Christmas Eve

It is busy in town today! Cars are being washed, people are in lines at the bank and the grocery store (Pepe’s) and we are sure that lots of cooking is happening. Tonight is the big night for everyone and then tomorrow will be quiet. Recuperating from hangovers?

We were big spenders yesterday (haha) - had our laundry washed, dried, in the sun, and folded yesterday at the local laundry place one block away ($7), bought some coffee from Tepic which the store ground for us ($7 Cdn/kg), bought a bouquet of flowers ($4 Cdn), and ate an early Christmas dinner at our favourite restaurant called El Tapanco. We had an appetizer of squid rings with chipotle sauce, followed by a km rack of ribs, mashed sweet potato and banana and a delicious green salad and a drink ($40 Cdn which included the tip). Today, Chris had his hair cut ($5 Cdn) and we bought 4 sweet grapefruits ($1.50).

The cleaning lady who lives next door was supposed to come today but asked if it was okay if she
comes tomorrow, December 25. She has company today - feeding two truck loads of soldiers dressed in full army gear a Christmas lunch! She gave us clean towels and but will clean the apartment later.

We met some people who were on tour from Puerto Vallarta and they were amazed that we found this town and on top of that a place to stay. In the last two days, two different people have offered us nice apartments to stay in for under $300/month! Our apartment is more expensive but we have a lovely clean apartment in a good location with solar water heating and everything that we need. The owner lives in Guadalajara but is easy to contact and acts immediately re any little issues or wants that we have.

Last week, as we were walking to the village of Yerba Buena, we passed an open doorway. Chris complimented the lady who lived there by telling her that her flowers were nice. She promptly invited us into her home to show us her Charlie Brown Christmas tree, which she had just started to decorate. Obviously, she was very poor. The floor was part concrete and part dirt, the kitchen counter was a big stump and we have seen better furniture at the dump... but, she was happy to show us her collection of Christmas decorations and wish us a Merry Christmas.

I decided that one of our gnomes would look nice with her tree and nativity scene, so we took one to her. Well, she immediately recognized us and once again invited us in. Her big son was there but was shy so quickly went into another room. She called him back and Chris took a photo of her with the ‘Good Luck” gnome. She was thrilled and wanted to put it in the manger scene! For sure, she will have a little story to tell her neighbours about the Canadienses who gave her the gnome.

A restaurant in Mascota, called Navidad, is known for its soup called pozole. Pozole, which means "hominy", is a traditional Mexican soup or stew. Hominy is dried corn that has been soaked in a lye/lime solution. Grits are made from hominy. Pozole is made from hominy, with meat (pork or chicken, or both), and can be seasoned and garnished with shredded lettuce or cabbage, chile peppers, onion, garlic, radishes, avocado, salsa or limes. We got the basic soup as well as a big plate with all the garnishes so we could choose what we wanted in our soup. We managed to eat half of our huge bowls of soup and took the rest home. It is very filling.

We decided that we would eat a simple dinner at our apartment, play a game of Quirkle and watch a movie. Mascota activities went on all night with bells and fireworks at midnight. Tomorrow should be a quiet day for a reason!Read more