Morelia

There is so much to tell that I shall take more than one post. Morelia is a great city. They have really preserved the central area with its early Spanish colonial architecture. As in most Mexican cities, the center is a large Plaza de Armas with the huge cathedral on one side (the photo was at night with the lights on) and what were government buildings along the others. All around the plaza, the buildings have large porticos--15 - 20 feet wide. Many of the ground floors have restaurants and use part of the area under the porticos as sidewalk cafes. Many other buildings in the surrounding blocks were originally large private residences of the wealthy. Today, many of the buildings have been converted to hotels. There seem to be fairly strict laws which do not allow large or garish signage. Most of the buildings were built with a pinkish stone, called canterra and the facades are clear and uncluttered.

Our hotel was just half a block from the plaza. As is typical of much colonial architecture, the two-story building is a square surrounding a large courtyard with trees, flowers and fountains; the photo shows the courtyard at night. You can see a large number of candles around the central fountain, both on the ledge and around the base. The ceilings are very high; on the 2nd story where the bedrooms are, the ceiling is at least 13 feet high. Our room looked out on the front and had a small, narrow balcony. Kate and Jack’s room had a king size bed. Ours had 2 ‘camas matrimoniales’ (double beds); it was comfortable and we slept well. Our bathroom had both a tub and shower, although the wash basin was in the bedroom. Most of the streets in the center are very narrow except for the north-south avenue which bisects the city. Thus, traffic often flows at a snail’s pace.

I’ll talk about our day on Friday in another post. On Saturday, we were free all day to explore Morelia. We had breakfast in a cafe facing the plaza and then went looking for a city tour with an English-speaking guide. Most of the bus tours were in Spanish. However, we found a delightful young woman, Maria, who spoke quite good English and drove a van for a tour of about 2 hours. We ended up with 10 of our Ajijic group. Maria was very enthusiastic and had done lots of research with dates and other background. One thing that was very interesting was that many of the churches (there are a lot of them in Morelia) are very heavily booked on Saturdays with one wedding after another. One church we were in (it was incredibly ornamented) had just finished one wedding. We had only about 5 minutes or so before we had to leave via a side exit as another wedding procession was starting up the aisle.


There were things going on in the plaza all day. At one point, some bagpipers and drummers were doing Scottish music. Later a band with huge amplifiers was performing. Other street performers were active. There was one group involving 5 dancers and 4 musicians. As you can see in the photo, the dancers had colourful embroidered costumes and ponchos; they wore masks that made them look like old men. They had sandals with hinged wooden soles. When they danced, the sandals made a loud clacking sound like tap dancing, but louder. The dancing was very vigorous; after they had finished their set, the dancers went over and flopped down with their masks and head pieces off. They were all young--teenagers.

One more little story for this post. Around the plaza were a number of men with stalls shining shoes. I had my old walking shoes which had not been polished or oiled for at least 2 years and were pretty grungy. I thought that it wouldn’t hurt to let one of the men see what he could do with them. He washed them first, and then used a clear wax (the shoes are natural coloured leather). By the end (he worked for about 15 minutes), they were looking better than they have for years. I went back in the afternoon with my dress-up shoes and had him do them too. His price for a shine was 15 pesos, or about Can.$1.30.

Ajijic festival again

Last post, I should have noted that not taking things for granted regarding house wiring does not just apply to Mexico. In 1985, we bought a house on Purcell’s Cove Road near the Armdale Rotary in Halifax. The house, built in the 1920s, seemed to have been renovated and the wiring upgraded. However, when up in the attic installing more insulation, we noticed the old parallel wiring with spool insulators. We thought that they just had not been removed when it was rewired. However, on checking, we found that the wires were live and that all the ceiling lights were still connected to this outdated wiring. While all the rest of the house had been rewired, no one had bothered to go into the attic and rewire up there.

