MEXICO 2013"Monarchs and Cooking School

Mexico 2013

Monarchs and Cooking School

Guanajuato, Mexico

Maddy and Terri, Morelia, Mexico

San Miguel de Allende is in what is called the “Colonial Heartland” of Mexico. Many Americans live or winter there and it is frequently homebase for me.

In a nutshell, this trip encompassed three colonial cities and several themes:

Migration of the monarch butterfly
Cooking School (no one that knows me will believe this)
Exercise in the park
Lovers

LOVERS

Because I’ve been to Mexico so many time, I choose a theme for my photographs. Last year it was roadside shrines. This year, on a more upbeat note, it was lovers. They are everywhere. If you were a sarcastic American (as I am when I am in the USA), you’d say “get a room”. In Mexico, it’s just plain sweet - all ages. Maybe there is hope for me yet. I only regret that I wasn’t able to get a photograph of two clowns embracing on a park bench.

Guanajuato is a university city (population 75,000). The guide book describes it as a “labyrinthe”. Walking the streets you feel as if you were trapped in a MC Escher drawing. Our hotel was also built on this theme. Rooms were built into the mountainside connected by a maze of hallways gardens and staircases. Returning to my room with Terri’s coffee one morning, I became lost. Every route kept leading me back to the sounds of amorous lovemaking. I’m happy they were having such a good morning!

BUTTERFLIES

The city of Morelia was home base to the monarch butterfly portion of the trip. Millions of monarch butterflies winter from November to March in this part of Mexico before migrating to Canada. It goes like this:

Mate, fly to Texas, lay eggs (about 400 per female) on milkweed trees, male and female die, larvae hatch as new butterflies, eat milkweed, fly north to more milkweed trees
Cycle repeats 3 more times.
Fourth generation arrives in Canada by summer having spread the whole width of country
Fourth generation (now super monarchs), fly (via aroma) all the way to Mexico, arriving around November
Cycle repeats

It’s unbelievable to actually see butterflies mate and I can carry on the theme of lovers.

FOOD

Food and tequilla were constantly discussed. On this trip, I learned to sip tequillas (Centinario, Correlejo, Don Ramon) or drink “bandera” (flag of Mexico style) - three glasses in front of you, first with lime juice, second with tequila and third with “sangrita” (a tomato-y concoction). Sip, sip sip. Friend Terri is a caterer, so when we heard of cooking school in San Miguel, even I thought it sounded like fun. In three hours, two chefs took nine of us with plastic Mexican “go to market” bags to the market where we learned about and bought different types of chile and tasted: atole with tamales, pulque, pepian, helote, tortillas, mole, boiled peanuts and boiled garbanzos. We then returned to the school and prepared and ate: two kinds of quesadillas one with squash blossoms the other with corn, and a great sauce, sopes (thick corn tortilla) with beans chorizo and cheese, sautéed cactus (nopales), guacamole and salsa that we made with roasted vegetables. We made our own corn tortillas.

EXCERCISE IN THE PARK

Truly though, my favorite part of San Miguel days was morning excercise in the park - zumba, tai chi (who needs Boston Sports Club), but better than those was walking with the Mexican women. Group leader, Esperanza (name means “Hope”) walked - “arms in front”, “roll your wrists”, “on tip toes”, “up/down the steps”. She was the Pied Piper. Each time we turned around, the double line of Mexican women of a certain age had gotten longer. We did push-ups on trees, then literally hugged our tree and thanked it. The session ended with a prayer (translated from Spanish by me):

“Senor, send us the energy that we need to live this day with happiness, enthusiasm and the knowledge that we need for all that is presented to us in this day”

Maddy's Travels