Yakati Yak Jack

Today Manuel brings us a gift. Unannounced, he lumbers down the steps that lead from the street to our garden retreat lugging a bulbous object with both hands. His knees are splayed wide to better support the weight of what he carries. Teenage sons Harry and Edgar bring up the rear.

"Yaka," says Manuel. He looks around for an appropriate perch in which to set it down. The wide edge of the pool will do. "Deliciosa, y para la salud, excelente."

"He says it tastes good. And it’s good for you." Harry translates although we easily get the drift of where the scenario is going. Edgar wrinkles his nose. We soon learn why.

My husband and I had seen the gigantic globes of yaka, or jackfruit, hanging from hooks at fruit stands alongside the highway between Las Varas and San Pancho. We had never given close inspection. I scrutinize this specimen with suspicion as to edibility. The greenish pimply rind looks like a porcupine with snubbed-off quills. Harry tells us he doesn’t particularly like the taste of the fruit, but it’s okay when blended with milk and banana for breakfast. "Good for virility," he adds.

Okay. I’m game.

Manuel requests a knife, cooking oil, a bowl, another bowl with water, discarded newspaper. The ceremony begins. Like a surgeon he makes a clean cut, severing the beastie in two. He douses both hands in vegetable oil and plunges inside the folds of the fruit. Up to his wrists he curls his fingers around two-inch-long brown pods nestled beneath slippery squares of pale orange flesh. Pods tossed on the newspaper, pulpy flesh plopped in the bowl of water. A strong scent, like cheap perfume from the five and dime.

About 30 minutes later Manuel’s midwifery yields dozens of pods and a bowl heaped with slimy-looking foodstuff. He dunks the fruit a bit, swirls it around the bowl, offers me first bite.
Tastes like over-ripe cantaloupe this side of floozy: a little too much scent and slick for my taste, but, hey, it is interesting. Samples all around. My husband, Win, looks askance. Harry passes. So does Edgar. Manuel takes a sizeable chomp, grins.

I thank Manuel for expanding my culinary experience. He thanks me for the work we provide his family, and for the referrals we are happy to give our friends.

"Le gusta armadillo?" he asks, as he prepares to leave. I look at Harry. I look at Edgar. I look at Win. "Did Manuel say armadillo?" I ask."

"Afraid so," says Win.

Julio, My Poetic Spanish Teacher

I’ve had a lot of Spanish teachers, and Julio Delgadillo was one of the best. Julio is a Mexican architect who lives in San Pancho, and he and I first met in 2003. The architecture business was slow, and Julio was playing guitar and singing in a local café. Between songs he often recited a poem that drew the crowd’s rapt attention. His delivery was perfect: a deep baritone, flawless diction, just the right amount of dramatic emphasis. I asked him about the poem, which he said was La Casada Infiel (The Faithless Wife) by the Spanish poet Federico Garcia Lorca.

I strained to understand the words Julio recited, but my Spanish wasn’t up to it, so I bought a dual-language anthology of Spanish poetry and read the poem in English. Sensual and mysterious, it was the story of a gypsy’s romantic encounter with a woman he had believed was unmarried.

Knowing I was a fan, Julio stopped to say hello when we saw each other around San Pancho. We chatted as best we could, given that neither of us knew much of the other’s language. Soon Julio was stopping for morning coffee on my porch, toting his English books. Eager to practice Spanish with a native speaker, I was ready with my Spanish dictionary and "501 Spanish Verbs".

Julio and I talked for hours about social customs in the U.S. and Mexico, music, politics, the best places to shop, Mexican art, Julio’s architecture projects, and his love life. We checked with each other regularly for new chisme (gossip) from the village. But our most interesting topic was poetry. Julio’s favorite poet was the Chilean Pablo Neruda. In the ‘90s I had seen the Italian film Il Postino, a story based on Neruda’s year in Capri, but I hadn’t read his poems. Now Neruda became a favorite of mine, too.

Though Julio came from humble circumstances, he is a person whom Mexicans might describe as educado. More than “educated,” the word connotes “well-mannered, polite.” He was born in 1959 to a poor family in a tiny village near Tepic, Nayarit. Julio’s parents had split up, and he was cared for by a grandmother and an aunt. As a young boy he tended the family’s cows and goats, and, although his father was a teacher, Julio’s schooling was not a priority. In 1973 he and his father moved to San Pancho, where his father found work.

By the time Julio was in secondary school, he showed talent for drawing and reciting poetry. His teachers picked him to do the customary poetry recitation at end-of-the-year ceremonies. At first he did it simply because he had to, but then he realized his recitations distinguished him from the other kids, and he began to enjoy them. Julio demonstrated for me how he had perfected his diction: He placed a pencil crosswise between his teeth, and then practiced the words to the poem. A teacher gave him a poetry book -- “Five Hundred Famous Poems” -- and the first poem he memorized was “The Faithless Wife.”

Danger

This is my new response to the question, “Are you safe in Mexico?”

“As safe as I am in Evanston, Illinois” I say. Here’s why.

It is 5:00 pm on a hot and sunny Fourth of July. We are ready for a cook-out, a good old fashioned fourth; hamburgers and hotdogs, fresh corn on the cob and potato salad. Comfortably encamped on our deck with friends, we have iced drinks in hand.

Police cars, sirens screaming, screech to a halt outside. They block our street. If the sheer number of squad cars is any indication of a threat to our safety, we are in serious danger. We watch as police claim access to the back yards and alleys on foot, rifles at the ready. What is going on?

