Pátzcuaro and Tzintzuntzan

On Friday in Morelia, our tour included being bused to 2 nearby towns, Pátzcuaro and Tzintzuntzan (it has a rythmn). Much of the present day state of Michoacán was part of the Tarascan Empire.[The name of Tarascans was given to the local Indian population by the Spanish. One story I was told for its origin may well be apocryphal; to the local Indians, the Spanish men were promiscuous. When the Indians were hailed by the Spanish, they jeered back refering to the Spanish as “Tarascans” which meant ‘adulterers’ or perhaps stronger epithet. The Spanish did not understand and thought that was what the Indians were calling themselves.] It had successfully resisted attacks and being conquered by the Aztecs. It had more extensive metal working than most pre-Spanish kingdoms. Because some of that metal included gold, the Spanish were soon attacking and conquering it too by the middle of the 16th C. Pátzcuaro had been the original capital, but the latter had been moved to Tsintzuntzan. When the Spanish conquered the area, they made Pátzcuaro their capital. You can read the history in the above links to Wikipedia. The Spanish later moved their capital to what is now called Morelia. The explanation we were given by a guide was that the Spanish were worried by too much inter racial mixing in Pátzcuaro so moved the capital to the newly founded Spanish city. However, the early and rapid emergence of mestizos seems to indicate that concerns about racial mixing had little inhibiting effects on fraternizing with Indian women. There was certainly a rigid chaste system in the colonial period--Spaniards from Spain, those of Spanish parentage but born in New Spain, mestizos, and finally Indians and imported African slaves at the bottom. However, as is usual, males in dominant social positions frequently fraternized sexually with women lower on the social scale. I suspect that there were other, more significant reasons for the move.

What was noticable was how Indian the population of the 2 towns are. Although the area is kind of central in Mexico and subjected to early and continuous religious and political pressures, there seems to be lots of continuing influences from the pre-Spanish past. The area is especially noted for its elaborate ‘Day of the Dead’ celebrations. Oct. 1 - Nov. 1. Although it was a month ago, we noticed that the cemeteries are elaborately decorated. In Pátzcuro, I bought a t-shirt illustrating the humor Mexicans display towards death. I’ll put a photo in a day or so. It has the skeleton people standing at a bar. The inscription is: “Comamos y bebamos que manaña moriremos” It is a very emphatic “Let’s eat and let’s drink as tomorrow we shall die!”

Pátzcuaro has 2 plazas, grande and chico (large and small). The large one is on a grand scale like one sees in large cities planed by the Spanish in the colonial period; itis surrounded by buildings with porticos. In these buildings there are numerous restaurants and stores, many of the latter catering to the tourist trade with correspondingly higher prices. The smaller plaza is more like small Mexican pueblos with loads of street vendors of foods and a wide variety of other things. There were relatively few people in the large plaza while the small one was bustling with local people. Ultimately, it was the more interesting one for us.

In Tzintuntzan we had a tour of the Franciscan convent of San Francisco de Asis (the photo shows the entrance with members of our tour). It was founded by a nobleman who led the order’s mission to the area. He had big, grandeous plans and built to house over 100 monks. However, none of the orders were allowed to recruit Indians and this convent never had more than 10 monks. Eventually, in the effort to separate church and state, most of the orders had their property confiscated and they had to leave or disband. Subsequently, it was used for a number of purposes, including as stables. It was in serious decay and ruin. However, the community has been undertaking a huge restoration, including refreshing the murals and decorations that are left using the pigments that were used in the late 16th and 17th Cs. One wing has been substantially restored and work is in progress shoring up and restoring the cloister in the center square. The community owns the property and gets no money from the government, but they have raised substantial amounts from businesses. The community uses it for weddings and fiestas.

In front of the convent itself is a large park. The monks planted many olive trees and set up processing of olive oil. However, producers in Spain wanted to eliminate competition and got the Spanish government to order the destruction of all olive trees. To comply, the monks cut down all the female trees (except for a couple in the back where they couldn’t be seen), but left the male trees (I hadn’t known that olive trees are either male or female; only the latter bear fruit). As a result, the park has rows of olive trees over 350 years old. The photo shows one.

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!

El Dia de los Muertos

Halloween! This is not a Mexican custom, but in recent years, it has really caught on. It may have been Mexican kids who had lived in the US and brought the custom back. Or maybe the gringos down here started it. Whatever, the kids love it. They especially head for the areas where there are lots of foreigners, like here in La Floresta and as Rosendo the gardener told me, Chula Vista, an upscale development surrounding a golf course. One group who came here tonight included Letitia, our maid, with her two children from Chapala!

