An African-American asks about Mexico

I recently received this email, and with the writer's permission am posting it here in hopes that others can help me out with their own experiences. I can't answer some of her questions.

I am an African American who is fascinated about Mexican culture and its people. As a black person, how will I be treated? I have read and heard nothing but bad things concerning blacks and Latin America, specifically Mexico.

Are Americans treated well in general?

...I was wondering though, are all of the wealthy white and all of the poor black or native? Are any of wealthy mixed race, black, or indigenous, or at least dark skinned in Mexico? Or is it that all of the wealthy and elite are european looking?

It is just that the image is one of rich whites controlling everything and dark skinned poor people, especially in Latin America, specifically Mexico. How color conscious are Mexicans in general and does it have any effect on how tourists are treated? What effect would it have on expatriates who are black getting a job? I have read about the "good presentation" meaning that they prefer the whiter, lighter skinned candidate. Is that true?

How much Spanish do I need to know before I enter mexico? I would like to go to a Mexican university but it has been years since i have learned Spanish... Your help would be greatly appreciated.

As a black how will you be treated? Hmm, I really don't know. I have seen black people in various parts of Mexico from time to time but never had a chance to really ask a black person what his or her experiences have been. I saw a black American the day before I got your email, and from now on I will watch for a chance to ask someone -- and of course blog about it!

Also, some of the black people I have seen have turned out to be Mexicans, usually from Mexico's eastern shores. I'd imagine that they have experienced plenty of racism. This IS a very color-conscious society and more European-looking people are more likely to be news anchors, actresses, and so on. But bit by bit this is changing, and there are certainly many successful people with Indian appearance. Benito Juarez, one of Mexico's greatest presidents, was of totally Indian ancestry.

Interestingly, several modern Mexicans whose skins and features show a strong ancestry of native peoples or perhaps both native and european have told me that they simply think of themselves as Mexicans. On the other hand, a brilliant friend of ours from Oaxaca in the south is very proud of the fact that he has no European blood.

Getting a job here as an expat has its own set of problems. I'm no expert but so far as I know, foreigners can't get jobs that a Mexican could do, though I'm not totally sure how that works. There is also a reason that so many Mexicans head north to work. There often isn't work here.

You ask how well Americans generally are treated, and that is one question I can answer. I and many other Americans and Canadians are delighted with the kindness and graciousness of the Mexican people. You can imagine, no doubt, that a lot of the actions of our current government -- from planning a 700-mile-long fence to going to war abroad -- do not go over well here. But Mexicans I have spoken with have always been extremely polite if the topic came up, and they are entirely able to separate how they feel about a government's actions from how they feel about people they meet.

Many Americans who live here say that one of the main reasons they like it here is the people. That's surely true for me, and if you read back through the posts you'll see that.

You can come to Mexico without knowing Spanish, but the more you know, the richer your time here will be. There are many, many places with various price tags where you can take Spanish classes. For example, there is a Mexican woman in our town who I haven't found yet who is said to give very good classes which cost about three dollars a session. You may be pleased at how much the Spanish you used to know will come back to you.

Okay... I am well aware that I have not truly answered your question about how much the color of your skin will lead Mexicans to pre-judge you. I have far too much awareness of how deeply people can be affected by conscious or unconscious racism to simply say that they will treat you as a person first and as a black person second. I don't know if that will be the case for you. It certainly might be, but I just don't know. If you have heard "nothing but bad" concerning blacks and Mexico, then another challenge for you would be to work at not letting those ideas shape your own personal experiences.

I'd say, come on down, trust that fascination, use common sense, and see what you learn. As a woman, especially if you come down by yourself, you will likely also encounter the ideas Mexican men have about American women!

Kevin Witty

I've met three readers of this blog. Two were women who were visiting the Lake Chapala area, and one was Kevin Witty. He and I had exchanged a couple of emails while he was still back in New England, and after he bought a house just outside Ajijic, we got together with him for a leisurely lunch in an outdoor restaurant in Ajijic. It was just at the beginning of the rainy season this past spring, and we had to move our table a few feet when a downpour suddenly started splashing on us.

