather goods for unbelievably affordable prices at the tiny shop on the Carretera called Marcelino (Carr. Oriente #8). Marcelino himself sits there at his sewing machine and can make anything you ask for, be it coat, jacket, or bag. We got these three items for under $70.
Travel.
Taxi. Plaza (766 0674) and Gasoliera (766 1663). The two plus kilometers from the city center to our rental costs 50 pesos.
Chapala Buses. You can catch them at stops along the Carretera and the drivers can make change for reasonable denominations. The buses are always clean, have fairly comfortable seats, and are heavily used. You can catch a “Directo” from here to Guadalajara, for about $2.50/trip, and 45 minutes into Guadalajara’s old bus station.
Local. 7 or 8 pesos in the neighborhood of Chapala and Ajijic. About 40 pesos to or from Guadalajara but takes nearly twice as long as the “Directo”, and stops at every possible “parada” along the way, so a 2-hour trip.
The Guadalajara Old Bus Central (Antigua Central Camionera, known locally as Central Viaje) is inconveniently located some distance from the city center, which means an 80 peso taxi ride into Centro Historico. The station is also pretty grotty. We took a local back to Ajijic just to avoid having to wait an hour for the “Directo”.
Drivers. They are easy to find by recommendation, but a bit pricey — 1,000 pesos (so $50) for a four hour trip to Tlaquepaque, the upscale craft neighborhood of Guadalajara. Similar fares for drivers to Mazamitla, an architecturally interesting town about 1 1/2 hours from Ajijic on the other side of Lake Chapala, and slightly more to Teuchitlan (Guachimontones Pyramids) 2 1/2 hours away on the other side of Guadalajara.
Tour buses. The big name in town is Charter Tours, http://charterclubtours.com/en/home/. Again, they seem kind of expensive — more than $100 U.S. for a day-long venture to the other side of Lake Chapala, and they require a certain number of people for the tour, so often cancel.
LCS buses. The Lake Chapala Society sponsors inexpensive bus trips to favored destinations — Tonalá (handicrafts) and Tlaquepaque (artsy Guadalajara) about every three weeks, 350 pesos (450 pesos for non-members), depart 9:00 and return 5:00.
Golf cart rentals. Because of the tortuous cobblestone streets and the steepness of the Upper Ajijic roads, many people rent golf carts to get up and down the hills. Emiliano Zapata #52, corner of Encarnación Rosas, Upper Ajijic. About 3,000 pesos per week. Much reduced for longer rentals.
Autos. Long time residents say it’s not as frightening as it looks, but it takes some getting used to. Car rentals seem expensive because U.S. or Canadian insurance isn’t accepted here, so one has to purchase Mexican insurance.
Phones.
We were taken to the Telcel shop on the town side of the Carretera west of Juan Alvarez. Sim card and 1 gig plan for about 500 pesos. It is vastly preferable to purchase a Sim card and plan for your U.S. mobile rather than incur international roaming rates. Sandra, the proprietor of this Telcel shop, is easy to speak with and generally instructed her associate regarding our needs.
To call US and Canada 001+area code+phone no. Local land line, 7 digits. Local cell, 333+7 digit number. Mexico long distance land line, 01+3 digit area code+7 digit local number. Mexico long distance cell, 045+3 digit area code+7 digit phone number (Mexico City has 8 digit phone numbers).
Birds.
A Vermilion Flycatcher outside our kitchen window.
So many lovely birds! Vermilion fly-catchers, kiskadees, lots of water birds. To my disappointment, LCS offers no bird watching groups, but we know they must exist here, because of this kind of video:
Dogs and horses.
The locals let their dogs bark and many allow them to run in the street. They’ve never given me much notice, though the occasional dog confined to a porch will bark viciously. We find the attitude about dogs here the most dismaying aspect of Mexican small-town life.
There are horses all over the place here. No horse carts or wagons though, only saddle horses, most often used for carrying five gallon water jugs.
If you know which street to walk down (hint: Encarnacion Rosas) on, you will often get to see a hen and some chicks foraging on the side of the street.
That about wraps up our practical info and George’s observations about life in Ajijic these past few weeks. So after the chickens, we will end with two beautiful scenes right outside our door:
And a list of special characters to copy and paste:
3rd Duke of Roxburghe by Batoni National Portrait Gallery of Scotland
Christopher Gibbs, 1970s.
[Another George post! –ee]
Today is June 17. Chambers Book of Days mentions that the Roxburghe Club — the famously exclusive book collectors’ club — was founded on this day in 1812. Curious about its publications — each member is expected to publish an antiquarian volume for their fellow 40 club members — I found a list of the club publications and a list of the club members at its website. Among the current members are the fashionista Christopher Gibbs and Getty Images founder Mark Getty. After a romp through Gibbs’ antic career as reported in Wikipedia, I checked Getty’s page there. In neither instance does the Roxburghe get a mention. Curious about Getty’s wife Domitilla Harding, I found her photo on Google Images accompanying a Daily Telegraph story about her support of the Lambton sisters’ effort to get some inheritance. The story mentioned that the Lambton and Getty marriage ended in 2011.
