Three years ago, while sitting in one of Guanajuato’s plazas and doing nothing much but watching the tourists, a lady from San Miguel de Allende approached us and asked if we lived in Guanajuato. After exchanging pleasantries, she said she was in town looking for cheaper accommodations since the cost of living in San Miguel had become unaffordable for her. Then, almost in tears, she said she would have to retreat back to the States since she could not speak Spanish. She concluded she could not live in anywhere in Mexico other than the exorbitantly priced Gringolandias where she didn’t have to speak Spanish.

Four days ago while strolling home from El Centro, we met an American couple from yet another Mexican west coast town that were visiting Guanajuato. They were looking for a cheaper place to live in Mexico because the area where they live has become too expensive for them to keep living comfortably. They were in Guanajuato checking out the lay of the expatriation land. While my wife spoke to the woman, the husband took me aside and spoke to me in hushed tones as if he were revealing national security secrets. He asked furtively, “I suppose we will have to learn Spanish?”

That evening, I was doing some reading on the Mex-Connect forums when I came across an interesting entry. This lady expressed her indignation that while she was in Guanajuato visiting for a week or two, no one would speak English to her. She was, as many Americans seem to be, convinced the locals could speak English but were only pretending not to. She acted as if these Mexicans knew this woman was coming and decided to make a pact in order to torture her by speaking only in their native tongue?

She said, now pay attention to this, “They should speak English.”

I would love to tell you this is an isolated nutty woman but I’ve heard it in person and online too many times for it to be so.

If you really want to see what Americans who do manage to make it to The Mexican Highlands think about the city of Guanajuato, you should read the travel forums. There seems to be a consensus among them that Guanajuatenses are all actually bilingual in English but in some deviously planned plot, all agree never to speak to Americans in English. One lady stood outside a sidewalk restaurant in El Jardin and shouted the “I know you speak English and are pretending you don’t” mantra in front of God and all his witnesses-Mexicans and Gringos alike!

The truth is that when we first moved here, we found precious few who spoke English. We set about learning Spanish with a vengeance. Frankly, we couldn’t have cared less then nor do we care now if we ever encounter another English speaker. When we encountered trouble, we figured out how to handle it in Spanish. Our reasoning was that Mexicans decided long ago that Spanish was going to be the language they spoke and they have been very happy with the decision ever since.

Of the many reasons I write what I do on expat and Mexico issues (I am most certainly an equal opportunity critic) is for the following reason. The people who make their way to Guanajuato, mostly Americans who come with ridiculous and outrageous expectations, go back to the U.S. as self-proclaimed experts on Mexican culture. They spend the rest of their lives mean-mouthing the city to all their friends, family, and neighbors.

Would you not agree that those who return to the States and then write the following should not be allowed outside America’s borders?

“I had to walk an entire block to my hotel and carry my own bags.”

“Of all the nerve! I had to walk up some stairs to my room because there was no elevator!”

“I know they all speak English in this hotel and are pretending they don’t.”

“I screamed (in English, of course, since I don’t speak Spanish) at that Mexican kid writing graffiti on the wall. He acted like he didn’t understand me. I know he was faking.”

These go on and on.

So, how do you get through to these people who are flooding into Guanajuato? You tell the truth.

I tell the truth in my articles so those who do end up coming will not be the types with silly and unrealistic demands. They will be the type who return to America and tell their reasonable friends they had a good time in Guanajuato in spite of the bumps and bruises one is bound to encounter in another culture.

Can you imagine a hoity-toity American coming to Guanajuato and trying to make his or her way through the Pastita barrio to visit the Olga Costa Museum and encountering the not-too-unusual practice of some Mexicans who abandon the issue of their hyper-fertile female dogs alongside a trash dumpster? Dumping puppies at the trash bin will send most Americans I know into a tailspin of apocalyptic proportions. They will not describe Guanajuato kindly in any venue. It’s best they know what to expect before they get here.

The Spanish issue is almost an unfathomable one. And, it is sad.

Many could expatriate to Guanajuato if they mastered Spanish. They could live far more cheaply if they could live, shop, and function in a Spanish-speaking neighborhood. Most Americans have absolutely no idea how to begin the process. They resort to taking classes.

One person wrote me and said I had almost convinced him not to come to Guanajuato to study Spanish. That isn’t the point at all. Study Spanish in America by using any number of the home study courses before enrolling in a class at home or abroad. The classroom will teach you a lot of things about the language but impart little to no spoken fluency.