No matter, we enjoyed sitting and talking. We talked about U.S. politics, a subject on which we were in general agreement. We talked about loving the Lake Chapala area. We talked about how we spend our time here. Kevin was happy to be taking photographs for the local little theater group, as that is something he'd done before.

A while later, we invited him over for dinner at our house. We ate on our porch and looked out at the lake. Again, we talked and talked. One of the topics was cats, as his was a very shy one. We shared life stories, to a degree. We did discover that Kevin was four months younger than me.

On October 5, Kelly and I stopped at the Superlake grocery store in San Antonio Tlayacapan on our way home from a dinner party. There was Kevin, going into a restaurant with some other people. He came over and we chatted a while. He was loving some teaching of English he was doing. In fact, he's the guy I mentioned in a recent blog entry, when I said he wasn't suffering from "retired expat drift."

Kevin said he'd call us the next week to plan another dinner together. We didn't get the call. Not to worry, I figured he'd call us one day soon.

Then today we did errands in Ajijic and I picked up a copy of the weekly Guadalajara Colony Reporter, an English language paper. When we got back to San Juan Cosala, we stopped at the place where we buy our drinking water in jugs. While Kelly was exchanging containers and paying, I glanced through the paper.

There was a photo of Kevin Witty. He had died one week to the day after we had last seen him, "suddenly at his home," the paper said. The article added that Kevin's time here was among the happiest of his life. We certainly felt his pleasure at being here.

This afternoon Kelly and I have been appreciating the preciousness of each moment of our lives.

Mazamitla street scenes

Here is a selection of photos from that day trip we took to Mazamitla a while back:

Ajijic Bed and Breakfast La Paloma

A couple of months ago, I met an American natureopathic doctor who lives in nearby Ajijic and began doing a health-enhancing program under his supervision. I'm definitely feeling better from it -- I'm drinking two quarts of water or so daily, and eating in a way that is designed for my particular metabolism. It's nice to have lost some weight too!

Anyway, Doc McGee and his wife MarCia McBride-McGee manage an attractive bed and breakfast in Ajijic. Since they are both very nice people, I am sure that staying there would be a very pleasant introduction to the Lake Chapala area. Room rates at present range from $55/night to $87/night, taxes included, with seasonal discounts, wireless internet throughout, and more. For more details see the Ajijic La Paloma Bed and Breakfast website, which has a lot of pictures. And if you go, tell them Rosana sent you!

The Retired Expat Drift

"There's always something going on," the retired American lady said to me. "Somebody comes by for drinks and then we go out to eat someplace." She was explaining why she never got around to doing the creative artwork that had meant a lot to her in the past.

Last week we ran into another American we know here by Lake Chapala. I immediately noticed that his eyes were sparkling and he exuded vitality. "I've been so busy!" he said. He told us he's become very involved in a program that teaches English to Mexicans.

As Kelly and I walked away, I said to Kelly, "Well, he's sure not suffering from Retired Expat Drift... hey, that's a good phrase, I 'd better use it in my blog.

We do see it in a lot of people here. Not most.

The wasps' nest in our Mexican yard

Kelly noticed it before I did. Neither one of us was eager to do anything about it. So it grew and grew, right next to our path down to the street.

The wasps' nest would not have lasted the months that it did if the wasps had been aggressive. But they were homebodies who never went after us... unless we messed with them. Kelly had removed another nest, much smaller, from another part of the yard, and he had unpleasant memories of the sharp stings he had received.

When Roberto started working in our yard, he had several ideas for removing the nest. Like us, he prefers not to use poisons. We arranged that he would come over very early one morning, before the wasps could fly. He explained that in the cool of the night they become very inactive.

