Taking the Plunge
Ramblings
When Mexico is adorable it is wonderfully so. Children chasing chickens in the yard, festivals of colors and lights and saints, spontaneous parades, palm trees, colonial architecture and cheap delicious street food are all undeniably very good things. But when Mexico is awful*, it is terribly so. We’ve discussed how there is not really anything [...]
1Mar2010 | Jillian | 0 comments | Continued
Things to do in Yucatan Before I Leave aka My Yucket List
Dance all night at The Mambo Cafe
We had our wedding reception at this live music venue/dance club at the Plaza Las Americas mall and it was amazing, shiny, loud, and vibrating. But I was a little distracted/overwhelmed/intoxicated and would love to go back to shake my money maker without worrying about our forty friends and [...]
That’s Debatable: A Person of Interest
This house maintains that living abroad makes you a more interesting person.
Pro
To live abroad successfully you have to be adaptable and open to new ways of thinking. Your worldview is cracked wide open, if not totally destroyed and forced into a new configuaration. It’s a symbolic death, such as one experienced by the hero. Out [...]
Waiting For My Man
We’ve had one norte after the next blowing through our port, the skies are opaque gray and all the Yucatecans and casi Yucatecans are bundled up and battened down. We drove into Progreso to run errands while the help leveled rubble and planted and washed our pots and pans. I picked up our laundry and was waiting for [...]
17Feb2010 | Jillian | 0 comments | Continued
The Misfits
What if I’ve become too strange to go back?
strangerinastrangelandyoucantgohomeagainpeoplearestrangewhenyoureastrangertheresnoplacelikehome
These are the fleet streaming thoughts that pluck me out of sleep at four am.
itsabanditsthatarthurmillermarilynmonroemoviehesthemaniaccharacterinagoodmanishardtofind
But I wouldn’t say I’m too terribly anxious.
Not like the months leading up to leaving. I was a wreck, all panic attacks and acting out. Going home is both easier and more frought. [...]
A Nation of Two
As much as we have lived in Mexico these last four years, mostly we have lived alone in a world of our own construct. Throughout our relationship we’ve always been close. I distinctly remember the year we met, during our ritual of watching The Practice and eating takeout in Malcolm’s tiny first floor dorm room [...]
12Feb2010 | Jillian | 0 comments | Continued
The Reckoning: Verbal Skills and Communication
Language Lab
Most of the Spanish that I speak, I learned my first six weeks in Mexico. I bounded into the English library like a puppy, and in the eyes of the cranky ancients, smoking and mouldering amid the stacks, must have seemed like one about to piddle on the carpet. I signed up for a [...]
… And We’re Back (But Not For Long)
As it turns out, as we have proven, you can abandon your pressboard life, board a plane to a place you’ve never been and carve out an existence – and a pretty sweet one at that – in an uncanny valley far, but not too far, from home. We didn’t drop off the edge of [...]
Searching for the American Dream…in Mexico
I just wanted to call everyone’s attention to this little nugget, which appeared in New American Media:
“MERIDA, Mex. – At some point last fall, the one millionth American established residency here in Mexico. That makes Mexico the host nation for the largest American expatriate community in the world. There are now more Americans living in [...]
Everybody Seems to Wonder What It’s Like Down Here
it’s not as difficult or as easy to live in Mexico as I imagined
I have seen exactly three scorpions in three years
don’t bother eating the Chinese food
you will not immediately lose 30 pounds
I still don’t have a good doctor
insurance is cheap
labor is cheap
quality furniture is not cheap and hard to find
we don’t drink beer all [...]
Bad Expat: Changing My Marketing Strategy
I knew there was a mercado in Chelem but I never went inside until today. Waiting for the combi in the heat of early afternoon in centro you can smell sun-drenched entrails, past-peak produce and the overwhelming scent of ripening flowers. I would watch repelled, the lazy dogs that lay in wait for discarded scraps [...]
17Mar2009 | Jillian | 2 comments | Continued
Enamigos
America loves a monolithic enemy. What united a disparate and fledgling colony better than big bad daddy Britain? When were we more American than when we were facing off against Russia? Since the Cold War ended (it’s been sooo boring, right?) the focus on The Middle East and Islam has been a fairly successful stand-in. [...]
16Mar2009 | Jillian | 2 comments | ContinuedHow’s the Weather in Chelem, Mexico?
Mostly Cloudy
Currently: 77˚F
Feels Like: 80˚ F
Hi: 77˚, Lo: 69˚
Wind: 7, Gust: N/A MPH
Wind Direction: NE (50)
Thanks for commenting, Susan. I will have to try Priceline with the Intercontinental, but there continue to be a few ...
Good to know, thanks! We usually stay at the Intercontinental, because we've always been able to get a steal ...
I've wanted to do that San Crisanto trip for a while. Perhaps someday soon the weather will change and we ...
I mean Yucket list 
"It makes me feel something like despair when I would rather feel pleasant or nothing at all." That's true for ...
Malcolm: I have read this like a 1,000 times and each and every time I read it again, I laugh ...
I've just stumbled onto your set. [oops! clumsy me.] Many thanks for mentioning La Musa. We will be sure to ...
Home is you and Malc, sweetie, it's all you'll ever need. Where? Doesn't really matter.