Murder, just blocks away. A twenty year old male was shot and killed while driving his car; a gang retaliation. Bloodied, dying, his car crossed two lanes of traffic and crashed onto the opposite sidewalk. On this bright sunlit day, miraculously no one was in his path. He died alone. Now, the search is on for his attacker.

A familiar tale told and retold in the media, both in Mexico and the U.S. Murders, the mayhem of drugs and violence, bodies strewn across the country. Mexico produces the drugs; the U.S. consumes them. Drug lords and gang members, locked in the world of suppliers and users kill each other on both sides of the border. There is no escaping the war that is being waged, not in Mexico or in our quiet suburb of Chicago. It’s the cost of doing business and we are all paying the price.

News reports the next day describe the victim alternately as a hoodlum with a long arrest record and as a misguided young man, mixed up with the wrong crowd. Outrage is expressed that the revelation of his crime-ridden past somehow dimishes the loss of his young life. Perhaps there was promise ahead, if only he had resisted the pull of gangs and drugs.

“If only…” we say, thinking of choices and risks. I know we won’t walk away from our rich full life in Mexico nor will we abandon Evanston, where we have spent half of our lives. We have made our choices; as for the risks, we’ll take them too.

What I Did On My Summer Vacation

My husband and I recently attended one of the Hay Festivals. In 2010-2011 they are being held in Wales, Cartagena, Beiruit, Kerala, Nairobi, the Maldives, Belfast, Segovia and Zacatecas—conveniently located about nine hours away from our summer home in San Sebastian. Writers, musicians, film makers, scientists, and social entrepreneurs talk, play, screen and inspire; Bill Clinton called it “the Woodstock of the mind.”

The festival was a brilliant experience and the romance of the city couldn’t be missed. A lecture might be held in the Antiguo Templo de San Augustin or in the partially ruined nave of the ex-convento which now houses the Museo Rafael Coronel with it’s collection of 1600 Mexican masks. The open-air concerts, and what perfect high altitude summer air it was, were held in a plaza created by a cluster of colonial jewels. Our hotel, formerly a bishop’s palace, had displayed Morelos’ severed head for two weeks on its tour of Mexico during the Revolution. Other historical sites, templos, museos and ex-conventos crowd the small Centro; we tried to see them all.

At the of the other Coronel brother, Pedro, one of Mexico’s most noted twentieth century artists, the visitor enters through a library. Once belonging to the ex-convento that houses the museum, the library is a grand room, perhaps seventy feet long with sixteen- or eighteen-foot ceilings and high windows set in the thick walls. The upper reaches of the shelves are lost in the dim light and are packed with leather-bound and gold-tooled volumes. We immediately began to see treasures—first editions of Bernal Diaz’s history of the conquest of Mexico and of Prescott’s conquest history in Spanish translation. As other museum goers passed through the library and on to the rest of the collection, we were riveted, exclaiming over and examining every shelf until the distinguished old librarian offered to let us see whatever book we wanted. He extracted whatever we asked for, bringing it to the lectern on the little desk beneath the window and turning the pages for us with his gloved hands.

Then he offered to show us the rest of the library. We passed through a black-curtained arch into another room, even larger, at a right angle to the first, taking up the entire side of the former convent. This room, the librarian explained, contained books from the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Every one was bound in parchment, discolored and crinkled, with hand-scribed titles on the spines in red and black ink. Then a third room along the back of the convent. Here were books with balsa wood covers and brilliantly marbled end papers, dictionaries, atlases, a facsimile of the Mendocino Codex, one of the few Aztec codices to survive the Spanish bonfires.

All that was a dream experience, but then this: Write out a solicitud, a request, go to the pharmacy and buy a left-over swine flu mask and latex gloves and all this was mine for the examining. I did it. Just another couple of hours, I assured Jonathan, but it took an extra day in Zacatecas before I tore myself away. Ask me what items and how much of them Montezuma received in tribute each year and what a parchment-bound Vulgate Bible feels like, book worm trails and all. I saw a collection of photos (not prints of photos) of Mexican churches taken by Frida Khalo’s father, an engraved map of Mexico City and surrounds when it was in the middle of the lake and reached by causeways and fifteenth century stories of the missionaries who brought Christianity to Ethiopia. I could go on.

One isn’t trusted around rare books in the US. I once (barely) got into the stacks of the Yale University Library even though supervised by my daughter who had access as a student. And the really old and valuable stuff isn’t there anyway, it’s over in the Rare Book and Manuscript Library and you aren’t getting in there without a letter of introduction from your academic advisor. Zacatecas is a good place to be reminded of how pleasant a society Mexico can be.

A San Pancho Grande Dame

In 1986, Gloria and Ken Hanson built the first home in the San Pancho jungle area called Costa Azul. After searches in Guatemala and the West Indies plus advice from friends in La Peñita, they visited Costa Azul.

Four bungalows owned by the Becerra brothers were all they found. In town, Chalupa’s was the only restaurant, and no shops had opened as yet. A perfect spot, they thought, for tranquil annual getaways from work and winter in home base Sioux Falls, South Dakota. For eighteen years they made the round trip trek in their van.

Ken, a native of Sioux Falls, had been a young U.S. Air Force and later Pan Am pilot when he met seventeen-year old Gloria, also a pilot as well as daughter of a Guatemalan politico. They fell in love and married, a marriage of 67 years that ended with Ken’s death in 2004.