So he came over the other morning just after it got light. He took the long pole that we normally use for pool maintenance and took off the brush attached to one end. From a good distance, with the pole, he was able to knock the nest onto the ground. Some of them could fly and he got stung, but he said later that it was only four times and of no consequence. I wouldn't have shrugged it off so casually, I'm sure!

He poured some buckets of water over the nest, and later in the day Kelly hosed it off from a good distance. Eventually something like 500 wasps took the hint that we didn't want them here and they swarmed away.

I do kind of miss them. They were always rearranging the front door of their nest, adding new layers, and so on. But I breathe a lot more easily going down to the road.

Peel Me a Grape

"There is a saying in English," I said to Rosa in Spanish. "It's 'peel me a grape.'"

I translated it loosely and explained, as she easily understood, that it had overtones of decadent luxury. I told her that since she started working for us a month ago, that's how I felt.

Rosa is our maid. After about half a year here, I asked some neighbors if they knew of anyone who would like to clean our house once a week. They came up with Rosa, whose grandson is married to their daughter, or something like that. It might be her sister's son who is married to their daughter.

Rosa came over and I liked her immediately. That was important. There is a woman in our neighborhood who had cleaned this house in the past, and who had asked us if she could work for us, but we don't find her easy to be around. Rosa was different, we could tell right away.

So I showed her the house and she told me what to buy, chiefly a long string mop. We agreed on a time she would come each week. I asked what she would like us to pay her. She said firmly that she gets 35 pesos an hour. That's about $3.20 US... I tend to round up the amount of time she's worked to pay her a bit more. She's here about four hours, once a week.

She is a delightful woman, full of zest, and very professional about her cleaning. She has worked for foreigners before and her Spanish is clear and easy to follow. I ask her lots of questions about Spanish vocabulary and grammar; she laughs when I call her my professor. And it's very nice to leave the heavier cleaning to her!

We didn't stop there. We have known all along that we would need to have someone to take care of our swimming pool and to water the yard and mow the lawn, chiefly when we're away but perhaps at other times too. If we were lucky, it would be one person to do both pool and yard work. Emboldened by how well Rosa has been working out, we started asking around, and a young woman we know said her father would be interested. He was, so soon Roberto started working for us.

He is extremely knowledgeable about swimming pools, as he works at the local hot spring resort. But he was glad to have some extra work. He now comes over three days a week for a couple of hours each time. We got a friend's price from him because we are friendly with his family and help them some with their English, but he does charge more than Rosa. He is very industrious and also nice to be around. Kelly was never fond of scrubbing our pool, and I don't have the strength. We both enjoy glancing out the window from our computers as Roberto scrubs with vigor, adjusts the chemical balance just so, mows the lawn, and pulls weeds.

Peel me a grape. Oh, give me another one!

SentenceShaper, software for people with aphasia

I've been helping my sister lately with her website, and now want to announce it to the world! It's at www.sentenceshaper.com.

She has done research for the past ten years or so on people with aphasia, and has created SentenceShaper, an effective piece of software which helps them to communicate more fully, either when they are using the software or after they have used it. In other words, it often has a carry-over effect. Not everyone who uses it gets both kinds of results, of course, as people vary in everything.

Anyway, it has been a real pleasure to help her with the site, both for the fun of working together and because it's a joy to work on something that has the potential to improve so many people's lives for the better. She's told me a few stories (not yet available on her site, as she has to get permission first to use details) about people with aphasia being really thrilled with the results.

Aphasia can occur after strokes or injuries to the brain, and where the brain is affected will determine whether language use is affected, and if so, how.

Well, this has nothing specifically to do with Mexico, but I figured somebody would be interested!

A visitor to Mexico wonders...

I recently received this email from a reader of this blog, a woman from the US who had just gotten home from a trip to Mexico. She and her husband had flown into Guadalajara, come out to the Lake Chapala area and taken us out to dinner, then gone by bus to Guanajuato, San Miguel de Allende, and Queretaro before returning to Guadalajara to fly home nine days later. Quite a trip!

