Tag Archives: Sinaloa

Pasacalles, Clausura del Festival Escena Mazatlán 2013

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The theater festival this year was wonderful, as usual. We are so blessed with terrific arts in this small city! What really capped it off for me was the “pasacalles,” an ambulatory “theater in the streets.” It was Sunday October 13 at 7:00 pm. starting at the Glorieta Sanchez Taboada and winding its way around to the Machado.

35 students from the Municipal School of the Arts theater workshop participated, along with two terrific singers—Flor Estrada and Jorge Echeagaray, plus a few wonderful dancers. It was directed by Jorge Gorostiza Zatarain.

What a fun event! There was live singing and dancing (“Perfume de gardenia”, “Personalidad”, “Luna lunera” e “Historia de amor” “La Tombola”), dramatic acting, and a really cool “theater-on-feet”—the students held a sheet as they danced, and a projector showed clips of the Golden Age of Mexican cinema onto the white sheet. How creative is that?

Looking at the costumes, you can tell what most of the participants are dressed as, right? Come on…. Label them… (Mouseover a photo to cheat, click on it to enlarge and view slideshow.)

La Araña, La Estrella, y El Sol also
El Katrin
El Valiente
La Mariposa
El Borracho
La Sirena
Help me with this one. El Negrito? El Músico?

Lotería, of course, in this most Mexican of fiestas! Once we entered the Plazuela, Lotería was called, and the “board”—in the center of the street—was filled in with live people. It was great! Once that was complete, four luchadores put on an exciting show. The fight saw “El Santo” and “Blue Demond” against “El hombre lobo” and “Los vampiros.” You can view my 1-1/2 minute video of the event below.

Get Your “Chicken Breakfast” Tickets Now!

One of 11 routes...

One of 11 routes…

Every year since 1990 (that’s 23 years!), thanks to Yolanda Medina and her entire family plus friends, over 2000 families in the very poorest areas of Mazatlán receive a whole chicken, 10 days’ worth of food, some gently used clothing, toys and candy for the kiddos.

Waiting my turn

Waiting my turn

This is a truly multinational effort, with loads of locals, foreign residents, snow birds and even tourists joining in. It’s quite magical. It is our favorite event of the year. The joy of being able to bring such joy to people! Won’t you join us or help out? There are options for nearly everyone. Here are a few:

  1. Buy tickets for the fundraiser breakfast on Saturday December 7, 2013, from 8:30 am at the API/cruise ship dock. Your ticket, which costs 150 pesos, will include breakfast, a raffle, and entrance to a Christmas Bazaar and Silent Auction. Tickets are on sale at the Mazatlán Membership Library in the Centro Histórico, as well as at Post-N-Ship in the Golden Zone (across from DHL and Aeromexico, next to Dolce Mami). You can call me at 118-4114, or Jorge Medina, in English, at cell phone number 6691-10-0744, and he’ll get you tickets. Quite a few foreign residents will be selling them as well.
  2. Can’t make the breakfast? Please give a donation! 100% of your money goes to buy food for those in need, as all of us who work on this project are volunteer. People who are out of town asked if they could please donate, so I’ve set up a link on the right of this blog, right under where readers subscribe. Just click on “Donate” and you can do so via PayPal. I know recipients will appreciate your help!
  3. Collect your gently used clothing, toys, and stuffed animals, buy some candy to give the kids, donate used blankets or coats, and bring it by Jorge’s shop, Quince Letras Wrought Iron (corner of Francisco Villa and Tampico, just down the hill from the Church of Cristo Rey /Christ the King church), downtown.
  4. Make items for the Christmas bazaar—craft items, sewn items, canned goods, pies, cakes. 100% of the money collected at the bazaar goes to buy food for those in need.
  5. Donate items for the Silent Auction. Do you own a restaurant or know someone who does? Do you own a spa or frequent one? How about a hairdresser? Do you make stained glass or paint, or…? Please, help us collect items to be sold in the Silent Auction. It’s a great way to promote a local business, and for such a good cause!
  6. Solicit donations of foodstuffs with a shelf life: rice, beans, pasta, canned tuna, tomato puree, vegetable oil, sugar, salt, instant coffee, and cookies are most welcome!
  7. Join Yolanda the week of December 16th, to pack bulk foodstuff into smaller portions, so we can be ready to go on the “big day,” December 24th.
  8. Let us know you have a truck and are game to drive it on December 24th. We (almost) always need more vehicles in which to transport the frozen chickens and food sacks.
  9. Join us on December 24th! That is the day we will meet early in the morning at Quince Letras to assemble ourselves into routes, pack up the items we’ll need for that route, and then drive to the colonias to hand it all out. Show up at 7:00 if it’s your first time; 6:30 if you know the drill.

Want to know more details about this project? Other posts on this blog about Breakfast of the Chickens:

Another Gorgeous Friday Morning in Mazatlán

Sometimes routines can be a really good thing. We hike the lighthouse hill, as you know, several times a week. It’s wonderful to see those who also have that routine, and to notice the small, day-to-day and week-to-week changes.

Sunrises are always gorgeous here, and today’s over the harbor was no exception.

Flowers are in full glory right now. The smell is intoxicating, and they are also a definite feast for the eyes. I love how the flowering vines grow over and decorate the cacti, and I especially love watching the shrimp boats just outside the port.