Someone wrote and said they had studied Spanish for nearly 20 years but still cannot speak the language.

I rest my case.

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Mind you, I am not talking about normal Mexican things. I am not talking about things like stores never opening when they say they will. I am talking not about the traditional, provincial Mexican custom of never showing up on time for anything. I am not talking about never offering so much as a “How-Do-You-Do” when the kindly Mexican is asked why he didn’t call to cancel an appointment by his good anal-attentive American pal. That’s not what I mean.

I have been talking about things in my columns like getting shoved off the sidewalk into the path of a bus manned by someone who thinks he is a racecar driver. I am talking about calling for the bottled water to get delivered only to have it finally come after you’ve died from thirst and your body was shipped back to the States three months ago. That’s what I mean.

My friend sent me a story today. She is one who has finally admitted that perhaps my wife and I see this sort of stuff, and she doesn’t because she and her husband, in typical American expat fashion, stay pretty much holed up in their lavish estate (it isn’t really an estate but I am adding this in case she reads this-and she occasionally does) until they need something. When they venture out, when they pull themselves from their American TV channels beamed from space via satellite, they drive everywhere. They rarely walk so they seldom have the pleasure of being run over by a bus when a kindly Guanajuatense pushes them into its path.

Our friend went to the Mega Superstore today. Yes, gentrification has begun in Guanajuato with a superstore, on the scale of a Super Wal-Mart, to totally destroy a way of life and ancient culture in Guanajuato. She was in a line with just 7 people in it. A Mexican woman, with no groceries, was in line in front of her. When “her turn” came, she whipped out her cell phone and called her large extended family–comprised of several generations–to get up from the coffee shop and come up front to check out. So, here came her family, about 30 of them, with shopping carts full to overflowing, to cut in front of our friend and check out. Our friend did the “Guanajuato Shove” and cut in front of this woman saying, “Con Permiso” and checked out before she would have surely been thrown, shoved, and elbowed out of the way.

“In general, Mexicans are polite and formal when dealing with foreigners from the North. Newcomers from the States often take this treatment as friendliness, but it is far more complicated than that. Mexicans and other inhabitants of Latin America often wear a mask that
covers their true feelings.” – Ken Luboff

All sympathetic ranting and raving will be entertained and appreciated by phone or e-mail.

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Well, and a circus they threw last night?.. Zero Gravity Circus provided 2.5 hours of jaw-dropping colorful and amazing entertainment, the more-than-capacity crowd at the Hall at Toronto’s downtown Steamwhistle Brewery was in absolute awe and cheering wildly.

When I got there at 7 pm things were a little more sedate. The stage was still being set up, and the bar area where the silent auction was going to be held had been set up already and a few G.A.P employees were around, finishing last-minute touches. The Silent Auction include a variety of fabulous items:

- G.A.P Adventures trips to Costa Rica & Peru
- A round trip air ticket Toronto to Lisbon with Air Transat
- A Stratford Theatre Get A Way – 2 tickets to the Stratford Theatre & overnight stay at Bentley’s
- Professional Chef services – a gourmet 4 course dinner for 4 in your home by Vanessa Yeung (Bistro at Home)
- A Fuji film digital camera -S3000
- A gift Certificate for a pair of Blunstone boots
- A framed Guatemalan Market Photo – by Paul Teolis
- Diesel Fitness Memberships
- Personal Training by Tranz4m Inc.
- Platinum Seats to an upcoming ACC event
- Hand Crafted Jewellery by Tanya Tkachenko
- Peruvian Woven Table linen made by The women of the Ccaccaccollo Community, weaving book &aArt piece by JJ Nicol
- A manicure & pedicure at the Beauty Exchange
- A Sky Dive from SWOOP – Independant Jump
- Dinner for 6 at the Bright Pearl Restaurant
- Dinner for 2 at Thuet Restaurant
- Dinner at Focaccia Restaurant

From about 8 pm onwards people started rolling in and the steady stream of onlookers didn’t stop. A violinist on stilts and two other colourful elevated characters were entertaining the pre-show crowd.

And when the show got going at about 9 pm, every seat in the house was full and people were standing on the sides and in the back of the theatre. In his welcome speech, Bruce even tried to persuade members of his staff to give up their chairs in return for a free beer at the Steamwhistle Brewery, that’ s how full the theatre was.