If a hotel clerk makes $6.00 a day and a hotel manager only makes $9.00 a day, how can they afford the prices we saw for food and clothing? That is not to mention housing of some kind. This is the salary we heard were paid for these types jobs, but I can not remember who told us that. If maids make $3.50 an hour for housekeeping at a private home for a Gringa, why would hotel staff be so low? Maybe it was wrong.

We went to a big grocery store in SMA outskirts and looked at the prices for Grocery/ Health and Beauty aids. They were as high or worse as the USA. This was where the locals shop. I don't know how they can live. I shop at a Mexican Grocery store outside our neighborhood because the prices are better and the prices are about the same as Mexico and our salaries are much more.

Another observance was that soooo many people eat out at all the little hole in the wall places. I don't know how they can afford that either. Always buying fruit, corn, candy or something. You even see the kids taking buses and taxi's.

Example, we went to VIP's in Queretaro to eat one evening. It was like a nice Denny's in the USA. The place was full of Mexicans and it cost us $20 US to eat. Some looked like Bank clerks that were sitting in a table by us. We just can't figure the economy out. Do you understand how they make it or know that they make more salary than we heard?

I don't know that I can answer all the questions, but I'll give it a try. Some of the people you see eating or buying things at the expensive places may well be doing it as a rare treat. The little hole in the wall places are often very cheap.

Also, they typically have less stuff than we do, partly because their houses are smaller and wouldn't hold it all. So if you see a young woman buying a pricey cosmetic, for instance, she likely doesn't have tons and tons of them at home like Americans might.

As for food prices, the poorer people eat a lot less meat and fish than we do, a lot more beans and tortillas. You can feed a large family a lot of beans and tortillas for not much money.

Here are some of the expenses that Americans typically have and Mexicans typically don't:

• Rent or mortgage payments, often astronomical... most Mexicans live in the family home which has been owned ever since it was built.
• Expensive appliances and furniture for the homes. Many Mexicans don't even have refrigerators or washing machines, though this is more true in rural areas.
• Car, car payment, car insurance, car repairs, gasoline... most Mexicans don't have cars, though the middle class does more now than before and the wealthy don't have problems here. This lack of a family car is part of why even children will take taxis at times.
• Credit card bills with high interest payments. Rare here, though beginning.
  
• Health insurance. There are plans here, but it's relatively rare.
• Vacations. I've heard Mexicans say that they have never been to a particular city because they have no relatives to stay with there.

Hope this helps. I'm sure there is more to it.

The Ken Edwards Pottery of Tonala

Last Saturday, Kelly and I and some friends drove from our home near Lake Chapala into the greater Guadalajara area, to the city of Tonala (population about half a million) on the southeastern edge of the urban area.

We were on a mission: dishes. Tonala is famous throughout Mexico and beyond for the fine ceramics and many other crafts that come from this creative city. Many of the items made are sold in nearby Tlaquepaque, at considerably higher prices.

Kelly and I had been there a couple of times before, but the last time had been over twenty years ago. We remembered a rather rural town. No more! It's very much a city now.

I remembered going to the pottery factory and workshop of an American, Ken Edwards, who lived and worked in the area. Edwards is now living and doing pottery in Guatemala, but the workshop continues in Tonala:
We spent the morning looking in other stores. There's a wonderful store with all sorts of Mexican crafts right on the plaza in Tonala, La Mexicania, and we lingered in there a good while. Both the other woman and I emerged with lovely nativity sets.

We had delicious chicken fajitas or enchiladas for lunch at Restaurant El Rincon del Sol, a couple of blocks south of the plaza. Here's the entryway to the restaurant. Unfortunately you can't see the empty tequila bottle in the dummy's hand!

After lunch it was time for the main course of the day: those dishes we'd come for. The Ken Edwards workshop is north of the plaza and a little east, at Morelos 184.

The dishes we selected were much like these. They were seconds, but it was easy to find ones with very minor flaws. We walked out of there with a huge, well-packed box of dishes for which we had spent barely over a hundred dollars. We're having so much fun with them that Kelly is going to get some more when he goes into Guadalajara soon for a dental appointment!