Gloria continues on as the Grande Dame of Costa Azul, living in her striking home. She describes it as “old Mexican style,” referring to palapa-covered open-air porches filled with equipal furniture, parota(Mexican mahogany) woodwork, traditional talavera tiling, and white-walled rooms cooled by sea breezes blowing through doors left open to them. Gloria remembers the construction well and spoke with me about it as we sat on her front porch.

Gloria: “Little or nothing was available in town back then, and Adalberto Garcia, our builder, didn’t have his own vehicle at first. We took our van and went with him to buy bricks and cement in La Peñita. We had to buy everything in La Peñita and haul it back---rebar, lime, screws, string, you name it. And we had to drive to Guadalajara for tile. We made countless trips, as you can see from the kitchen and the bathrooms coated in talavera. ”

Ellen: “Supplies are still relatively limited or prohibitively expensive. What was available to you back then, for example, things like light fixtures, faucets, and doorknobs?”

Gloria: “We brought a lot of them down from South Dakota. We even packed in a refrigerator, a stove, and a couple of mattresses on one of our first trips. We didn’t have many furniture choices back then either, but Ken came up with the design for a rocking chair and made dozens of them himself in his workshop next to the house. You’re sitting in one right now.”

Ellen: “How about construction workers and household help? Were there townspeople for hire?

Gloria: “A few. Adalberto was good and could train his crew on the basics, but he had never built a house this big or complex before. So Ken had to be vigilant and do a lot of training and explaining.

As for household help, Güero has been my gardener and handyman since 1986. Alicia has cooked and cleaned here for 18 years. Her son, Luis, has been with me almost that long.“

Ellen: “That speaks to their loyalty and your fair treatment. I can speak to Alicia’s fabulous meals. It’s such a treat to be invited to your house for lunch. It’s comfortable and genteel at the same time, sitting at your elegantly set table, taking in the view of your garden and the sea beyond, being served by your staff.”

Gloria: “You’re always welcome here; you know that.“

Ellen: “I know that you have taught Alicia to make a lot of new dishes over the years to add to her repertoire of traditional Mexican favorites. Do you have a set menu?”

Gloria: “Yes, we have developed a menu we like. And everything is homemade, of course---even the ice cream. Saturday is and always has been pizza day. Other days Alicia makes chicken in white wine sauce, creole coconut shrimp, chiles rellenos, enchiladas, and her special mole. Along with rice, beans, and salad. For dessert, cappuccinos, espressos, and sundaes with fresh fruit. But we try new things, too, like the meatloaf we’ll be serving you today.”

Ellen: “Yet look at you, so chic and trim. You’re the fittest eighty-something woman I know. How do you manage, faced with such delicious daily fare?”

Gloria: “You know the answer. You used to join me for an hour of water aerobics in my pool. A couple of other women friends come over now. Plus I do Pilates every day, too.. And Robert still comes every Friday to give me a massage. That really helps me.

It’s not just the exercise, though. It’s the life style here---the peace, the lack of scheduling, the long reads in the afternoon, the good night’s sleep. It’s healthy. It’s the life style that attracted Ken and me to San Pancho in the first place and that hasn’t changed much over all these years here.”

(Author’s note: Gloria broke a hip recently and has undergone surgery. My sincerest best wishes to her for a speedy recovery.)

CASA HANSON MEATLOAF

2 lb. ground beef

1 c. bread crumbs

1 small onion, diced

2 eggs, beaten

¼ c. catsup

¼ c. milk

2 T. salsa verde

1 T. Worcestershire sauce

2 t. salt

1 t. black pepper

Combine all. Bake at 350 degrees for 50 minutes.

Corazón de Agave

The Pinot Noir my husband is making in San Sebastian needed time in an oak barrel for its finish. He ordered one from a cooper in Tequila and we combined the pick up with touring visitors around the sights. It is a beauty, the barrel, 200 liters, 50 gallons or so, bearing the name of our winery, Las Fincas. The oak comes from Kentucky. If it’s good enough for Mexican tequila it’s good enough for Mexican wine, we say. Besides, I heard they’re cutting down the forest of Fontainebleau outside of Paris for that precious French oak.

Visitors in tow, we toured the Herradura tequila factory. The cores of agave azul, called piñas for their resemblance to a pineapple, are roasted and pressed, the juice fermented and distilled. One always is treated to a taste of the roasted piña on such tours—delicious, smoky-sweet and very fibrous. You are reminded that alcohol comes from sugar. The agave has plenty.

Down the road we stopped by a little table where half a roasted piña was laid out for sale. We were offered the ends of the cut-off spears which were mahogany dark and roasted to caramel perfection. We separated the sweet stuff from the fibers with our teeth just as you’d get the meat off an artichoke leaf. We had already made out purchase when, seemingly as an after-thought, the seller offered us a sample from the piña’s center, its heart, its corazón. It was firmer than the heart of an artichoke but similarly smooth, no fibers. It was even more delicious than the spear ends. We were ravished. I bought a large wedge and began to brain-storm recipes.

First came pork loin cooked and sauced in corazón de agave. In my test kitchen, also known as my kitchen, I wrapped the pork in the fibrous spear-ends, encased it in foil and roasted it slowly. Fibers were strained out, sweetened juices reduced and mellowed with cream, cubes of corazón heated and served beside the meat. Oh, boy.