A keen Wikipedia editor, I now wonder if I should edit Getty’s page to include mention of his Roxburghe membership. It wouldn’t hurt but there’s not much room for it. Should I also mention that his marriage ended? I don’t think so — it seems intrusive.
Dinner. It’s lovely to eat, but the ratio of time is about 4 to 1 of preparation and table. The pleasure needs to be in the kitchen. What are we doing in the kitchen? Fiddling with groceries on their way to the table. So I’ll talk mostly about groceries here, since that’s what I like best. So there!
We’ve been here fall, winter and spring. Unlike our experience a couple of dozen years ago, the fruit has been various throughout the seasons — apples, oranges, bananas always pretty good, berries variable, melons very good, and the cost of all seasonal. If you’d rather buy an avocado than a car, it’s yours. The same is true of veggies — zukes are somehow always good, lots of them coming from Africa in the winter, I guess. The local spring greens of a surprising variety start to arrive in the south from February or March and northward from March and April. The affordable winter lettuce must come from greenhouses. Arugula hits the shelves like a spring rain. Radicchio and endive are a bit expensive, but still worth it to my mind.
One of the Bosnian markets.
Let me get some order in this. Salad, done. Standard vegetables: everything is like the U.S. Frozen peas and beans are great. Onions, potatoes, shallots (!), mushrooms (watch for forest-picked mushrooms usually from stands on the roadside), carrots, and cabbage are routine and good. I may have mentioned the asparagus arriving in a flurry. They’re really keen about produce as it comes to market through the season for good reason.
Because I can’t speak the language, I look for my meat in packages. Our butcher in Lisbon, whose shop was literally on the ground floor of our apartment building, insisted that he could speak enough English that we could get what we wanted. It had never occurred to me that ground beef for hamburgers might be different from ground beef for meatballs. He had the best cheap wine too.
In the enormous Kaufland supermarket, East Berlin.
Similarly, the fish mongers were wonderful. I was astonished watching a woman in a normal store cleaning whole squid. Sorry to say, but I was too timid to venture beyond recognizable fish. Once you get to a fish market here, you’ll understand what I mean by “normal” fish. That said, I had a squid ink risotto that I know I could make if I could get the ingredients.
”Our” wonderful fishmonger in Barcelona.
Sliced meats of a million sorts are usually sold in 100 gram portions. The same goes for dips and olives and dozens of other treats. Again, look up the local phrase “one hundred grams” in Google Translate and point. They will understand when you gesture for more.
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Bread is a fraught topic. In fact, it’s not an issue. Outside of the German-speaking countries the bread is mediocre. We didn’t even find very good Italian bread in Trieste. You can pick from bins or cello-wrapped loaves if you want. The women (truly, always women) behind the bakery counter will halve most loaves for you and often slice them, too. It’s a matter of point and nod or ask for a bit of English. I’ve never had an uncomfortable interaction, but I have sometimes ended up accepting what didn’t surprise me to be not quite what I’d hoped for.
Let me revise my assertion that only German-speaking bakers are any good. We were in Greece on a special bread-making day (“a special bread-making day”? yeah, sure, why not?) that featured an incredible big thin loaf of white bread with lots of sesame seeds sprinkled on it that sustained us for days. We found a loaf full of seeds and nuts at Veritas, an organic shop in Barcelona, so good that I mourned when we’d finished eating it.
In an Athens bakery on the special bread day.
Wassa Brot crackers are usually available. I love the British cracker Tucs, but sadly it uses palm oil, so I shouldn’t eat them.
Sweets and baked goods are fantastic and dependent on their origin. Honestly, although everyone says that they are traveling for high cultural experiences, they’re really in Europe to eat. The reason to eat lunch and dinner late in Barcelona is to snack at 11 and 4. Sure, visit the Temple of Hephaestos in Athens, so you can cross over for something in the cafes adjacent to the site. I don’t mean some modest cookie; order a small plate of grilled sardines and a glass of wine or a couple of chicken and spinach filo pastries to tide you over until dinner several hours later. The Viennese museums all have cafes. My suggestion is that you are visually tired after an hour or so, but a snack can give you a second hour of viewing. You can pretend to pretend to come to the cultural site for the coffee but really come for the coffee.
What else?
Our soups are usually based on chicken broth from inexpensive parts — backs and wings, boiled for a short while with onion and carrot, cooled, cleaned, the bones returned to the pot and the bits of flesh set aside and usually used in a chicken stew.
The electric mixing wand we bought in Barcelona has saved its cost three times a week making vegetable soups.
All up, as usual success is in the planning. One bowl for salad and pasta? Make the salad and move it to the salad plates. One element boils, the others only warm? Use the tea kettle to boil the water for the peas. And one time I ended up boiling eggs in the tea kettle!
Oh, here’s something.
What we traveled with (or here’s pretty strong evidence that my suggestions are not particularly sensible after all) as we went from one kitchen to another:
Small French press, bag of coffee, bag of black tea, some packets of herb tea, carton of goat’s milk, small cheese grater, head of garlic, bottle of olive oil, usually a chunk of pecarino cheese and a bit of butter (there’s a dangerous substance to carry around–I once had a pat of butter melt into my shirt pocket!), measuring spoons, packets of oregano, basil, whole black peppers and sugar, a lemon, a couple of empty plastic bags, and as snacks on the road a couple of mandarin oranges, some peanuts, some digestives biscuits (McVite’s were the favorite).