The other day we noticed some young men painting new murals on the walls of Colegio Pacífico on the hill. There was already one there from 2011, but now there are quite a few more.

And, finally, as we worked our way home to start the day’s work, we met up with a march for World Mental Health Day. Marines, nurses, and a whole lot of young people took part in the parade. It was encouraging to see.

And, we’re showered and at our desks by 9:00 am! Thank you, Mazatlán, for all your beauty!

Las Barbikiu de Cochi – Great ribs right here in Mazatlan!

One of the most commonly searched out foods in Mazatlan is great ribs. Most of what passes for great ribs in town are not, they are just relatively better than what everyone else has. Well, the bar has just been raised. Oswaldo Cordero opened his new barbecue stand on Saturday Sept. 28. These are meat packed ribs with incredible smokey flavor and a homemade sauce. Oswaldo lived in the Bay Area for over 12 years and is happy to speak English with you. Click through the pictures to learn more, like how to find him!

Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/barbikiudecochi?fref=ts
Phone 669-932-89-39
Deliveries available for orders over 3 kilos – but then you miss the chance to talk to the Sheriff!

Open seven days a week beginning at 1:00 until around 5:00. Rain or shine!

Finger lickin’ good – provecho!

Sheriff Oswaldo!
Don’t these look good?
This is the sign to look for on Rafael Buelna
Just off of Rafael Buelna, across from the bull ring, under the large billboard currently advertising for dportenis.
The Sheriff’s got his own secret sauce recipe – it is very good, but he happy to not put on sauce – just tell him.
The smell from this smoker it awesome!

5th Anniversary and 200 Posts

5 yearsOur first entry on the VidaMaz blog was June 14, 2008. At that point, I had been a lover of and frequent traveler to Mazatlán since 1982; Greg since 1993. We had been married here (at the Hotel Camino Real in its heyday), and we had already owned our home here for a few years. In 2007, we had made the decision to change our lives, and the country in which we lived. In June of 2008 we loaded our just-out-of-sixth-grade son into a car, drove south by southwest, and enrolled him into junior high school here in our adopted hometown.

And oh how we’ve loved it! Danny did not want to come. He didn’t want to leave his friends. He didn’t want to learn Spanish. When we woke him up for school on the one-year anniversary of our move here, he proclaimed, “One year since we made the best decision of our lives!” We have made so many dear friends, we have learned so many new things, we have experienced events and realities that have stirred our souls. Our son has become bilingual, bicultural, the children of immigrant parents. He celebrated his 13th birthday in our pool, and just two weeks ago he celebrated his 18th. Every parent says it, but where has the time gone?

We started this blog in order to let our family and friends back home, and worldwide, see a bit of our new lives here. What I really treasure about this blog is the way it has helped us keep a record of our journeys, of some of what we have learned, and most importantly, of the people we have met along the way. Mazatlán absolutely has some of the world’s friendliest, happiest, and most open-hearted people on the planet! Thank you all for allowing us to live here in this beautiful port city with you!

In looking at the blog’s statistics, I realize that the blog has become a source of information for many of our fellow expats. We didn’t plan it that way, but we are very happy to be able to be of some service to others. We have thousands of readers who come here to learn how to enjoy Mazatlán with kids and how to choose a school and live here with kids (one, two, three, and many more). Two of our most popular posts include last year’s Immigration Forum (not a topic we’d normally write about, but the changes in immigration rules were hugely important for all expats, and no one else at the time, at least in Mazatlán, was really writing about it), and Getting a Driver’s License in Mazatlán (information that has of course changed since it was first published, but our readers have kindly kept it updated).

Most of our posts, as you our readers know, are about events and people here in town. We definitely enjoy life here, despite or because we work more than full-time. Other popular posts have included:

HOLIDAYS

  1. Quite a few on Carnavál (one, two, three, and our “eternal calendar” of Carnavál events)
  2. Day of the Dead
  3. Spring Equinox at Las Labradas and the Deer Dances (one, two)
  4. Celebrations for Independence Day here in town
  5. Religious tourism in and around Mazatlán for Holy Week

EVENTS

  1. Happily for us, posts about our favorite event all year—Desayuno de los Pollos, a charity event conducted by my good friend Yoly (one, two), are popular. We have participated in this event from the time we came down as tourists. Danny was maybe eight the first time we had the privilege of participating.
  2. The extremely cool annual swim to Deer Island, the Travesía Anual

PROFILES

  1. Eating breakfast with oyster divers
  2. Interview with a cancer survivor who opened a meat shop and deli (and the story of a historic restaurant we enjoyed decades ago)
  3. Shrimp fishermen (one, two)
  4. Lots of excitement around Ice Skating at Christmas last year

OTHERS

  1. Travel nearby (weekend trips): Mezcaltitán, Bird watching in Singayta
  2. Definitely take longer to fully enjoy Copper Canyon

There are hundreds more posts—our observations and experiences of the culture here, dozens of other holidays, events and people. Please check them out.

Everyone, thank you for joining us! We work full-time, we have a son still at home, we enjoy nature, like to exercise, are always ready for a good time, and we enjoy the opportunity to record some of our pleasures here in this space. We are most grateful that you have found this blog interesting or useful. What has been your favorite post?