Then there was corazón de agave pecan pie. I heated two cups of corazón bits with a cup of orange juice and thickened it with flour. Some orange zest for that little edge. After the mixture cooled, I blended it with three beaten eggs and lightly-roasted pecans, poured it into a pie shell and baked it for an hour. Served with cream, it was better than mincemeat.

Now friends are in the act. Lorena made corazón de agave ice cream. Canela proposed mashing it and serving it instead of yams beside the Thanksgiving turkey. Imagine chunks in capirotada, Mexican bread pudding. Feel free.

Miguel and His Murals

The hand painted sign at the entrance to Los Arcos restaurant caught my eye the first time I visited San Pancho: “Nice design,” I thought. “A detail that sets the place apart.” That sign was Miguel’s first project in San Pancho, and now his work is all over town: His mural at the beachfront plaza depicts San Pancho’s history; a huge hibiscus blossom embellishes a satellite dish; Art Deco beauties grace a restaurant wall. You don’t see work like his in every Mexican village.

Miguel Angel Vallajan Estrella was born in 1972 in San Juan de Abajo, about 20 miles from San Pancho. When he was six, his family moved to San Pancho because his parents found work here – his father as a gardener at the junior high school and his mother as a cook at the hospital. Miguel finished ninth grade in San Pancho, and then started high school in La Cruz de Huanacaxtle, the location of the nearest high school at the time.

“I had to drop out when I was 14,” he told me. “I took the bus to La Cruz every day, and it was too expensive for my family. I needed to work, so an uncle in Puerto Vallarta helped me get a job varnishing furniture for hotels. I did that during the day, and at night I went to a taller (an artisan’s workshop) to learn how to paint letters and decorative designs. I didn’t get paid, and I had to buy the paints myself, but I loved what I was doing. I guess I showed ability, because the owner asked me to paint signs for a hotel when I was 15.”

At 18 Miguel opened his own taller in Puerto Vallarta . Business was good, and at one point he had three people working for him. They got big commissions—the Sheraton Hotel, the Collage nightclub— for signs, lettering, drawings and murals. During those years Miguel made frequent bus trips back to San Pancho to visit his family, and on one trip he met Julia, a young woman from the village. They became friends, and after three years they married. Miguel and Julia now have three daughters and a baby grandson.

About 10 years ago business in Puerto Vallarta began to slow down because graphic design had shifted to computer-based processes. Dar Peters, a San Pancho builder, told Miguel he could give him steady work, and persuaded Miguel to move back to the village. Since then Miguel and his helpers have done regular house painting, but his first love is still signs and graphic designs. Besides work in San Pancho Miguel does special projects for the county government, such as murals in village plazas throughout the Bahia de Banderas area.

Paint stores may have computerized color matching, but they can’t outdo Miguel’s infallible eye. Choosing paint colors with him is a pleasure. Should the color of a wall be taupe, mushroom, sand or beige? Miguel mixes up a sample on the spot, paints a swath, and we study the result. Not quite right? He mixes another sample, and we try again. With no sign of impatience Miguel spends as long as it takes to get the color right.

Boring expanses of stucco are transformed under his hand. In our house a 20-foot high wall towers at one side of the dining room, and we wanted to bring the huge mass down to human scale. Our idea: divide the wall in half lengthwise with two colors of paint and add a decorative border. Working from photos we took in a 19th century Mexican church, Miguel came up with a design that solved the problem perfectly. And he did everything freehand—no stencils or computer graphics.

Unfailingly polite, quiet, and a little shy, Miguel’s work gives him the right to brag, but he never does. He is a modest man. And one who has added touches of artistry to the face of San Pancho.

Barefoot in the Kitchen

The first time a scorpion stung me, it was almost a relief. My being stung seemed all but inevitable, given the number of stories my jungle neighbors told about their encounters with the bug. I was anxious to get it over with, just so I’d know how my body would react.

I got my answer early one morning while walking barefoot into the kitchen. A piecing pain suddenly shot through the big toe on my right foot. I turned on a light, saw the scorpion on the floor, and bolted for the bathroom where I had stashed a bottle of antihistamines with this occasion in mind. After gulping a couple of the pills, I sat and waited for a reaction.

It was a short wait. In a matter of seconds, beginning with my now hot and throbbing big toe, the pain rolled up my right side like a wave and left nerves numb in its wake. I felt nauseous. My throat constricted but only slightly. Not enough to warrant a trip to the hospital. Besides, that might have meant missing our “girls’ weekend” in Guadalajara; a friend was picking me up in an hour.

I wobbled a bit the first day of that shopping trip. But three days religiously swilling liquids and I bounced back. Three months later, I regained feeling in the big toe.

Since then I’ve been stung twice more. The third time I acquiesced to my children who told me I looked green and drove me to the hospital, where seasoned staff put me on an antivenin IV drip.

“We do this routinely,” they said. “Don’t hesitate because you think your case isn’t serious. We rarely see a case that is. Just come in; you’ll appreciate the quick relief.”

Two hours and 250 pesos later, I walked out feeling fine. My kids were right; that’s the way to go, I now advise. That and don’t go barefoot, not even in the kitchen.

The Librarian: Lonely No More

Was it only a year ago that I, the “lonely librarian,” sat on the floor in the library at entreamigos surrounded by boxes, tape and markers, packing books for storage? Last April the future of our small community organization seemed bleak. Staying in the building on the main street that entreamigos had occupied for three years was not an option. Its location near the beach was prime real estate; the landlord had other plans.

