Sitting on the beach in Mazatlan waiting for the ferry to take us to La Paz, on the Baja, composing these thoughts. To take you back to the trip from Acapulco...
Miles of mango trees. Who eats all these mangos, anyways? Drove to Colima, a climb, to a cooler place. Nice city, wide streets. Should have spent the day there, but just crashed.
Saturday, drove to Guadalahara to spend a few days there. Ended up in a suburb, Tonala, because Alexander Florez has a studio there. It is really a buyers paradise because so much is manufactured here. Ceramics, jeans, pottery, paintings, everything mexican. Lots of junk. Want 1000 ceramic frogs? No problemo. Stayed in a hotel that caters to buyers... there is a huge parking lot and it had lots of small trucks from Texas, Arizona, California, Ontario, Mexico, some in the process of loading boxes. There is a huge market of maybe 10 acres that at night is an empty field, then, starting around 7 AM they set up their stalls and then by 8 PM they tear down everything and truck whats left away.
Saturday night, we wandered Tonala, and later went to a couple of discos but they were too loud. Funny, things are the same around the world. The discos had police at the door carrying machine guns. Then drifted into a bar full of middle aged Mexicans. People friendly, several introduced themselves to us. I understood very little, Ardell, nothing at all. But we shared laughs, anyways. We wished the juke box would stop, the music was so bad, but when the band started, we wished the juke box would return. 3 man band, with their backs to the audience, so they seemed to play to the bar. Accordian, Bass fiddle, and Drum. But after we had a few beers, they improved considerably. The drummer found the beat of the accordian player, and once actually turned a 360 and kept the beat. Later the bass player vigorously spun his fiddle on its leg so that it crawled across the room. Much applause. We danced. A mexican guy showed me the proper way to dance in Mexico, apparently my footwork was all wrong. Some people bought us beers. We bought some beers for them. Guy walked in wearing a parka. I asked him if it was snowing. It was too cold for him he said, maybe 22 degrees (70 F).
Sunday we took a bus into Guadalahara, a city of 4 million. Downtown is a beautiful place, they block off 20 blocks of a main street Sunday and people bicycle and inline skate down the sreet. Lots of parks. People playing chess, games and sports. The weather in this area is perfect year round. They say every season is like spring. Many trees were in flower, and just getting their new leaves. We visited some galleries, then returned home via a subway and then bus. Got on the wrong bus and spent over an hour driving through some really ugly neighborhoods. It made me think, this place should be a Garden of Eden, but it has been ruined by so many people trying to survive. If we could go back in time and do something about their birthrate...
Monday, went to Tlaquepaque, another suburb, and this place was an upscale Tonala. Great galleries owned by artists. Lots of limited edition 3-D art. Have you seen those statues of fat mexicans on bicycles? That guy has a studio and gallery here. And lots of others. Really a place to come and see the best art of Mexico in one place.
Hope everyone is doing well.
Peter and Ardell
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