LA LAVADORA

The outhouse (as mi madre calls it; el sr J says, "it's only two steps away") is getting full.  The newest addition is a lavadora.  Our lavandería is moving farther away and we were tired of lugging laundry anyway. Besides, there is nothing like the smell of freshly laundered, sun-dryed sheets.  There is no shortage of sun here.

Interestingly, those yellow stickers on appliances that indicate energy efficiency are scaled differently in Mexico:  in the US, the scale on the bar graph indicates energy used (the farther to the right, the more energy used); here, the scale is money saved (the farther to the right, the more you save on your electric bill).  This took a little getting used to, but we managed to get it right.  By the way, 5 puntos for identifying at least two ways (other than the yellow stickers) that Mexican lavadoras are different from those in the US. 

EL JARDIN DEL ARTE

All quiet on the andador today, so let's do a little sightseeing.  A couple of blocks away from us is El jardín del arte.  It is a serene spot, except when the music is loud.  It is also the site of a flea market where vendors sell, or at least display, old (mostly useless) stuff.  It is a little like the San Telmo flea market in Buenos Aires, where impecunious porteños sell off their patrimony so they can survive the vicissitudes of the economy there.  But here the stuff doesn't seem to be so personal, or so valuable. 

Here is the "arte" displayed in front of the taller that produces it.

This is more like it:

One of several orange trees:

Another view:

Looking up ( a perspective Alain will appreciate):

On Sunday there is dancing to live music in the nearby Jardín Zenea.  These people apparently couldn't wait and were dancing to canned music on a Saturday.  Or perhaps they were practicing their moves for Sunday.  One thing is for certain:  the nude, prone in the foreground, does not move.

DIA 5: VENUSTIANO CARRANZA DESTAPADO

This morning we opened our door, ready to set off for market, when we saw this:

I looked to the left:  an army of men in shiny black suits and pomaded hair were hurrying toward and then past me, leaving a trail of cologne, to converge facing this shrouded figure, whatever it was.

El sr J ran inside to get the camera, came back out and said, "let's go."  No way was I going to try to slip through that barricade of dignitaries and bodyguards sporting earpieces.  So I stood in my doorway and watched.  He left to join the crowd and photograph the event.  Eventually I saw his head above the crowd.  Here they are just about to uncover the bust of. . . .

You guessed it:  Venustiano Carranza, "hero" of the Mexican Revolution.

My knowledge of the Mexican Revolution comes mainly from Mariano Azuela's Los de abajo, translated to English as The Underdogs, a very bad novel in a series of bad novels I read at one period of my life.  All I remember from the novel is that groups of armed men roved the countryside, betraying and killing each other.  (Kind of like now, come to think of it).  Here is a brief history lesson from El sr J:

Carranza was the leader of one the factions fighting to control Mexico during the Revolution.  The others included Pancho Villa and Emiliano Zapata.  They formed various combinations, none of them lasting, and issued various decrees and proposals for shaping the new society in an effort to garner support to form a new government..  Carranza's was the 1913 Plan de Guadalupe, a response to the recent coup in which General Victoriano Huerta overthrew and executed the sitting president, Francisco I. Madero.  Carranza called for a restoration of constitutional government and peaceful elections.  After a period of continued negotiating and fighting, which also involved U.S. incursions and bombardments, Carranza ultimately (with the diplomatic support of the U.S.) succeeded in overcoming opposition.  He organized and led a constitutional convention in Querétaro in 1917 which produced the current frame of government.  Not surprisingly, Carranza was subsequently elected president.  He was assassinated in 1920.  And so it goes.

Carranza, whose followers called themselves Constitutionalists, is considered a hero by those who decry the so-called excesses of the Revolutionary period, often associated with Zapata and Villa, whose popular support came primarily from the landless campesinos and los de abajo and who had a more radical approach to the problems confronting Mexican society.  I suppose one could say that Carranza's policies were fundamentally conservative, reflecting as they did an insistence on traditional governmental structures (Carranza was himself a long-time government functionary before the Revolution) and a cautious approach to reform.  And then there's that U.S. support, which traditionally has gone to the person or party most likely to provide stability and predictability and a good climate for business.

Today, 5 de febrero, is the anniversary of the promulgation in Queretaro of the Mexican constitution, a day celebrated throughout the country, and, not coincidentally, the date of the unveiling of his bust on the street named for him.  But those in attendance were not los de abajo.  They were los de arriba. 