Bruce is certainly an icon in Toronto. One of Canada’s most successful entrepreneurs, he came from humble beginnings as a child of a Chinese-Trinidadian immigrant family who settled in Calgary. Blessed with a keen sense of adventure and entrepreneurial talent he left for the greener pastures of Toronto and in his early twenties he started G.A.P Adventures, now one of the world’s leaders in small group adventure travel and a company dedicated to social causes and environmentally sustainable travel. Bruce has won many prestigious awards for his entrepreneurial achievements and his dedication to social and environmental causes. No doubt he is a charismatic figure and the media’s extensive coverage of him attests to Bruce Poon Tip’s ability to fascinate a crowd.

After Bruce’s introductory words, we saw a just released film on the big screen about Planeterra’s initiatives in Cusco. The local director of the drop-in centre in Cusco spoke about the street children and images graphically illustrated the poverty of these children and the fact that this organization makes such a difference in these children’s lives by housing, feeding, educating and providing them with psychological support.

Then the big event was ready to kick off and the MCs, Foo and Feso, two theatrical clowns from Zero Gravity Circus, came out to welcome the crowd. Throughout the entire performance Feso never spoke while Foo talked a mixture of French and extraterrestrial gibberish, with the odd comprehensible English word thrown in to help the crowd get her point. Foo mainly relied on voice inflection, facial expressions, gestures and body language to make herself understood and the two provided a wonderful humoristic duo guiding the audience throughout the show.

At one point Foo called for a volunteer from the audience and a young man with a t-shirt saying “Bite Me’ got up on stage and joined the two MCs for a trick with a spinning plate on a stick. At various times during the show Feso juggled or did fire tricks and at some point he even included a running chain saw in his juggling act.

The first official act in the show was a Hula Hoop Act featuring a beautiful Oriental woman who at some point had in excess of 6 hula hoops twisting around her body at the same time. Her lithe body contorted itself in all sorts of virtually impossible shapes while she kept the hula hoops spinning, always with an angelic smile on her face.

Fire artists were next: 2 young women with lit fire boxes on wires were twirling their illuminated tools according to their choreography and came together in perfect unison. An aerial rope artist came out next and performed unbelieavable stunts, often suspended in the air by only one foot. A duo of plate spinners then had the crowd in awe when at some point they had 6 plates spinning on sticks that were mounted on a table, and 6 additional plates spinning on the table’s surface in between. Every few seconds they had to go back and re-spin the plates to make sure they wouln’t drop.

A real crowd pleaser was about to come up next: 4 young men, two dressed in red, and two dressed in dark colours came up and the stage was set for a mock gang fight. The crowd was certainly enthused about the macho performance that was about to unfold. Each duo performed floor acrobatics and break dances, summersaulting through the air, breakdancing on their backs or on one arm, and the mock confrontation of two imaginary gangs resulted in the total delight of the audience.

The next performance was called “aerial silks” and a woman was performing all sorts of aerial stunts on a red sheet of silk that had been lowered from the ceiling. After all this excitement, a brief 15 minute intermission helped to calm the crowd down and as people were filing out from the Hall into the bar area, I was listening to the audience’s amazed comments. Everyone enjoyed the show and was in awe at the unique high-quality of the performances.

When the crowd had settled in again after the intermission, Bruce and Elinor Schwob, one of Planeterra’s fundraisers, did a draw for door prizes. Tilleys Endurables had sponsored a door prize, G.A.P had sponsored a prize pack as well as the top door prize: a trip to the Galapagos Islands which was happily won by a woman from Cambridge, Ontario.

The show continued with a young acrobat that had an audience member toss him a volleyball which he caught and balanced on a stick that he was holding in his mouth. He then asked for another audience volunteer and a young woman reluctantly came up from the crowd, upon which he asked her to lay down. Then he picked up a metal ladder, climbed the ladder and balanced himself perfectely upright using little steps. And with these tiny steps he approached the young lady lying on the floor who was getting more anxious with every second. The acrobat successfully walked over her on the ladder without falling over or stepping on any parts of her body, but the tension and suspense was palpable.

A group of 5 gorgeous women was next, four of them, barefoot and dressed in purple gowns, performed a choreography on the floor while one women, dressed in striking lime green, performed acrobatics hanging from a red hoop. This was a very visually striking act as the group performed with perfect grace and harmony.