Yesterday, the San Andres (Saint Andrew) festival for Ajijic’s patron saint started. It runs for almost 2 weeks. Today, there have been lots of big rocket firecrackers starting at about 5 a.m. We are far enough away that they don’t bother us too much. However, we were having brunch in the center of town only 2 blocks from the church where the rockets are set off. It was deafening. Every evening after mass, the plaza hums with entertainment, rides for the kids, lots of stalls selling everything, and lots of people. Practically every night, there is a big fireworks display at about 10:30 next to the plaza. Each night’s entertainment and fireworks is planned and paid for by different groups and unions in the town. Each group plans and raises money all year in order to make a big impression for their night. A lot of ex-pats go away for part or all of the festival time and/or complain a great deal. But this is Mexico and the Mexican way. No one is forced to come here and Mexicans are very tolerant of us, even though our being here impinges on their lives in many ways--some good and some not so good. Besides, it is very interesting to go to observe and even participate a little.

Our trip to Morelia is fast approaching; we leave Thursday, 26 Nov. It takes about 4 hours for the drive. From everything I hear and learn, Morelia is a fascinating city. In an earlier post, I gave Jim Cook’s blog with his pictures of Morelia. Below are a couple of websites with more information and photos. The schedule is quite busy. On Thursday, there is a dinner plus 2 concerts even though we get there only shortly after 12. On Friday afternoon, there is a short trip to Tzintzuntzan to the Convent of San Francisco de Asis and on to Pátzcuaro, which was the capital of the pre-Spanish Indian empire in this area. These people were never conquered by the Aztecs. Their capital also contained fantastic stone architecture. There is so much history in Mexico. We are free all day Saturday until 7 p.m. to explore Morelia itself.

Morelia

Google photos

Not properly grounded!

Life here has gotten busier. The arrival of some of our snowbird friends involve a more active social life than we had over the summer. Also, there are more events taking place for the same reason. For example, we went to a concert on Nov. 3rd (another next week) plus to the theater for a production of the Mousetrap on Sunday afternoon. This Saturday night we are going to a dinner/concert benefit in Chapala. People may imagine that because so many retirees live here that this must be a sleepy place. The exact opposite is true. Many of these retirees have been and remain very active; they are busy arranging a multitude of things to do. The problem is not what to do, but to restrict one’s activities to avoid becoming exhausted.

We had a reminder that in Mexico one must expect the unexpected. Barbara was having trouble with the washing machine that we bought only last January. We arranged for a repair man to come. With some initial lack of success, he did get it working properly and declared that it seemed to be alright. However, he had a gadget to measure the voltage. It was registering 140 volts--higher than the norm of about 120 volts in Canada and the US. However, it seems that in Mexico there is more variation, commonly 125 - 140. Most appliances made for Mexico are made to handle this, but appliances imported from up north often burn out the motors. Also, surge suppressors are virtually a necessity for most electronic equipment because there are more random surges here. However, this was not the big problem that was discovered. The repairman showed me that the 3rd prong of the plug (the ground) was in fact live!

I called Jose Luis who agreed to come the next day. He had a gadget which diagnoses whether or not plugs are wired correctly. He found that in that plug, not only was the ground live, but the neutral and live wires had been reversed; that plug outside was also connected to a plug inside the house to which our refrigerator was connected. Of course that plug was also wired incorrectly. I was getting in a bit of a panic. We had thought that the house was all wired with proper, grounded 3 pronged plugs. I was beginning to fear that all the wiriing in the house was bad. However, with one exception, all the other plugs are wired correctly with a ground. Obviously, someone who didn’t know what they were doing had messed around with those plugs. Jose Luis corrected the plugs to the washer and refrigerator by attaching the ground wire to the metal water pipe nearby with a clamp. I’m not sure what electrical inspectors in Canada would think of that, although in many houses the ground is connected just like that to the copper water pipe coming in from the street.

The other plug that was bad showed no proper ground; this is the plug that we were using for most of our computer and internet equipment! When Jose Luis opened the box, there was a ground wire, big as life. When he pulled it, it ended after about 8 inches. Apparently, it had been extended through the wall and connected to a metal post driven into the ground (we found the latter eventually). However, someone had come along and cut it off, probably when the house was repainted during the renovations before we bought it! It was easily fixed. A new ground was extended through the wall and connected to the post. Thus, in the end, it was all corrected quickly and inexpensively, but it is a reminder that you can’t take things for granted. By the way, the washer seems to be working properly now!