APOSTROPHE S OR 'S

This morning at breakfast el sr J announced that he was going to edit to a previous post and change "Soriana's" to "Soriana."  This led to a discussion of that tricky and much overused "apostrophe s" or 's.  Why do we say, for instance, Penny's for J.C. Penny and Kroger's, but Walmart (not Walmart's), Costco, etc.  I looked up the logo for McDonald's and the McDonald part is in white, but the apostrophe is in red to sort of blend in the background.  That's hedging it.  And then I thought about how we say we're going to the doctor's, as in his/her office, but we never say "I'm going to the dentist's."  Or do we?  And then there is the whole other misuse of the thing:  creating plurals by adding 's, as in banana's.  And worse:  it's instead of its.  This is not a problem in Spanish, where there is no apostrophe.

I know there are some grammar fascists socialists (how about that new strike through function.  El sr J found that for us) commenting on this blog.  What's your take on this issue?  10 puntos for some illumination.

Day 4 on the andador

It was very windy today and we had to come and go in the opposite direction of the wind to avoid getting our faces covered with the cement polvo that their faces were covered with.  Is it OK to end a sentence with a preposition?  Or start one with a conjunction?  Just think of all the grammar rules we learned in grade school, and how they have been modified/abandoned through usage.  But the apostrophe remains sacred and its (not it's) misuse a pecado for us.   

MENONITAS EN QUERETARO

When we take taxis outside of the centro there are always people selling things at red lights on the main streets.  Candy, newspapers, incense, etc.  Sometimes there are young boys doing cartwheels in the middle of the highway and I have to avert my eyes.  Yesterday we were on our way to Home Depot and there was a girl of 14 or 15, blond and pink-cheeked, in an old fashioned dress, with a straw hat, selling cookies, car door to car door.  After we politely declined and moved on, the cab driver told us she was a Mennonite and that there was a community of them living in Huimilpan.

When we finished at Home Depot we went next door to Soriana.  There were two boys of about 10 and 12 inside the entrance, selling cookies.  They were dressed in bib overalls and they were very blond and fair-skinned.  We bought a bag.  Six for 25 pesos, pretty expensive.  I felt like asking them why they weren't in school, but I didn't.  The cookies taste to me like gingersnaps, but el sr J does not agree.  He thinks they have a molasses taste.  Here they are:

I don't think the Mennonites should be sending their young girls out on the streets.  This would not happen in Lancaster County, PA.

Day 3 on the andador

SECRETOS DE UN MATRIMONIO

Yesterday at 5:00 we went here, two blocks from our house, to see Scenes from a Marriage (1973), in Swedish with Spanish subtitles.  Sometimes the sound went out and I realized that even though I didn't understand a word they were saying, I needed the sound to enjoy the film.  Strange, huh.

 Both the marriage and the movie seemed interminable, but weren't, with lots of 1970s-style criticism of bourgeois lifestyles, boring jobs, family obligations, male entitlement, etc.  But I must say that Liv Ullmann was a delight to look at, fleshy but not fat, with the whitest skin I've seen in a long time.

I wonder what she looks like today.  Let's Google her and see:

Hmmmm. . . .

Here's day two of the project on the Andador.  They built a plinth.  Lots of concrete and re-bar.  Our neighbor, Rocio, said that it's going to be a monument in honor of Venustiano Carranza, hero of the Revolution and the source for our eponymous address.  It will also, conveniently and purposefully, block any motor vehicle from violating our walkway.  I'll keep posting progress reports.

¿DONDE ESTA EL MARTILLO NEUMATICO?

Look what we saw when we exited our house this morning.

Two hours later

Two hours after that

Where's the jackhammer? It's all done by hand. They're using a crowbar and a big hammer to prise out each paving stone at the upper end of the andador. We haven't worked up the courage yet to ask them what they're doing. Could it be a fountain? I'll never leave this place if it is. Or is it a barrier to keep al Qaeda car bombers from getting down to the government office at the other end? (In our old US home town, the government erected just such barriers around the federal building, which included the post office. We called it, among other things, the faux phallic phalanx.) Or maybe they know that I was running out of blog material and wanted to give me some exciting things to post? I will keep you abreast of the progress.

Congratulations to all the point winners. We have the smartest friends (and relatives)!