A contortion duo with candelabras was next: 2 young exotic women, one had already ratpured the crowd with the hula hoop show earlier, performed floor acrobatics with lit candelabras on their heads, in their feet and in their hands. They twisted themselves into impossible body positions while always maintaining the lit candelabras upright. At certain points they were balancing four lit candelabras each: one in each hand, one with their foot and one in their mouth. It was as if they had bones and joints made of rubber.

The senses were being teased at every turn. Three men dressed in blue silky uniforms performed a variety of stunts and acrobatics, and at one point one of the men was balancing the two others on his shoulders and they completed the stunt with a jump down on the floor and a tumble.

A male and a female performer on a trapeze and in gorgeous skin-tight suits performed a very sensuous trapeze act and melted into a variety of positions suspended in the air, an appropriate end to the official part of the show, when Foo came out and invited all the performers out on stage. The crowd clapped and cheered wildly and every time the performers took a bow the audience spontaneously erupted into another round of enthusiastic applause.

Bruce and Elinor got up one more time to thank the audience and thanked Zero Gravity Circus for donating their performance free of charge to the cause of Cusco’s street kids. They also indicated they were going to do a singing duet. Unfortunately, none of the microphones cooperated so they postponed their singing premiere to G.A.P’s fundraising ball at Casa Loma in October. When the microphones finally came back on Bruce joked about having to fire the sound company.

The crowd was invited to stick around for a meet and greet with the performers and it seemed like hundreds of people stayed behind to chat and to take advantage of the fruits and the chocolate fountain. I chatted a bit with Paul Teolis, a photographer who I had recently interviewed who had also donated a beautiful photo of a Guatemalan street market for the Silent Auction.

By this time it must have been 12:30 am, so Paul and I said goodnight and a big thanks for this great event to Bruce who was swarmed by this time by a crowd of appreciative supporters. Paul and I rode the subway back into Toronto’s east side and we both commented on what a wonderful event it had been.

In total, an amount of over $20,000 was raised for Planeterra’s Cusco initiative from ticket sales, the silent auction and the sale of water bottles, popcorn and jambalaya. It’s amazing what can be achieved when a group of people with determination, dedication and good will come together.

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Originally from Brooklyn, Andie had lived in Atlanta for 20 years and become an expert in advertising production and management while Nancy, on the other hand, had been involved in the screen printing business. Nancy represented several American companies in the Latin American market and spent quite a bit of time in Latin America, including Cuernavaca, and this was the beginning to their Mexican adventure.

Andie’s comments shed light on the decision to relocate to a foreign country and the inevitable issues of culture shock and psychological adjustment that go along with the move to a strange land. Her story will also illustrate coping mechanisms and the fact that the human spirit will indeed adjust over time.

As Nancy had been spending more and more time in Mexico, Andie and Nancy were starting to think it might actually be nice to live somewhere else. Cuernavaca might be a good destination since it was close enough to easily go back and forth. Andie had attended a Spanish course at the Cetlalic Alternative Language School and had a chance to meet a lot of people from Cuernavaca’s local gay community and Cuernavaca increasingly looked like an interesting destination.

Both women thought that it might be a good idea to move to Cuernavaca, a goal they decided to accomplish in the New Millennium. So Andie decided to give up her job in advertising which was made easier by the after-effects of 911 which had severely affected the advertising industry.

Andie worked for a month with the previous owner of Villa San Marcos to gain some practical experience running a bed and breakfast. So the women put their furniture into storage in Atlanta and after their arrival in Cuernavaca they first lived in a furnished apartment. They later moved into an unfurnished condo, a rather bare place, which Andie describes as “graduate student living”. Andie admitted that as you get older these types of transitions get just a little harder.

Prior to their purchase, their B&B had been empty for five years. Once they acquired the property, they invested another year of renovations into La Nuestra. Building a clientele from scratch is always an issue for new entrepreneurs and Andie indicated that their clients mostly find them through the Internet and through word of mouth. In addition, Andie sent many news releases to independent booksellers and feminist book stores to request that the information about their B&B be put on their bulletin boards.

As new B&B owners, Andie and Nancy also decided to advertise on three web sites, two sites about Mexico and one site dedicated to gay travelers. Andie stressed, however, that their target market is not only the gay community, but people from all walks of life. Travellers come from the United States (California, Minnesota, and various places in the north), but also from Canada. In addition, they also host many weekend guests from Mexico City. Many of their guests don’t even move when they come here, they just relax in the beautiful garden by the pool and say this place feels just like home.

