criplomats

Sunset, Puerto Vallarta

It’s hard to imagine how cold it is right now in Arkansas! Due to the altitude here, Guadalajara is blessed with wonderful weather. While the locals think it’s getting cold here, I’m still fine wearing sandals and short-sleeved shirts, perhaps with a sweater in the morning. Lovely!

This week was pretty calm. Tuesday was Veteran’s Day; it was a bit rainy and overcast here. We stayed in most of the day because our internet was out and the technician was in and out of the apartment all day. He finally got it fixed, but we were without it for several days – in a way it was pleasant. Without it, there was no surfing or TV since we stream everything – but we got caught up on talking and reading, so it was nice!

An entry-level officer started his rotation through my section this week, so I spent a lot of time training him to adjudicate citizenship. It’s so interesting that it’s fun to train.

John and I had a nice dinner out at La Tequila after work one evening. We were also introduced to a good salad place for lunch this week, so we ate there several days.

Saturday afternoon we went to Cindy and Raoul’s. They had several vendors at their house, plus it was a good chance to eat and drink and visit. I bought a pair of earrings and a necklace, both done by Cindy – very pretty.

After years of feeding Flavia only dry cat food, this week I switched her to “wet” food, after reading some about the benefits of wet food (better hydration for kidneys). She seems to love it and has adapted just fine to the switch!

Cheers! Tamarind margaritas

The Consul General hosted a very nice party in John’s honor on Friday night so the local business community could meet him. Lots of landlords and various business owners and service providers – all of whom do business with the Consulate, and, specifically John’s section – came out to say hello. It was a beautiful venue, up on a rooftop terrace, and the weather was perfect. The CG gave remarks and introduced John, then John also gave remarks – and did a great job, of course! I was very proud of him!

John’s birthday was earlier in the week and we had fun celebrating. His team did a breakfast for him – lots of good food and cake, then later in the day, I took up another cake. That evening he and I walked over to a nice Peruvian restaurant for dinner. We sat outside and enjoyed Pisco Sours and an excellent meal. He got lots and lots of birthday wishes and I think he enjoyed the day!

Saturday we met some Consulate folks in the little town of Tonalá, about 30 minutes from here. Some of the local artisans took us on a tour to see some of the town and their beautiful ceramics at the artists’ homes. First they took us high up on a hill overlooking the town (and you can also see Guadalajara from there). It’s a lovely view, plus there is a beautiful stone church there:

Church at Tonalá

Rocks with prayers placed in front of the Virgin of Guadalupe

Next we visited two local artisans’ studios – which means we went to their house and backyard, basically. The locals artisans are (rightfully) very proud of keeping their traditional arts alive, and have a hard time with the rest of their town, which is known as one of the biggest and cheapest markets around – but lots of the vendors sell stuff that they say is from the locals but really it’s from heaven-knows-where and are cheap knock-offs. I really liked Florentino Jimón’s work (and he is so nice) – here he is signing a decorative plate we bought:

The plate has two nawales on it – they are creatures who can take the shape of anything, sort of shape-shifters, I guess. You see lots of them in the artwork in Tonalá – and I found this one in the dust on a window:

Nawal

We also went down underneath a church to see the niches, where cremains are stored (Mexico is running out of cemetery space), and then we ended the tour at a tiny market where about a dozen artesans displayed their ceramics on tables for sale – fittingly in the old house of one of the town’s first ceramic artists.

Last night we walked down to Cindy and Raoul’s apartment where they had about a dozen people over for lasagna – the food was delicious, and I enjoyed sitting out on their balcony chatting with friends all evening.

The only down side of the week was on Saturday morning around 4:30 AM. I heard an odd noise that woke me up; we quickly discovered that it was water pouring down behind the wall of one of the bedrooms. Turns out the apartment two floors above us had some sort of water problem. Luckily it didn’t do too much damage to our apartment, although it did leak gallons of water into a bucket we put out and a lot of plaster fell off the ceiling!

Here are a few more photos from Tonalá. Click here to see all of them.

Ladies Room Door

Mops

Door

Basket

Truck with Chickens

Vegetables

Gum ball machines

Street posole

Ceramic Studio

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We got the rest of our air shipment delivered this week, so John has his beloved espresso maker and coffee roasting equipment – which means I get delicious lattes on the weekends! I’m enjoying my second one of the morning right now.

This week was fairly routine. I made it to the gym several times this week, although I’m not making it every morning like I was in Pakistan, but I’m working on it! Our building has a nice little gym downstairs, which makes it convenient so I really don’t have an excuse!

Work is going fine. It’s actually a bit of an adjustment to slow down from the pace in Islamabad, but it’s a good problem to have! John and I usually venture out together at lunch and find a place for a taco or a salad (yes, you can eat the veggies here – we even get fruit cups from the street vendor). The weather is so lovely, and it’s such a treat to walk out of the Consulate and be able to walk around.

Another good thing about being here is that we’re more aligned with the time zones, so it’s easier to talk to friends. Ann and I had a good long conversation yesterday, which was nice.

Afterwards, I walked across the street from our apartment to the mall and had a nice manicure and pedicure. One of the hardest things about moving is finding those little things that make you feel more at home – we’re getting there!

We capped off the afternoon with a going-away party for a woman in our office who is heading back to Washington. It was a nice outdoor event at her apartment building with a lovely view of the city – the caterers set up a grill and had all kinds of yummy tacos.

Flavie continues to feel more and more at home. She’s regained some of her playfulness and is eating more – I like to think that she realizes she is home and doesn’t have to go anywhere for several years!