3 Exhibits at Museo de las Artes in Guadalajara

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A Christmas Letter - 2019

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#WakeUpOlive

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Guadalajara Book Fair 2019

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Dia de los Muertos - 2019

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A Journey to Peru

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Punta Ixtal - Primal Migrations

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Sean Scully, The Years In Mexico

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Galo de Allende - A Visit To The Goat Farm

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Oaxaca!

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Monte Albán

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San Cristóbal de las Casas

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Palenque

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Zinacantán

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Cañón del Sumidero

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Misol Há & Agua Azul

In the mountains surrounding the ancient Mayan site of Palenque in the Mexican state of Chiapas, close to the Lacandon jungle and Usumacinta River which divides Mexico and Guatemala, thundering waterfalls dot the landscape. Cascada de Misol Há falls from a height of 115' into a nearly circular pool surrounded by lush tropical vegetation. The water is clear crystal blue due to its mineral content and on a warm spring day the water is perfect for swimming! There is a 60' long cave along the massive rock face that allows you to walk behind the waterfall and provides stunning views of the world from behind the veil.

Aqua Azul is a seemingly endless series of spectacular cataracts one following another as they cascade down the mountainside. Surrounded by tropical forests, banana trees, brilliant pink hanging heliconia and bright red ginger. The place is truly magical.

Photography by Bill Sheehan

Indigenous Apostles

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Carnival - Ajijic, Mexico, 2019

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Ajijic is getting Too Crowded!

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Everyone talks about the multitude of new arrivals that continue to flood into Ajijic and how fast the neighborhood is growing. Everywhere we go it keeps getting more and more crowded.

Just this week we’ve got three new additions to the neighborhood!

If this keeps up we’ll soon be running out of room!

Abuelinda's Cooking School

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Abuelinda's Cooking School

It’s a Mexican history lesson, it’s a cultural emersion course, it’s a health seminar, an international economics tutorial, an anthropology lesson, a culinary shopping experience, and it’s a cooking class!

Linda has been cooking in Latin America and the Caribbean for 35 years, and the classes that she offers are an astonishing mix of everything she’s encountered during that time. Every Wednesday she offers a “Tianguis to Table” class which starts in the local open air street market called the tianguis (tay-yán-gays) learning about and selecting local fruit, vegetables, Mexican foods, and then returning to Abuelinda’s kitchen and preparing a meal. She also offers classes from the culinary worlds of Chiapas, Oaxaca, Veracruz, Puebla, all unique, all fascinating.

We started early one morning at the local tianquis  where blue plastic tarps tethered haphazardly to trees and each other arc low over the jostling crowds. The  rows of tables that line the cobblestone streets feature beautifully crafted corn-husk dolls, excruciatingly detailed beadwork by the local Huichol Indians, magnificent woolen shawls and clothing from the highlands outside of Chiapas, homeopathic remedies, and an astonishing array of fruits, vegetable, meats, fish, cheeses.  Queso fresco and panela cheeses, spiny nopal cactus, plump blueberries, roasted garbanzo beans, natural pig skin pickled in vinegar (cueritos), or fried (chicharrón), candied quince, fresh fish, chickens, flowers, The variety is endless!

We bought ingredients for our afternoon menu of Chiles en Nogada, deep green poblano chilies, a pork shoulder, plump raisins, dried mango, candied bisnaga cactus, pears, apples, peaches, plantains, Mexican canela, pomegranates, Queso de cabra, walnuts, rice, the list goes on.

But it was in Abuelindas kitchen that the real magic happened. We were each guided through an assigned a task, charring the poblanos over an open flame, dicing the pork, mixing and grinding spices in a molcajete (volcanic rock mortar & pestle), chopping fruits, seeding pomegranates, all accompanied by a running commentary and explanation of our many unfamiliar ingredients, and delightful stories about the cultures and cuisines of Mexico.

And then the best part. We got to enjoy the fruits of our labors. The roasted, smoky, earthy flavor of the poblano chile is the essence of Mexico, and when stuffed with the warm picadillo filling of diced pork, fruits, nuts, herbs, and spices, covered in a cool, creamy walnut sauce, and sprinkled with tangy, tart, pomegranate seeds, the result is simply heaven! I could eat this every day of my life!

Dia de la Candelaria

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Dia de la Candelaria

If you found a plastic baby Jesus in your King’s Cake on El dia de Los Reyes (Three Kings Day) on January 6^ththen listen up!  Tradition states that if you get the plastic baby, you are the designated Padrino (Godfather) and get to host the fiesta for everyone on Dia de la Candelaria which is today (Feb. 2) and, among other responsibilities, you have been designated to provide tamales for everyone! Perhaps you should have been paying attention a little earlier, because this is a really big deal (and a lot of work).

Día de la Candelaria, like so many other Mexican celebrations, is a fascinating fusion of pre-Hispanic traditions and Catholic beliefs. It’s a seasonal celebration (midway between the winter solstice and the vernal equinox), an agricultural celebration (the January rains will determine the best time to plant, indeed they’re thought to predict the weather for the entire year), and a couple of religious celebrations (the Feast of the Purification of the Virgin, and the Presentation at the Temple). 