I asked Andie to elaborate on this process of cultural transition which they went through after they first relocated to Mexico. At first they felt excited, the place was new, they were learning the language, and there was this general feeling of newness that made everything so interesting.

But as the newness wore off, feelings of culture shock started to settle in. Andie experienced frustrations as she had to adjust to the Mexican concepts of time and reliability. Adjusting to the much more relaxed concept of time was difficult, especially since Andie had been living her life in Atlanta with a strict agenda. The unreliability of workmen and repair people was also a frequent source of frustrations. Andie told me a few stories of her renovation project and mentioned that workers might show up a day later or sometimes not at all.

On the other hand she was impressed by the easy-going attitude of local Mexican people and commented that they are very helpful when you make an effort to speak Spanish. Traffic can also be quite bad in this city. On the issue of cultural adjustment Andie said, that one of her friends commented on how great it must be to live in this new place while Andie admitted that many times this adjustment phase was really tough on her, especially at the beginning. She was missing her friends, her culture, her familiar environment.

Now things are much better. Andie runs an organization called the Newcomers Club which is an association of recent, mostly English-speaking residents, of Cuernavaca. The club had been in existence for 15 years, but had not been very active. Andie became president about four years ago, and the club now has around 170 members, ranging in age all the way from their forties and up. The oldest member is 91 years old.

The Cuernavaca Newcomers Club has a number of functions:
- It welcomes new English-speaking residents and helps them find their way
- It publishes a service directory every 2 years
- It provides a buddy system
- The club hosts a variety of social events throughout the year
- Speakers are invited to the club’s meetings and speak on various topics of interest, such as ecology, globalization, alternative health, investments and many more.
- The club is involved in a variety of charity projects as well.

The Newcomers Club holds two big social events a year: a cocktail party in September and a holiday party around Christmas time. Evening events include guitar concerts, talks on topics of interest and a “studio crawl” where the group visits different artists’ studios around town. An increasing number of social events will be held over the summer months as well, which used to be a quieter time.

One of the Newcomers Club’s most important involvements is in philanthropy. At Christmas members are encouraged to adopt a family in collaboration with the Episcopal Church. The club itself is non-denominational, but the church provides a list of 15 of the most needy families. Then, with the help of donations, the club purchases boxes of basic items that are given away to these needy families.

The Newcomers Club is also involved with a Mexican Charity called “Caminamos Juntos” which was founded by Susan Smith, a Canadian woman. Caminamos Juntos para la Salud y el Desarollo dedicates itself to helping one specific Mexican village in the state of Guerrero. This village has many problems: the water supply contains a toxic level of arsenic, there is a lot of poverty and alcohol abuse. Every month Caminamos Juntos asks for different supplies, e.g. in September the charity requests school supplies, in December it requests blankets, and at Christmas the charity request non-battery operated toys.

Andie indicated that the average age of newcomers to Cuernavaca is in their 50s. She added that dollars go a lot further in Cuernavaca than they would in Florida or the Caribbean.

In addition to volunteering with the Newcomers Club, Andie also donates her time to a local library called the Guild House. She volunteers four Friday mornings a months, two in the library, two with the Newcomers Club. Together with her work as a B&B owner at La Nuestra this keeps her busy.

Nowadays she still goes to back home to the United States about 4 to 5 times a year. Nancy and Andie still have a small apartment in Atlanta where they stay when they go home. Andie and I had a great conversation about her travel experiences in Israel and Spain, and about Latin machismo which also manifests itself on the road (a woman cutting a man off on the road will definitely incur his wrath, while the opposite is just considered normal).

I am one of these people who thinks that one day in my life I’ll probably try to spend 2 or 3 months of the year in a warm place, and Andie’s experience in Cuernavaca has given me some valuable insights about the decision-making process, the cultural adjustment phase, and the rewards of getting involved in a local volunteer organization.

For the entire article including photos please visit
http://www.travelandtransitions.com/stories_photos/cuernavaca_7.htm

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When I got there yesterday at about noon the restaurants and bands were still setting up. Streets were closed all the way from Euclid to Shaw and everyone was working feverishly to prepare for the 3rd and final day of this year’s Taste of Little Italy. All the major bars and restaurants had big screen TVs to beam the live Brazil-Australia World Cup match to a crowd of avid soccer fans.

At the heart of Little Italy is the CHIN Building, headquarters of Toronto’s first multicultural / multilingual radio station, founded by famous Italian-Canadian entrepreneur and community leader Johnny Lombardi. CHIN broadcasts in more than 30 languages in Toronto, in more than 18 languages in Ottawa/Gatineau and is available via satellite all across North America.