A large abandoned warehouse at the other end of town had been given to entreamigos but renovating it into useable space was overwhelming. First, it would take a massive effort to clear the building of years of debris and garbage. Then, even with the possibility of a $36,000 grant from The Three Swallows Foundation, the San Pancho community would have to raise twice that amount of money to begin construction.

Did the community care enough to make the effort? When larger cities, including my home town of Evanston, Illinois, are closing their neighborhood libraries, could a project of this size in our small town possibly succeed?

The answer is a resounding “yes.” Having a library and community center did matter. Today entreamigos has a brand-new home; in cash, more than $100,000 was raised. The dilapidated warehouse was restored inch by inch into a completely “green” space through hundreds of hours of volunteer labor and donations of supplies.

A few months ago I sat on the floor in the new library at entreamigos and unpacked all of the old boxes. The newly painted wooden shelves, recycled tires and crates, were ready to be filled. The large, airy space with brightly-painted tables and chairs and comfy pillows beckoned eager readers. It had been a labor of love for all of us, a commitment to libraries and to education that San Pancho was willing to make.

In Evanston, news of a $10 million deficit in the budget sounded the death knell for the neighborhood libraries. Closing the two branch libraries was not a new threat; in fact, it was almost an annual event at budget time. But this year was different, and the end of the neighborhood libraries seemed imminent.

There was one possibility. The Branch libraries received a six-month reprieve to raise $200,000. Could the Evanston community raise that amount to keep the Branches open?

To date, 1000 volunteers have raised $65,000 with more commitments of support daily. But a “For Rent” sign in the window of the South Branch library has added to the pressure.

Come on Evanston. If we can do it in San Pancho…

Our Mexican Medical Adventure

“I thought he seemed pale.” That’s what our San Pancho friends said later. Probably out of politeness no one said anything at the time. I thought he looked pale, too, but we had just arrived from overcast Connecticut, and I chalked it up to lack of sun. We had no idea that a serious medical problem was brewing.

During the next ten days Skip felt tired, then lightheaded and dizzy. We called his internist in Connecticut. “Better get him evaluated,” the doctor advised. Though we didn’t know what was wrong, we suspected the problem might be more than the small hospital in San Pancho could handle. AmeriMed in Puerto Vallarta advertises that they provide “full medical services based upon U.S. standards of health care” and that their staff is bilingual, so off we went.

Lab work revealed that Skip’s blood count was dangerously low. He needed a transfusion immediately. The doctor ordered two units of blood and called in AmeriMed’s gastro-intestinal specialist to do an endoscopy, on the hunch that intestinal bleeding might be causing the blood loss. He discovered stomach ulcers we hadn’t known about and showed me the images on his monitor. He even gave us a DVD of the procedure.

Medicare doesn’t cover anything outside of the U.S., the out-of-pocket costs were mounting, and we wanted Skip to be treated by doctors who already knew him. So we decided to return to Connecticut. After lots of blood work, more transfusions, another endoscopy and other tests, the Connecticut specialist had no conclusive explanation. “I question whether those small ulcers could have caused so much bleeding,” he said. Nevertheless, after a month Skip was fine: no symptoms; blood count normal; no more pallor. The doctor cleared him to return to Mexico, and we booked the first available flight.

Health problems will inevitably arise for expats in Mexico, especially those of us who are of Medicare age. Sometimes the solution is clear. For minor problems we can go to the hospital in San Pancho or to one of the English-speaking doctors in the area. The time I nicked myself with garden shears I got a free tetanus booster in five minutes at our village hospital. If one of us had to be hospitalized for an emergency, we would use our MedJetAssist plan to cover air medical transport to a U.S. hospital.

However, there is a confusing middle ground, as in our situation. The problem isn’t minor, and yet it doesn’t require hospitalization. We have asked ourselves many times, "Did we do the right thing?" We wish we had noticed Skip’s symptoms sooner, but sometimes they take awhile to crystallize. Language becomes a factor. The doctors at AmeriMed spoke English, but the nurses and technicians typically didn’t. We muddled through, because a lot of medical words in Spanish are the same as their English versions, but pronounced in Spanish.

In the U.S. we are accustomed to a large university teaching hospital minutes from our home. In the midst of the crisis we were comparing AmeriMed to Yale New Haven Hospital—not a fair comparison. AmeriMed wasn’t world-class, but the staff was resourceful and they got the job done. The transfusion pump, for example, didn’t work and neither did the replacement. After a lot of tinkering, the nurse improvised a solution: He tied a blood pressure cuff around the bag of blood to prime the pump, blood began to flow, and the transfusion proceeded. When Skip had another transfusion in the U.S., the pump was the same type as AmeriMed’s, but in that high-tech, expensive hospital I noticed with some relief that a sign was attached: STOP! If pump fails for any reason: REMOVE from patient immediately; TAG unit as “out of order”; CALL Clinical Engineering Department.

Since this episode occurred, I examine Skip for signs of pallor, and I ask intrusive questions about bodily functions. But, except for noticing symptoms sooner, we would not have done anything differently.

Aldo's Ambition

I see one of my former students driving a taxi around town, and it makes me sad. I’ll call him Aldo, not his real name. Such a bright kid; what a waste, I think but would never say. I know there’s nothing wrong with being a taxi driver. And staying close to home is O.K., too. I admire the extended families I see in town, maybe even envy their togetherness: three generations living under the same roof; gathering to chat, day after day, as they sit in front of their houses on white plastic chairs.