What we found at our destination apartments:
Dish soap, liquid bath soap, salt, pepper (not always), pasta (often), sugar, one beer and one wine (not always), coffee, tea, herb tea, tp (two rolls usually)
[EE: this may be the last of George’s missives on fun in the kitchen in Europe! Laundry tips may follow!]
[George continues his recounting of life on the road and in the kitchen….ee]
Right now we’re staying in Hans and Edith’s Vienna apartment. Its kitchen is spacious, well equipped, and, with a big window, well lit — a trifecta shared by only Evy’s Andros apartment once we gave it a microwave. (Yes, yes, I know, they’re superfluous, but if you freeze much broth or drink your morning coffee slowly, a microwave comes in handy. I wish I’d learn how to cook veggies in one.)
Stoves and ovens.
The local technology in each country has provided us with simple, usually flawed electric stove tops with pretty good ovens, and when our stars shine (in Vienna and Portugal), gas stoves. I sent the following description of the weird elements on a see-through stove that was a bit worse than normal to the owners of our apartment in Barcelona:
I use a gas stove top, so the electrical stove top is a real novelty for me. I thought that a rheostat would make it possible to vary the heat of the elements. Here they are either on or off, but serially and not very conveniently. The stove has right and left top and right and left bottom elements.
At 1, in the 1st and 2nd minute, only the top right element works, it is bright red.
At 2, in the 1st minute, the top left element is hot, the top right element is bright red, in the 2nd minute the top right element alternates off and on.
At 3, in the 1st minute, the top left is bright red on but usually off, the top right element is usually on but sometimes alternating. The lower left element is bright red.
At 4, the top left element is on and off bright red, the top right element is usually bright red but also sometimes off, the bottom left element is bright red for the first minute and on and off bright red for the second minute.
The lower right element never turned on.
In short, the clever cook will spend a few minutes in the first evening checking which elements can boil water and what settings will simmer. Keep notes and plan your cooking accordingly. If you’re not used to electric cooking, keep in mind that the element is brilliantly hot for a few moments, then off for a few moments. Someone will make a fortune when they re-introduce the rheostat. [EE: As you can tell, we do not like electric cooking, and George always assumes that everyone else feels the same way, and that no one in America has had to deal with electric cooking!]
Most of the ovens have had convection fans, believe it or not. I understand that there’s a terrific benefit, but I only ever made biscuits and roast chicken.
Our Meals.
Breakfast. We traveled with a French press, coffee, and a mixing wand. Several of our apartments had single-shot fancy coffee makers, but we never used them. I can barely boil water before a cup of coffee, so the press worked perfectly. One-cup filters would work well, too. The filters are routinely available in the grocery stores.
My breakfast was usually coffee, soft-boiled eggs, and some version of toast. Toasters are rare; jaffa-makers don’t really work, but if you use only a bit of oil and butter, you can toast bread in a frying pan pretty well. Eventually I got so I would tolerate plain bread. Erika had coffee and sometimes a smoothie — goat or sheep yogurt, berries or pear, and banana (have I mentioned that I despise this perfect fruit — portable, cheap, routinely available, tidy as, healthy, tasty if you don’t mind banana — that I had as a snack nearly daily for years). Otherwise, she had muesli.
It takes some looking to find unsweetened juice, so we often just juiced our own oranges. The goat or sheep’s milk products for Erika’s wonky stomach are usually in the better stores and easily found the farther south you travel. Eggs sell half and full dozen, but you can get them singly at the markets — what a pleasure to take a small paper bag full of eggs home nestled amidst the lettuce and spinach!
Lunch. When I could, I’d shop for both lunch and dinner in the morning. We’d have a substantial lunch and a light dinner. Often we were out and about starting at about 10:00 and would have lunch in a cafe or restaurant. When we did, we generally shared a first course and a salad.
Dinner. Served next Tues. I need some photos of the markets.
by May Jasanoff). Colm Tóibín. 
Super Lake, in San Antonio a few kilometers east of Ajijic, caters to the U.S. and Canadian residents. It’s the ex-pat market par excellence. Clabber Girl baking powder, Schar digestive biscuits, McCann steel cut oat meal, Wasa Brot, bottled herbs, proper mayo and mustard, cilantro, wine, yogurt. One pays through the nose for the privilege of having these items available: a box of granola that would cost $2.50 at home costs almost $5 here. It’s also best to check the use-by dates as well.
You will find that the town is divided first between areas above and below the Carretera (the Carretera is the main highway, and very busy and dangerous to cross). North of the highway is seriously up hill along quite cumbersome cobblestone streets. Our street, in Upper Ajijic, is the only paved street in the entire town–that is, paved with smooth, walkable tiles, rather than chunky, volcanic-rock cobblestones. West of the town center are many prosperous properties, some in gated associations, still on cobblestone streets.
El Perrito Sabio Librer
esauboeck 