Little Italy is one of Toronto’s most popular entertainment areas with a great variety of Italian restaurants, trattorias, bars and cafés. Other cultures have also made culinary inroads and you’ll find Japanese, Mexican, Peruvian and Portuguese eateries as well.

Since the festival wasn’t quite off the ground yet I decided to treat myself to a little lunch and chose a nice window seat at “El Bodegon”, one of Toronto’s foremost Latin restaurants. Although the menu is dominated by meat and seafood, I opted for a light meal, combining a savoury avocado salad with fried plantains, one of my favourite vegetables. I had a perfect view from my little table by the window and caught a glimpse of two celebrities making a brief appearance: Jack Layton, federal NDP leader, and Olivia Chow, now a federal Member of Parliament. Toronto’s foremost political power couple, made an appearance on their bikes at the street festival.

At about 1:30 pm the music started to get going and right across from my lunch spot a two-man band started to play Latin rhythms and flamenco. After a very satisfying mid-day meal I started strolling through the area and chatted with a few of the bands. One of the music groups, Los Imbakayunas, is from Peru and tours all throughout Eastern Canada during the summer months and plays at various street festivals and special events. The hot Peruvian rhythms and melodic sounds of the pan flute were enchanting the crowds and hips were started to gently sway. Even a woman in an electric wheelchair started to dance exuberantly to the music.

I talked to a gentleman from the Coro Folcloristico Italia di Toronto who informed me that his group has been singing for more than 15 years and their repertoire includes the whole gamut of Italian folk songs, from the north to the south. I also had a brief chat with Pablo Terry, bandleader and flute player of Sol de Cuba who has been brightening up the Toronto music scene for the last 11 years.

Across the street was another band playing Latin Jazz, followed by a group playing contemporary Italian music. A few steps down from Terry was the Jeanine Mackie Band who got the street cooking with their funk, blues and R&B tunes. Further east another Italian choir, the Coro Abruzzo, was setting up for its performance.

A street festival always attracts interesting people. An older gentleman on a bike decorated with a tiger tail, a green plastic superhero adorning the handlebar and a tyrannosaurus rex made an appearance. Of course I had to talk to him. He said his name was Mickey, he’s retired now and he figured decorating his bike would be something to do in his retirement. From dressed-up dogs to dogs in baskets on bikes, everyone seemed to have a lot of fun.

Various entertainment areas were set up for children: young ones were running back and forth inside a very large inflatable train, a soccer challenge was set up and at “Hoop It Up” people could test their basketball skills. Various games of chance were enticing the crowd to try their luck.

Low-cost shiatsu massages were available and henna tattoos could also be obtained. Many of the local stores participated in the festival by providing special sale-priced items on the street.

The Nicorette girls, dressed in devilish red dresses, adorned with diabolic tails, were handing out free stop-smoking chewing gum, trying to entice the smokers to give up their filthy habit.

More freebies were to be had in the form of “clodhoppers”, a truly delicious concoction of fudge and graham wafer crackers. I have to admit I walked by the Clodhoppers truck four times just to scrounge up another free sample of these delicious sweet treats. Another bunch of people were handing out free taste bags of Doritos, containing the new Jalapeno flavour. Later on I bought a pop at Kalendar Koffee House and was promptly given a free hot Nutella sandwich. The generosity was appreciated.

Freebies were available everywhere, free music and very reasonably priced food samples (costing between $1 and $5) made for a great low-cost outing on a hot June weekend.

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We came to central Mexico expecting Nirvana. We thought we had arrived in Camelot. If this wasn’t a utopia, it surely had to be the closest thing to it compared to the United States. After all, Mexicans, we observed, seemed happy. They walk around laughing and smiling and seem like they enjoy life and are glad you came along to make their existences just a little bit better. We got a reality check. We got it fast and hard.

The first thing we noticed was that Mexicans, and maybe it is something peculiar to central Mexico, do things in public that would in America get them shot, stabbed, or taken outside into an alley for a sound beating. If you were to move here, you would soon see how that at a store counter, whether it is your turn or not, men and women will elbow you out of the way and shout their orders to the employee behind the counter over you. It is like no one has ever explained to them the concept of taking turns in a line. I mean this most sincerely and seeing this happen daily never ceases to disgust me.