I also laugh at the old joke about ambition that features a Mexican fisherman. You know the one---about the Harvard MBA who chides the young Mexican for being content with his simple life by the sea, a life of fishing, making love to his wife, and taking his kids to the beach.

“You should buy more boats,” the MBA says, “increase your catch, expand your market. You could make a lot more money, then retire early to enjoy the good life--- fishing, making love to your wife, taking your kids to the beach.”

Still, I thought Aldo's future held more promise. Tall, handsome, quick, book-smart, hardworking, popular, he was a sponge when it came to languages and the best English speaker among the beginners at our high school. He said he wanted to study engineering at the state university in Tepic. He had a steady job in an upscale restaurant to help pay for higher education and a family willing to support him as well. I don’t know what derailed him; other than waving to each other from car windows on occasion, we lost touch after graduation.

Lack of motivation might be the culprit. For all the four-year colleges and universities in our area, the number of professional job opportunities is abysmal. The Bay of Banderas lives and dies on tourism. No major companies are based in Vallarta. Even large hotels and development firms that operate here are branches of larger corporations and, as such, hire advance-degreed locals as peons. Talk to some of the time-share hawkers and you’ll see how many are university graduates.

To get ahead here means to relocate, assuming you are one of the lucky, light-skinned, multilingual employees offered that chance. Your other option is to build your own business from the bottom up. So maybe being a taxi driver makes good sense to Aldo, even as it disappoints his old teacher who saw his potential for more.

Lime Drinks

If the color green had a flavor, it would be that of cut Mexican limes. Their mouth-puckering tartness evokes Mexico for me like no other taste. I love their scent, too: fresh, tangy, clean.



Lime juice is used in every meal in Mexico : as a salad dressing, in salsas, as a marinade, or in drinks. Limones are readily available all year long, and they are inexpensive. At the supermarket nearest San Pancho, I pay the equivalent of 50 cents for a pound of limes. Compare that to 50 cents for a single lime at my grocery in the U.S.

Drinks based on lime juice, with or without alcohol, perk up a meal and add a Mexican flair. The limes that work best for drinks are sin semilla (without seeds). Select slightly soft limes with a hint of yellow in the skin. Store them on the countertop because they will last longer than in the refrigerator, and they will look pretty, too. Lime juice can be kept for two days in a glass container in the refrigerator. To extract the juice I use my citrus squeezer that is imprinted with Hecho en Mexico (Made in Mexico ). I think it makes the juice taste even better.

Here are three time-tested lime drink recipes: Nancy Brown’s Limonada; Ellen Greene’s Margaritas; and Channing Enders’s San Carlos Slush.


Limonada (one drink)
2 ounces fresh lime juice
2 ounces sugar syrup
Sugar syrup (jarabe natural) can be purchased at Mexican grocery/liquor stores, or you can make it by combining two parts sugar and one part water and boiling for five minutes. Cool and store in a glass jar in the refrigerator.
Seltzer water

Fill a sixteen ounce glass with ice cubes, add lime juice and sugar syrup, fill the glass with seltzer water and stir. Proportions of sugar syrup and lime juice can be adjusted to taste.



Margarita (six good-sized drinks)
one part fresh lime juice(1 cup)
one part Controy (1 cup)
one-half part fresh orange juice (1/2 cup)
one-half part confectioner's sugar (1/2 cup)
two parts Tequila (2 cups)

Stir and serve on the rocks.



San Carlos Slush
Note from Channing: This drink was invented/concocted by a beloved retired pastor who lived in San Carlos, Sonora for many years. He died last year but his recipe lives on, at least in my kitchen.

1 cup Tequila
1/3 cup Controy
1/3 cup fresh lime juice
6 tablespoons lime (or other flavor) Tang
2 1/2 cups water

Blend and freeze. Scoop out amount you like, re-blend, and serve.

Can You Hear Me Now?

Gail:

4:30 AM. We are jolted from sleep by the ringing phone. It’s the cordless handset that alerts us to an incoming SKYPE internet call. Instantly awake, we rush to the computer. The number on the screen calms fears, brings annoyance. It’s not family, it’s a long-time customer with equipment problems calling Bill.

When we first came to San Pancho nearly ten years ago, there were only a handful of public telephones scattered around the pueblo. Armed with a stack of phone cards, I would walk from one to the other to find the shortest line. It took two phone cards and a long series of numbers to execute one call. Under pressure, I would inevitably misdial and have to start again. The polite coughs and shuffling feet behind me felt like signs of impatience and that did not make it easier.

Carolyn:

You had it easy, Gail. When we got her fifteen years ago there were two phones and a fax machine in a little hole-in-the-wall a block from the beach. One of the old families was running the business, and it was a life saver. There was a chalk board mounted on the outside wall where your name appeared when you had a fax. If you were awaiting important news you’d be down there every few minutes until your fax arrived.

My husband was trying to have it both ways, keep a software writing job and come to Mexico too. He would take his laptop to the little office and plug it into a phone to download his email. One day, the download went on until his bill was up to 200 pesos (when 200 pesos was real money) and he had to quit. The next, he drove into Vallarta in search of a faster download--no, internet cafes used phone lines there, too, and though they didn’t charge 10 pesos a minute as in San Pancho, the email was still taking too long to come through.

