Mi Casa Es Su Casa

As per request, here are some quick pics of the house.


It's the bidness room *wink wink* (messy, I know, hush)



My weird, outdoor shower and Zed's hangout


La cocina, where the blowknee and cream cheese burritos get made

The downstairs deck



Em's room

Bozlish and a Kidnapping

Since we came to Mexico, we've been spending a lot of time with my family in Guadalajara and my husband has been working on an entirely new idiom. He has no qualms whatsoever about mangling the Spanish language, in fact, he seems to relish the fact that he's creating an entirely new language based mostly on the average Spanish speaking three-year olds' verbal skills and his own auditory processing deficiencies. For example, when my grandmother tells him, "Dios te bendiga" (God bless you, something she says constantly) he happily responds with, "Albondigas!" (meatball soup).


In other news:
Balian, my adorably dorky Boston Terrier baby boy was kidnapped! A construction worker, working on a house up on the hill behind us, decided he'd just wander off with my dog the other day. After a frantic search and a rather reasonable greasing of a co-worker's palm (apparently, the kidnapper is not very well liked amongst his colleagues who repeatedly referred to him as 'that lazy...erm...ox'), we located Balian tied up in said construction worker's yard on the east side of town. When we confronted the kidnapper, his attitude was, to say the least, totally unrepentant. Apparently, he'd hoped to sell Balian to supplement his income as the guy who lays down on the building materials all day to make sure they don't blow away in the wind, but didn't bother to check and see whether Balian had procreative capabilities. He doesn't, for which he still gives me dirty looks, and that makes him utterly useless on the Mexican dog black market. At any rate, his response to my husband's demand for an explanation was, that dog's not worth a damn, go ahead and take it back. My husband's reply? "Oh, I'm so sorry. What kind of dog do you prefer so I can get me one."

"I coulda been kilt!"

Zed and Zora

Zed and Zora are my new roommates. At first I was afraid of them because my husband accidentally ran over one of their relatives in his excitement to show him to me. “Look at the Iguana, babe!” Squish. I thought they’d come for retribution, to exact their revenge, take their pound of flesh, an eye for an eye and all that.

But it seems that Zed and Zora bear me no ill will for my husband’s haphazard tour guide techniques and have decided to take up residence. Zed lives in my bedroom, Zora in the kitchen. They eat bugs and stuff, so I love them. They live in the light fixtures and ask only that I never approach them. I can live with that.

What I’m having trouble coming to terms with is the fact that Zed is a pervert. He comes out every day, without fail, to watch me take a shower, his eyes glued to my ample behind (really, where else would a lizard look) as I strip and step into the tiled stall. Yesterday, I could have sworn he whistled, but then I realized that the construction crew up on the hill were probably watching the two beach bunnies who live next door to the house they’re working on, as they take their daily, scantily clad meander down to the beach.

But still, Zed stares, and it’s unsettling.

The other day, I considered chasing Zed off with a fly swatter and a can of compressed air so I could shower in peace. As I stared at him, considering my best plan of attack, I watched in horrified fascination as Zed consumed the biggest, ugliest, wormy looking thing I’d ever seen. The beast had wrangled its way into my shower through one of the drain holes in the side of the wall (some day soon, I’ll post pics of my lovely, outdoor/sort of shower so you can get an idea). It was at that point that I decided Zed was all good and I would do just about anything to keep him happy. So, if Zed asks, I’ll gladly have a pole installed in the shower and do the Coyote Ugly…butt naked on the windowsill if it’ll keep my brave, bug-fighting Zed content.

I’m just hoping Zora is really a she. The idea of frying bacon in the nude…*shiver*

This is Zed sunning himself at the back of the property. You can tell it's Zed because Zora has longer hair.

I'm Still Alive!

Sorry it's taken me so dang long to get back online. Things have been crazy busy since the move, and I barely had a chance to set my computer up today. The unpacking is almost finished, though, so I can stop hatin' life now. I tried to keep a journal of the every day things going on here, looking at it now, a lot of it is kind of boring, so I'm just going to post the ones that don't put me to sleep half way through.