The other day, my wife was standing in line for some tamales. My wife had given the order, paid the man, and the man was serving up our food on little paper plates. A woman simply elbowed my wife in the ribs knocking her away from the counter and began shouting her order at the server. This is not an isolated thing. It happens constantly. There you are, it is your turn, and someone, usually another woman, will act like you aren’t even there or are a piece of trash to be kicked out of the way.

I’ve been yanked off buses so some Mexican can cut in front of me. I’ve been pushed, knocked off the sidewalk, not once but twice, and into the path of an oncoming bus that hit me both times. I wasn’t seriously hurt since I am writing this and not pushing up daisies.

In every aspect of life in Guanajuato that requires lining up or queuing, the “good” people of Guanajuato are totally committed to disordered chaos!

You should try walking down or up stairs. They come up in a massive, throbbing blob of humanity and seem not to know that there can be two lines on a stairwell: one descending and one ascending line of people. They honestly don’t seem to understand this. They go up or down the stairs in one gigantic throng with no sense of anyone else around them. And if you are descending the stairs when the Mexican mob is ascending they either all stop and stare at you or simply knock you down, out of the way, or carry you back up the stairs requiring you to start over.

I was once in a drug store at the cashier when a young man grabbed my right arm and shoved me out of the way. Can you imagine the consequence of this event occurring in the United States? Knives and guns would soon come out and that would be all she wrote.

I cannot explain this to you. We are fluent enough in Spanish to ask and have been told that these are “malcriados”-ill raised. But, here’s the thing: Those who tell us this are from other parts of Mexico where apparently they aren’t so “malcriados.” I do not know if this is true or not.

I am writing this article because of an event that happened just this afternoon. My wife and I were trying to eat in what we would call in the States a deli. My poor wife stood in line waiting while the young woman served all the Mexicans first before waiting on my wife who was clearly there before all the Mexicans were. This has happened before to us.

There is a restaurant here called “Truco 7″ where the waiters will wait on all the Mexicans before bothering with the gringo slime-which is how you are made to feel. We won’t go there anymore because of this and I use my writing venue to discourage Americans and Canadians from eating there.

This also happened to my friend, a retired District Attorney, who was told he and his date would have to eat in the kitchen because the gringos were not allowed to eat with the Mexicans. He was told this to his face. The owner didn’t like Americans and this is how they get treated-to the kitchen with you, gringo man. This was at a different establishment that is now defunct.

I’ve written about this before and am moved to cover the topic again because frankly I expected more of the Mexican people.

Some Mexicans tell me this is specific to Guanajuato and the surrounding areas. I just do not know.

Some will say things like, “Well this doesn’t happen all the time.”

Just what does that mean: “All the time?”

How many times is too much? Is one act of anti-American sentiment acceptable whereas two acts aren’t? Are we talking about a matter of proportionality? Should we come up with some sort of scale that we use to determine how many acts of discrimination constitutes too much? You hit ten events and then you get to feel a little pissed but not before then?

I am appalled at any act of discrimination, any time, any amount, and in any fashion. Percentages do not count when it comes to this sort of thing, don’t you think?

So far, I’ve been:

· Pushed off the sidewalk twice and in the path of a bus that hit me both times.
· Yanked off of the first step of a bus twice.
· Pushed out of the way in a drug store once.
· I’ve been passed up by cabs and buses so many times I cannot count. They will stop if a Mexican is with me but rarely when I am alone.
· I’ve been passed up in restaurants while the waiter helped Mexican clients who came into the place long after I did.

And, really this happens so often that I tend to lose track of how many events. I’m thinking about collecting the stories from the other American expats here for a chapter in a new book.

The closest thing I can compare it to that makes any sense is that the people of Guanajuato, especially when on the street walking with them, appear to be functional autistics.

If you’ve ever worked with the population of the disabled you know what I mean.

You are just a thing to knock out of the way, climb over, ignore, or go through like you aren’t even there. I cannot get a grip on this with any other explanation. It as though you do not exist. Invisible.

I have emails from other Mexicans from other less “provincial” parts of Mexico who have reported the same observations about their fellow Mexicans in Guanajuato.

What am I going to do? I don’t know.

But maybe, just maybe, this is part of the adventure.

What I do know is that as a writer I will never present an unrealistic, Pollyanna view of what it’s like to live in Mexico as an American expat.

That much I do know.

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The Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza is a young museum. It was created when the government of Spain offered to purchase the amazing collection of art for $350 million in 1993. They then created the museum out of the Villahermosa Palace of the late 18th century. It took an additional $45 million in renovations to complete the museum.