Gail:

Then you understand how excited we were in 2004 when we our house was completed and we could apply for a private line.
“We’re very sorry. No more phone lines are available in San Pancho,” Telmex said. They would put us on the wait list. But the number of people wanting phones had exploded and we ended up waiting two years. The good news was that, by then, we could get broadband, too.

Carolyn:

That was rough. We got our phone when the first twenty private lines were offered, but we were on dial up for a long time.

Gail:

Then SKYPE! We loved it! Then a cell phone tower! Ten year olds in the pueblo had cell phones. Soon we did, too.

Emails—we get lots of them. Many promise eternal happiness if we forward same to 50 of our closest friends and every on-line purchase results in special offers. But my sister gets in touch every morning and we can stay close to family and friends. We pay our bills and read the newspapers on-line, too.

SKYPE calls—we get a lot of them too. Bill’s customers want him to fix their problems. Our sons call with questions about air conditioners and water filtration systems, or when the keys are locked inside the car in a snowstorm. But they also call to check in, to share good news, and to ask Bill for his coconut shrimp recipe.

By the way, Carolyn, did you ever find out what was in that email?

Carolyn:

It turned out to be a video clip of a rhinoceros trying to copulate with a very attractive Volvo.

A Stitch in Time

The sudden scream pierced my pleasant siesta. The sound was akin to an angry cat in the throes of comeuppance. I made my way from bedroom to laundry bodega, the apparent source of the high-pitch caterwaul. By the time I reached the washing machine sound had met fury: my fine, albeit rusted, Bosch thumped and shimmied a kind of tarantella across the brick bodega floor.

Load must be unbalanced, I thought. I stabbed the off button.

"What’s the problem?" The commotion had roused my husband, Win, from one of his fix-it projects.

"I’ll take care of it," I said. I stuck my hand in the belly of the Bosch, scrunched wet towels.

"I don’t think so. Smell it."

Burnt rubber. Uh-oh.

Win pulled the machine out of the bodega into the adjacent courtyard, removed its metal back plate.

"Bad news. It’s the belt. Snapped in two." He scrutinized the frayed ends. "Don’t know where we can find a belt to fit a Bosch."

"We’ll have to buy a new machine," I said. I ticked off the names of likely retailers: Costco, Wal-Mart, Tio Sam…"I can be ready to go in ten minutes…"

"Not so fast," said Win. He ran his finger over the tear, turned the busted belt this way and that.

"But we have company coming! We need to wash sheets, towels…we have four days before…"

"You can go to the river," said Win.

I think he was kidding.

During the next 48 hours Win focused on fixing the belt. First he knit the ends together with wire. But it snapped on the test spin. He then tried glue. Three tubes later, Win looked for another solution. The remedial attempts had truncated the belt; it was now too short to fit the machine. He looked around for material to elongate the belt as well as make it stronger. Here is what he applied with silicone: strands of webbing from a disintegrating lounge chair, a few inches of leather from the back of an equipal sofa, the strap from his rubber flip-flops.

Eureka! On a slow motion spin the belt held. But Win was worried. "It will break again. And when it does I don’t think I will be able to fix it."

We tried local hardware stores first. No belts. Perhaps one could be ordered?

I nearly wailed…no time…three days…laundry…guests...

The manager at Amutio, a major hardware store in Mezcales, did not have a belt either but intrigued with our problem flipped through a phone book for a likely retailer.

The shop he suggested was located on an unmarked street in nearby Bucerias. It did not carry a name either but the several washing machines in various states of deshabille stacked in the front yard were calling card enough. The woman behind the counter took a look at the old belt Win had stapled and glued then shook her head. She rooted around in the back of the shop, said she couldn’t find anything similar. She pointed to the layers of webbing and leather and rubber. Win laughed, explained his fix-it job. She returned to the back of the shop. The belt she eventually brought us was perfect. We took it home. It worked.

There is a moral to this small story. It touches on disposable societies up north and resourceful societies down south. While this gringa is still quick to toss the broken and buy the new, my husband has learned, by observation and osmosis, to do what our Mexican neighbors do: repair with materials at hand.

So we keep the patched up version of the Bosch belt. It could be useful for parts when and if the new belt breaks.

Chiles en Nogada

Ana Ruiz, head chef at Café del Mar and my housekeeper/property manager, makes the best chiles rellenos I have ever eaten. She stuffs the poblano chiles with shrimp and cheese and covers them with a roasted tomato sauce that is as light-handed as it is flavorful. I pay Ana to make me dozens at a time, which I then freeze, individually wrapped, sauce on the side in zip lock bags. It’s my dinner of choice for guests’ first night at Quinta Elena and is a no-fail crowd pleaser.

Chiles can be stuffed with any number of things---panela or Chihuahua cheese, ground beef or pork, canned tuna or refried beans and onions. The king of chiles rellenos, however, is chiles en nogada---chiles stuffed with picadillo, a rich mix of meat, fruit, and spices, topped with a creamy walnut sauce, sprinkled with pomegranate seeds and parsley. Touted as Mexico’s most patriotic dish because its colors are the red, white, and green of the Mexican flag, this stuffed chile has an equally colorful back story. The favorite version tells of nuns in a convent in Puebla inventing the dish in 1821 for Emperor Agustin de Iturbide and the first dinner celebrating Mexico’s independence from Spain. Frida Kahlo featured this dish on her wedding table when she married Diego Rivera.

