• 29Sep

  We love it here

  our new home, our new life 3 Comments

  It has been a whole week since we pulled into town. It seems like much longer to us…and our former world in the Pacific Northwest is in the distant past.

  We really love our morning walks with the dogs. We have several different routes so far, but all of them include the malecon for some portion of the walk. Both dogs have turned into nice little walkers…trotting along beside us and only pulling on the leash when we pass another dog.

  We have our internet up and running at home. We took over the former owner’s Telmex account for both phone and dsl, and that included his wireless router. After a little help from Cesar it is working fine. We didn’t know if it would reach downstairs since our walls are concrete a foot thick but the central courtyard allows us to use our computers in the kitchen, like right now!

  Yesterday we got the main floor thoroughly cleaned. It was great to watch them clean the tile floors…splash some soapy water, scrub with a broom, sweep the soapy water to the drains in the courtyard, and then mop with clear water. I don’t know if we’ll get regular help in the house but now I know how to do it…and from now on any dirt here will be our own. They come Monday to do the upstairs.

  Yesterday we bought a couple more things – a rustic wood table to use as an island in the kitchen, a coffee table, a floor lamp and a beautiful large mirror to hang in the dining room over a buffet that we have yet to find. They get delivered this morning.

  Today after the furniture is delivered we will go to the mercado – I really want a big bouquet of fresh flowers – and want to try to find one of those column type fans to blow from the side. The last two days have been very hot and humid – but right now it is very cool and fresh. We are adopting a habit that the locals have of carrying a bandana or washcloth and just mopping ourselves when we need to. I no longer wear makeup and have been wearing my hair in a ponytail or up in a clip.

  We have met a few of our neighbors, and everyone is friendly. We took the dogs for an evening walk last night and the people at the tienda around the corner petted the dogs and asked (as always!) if they bite. It seems funny to us, but as one woman who had experience with gringos said “The dogs of americans are very gentle and don’t bite…it is the truth!”

  So, the adjustment so far seems as natural as we could have hoped. We love it here.

  
• 27Sep

  Are we famous?

  maz people, our new home 1 Comment

  I forgot this little tidbit in my last post, so I thought I’d step back in time to Sunday.

  We’d moved our van full of stuff in, and after dancing around a while we headed out to buy a mattress. We decided we’d buy a queen size for the guest room and just stay in there for the time being. That is because we want a king size bed in our master bedroom and don’t want to buy it with the box springs in case the headboard we buy doesn’t need it. Lots of Mexican beds just use a platform with a mattress on top.

  So we headed out. Gigante. Soriana. Walmart. No. No. No. Only the mattress, or ony the box spring, or something.

  But when we were in Walmart staring at the mattresses a funny thing happened. A couple walked down our aisle and then said “Hey, you just moved here, right? We have read your blog!” So we had a nice visit and got some good advice from our new friends (buy the mattress at Sam’s Club) and laughed and smiled for quite a while about it.

  Another cool thing about buying something like a mattress in Mexico is that there is no problem getting it home. Right outside the door a pickup truck with seats on each side waited. We loaded everything in, and I jumped in with the driver to guide him to our house. A few minutes and a few pesos later we had our new bed all set up and ready for our first night in our new home. Pretty cool.

  
• 26Sep

  Home Sweet Home

  maz house, our new life 4 Comments

  We have been in Mazatlan since Friday evening….and here it is Wednesday! It has been a VERY busy time, but we have been having a blast.

  We spent two days at the B & B – which was wonderful but a pain since we had the dogs with us. Every time we went anywhere I worried they would bother someone but thankfully the only other guest was a working man who was gone all day. We couldn’t take them with us since it is too hot to leave them in the car, and we did have to eat, once in a while, anyway!

  But Sunday morning we got to move into our new place. What a relief it was to unload the van! The dogs explored and romped, and have settled in as Mexican dogs….barking occasionally as people pass but loving their walks on the malecon and trying to learn how to do their business on concrete when necessary.

  But enough about them. We love it here. We are dripping wet sometimes but haven’t really felt HOT. I will say, though, that our feet need to adjust! We walk so much that towards the end of the day we can’t handle any more walking.

  We have been doing a LOT of buying. We bought a gorgeous wrought iron table with a marble top for the sala fresca. We bought two leather chairs for the living room. Today we noticed our next door neighbor had a sign advertising chairs and tables for sale and we bought another wrought iron table and three chairs (with no table top or chair seats) from them. They seem very nice and we managed very well between their limited English and our Spanish.

  We really had to buy a lot of lamps. The house here is very old and when the previous owner restored it he kept true to the house and installed ceiling fans with no lights. So in order to even walk around at night we had to buy some lamps, fast! I had brought a few spotlights but we still end up carrying lamps from room to room sometimes.

  One exciting thing that happened is the other night there was a loud noise while we were sleeping. I got up to see what was happening and found a yucky looking poop in the central courtyard. I thought we had an animal get in or something. In the morning I was surprised to see an injured duck-like bird in the courtyard. When it was still there when we came back from errands I called Martha Armenta, a local woman who is part of an animal protection group. She came and picked up the bird and we had a nice visit. I really look forward to getting to know her and other people in Mazatlan who are active in the community. She also gave us some advice on bringing our bird into Mexico.

  We have been buying groceries – and hangars – and food – and tons of stuff which we will be glad to had over with soon.

  We went out yesterday with our realtor, Erin. She had offered her help getting the utilities worked out, even though it isn’t her main business. So, at 9 am we set off to get the water, electric, and phone transferred into our names, get a bank account and to make a stab at registering our FM3’s. Everything closes at 2 for comida so we knew we needed to be efficient. We went to Bancomer and of course she knew the man there. He cranked away at papers and we had a bank account with two bank machine cards in about 45 minutes. Then we went to the pest control to make arrangements for spraying (we had found some ticks) and then off to the water department.

  The water department was a 15 minute wait, then the paperwork was done, we paid the bill ahead 500 pesos and we were off. Now to the Electric company. We had a little snag because the house has two meters but that got worked out and off we went again! We went to Telmex to change the phone to our name and continue the internet, too. Again, it was about a half hour project. And I am happy we have a phone book, too.

  At this point it was 1 pm and we figured we’d go to Immigracion just to find out what we needed so we could have it ready when we came back. They were so amazing! Happy, helpful and nice. They said we should go to the tienda down the street where the lady would do everything including typing the documents and taking the pictures. We went there and she was incredibly efficient, and by 2 pm our visa registrations had been accepted and we were given a time and date to return to pick them up.

  At this moment we are in our makeshift office and I am sipping a glass of wine from a waterglass. We are both getting hungry so we will head downstairs now for a little food before we take a refreshing shower and head for bed.

  More later.

  

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