Banana Annie

My first real conversation with one of the locals here in Sayulita didn’t happen with a nice, normal, Mexican family, or even with one of the more colorful indigenous Cora or Huitchol Indians. No, my first encounter was with Banana Annie, or as her sign reads in front of her jewelry shop, Banannie.

Annie is a fifty seven-year old, platinum blonde artist and resident of downtown Sayulita. She told me she came here nearly ten years ago (though she refused to divulge why or how) and started hawking her handmade jewelry in the tiny town square.

I met Annie on my third day here alone, after my husband had gone back to L.A. I was sitting outside her shop on my quad, debating on what to do about dinner, when she called out to me. “Hey! You looking for something?”

“No, just looking around,” I assured her.

A couple passed by the front of her store at that moment. Annie let out a cackle and spoke to them in a voice just bordering on manic. “Denver, right?” When the couple nodded, whether in agreement or to humor her, I’m not sure, she cackled again with glee, pointing one hideously manicured finger (I’m thinking pink Whiteout, but it could have been the standard, nipple pink house paint so common ‘round these parts) at her temple and winking. “Yep, I know,” she said smugly. “I’m Crazy Annie, I know everything.”

She then stepped off her porch and approached me. “So what’s your story, sweety?”

“Well, I’m just looking for a place where I won’t feel too conspicuous eating alone.”

At this, Annie took hold of my arm and tugged until I got off my quad. “Oh, you don’t have to eat alone. I just made some curried rice and I always make too much. Come on, you can have dinner right here with me.”

“Oh no, I don’t want to intrude.”

“Nonsense!” she insisted. “I’m Crazy Annie, I love intrusions.”

It was at this point that I discovered that Crazy Annie has the attention span of a fish. Twice she stopped mid-sentence to talk to locals who greeted her with, “Hola, Ana!” asked her how she was and hugged her warmly. Then she led me inside her shop where I followed behind her as she flitted from one end to another, showing me her wares. Then we went out to the back where her adorable little adobe house and the rest of its occupants were; twelve cats and a gorgeous black lab whose name I can’t remember. The lab stared at her adoringly as she introduced each of her cats by name (can’t remember any of them either) and told me their origins.

Finally, she flitted past the stove, which reminded her that she had offered to feed me. She climbed up on a milk crate (the stove was tiny, but it was perched on top of the counter and she couldn’t reach it from the floor) and served me up a plate of rice that looked delicious, with the exception of some suspicious looking squares of meat that had me eyeing the cats with fear. She pointed out all the ingredients, corn, peas, onion, sunflower seeds, and assured me that the meaty stuff was tofu. Then she led me back out front to sit at a small plastic table, which she informed me was a relic from her days of selling jewelry in the square.

“I’m gonna run next door and get us something to drink.”

“Oh, let me get it, Annie. It’ll be my treat for such a nice dinner.”

“No, no,” she pooh poohed my offer with a wave of her hand. “How much is a glass of Jamaica?”

Ugh. For the record, I hate Jamaica water. My brother calls it Mexican Kool-aid. Hibiscus flower water with sugar, ick. But it was ice-cold and tasted wonderful in the afternoon heat and humidity. I gulped it down and ate the curry, which was delicious, even the spongy ‘meat’, as Annie ran off to help a customer.

When she returned, I asked her if she knew of a local dentist. I had an infection in one of my wisdom teeth that had gotten into my jaw and ear and it was starting to really bother me.

“Oh, oh, oh, Diego! NO!”

I looked up from my food to see her bolt out into the street, yelling at a toddler across the way, who was joyfully stepping off the curb and into the path of an oncoming (albeit slow moving) car, to come see, “Ana banana!”

After safely returning Diego to his mother, Annie returned, and without skipping a beat, said, “I love my dentist; he does an awesome job.” She then gave me a grin that displayed the most gruesomely crafted set of dental implants I’d ever seen.

I smiled. “Yes, he does.”

“He’s in Bucerias (the town just before Puerto Vallarta). Would you like his number?”

I humored her and took the small piece of paper on which she had scribbled the dentist’s ten-digit phone number.