I feature it on my table when I feel like showing off. To call chiles en nogada labor-intensive is understatement. For an amateur like me, all the roasting, peeling, dicing, and frying take up most of two days. (my recipe even calls for peeling the walnuts; I’m willing to sacrifice some authenticity and skip this step.) Fans of Mexican food, especially those who cook, have been known to break into applause when I set their plate in front of them. Even without tasting the first forkful, they pay homage to the effort involved.

Every Mexican grandma probably has her own special recipe for chiles en nogada. And would be aghast at shortcuts taken by some restaurants, e.g. plain ground beef passed off as picadillo; dried cranberries as a substitute for out-of-season pomegranate seeds. Here is a version I like.

CHILES EN NOGADA

INGREDIENTS:

For the filling:

1/2 lb. ground beef

1/2 lb. ground pork

2 large garlic cloves, finely chopped

1/2 medium onion, finely chopped

1 1/2 tablespoons lard or vegetable oil

1 medium apple, peeled and cut into 1/2" cubes

1 medium pear, peeled and cut into 1/2" cubes

2 plum tomatoes, peeled and chopped

2 ounces blanched almonds, slivered

2 ounces raisins, soaked until soft, then drained

1 stick cinnamon

salt and pepper to taste



For the chiles:

8 large poblano chiles, prepared for stuffing (See Note)

4 eggs, separated, at room temperature

1/4 teaspoon salt

Oil for frying

For the sauce:

1 quart unsweetened heavy cream

4 ounces walnut meat, soaked in milk, drained, chopped



For the garnish:

2 pomegranates, separated into seeds

parsley sprigs

PREPARATION:

After preparing chiles as described in the note below, pat them dry and set them aside while you make the filling. The batter will not adhere to them properly if the chiles are not dry.

Melt the lard or oil in a large skillet; saute beef, pork, garlic, onion, apple, pear, almonds, raisins and cinnamon stick until the meat has lost its pink color. Remove the cinnamon stick, add salt and pepper to taste and allow the filling to cool to room temperature. When cool, fill the chiles, dividing the mixture evenly.

You will have fluffier and more uniform coating if you make the egg batter and fry the chiles in two batches. Beat two of the egg whites until they stand up in peaks, stiff but not dry. Lightly beat two yolks and half the salt together; fold them gently into the beaten egg whites. Dip each of four filled chiles into the mixture, turning them gently to coat evenly. Place each one immediately into a large skillet with hot oil. Fry them until golden on the bottom side (lift gently with a spatula to check) then turn and fry on the other side. Repeat this process with the rest of the chiles and the other two eggs. Remove and drain on paper towels before placing on serving dish.

Put the cream and the walnuts in a blender or food processor and puree until smooth. Pour over the chiles, and decorate with pomegranate seeds and parsley.

NOTE: The chiles are prepared for stuffing by roasting over a gas flame or under a broiler until charred all over. They are then placed in a plastic bag for 10-15 minutes. Peel by rubbing them gently, using rubber gloves, under a stream of running water. (Stems are not removed, but can be trimmed beforehand if very long.) After the chiles have been roasted and cleaned, make a lengthwise slit up one side of each and carefully remove the seed sac and any loose seeds. Avoid over-handling the chiles.

Just Another Day in Paradise

To-do list, December 15:

1. Bucerias: find Sammy the upholsterer, drop off cushions. At the orange building (or is it green?) turn left, and then turn right. Look for his shop behind El Famar Restaurant. “Tapiceria” is painted on the wall.

Sammy’s great. He takes our cushions, we give him the fabric, we chat about extra pillows, we agree on a price. His fisherman-friend comes by in his truck with his wife and daughter. Sammy suggests we buy some fish. We look at the fish. We all agree it is very good fish. But we can’t buy it now, we explain. I show him our list: we have a lot to do. Check!

2. Pemex gas station: fill tank. No self-service pumps here. An attendant fills the tank, cleans the windshield. We give him the customary tip and are good to go. Check.

Our attendant especially likes the windshield wipers on the headlights of our Volvo. We all agree they’re unusual. We don’t tell him we’ve had the car for eight years and we still don’t know how they work. Check!

3. Lloyds: change money. Mega: buy groceries. This is our own mini-mall: fast food, banks and cellular phone stores. If a Subway restaurant opened here, it would be perfect.

To-do list near completion, and we feel very efficient! Suddenly, as we’re driving, there is an ear-splitting noise in the car, as if something has exploded. And something has; the entire back window of the Volvo has shattered.

Wait, that’s not on the list.

We pull to the side of the road, leap out and stare in amazement at what is left of our back window. Tiny pieces of glass are everywhere. We search in vain for a rock or air-to-ground missile that has done so much damage. The cause of the exploding window mystifies us.

But we’re not easily defeated. Not here, not in Mexico, where automobiles suffer indignities never imagined in the US. On to the shopping mall. We take turns guarding the car. The car-wash tag team approaches. Don’t they notice we don’t have a back window? We have our groceries and our pesos, back to San Pancho.

With tedious precision Bill removes the remaining glass and creates a new fashion statement; a customized back window out of pink Styrofoam secured by bungee cords. It will be a long time before we can find a replacement. In the meantime, we join the legions of car owners who have patched, wired, glued and taped their cars together. Our neighbors laugh. “Your car is now Mexicanado,” they say. Check!