This is also a big day for firecrackers here in Ajijic. It started at 5 a.m. and has been recurring frequently all day. There is a small statue of the Virgin (there are any number of these in Mexico often associated with some appearance of the Virgin and one or more miracles) that normally resides in the small chapel to the Virgin on the north side of the plaza. That chapel is very old dating to the late 17th C. In October, the statue is taken to the parish church just a block from the plaza, but in a long procession that wanders all around Ajijic. There are special masses every day all month in her honor. The statue is even taken to the church in San Antonio Tlayacapan (the village next to us) for 1 night. Anyway, today, the statue is taken back to the chapel where it will reside until the beginning of October next year. Tonight there is a big fireworks display about 10 p.m. We are too tired (we had the 3 girls, plus visitors from Canada staying next door at Steve and Heather’s came over to see the girls and chat). Also, tomorrow Kate, Jack and Sonia arrive.

Actually, the big Mexican celebration at this time of year is El dia de los Muertos (The Day of the Dead). It really takes place over 2 days--Nov. 1 and 2. It is fascinating for several reasons. It is a pre-Spanish and pre-Christian custom. For a while the Catholic Church tried to suppress it but finally decided to link it to All Saints’ Day (Nov. 1) and try to Christianize it. While Christian elements have been added and mixed in, in essence it is still a pagan custom and very different in sensibility. In the first place, Mexican attitudes to death involve humor and whimsy. It is a time to remember friends and loved ones who have died, but it is not a time of sadness. I’ll describe some aspects of the customs, but there is too much to cover in one post. In general it starts on the Nov. 1 as relatives go to the cemetery to clean up and beautify the graves of family members with flowers, paper streamers, even altars. On some, they may have photos of the loved ones as part of the altar; usually, there are lots of candles. They bring lots of food and drink and in fact celebrate, in some cases all night and into the next day. They sing songs and recite humorous poems. There is no worry about spirits or ghosts. Cemeteries are not scary places for Mexicans.

Everywhere, they build fancy altars, some small, but others very large. In Chapala, there is an entire street where altars cover the entire front yards on both sides of the entire street. They close off the street and different groups build the altars. It is like some places north of border where neighbourhoods used to put up massive Christmas light decorations on the houses. In the paper, it says that in Zapopan (a city that is part of Metro Guadalajara) they are building a huge altar (over 2 tons of flowers) to set a record. Often these public altars honor a person. The one in Ajijic this year is in honor of a man who died recently. A number of years ago, he started a youth orchestra and enabled many young people to play musical instruments. Many musicians who played in his orchestra are giving a free, public concert tomorrow night as part of the Day of the Dead celebrations. In some cases people will make an altar for a friend who is still alive. It is intended as an honor, and not an expression of a desire to see the person dead!

A favorite image here is La Catrina. This is Lady Death; it is a skull and skeleton with dresses. They are very fanciful and artists put them in all kinds of guises. I saw one today in a wedding dress, but often they will be dressed in other costumes, including a sombrero. Again, death is not feared or part of some superstition. For example, they make sugar candies in the shape of a skull and you can have the name of friend written in chocolate on the forehead for a small gift. The ones I saw today were a bit smaller than a fist. Joel, our Spanish instructor, got them for Jim and Carole Cook who are providing their house for our Spanish conversation class.

This very different attitude to death seems to be from the pre-Spanish era. In their cosmology, they did not fear death as they thought a good death would ensure a good afterlife. The indigenous peoples were very warlike. The best death was to die bravely in battle. The next best death was to be sacrificed to the gods! Many indigenous peoples, including the Mayans and Aztecs, made generous use of human sacrifice. Warriors who were captured in battle, hoped to be chosen to be sacrificed as this would undo the dishonor and missed chance for a good death. In fact the Maya played a game thought to be a bit like lacrosse. There are playing fields (like hockey arenas) in many Mayan cities. It is believed that the winners (not the losers) were given the honor of being sacrificed! Thus, this pagan attitude to death seems to underly attitudes in Mexico. While altars often have images of the Virgin or crosses, these Christian elements on the whole are a bit superficial; the Day of the Dead seems deeply rooted in pre-Christian paganism as are the attitudes to death.

Back to regular time

October is going by very quickly. Tomorrow night, we change the clocks back an hour. Mexico is still using the old times for the Savings Time changeover. Mexico did not follow the US (and Canada) when it extended the period for Saving Time. Thus, for a couple of weeks, we shall be an extra hour later than in the areas north of the border.

Surprisingly, we have had a couple of rains recently; we don’t expect it this late in October. The rain a couple of days ago was pretty light. However, late this afternoon, it got dark; we got thunder and lightning, but didn’t expect much rain. However, just as we finished eating, it did rain quite hard for 15 minutes or so. After a pause, we got another heavy rain. Barb did not have the rain gauge out so we don’t know how much it will be, but I would think that it is close to half an inch so far. With several cloudy days, the temperatures have been lower. A couple of mornings the temps have been below 16 degrees (I know, your heart bleeds); however, on sunny days, the temps still get up into the high 20s.