Many see a price such as $350 million and are in shock at the amount of money, but the truth of the matter is, this was a tremendous deal for the government of Spain. Many art experts who have seen the pieces in the collection of over 700 paintings disagree. They say the value of the paintings, now hanging in the Madrid gallery, by artists such as Rembrandt, Goya, Dürer, El Greco, Canaletto and Caravaggio is somewhere in the area of $1 to $3 billion dollars. There are art pieces of all types from the styling of Picasso to Kirchner to Sargent. There are also American artists such as Hopper and Homer represented.

But the exhibit is not done. In the past few years the museum has grown. It now includes what was the Palace of Goyeneche located on Marqués de Cubas street. In this location one can see another collection of paintings as well as sculptures by Rodin.

For art lovers, the collection is a way to see it all in one location. The views range widely from Picasso’s Harlequin With a Mirror to Renoir’s Woman With A Parasol, from Dream Caused By The Flight of a Bee by Dali to a portrait of George Washington’s cook by Gilbery Stuart and a Portrait of Henry VIII by Holbein. In addition, one can find Wyeth’s and O’keefe’s you may not have known of before now.

The design of the museum is also very attractive. Instead of putting paintings anywhere, they are all organized by time period. A stroll through the museums halls is much like walking a timeline through history from the 13th to 20th centuries in art. This is especially attractive to those who have interests in particular portions of history.

When it comes to the prestige of this collection, it is believed only to be second to that of the British monarchy. It is with thanks to the wife of Baron Thyssen, Carmen Cervera that it is now available to the public for viewing, at the museum as well as an additional 100 in Barcelona.

This gallery is one that is beautiful beyond words and worth touring for it’s appearance alone. Starting with the salmon colored walls and marble floors of the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza and spreading into the expended 86,000 square feet of space in the new addition, there is never a shortage of magnificent art to explore and experience. Make a reservation to be impressed!

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Due to its excellent location and beautiful environment of desert surrounding eight cities of Palm Springs, the place is an excellent heaven for national and international tourists and visitors. With excellent facilities and up-to-the-mark services, Palm Springs resorts provide you great opportunities to hold your business meetings and conferences in calm, serene and enjoyable environment.

Apart from many other mesmerizing things to do in Palm Springs one may prefer to make use of marriage garden facilities provided by most of hotels and resorts for the couples ready to tie love knot with each other for ever; Palm Springs can be best suitable place for making the love nights of new couple excitingly memorable.

Palm Springs has its own historical importance and if you are an enthusiast of air force, you may learn about the air-war-crafts of the era of World War II at the Palm Springs Air Museum.

Palm Springs Golf courses and tennis courts are famous throughout the western United States thus; you can have a great enjoyable recreational time during your holidays at Palm Springs.

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Overview of Costa Rica for Travelers

Christopher Columbus discovered Costa Rica and the indigenous people living there in 1502. The Spanish subsequently colonized it. The name of the country, Rich Coast, comes from their mistaken belief that gold was prevalent. It wasn’t, but the name stuck. In 1821, Costa Rica joined other Central American countries in declaring independence from Spain. True independence didn’t occur till 1838 when Costa Rica broke away from a federation of Central American countries.

In a major departure from many Central America countries, Costa Rica has largely been a free and peaceful democracy since 1899. It has a system of checks and balances similar to the United States, but more power is invested with the President and executive branch. The President and congressional members are elected to 4-year terms.

Costa Rica covers an area of 19,730 square miles. The capital is San Jose, which has a population of 2.1 million people. The terrain is rugged and tropical with dormant volcanoes, a rain forest in the south and immaculate beaches. Rainfall is heavy during summer months, but temperatures are consistently in the 70 to 90 degree range.

The people of Costa Rica are known both as “Ticos” and “Costa Ricans.” The total population is 4 million, but growing at 1.5 percent. Roman Catholic is the dominant religion, although 15 percent of the population claims Protestant as their faith. Literacy is at 96 percent. Average life expectancy for a woman is 79 years while men average 74 years. Spanish is the dominant language.

Costa Rica is both a hot tourist and relocation destination. The country is simply beautiful and the people are friendly. There has been a lot of construction and expansion over the last 15 years. Places like Tamarindo are no longer sleepy little coast towns. If you want to see the sleepy Costa Rica of old, now is the time to go before it is to late.

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