We chatted a while longer. Annie told me she was a big fan of American Idol and the Gene Simmons reality show. Occasionally, she would punctuate her conversation with, “Oooh, I love this song!” As yet another golden oldie from the sixties played through the speakers at the front of the store. Every other sentence or so, Annie would interrupt me to call out to Diego, wave to someone she knew, or thought she knew, and offer up the information that she was “Crazy Annie” to any tourists passing by.

I thanked Annie profusely for her kindness and rose to leave, but she had already lost interest in me and was out on the sidewalk talking to another small group of tourists.

I sat on my quad and watched her for a moment, realizing that part of Annie’s persona was no more than an act. It was what people expected from a single, older woman with too many cats, living the expatriate life in a remote village outside the US, and so she complied. Though part of Annie really was cracked, and I’m sure she felt the loneliness we all feel sometimes, perhaps even more so, she looked as happy as anyone I’d ever seen. She had friends who treated her like one of their own, even though they all called her loca. She had her dog, her cats and her jewelry.

I started wondering, which came first, the crazy or the move to Sayulita, and decided that it didn’t really matter. If Annie lived in the States, she’d be ostracized, maybe even institutionalized for her nuttiness, where they’d tried to ‘fix’ her…and she’d be miserable. Here, she was free to be herself, to act as friendly and as batty as she wanted without being judged…at least not too harshly. She’d found a home in Sayulita, a family, and as much happiness as any fruit loop could hope for. God bless you, Banannie.

See Ya On The Other Side

Well, everything's packed and loaded, I'll be bathing my dog, packing up my comp and doing last minutes errands and stuff. Next time I post it'll be from here and I'll no longer be Sayulita bound, I'll be Sayulita livin'.

Is It Really Almost Time?

I can't believe I'm three days away from fulfilling one of my wildest dreams and all I can think of is, don't forget your underwear, do NOT forget your underwear. Okay, that one is my friend Mel's fault, but there you have it.

So yeah, Playa de los Muertos. Sayulita is peppered with small, isolated beaches that are surrounded by rocks and only accessible by kayak. But there is one, Playa de los Muertos, that you can reach from a small road. Playa de los Muertos is probably the best swimming beach in Sayulita. It's a stretch of sand that runs about the length of a football pitch, located in an isolated cove. It's on the southern end, just a short drive through town and up a narrow path where you have to pass through the graveyard (hence the name, Beach of the Dead). When we were there, we met a guy from Buenos Aires, his American wife and their beautiful little baby (baby was sleeping so I didn't get the chance to ask if it was a boy or girl). We spent a bit of time chatting with them about how they liked living in Sayulita. I hope to meet up with the wife again once we're settled (if I can find their house again, somewhere near the center of the village). Although she says she loves the life there, she seemed pleased with the possibility of having a new, English speaking neighbor.

Playa de los Muertos

I hope I get a chance to make another post before I leave, but if I don't, wish me luck and talk to you when I get there!

Sayulita, A History Lesson, Part One

Sayulita is a rather small village in the state of Nayarit, in the country of Mexico, on the planet of Earth (shut up, Sid, just because they don't have a Sizzler, doesn't mean it's on another planet). It's about a 20 minute drive up the coast from Puerto Vallarta, unless you get stuck behind a semi, a school bus, or someone herding goats. It can then be anywhere from 45 minutes to two days to reach the port city (depending on how hungry the goats are). The road looks like this:
So going around said semi, schoolbus, herd o' goats, really isn't an option. The village was founded by a small group of families migrating from the state of Jalisco in the eary 1940's, a huge surprise to the Cuyuteco indians, who had foundededed it centuries before that. Queue Eddie Izzard moment:

"You can't claim us, we live here!"
"Do you have flag?"
(curtsey)

Then the surfer dudes and stoners found the place in the 1960's and the rest is history. Now people from around the world call Sayulita home. When we first visited the village of about 4,000 residents, we met people from all over the U.S. and Mexico, as well as from Germany, Argentina and Canada. The Canadians really appreciate the fact that you can stop talking for a minute and your lips won't freeze shut, ay.

Next Post: History of Playa de los Muertos (Beach of the Dead)