New Videos on Mexico

I've just been having great fun producing a couple of videos on Mexico. I went to a site called animoto.com and uploaded a bunch of our photos. I uploaded some royalty-free music I had for the first video below, and used some of theirs for the second. Their software did all the rest.

Here's one on Mexico in general:

And here's one from our Manzanillo and Colima trip:

If you happen to have a YouTube account, I'd love it if you would rate the videos, or comment, to help them get noticed! To go to them on YouTube, here is the link for first one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qvBhJHR3H9k

and the second:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6NdzYwYbxzA

If you would like to try something like this yourself, here are some animoto how-to tips from my Internet Marketing blog.

Where is Lake Chapala?

Technorati Tags: Lake Chapala,Guadalajara

People are always asking me where I live. Here is Lake Chapala relative to Guadalajara. I just discovered I can embed Google Maps in my site! San Juan Cosala is to the west (left) of where the town of Chapala is marked.

View Larger Map

And here the green arrow points to Guadalajara. We're pretty far south of the border. By the time any hurricanes might get here -- and ones from the Pacific do bring us a lot of our rainy season rains -- they have lost a lot of steam coming through the rugged mountains! If there is a big white box over the map, I don't know if there is a way I could have gotten rid of it but just click on the X in its upper right corner to close it. You can probably move the map around with your cursor to see further in any direction, or use the arrows. The + and - will take you closer in or further out.

View Larger Map

A Mexican blog I like

http://sparks-mexico.com/ is a very attractive blog with many photos. Scott Parks describes it as "Stories and photos about my travels in Mexico since 1998. I'm now retired and living in Melaque, Jalisco - the Costalegre."

On the right is a long list of other blogs about Mexico, so there's plenty to keep you busy beyond his site! If you go to his links page, there are all sorts of other good things.

I've had intentions of getting as well organized as he is about Mexican information, but now I will save my organizational attempts for other projects and just refer you there. Message boards, earthquake information, Spanish language, and much more.

Sounds we hear at our Mexican house

Ah, so many sounds here! I'm sure I've forgotten a few...

• The Scott Joplin tune that heralds the truck selling ice cream and other snacks, off and on during the day
  
• "Zeta G-A-S!!!... honk honk...Zeta G-A-S!!!... honk honk...Zeta G-A-S!!!... honk honk...Zeta G-A-S!!!... honk honk...Zeta G-A-S!!!... honk honk...Zeta G-A-S!!!... honk honk..." can be heard from early morning till pretty late. The gas is propane and as most smaller homes only have one tank they need it fast.
• Kids playing, usually quite a jolly sound
• Fireworks, often
• Recorded exhortations early Sunday morning which for a long time I thought came from the church but gradually realized it was a truck driving around selling a miracle health cure
• A brass band practicing, frequently... they aren't right now and I kinda miss them
  
• Neighbors playing radios or CDs, usually Mexican romantic tunes or mariachi
  
• Lots of thunder in the rainy season
• The occasional large airplane flying low on approach to the Guadalajara airport
  

Kelly's walk in San Juan Cosala

The other day, Kelly went out for a walk around our town, San Juan Cosala, near Lake Chapala. He captured a moment in one of the many soccer games that are always going on:


Here's a Virgin of Guadalupe. I like how the wheelbarrow and flowers seem to fit into the artwork, and you can see the black water tank on the roof.
But here the walk took an unusual turn. People were butchering a calf in the street:

One guy said to Kelly in English, "Why are you taking pictures?" Kelly said in Spanish, "Es muy interesante." The fellow nodded and agreed.

It didn't break my heart that I had missed this event.