Barb is getting more and more satisfied after testing the irrigation system. This week she set the timer (6 a.m each time as early morning is the best and most efficient time for watering): on Monday, the 2 zones in front of the wall, Wednesday, the 2 zones inside the walls and on Friday the zone for the flower beds. She can adjust the length of time each zone goes depending on how dry things get. This is going to relieve a great deal of time and stress the watering had become.

This past week, Barbara had a flareup of her lupus. She made an appointment to see the rheumatologist in Guadalajara. He has prescribed some new medications to get it under control again. When we were going in for the 6 p.m. appointment, we decided to get some other errands in Guadalajara done, altogether almost 7 hours. Guadalajara is a huge city and it is always a bit hectic going there. However, we managed without any serious difficulties, although coming home, we followed signs directing us to the airport and Chapala and ended up taking a route that we had never taken before. It turned out alright, although it was probably a bit slower as we didn’t get on the cross town freeway that we usually take. Also, it was after sunset; seeing street signs in the daytime is hard enough and almost impossible at night. Thus, we had to follow the signs and hope for the best as we couldn’t see what street we were on!

In another week the snowbirds begin to arrive. Things will get busier; already our calendar for November is getting filled.

October again!

I haven’t had as much to report, at least that is my excuse for not doing a post for a while. The watering system has taken longer than we expected. It is mostly finished now; here is the front of the house in the middle. Jose Luis is coming back to make adjustments to the lawn sprinklers. He finally connected the various zones; when he tested them, he was not happy because the pressure did not stay high enough. We agreed to get a new pump. The gasket on the old one was leaking and I was not sure how long it would last anyway. However, I also discovered that Jose Luis had been pretty anxious about whether or not the system would work properly. He had never done one that had to cover such a large area. Thus, he expressed great relief when it seemed to work. After installing the new pump yesterday afternoon, he was beaming because it is working perfectly. There are 4 zones for the lawn and a fifth for the flower beds. For the latter, he has had his worker, Jorge, embed plastic hose a few inches below the surface all through the beds. Then, he is going to go around and beside each plant, punch a small hole in the hose. It will then leak the water underground around the roots. That is certainly a very efficient use of water for irrigation. The control system allows the different zones to be done separately and can be programed to spray whichever days and times you want. Barb plans to have them spray early in the morning before the sun comes up so that much less water is lost to evaporation. The system will relieve Barb of several hours of very boring work. Here is Barb in her hammock!

We had rain surprise this week. We had had no rain for over 2 weeks and I had concluded that the rainy season had ended. However, Wednesday night we had a thunderstorm (over 0.5 inch of rain). The next day, it was mostly cloudy with short brief showers. Then, it started raining about 6 p.m. and continued all night (another half inch). Even today, although we didn’t get any rain here, in Chapala there was a brief shower. It will be interesting to see if we get any more.

Today, we heard from Elizabeth at Love in Action that the girls would not be able to go out as they were sick or just recovering from colds, fevers etc. We went around to see if they needed anything, especially in the way of medicines. We did get some antibiotic for a couple of the girls. Last week, the girls also tried out the hammock.

Last Sunday afternoon, we went to the Lakeside Little Theater for the first production of the season (we got season tickets this year). It is little as there are only 120 seats, but it is lovely and well equipped. The productions are really quite good in spite of the fact that they are all done by volunteers; most of the actors have had considerable professional stage experience in Canada or the US. In so many areas (music, visual arts, drama, science, academia, etc.), there are really talented and experienced people who have retired here and most, probably because they have always been active people, make use of their talents and experience here. On Thursday night, we went to the final (fifth) season concert of Viva la Musica! It was a jazz quartet from Guadalajara; at least 3 of them, are classical musicians. Jazz is not my cup of tea (I don’t hate it, but don’t feel that I understand very well), but Barbara likes jazz. Starting next month, the Music Appreciation Society begins its season of concerts during the winter. Thus, there are classical music concerts here in Ajijic all year round-- amazing for such a small community. Also, during the winter, Viva la Musica organizes bus trips to Guadalajara concerts and ballet; we have not tried that yet. If one has the energy, there are virtually non stop cultural events available.

In an earlier post (September 13), I mentioned the Viva la Musica 4 day trip to Morelia at the end of November. I thought we were too late and were on the waiting list. Subsequently, 4 tickets became available and I snapped them up. Morelia is about 5-6 hours drive south of Ajijic and about 2,000 feet higher in altitude. Jim Cook, who is in my Spanish conversation class, is a terrific photographer; here are his photos of Morelia on his blog.

The Canadian Club has a big Thanksgiving Dinner at the Neuva Posada Hotel each year. However, I was too slow in getting tickets and they were all sold out. Next year, I shall have to be quicker off the mark. Even without the snowbirds, there are lots of Canadians living here. In fact the American Legion in Chapala also puts on a Canadian Thanksgiving Day dinner each year. We shall probably just have a quiet day at home this year.