A Mexican baptism and party

The other day, some Mexican neighbors invited us to the baptism of one of their granddaughters, a baby of about 8 months. It would be held in the church here in San Juan Cosala, and then there would be a party to celebrate both the baptism and the second birthday of her older sister.

Kelly and I walked down to the plaza yesterday, arriving there just after noon. The church was already completely packed for mass, so we stood outside with dozens of other people. An all-day fundraiser to complete the renovation of the church towers was already going on in the plaza: different musical groups would play all day and into the evening, and stalls were selling snacks and miscellaneous items.

We saw our neighbors arriving by the front of the church, so we went to join them. Maria explained that the actual baptism would be after the mass. We stood near the front door of the church and admired the stalks of corn just inside the doors. I enjoyed the combination of sounds: now the church service dominated, now the music from the plaza just across the street.

I also reflected on the soul of Mexico as we stood there. Going to church is done here in a very casual way -- children run around quite freely -- and yet to spend even a short while among this people is to feel the devotion palpable in the air. I enjoyed the tattooed young father wearing a muscle shirt and brightly colored shorts, his face radiating kindness to the child in his arms. Young and old stood together, responding to the service, singing at times. When it was time to shake hands with the people around us and say "la paz," or peace, everyone moved around a bit, so we each shook hands with at least a dozen people. That's one of my favorite parts of the service.

When the mass was over, it was amazing how many people poured out of the church. We made our way up near the front, where three babies were being baptized. We sat a little ways back from the activities, next to another Mexican lady we knew. I asked her if the church was always so crowded for mass, and she said the noon one was always popular, but today was special because the people were giving thanks that the rain had been abundant this year. So that's why there was corn in the church. I felt the ancient, pre-Columbian history of this place when she told me that.

After the baptism, we went home and got our car, then drove a short way out of town to a home with a large yard where the party was to be held. We were among the first guests to arrive, and sat down at a table with a Mexican couple I had seen at the church. It turned out that they are from Guadalajara but have a weekend place in San Juan and are friends of the family. We chatted with them quite a lot. The lady came to the conclusion that I could understand a lot more Spanish than I can, and she spoke quite rapidly. A good workout for my ears.

Another American couple joined our table; the four of us were the only foreigners (not that anyone cared) among the dozens of people of all ages who arrived in waves. The kids ran around and played, the teens were cool but in a much more family-friendly way than you'd see north of the border, people sang along to the music playing on a big CD player. We chatted briefly with a realtor we knew slightly. The other Americans have lived here for some ten years and know many members of the family well.

Eventually, full plates of delicious stewed meat, rice, and refried beans appeared, with tortillas and salsa. Beverages had been offered numerous times already. Kelly and I had something else to do and we left before the pinatas and the desserts, the happy sounds of the party wafting out into the street as we walked down to our car. It was overcast, there were even a few drops, but there was no downpour till the evening.

What a delight!

Reposting Mexican beach and border update

Some readers were having trouble with my last blog entry not downloading so I am reposting it, hoping that the problem will go away...

I recently received this email, and have corrected the page in question:

I love your informative site...for those of us living in or considering living in Mexico it is an invaluable resource. I would like to point out an error in something you wrote. On the page that discusses owning land in Mexico...
http://www.mexico-with-heart.com/rlestate/about-mex-rlestate.html you state that waterfront land can be held by a corporation but that none of the owners can be foreigners. That is no longer true....A Sociedad Anonima may be totally foreign owned...if none of the owners have their FM3 then there must be a person who is Mexican and acts as an agent for the SA who signs the documents for the land purchase but is not necessarily an owner of the corporation. I know this because I bought 3 hectares of waterfront land in Quintana Roo and none of the shareholders of the SA are Mexican and none of us had an FM3 at the time we bought the land.

Kathe Kirkbride

Personal Website www.whirledvision.com

Mexico Project www.maricasa.com