In many cultures the forty days of postpartum confinement after the birth of a child, often referred to as ‘lying-in’, provides a recovery period for the mother and a time for mother and child to bond (referred to as “la cuarentena” or “forty days” in Latin American countries, the source of the English word “quarantine”). At the end of this period a ceremony called “churching” provides a blessing or purification and celebrates the recovery of the mother and her return to the church and a full social life. Celebrated on February 2nd, forty days after Christmas, the feast of the “Purification of the Virgin”, coincides with the time, according to Jewish law, that it was customary to bring a newborn baby to the temple, thus the feast of the “Presentation of the Christ Child at The Temple”.

In Mexico the baby Jesus is the most important part of the Christmas celebration. On Christmas Eve the baby is placed in the Nativity scene, and on January 6, King’s Day, the child is brought gifts from the Three Kings, and then on February 2^nd, the official end of the Christmas season, the figure of the Christ child that has been lying in the manger must be presented at the local church to be blessed in a ceremony that remembers the presentation at the Temple.

But this is not as simple as it sounds. The swaddling clothes that Jesus has been wearing for the past month or so are not the proper attire for this very special occasion. So if you were the lucky one to find a plastic baby Jesus in your Rosca de Reyes on Three Kings Day, then you are the designated “Padrino” (godfather) and must, among various other responsibilities, dress the baby Jesus in the finest of  clothes for his big day. The first year the baby is traditionally dressed in white representing El Nino de las Palomas (The Child of the Doves) or El Nino de las Azucenas (The Child of the Lilies), signifying purity. The second year the Baby Jesus is dressed with a blue, yellow or pink gown and the third year, and thereafter, he is dressed according to the preference of the Godparents, but traditionally as the Nino de la Candelaria (Child of the Candles) with a white gown, a candle in the left hand and flowers in the right.

The Padrino also takes candles to the church and in some agricultural communities he will also take a handful of seeds to be blessed and pray for a year of abundant harvest. At the end of the church ceremony the Padrinos take the Christ child back to the home where the Rosca de Reyes was served on Three Kings Day and the candles are lit. Later, in the evening there is a traditional “tamalada” where the tamales are made according to the custom of the place. There are many variations depending on which part of the country you reside, some are sweet, some savory, some are wrapped in corn husks, others in banana leaves, but they are all absolutely delicious! Traditionally these are served with “atole de pinole”, a drink made of a toasted corn meal, sometimes sweetened and mixed with cocoa, cinnamon or aniseed,  or “champurrado” (a chocolaty flavored thick drink). What a way to bring the Christmas season to a close!

In addition to The Feast of the Purification of the Virgin and the Presentation of the Christ Child at the Temple, not entirely coincidentally Feb 2^nd falls halfway between the winter solstice and the vernal equinox, a date that signaled that it was time to prepare the earth for planting of crops and of course the need to assess the upcoming weather. Celebrated in Ireland, and other European countries as “Imbolc” (or Saint Brigids’s Day) and in the United States as “Groundhogs Day”, there is also a Spanish tradition referred to as "Cabañuelas" but that's another story.

There's a Plastic Baby Jesus in My Cake!

If you’re fortunate enough to be enveloped by the warmth of family and friends in Mexico during the Christmas season you may be lucky enough to find a baby Jesus hidden in your dessert as you celebrate the Twelfth Night, or Dia de Reyes, (Three Kings Day) on January 6^th.

If you love fruit cake or panettone you’ll love Rosca de Reyes (wreath of the kings), a sweet bread with candied fruits that celebrates the arrival of the Magi. The tradition in Mexico is that whoever finds the baby Jesus in their slice of confection is blessed, and is bestowed the honor of preparing tamales and hosting the celebration of Candlemas on February 2nd.

Sometimes you’ll find multiple baby Jesus’ in the Rosca de Reyes because making tamales is a marathon effort that often involves all of the women in a community. Each woman brings one of the ingredients and each person is responsible for a portion of the production; preparing the masa harina,  cleaning and sorting the corn husks, making the dough, preparing the ingredients, making the sauces , filling the tamales, carefully tying them, steaming the tamales. This is an all day affair that often extends into the evening with all the women in the group gathered in a kitchen, ranchero music playing in the background, and children underfoot. So regardless of your esteem for Punxatawnee Phil, you’ll be too busy making tamales that day to pay much attention to whether the groundhog sees his shadow. But I'm getting ahead of myself, more on Candlemas later.

Three Kings Day is also the day when gifts are brought, not by Santa, but by the Three Kings. Children put their shoes outside their door along with a handful of straw (for the camels and the occasional elephant) and during the night gifts are placed in their shoes. Traditionally these were small hand-wrought toys fashioned from clay or painted sticks, but today of course includes cell phones and upgrades to your favorite electronic device.

This is the feast of the Epiphany as it’s known in much of the world and it brings a celebration of many things. In the Western Christian religion it celebrates the visit of the Magi to the Christ Child, the revelation of God incarnate as Jesus Christ, and in some Eastern denominations the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan River by John the Baptist, and in those communities not so strictly bound by religious edict, it's time to box up the Christmas lights and cart the Christmas tree to the local landfill.

In Mexico these celebrations are all intricately woven into the pattern of life. Each celebration is intertwined with the previous one as well as the next throughout the year. Deeply held traditions connect past and future passing these wonderful ceremonies from one generation to the next.