Acapulco, Guerrero State, Mexico

It’s great to have Peter McAfee SM visiting on his way back to New Zealand. Pete’s been the formator and superior in the Marist formation house in Brazil for the last two years. Prior to that he was novice master here in Mexico, at the ex-hacienda La Jordana. 

The Marist Formation House here in Toluca has opened. There are five of us in the community - Fr Juan Carlos, the Mexican Marist who is in charge of formation, me as socius and three new seminarians who will study Philosophy at Toluca Diocesan Seminary. More on this in my next post.

I was able to take a couple of days off last week, so we went off to Acapulco. We caught a bus from the terminal at 1.00am. Fortunately it was a luxury service – extra comfy seats and no stops – so we arrived into a grey drizzly Acapulco at 7.30am having had a couple of hours sleep. Pete woke me up saying we’d just travelled down Ngauranga Gorge (the entrance into Wellington).

Acapulco has some similarities to Wellington – it’s a circular bay surrounded by hills. Unlike Wellington it has golden sand beaches framed by high-rise hotels and condominiums. It’s also warm – it was over 30 degrees Celsius. The bay is also heavily polluted.

Some of the food was a bit krap!

After breakfast – pancakes – in a café called “The Parish”, we caught a taxi to Pie de la Cuesta (The Foot of the Hill) over the hill from Acapulco. Pie de la Cuesta is an ocean beach. And obligingly the sun came out. We spent the next couple of days lazing on the beach. The rooms we stayed in were basic, but adequate – bed, toilet, fan. There was a pool, but the water looked just a bit dodgy, so we swam in the ocean. All this for NZ$28 a night – food and drinks extra! We ate on the beach – grilled whole fish, rice and tortillas and salsa.

It's not all tough on the mission - the wine isn't Mission either! You may recognize the chap in the background.

The first day we took refuge from the sun at a table under a palm leaf shelter. No other customers. Eventually an elderly gent shuffled out and offered us a drink. We ordered beers – Coronas (which I’ve never had served with lemon slices here!) 30 pesos each ($2.80) – a bit steep for Mexico. He explained we were also renting the shade! The second beer – some time later – cost 25 pesos. We must have paid for the shade. In the afternoon same shelter, same old gent – two Coronas: $40 pesos! I questioned it – it was for the shelter. I pointed out that we’d been there in the morning – the only customers all day. No price change. I said we were going to stay a couple of days and wouldn’t be back if he charged us that. No price change…

The next day we discovered the hotel we were staying in had its own shelter and chairs. So we sat there – right next to the old fella’s shelter.

On Thursday we headed back into Acapulco and stayed at the Hotel California. A strange place – again basic but adequate. It’s run by an American and seems to attract elderly American men. Some looked like ex-Army. I guess they live better there than in the States. It was certainly cheap enough - $11.30 the night for our rooms.

La Quebrada - the cliff the divers jump off. The lights at the top are the shrine to Guadalupe

Can you make out the divers?

In the evening we wandered up the hill to where the famous divers perform. It was quite a show. Five or six young men parade through the crowd, climb a 35 metre cliff in front of the viewing area. There they say a brief prayer at a shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe and then one by one dive off. It’s quite dramatic – the setting of craggy cliffs overlooking the ocean, the sea crashing up very narrow inlet, the evident danger and the youth of the divers (between 12 and 25 years old). It’s very Mexican – grace and danger with a splash of machismo. 

Acapulco itself is a somewhat faded version of the glamorous place it was when it attracted the international jet set. Now-a-days international travellers go to Cancun or Cozumel. These days Acapulco mostly caters for the domestic market and poor Marists! It’s still a great place!

Mexico Goes to the Polls...

Mexico goes to the polls today. There are four candidates for election – the probable winner is the candidate for PRI, Henrique Peña Nieto. The PRI ruled Mexico for 71 years, by way of intimidation, vote buying, ballot stuffing, murder and general skulduggery. The acronmy stands for Partido Revolucionario Institucional or Institutional Revolutionary Party – which strikes me as somewhat an oxymoron. A revolutionary party that is institutional? Anyway the party seems to have reverted to type and most commentators think it will “win” the election. The party has thrown tens, if not hundreds of millions of dollars at the election – shattering the election spending limits.

The PRI's stranglehold on power was broken in 2000 by Vicente Fox of the Partido de Acción Nacional. The PAN, led by Josefina Vasquez Mota, seems destined to run second. She is the most attractive of the candidates, but being a woman will count against her. Fox has endorsed her opponent, Peña Nieto, much to the annoyance of PAN! Fox probably did that because Josefina was trailing Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador.

AMLO, as he is known, is the candidate of the Partido de Revolución Democratica or the Democratic Revolutionary Party – which also seems to be a bit of an oxymoron! His motto is “AMLOve”, though a less loveable chap would be hard to find. Fox has described him as Mexico’s Chavez (for the Cuban sympathizing Venezuelan President). The fear is that he’ll take Mexico down the same Cuban road as Venezuela.

AMLO was narrowly beaten at the last presidential election. In a fit of pique he called his followers out onto the streets and paralyzed the country for ten days. He does seem to have mellowed however…

The last contender has no chance – it’s generally agreed that he’s the puppet of the all-powerful president-for-life of the teachers union, Ester Gordillo. She’s an ancient, ruthless face-lifted caricature of herself. She controls the teachers union – possibly the biggest union in the country. So she is universally feared by politicians. Latterly she was spotted and photographed buying a Gucci bag in Mexico City. She also has a house in the USA. Hard to understand how she maintains that lifestyle on her union salary…

The most interesting development in the campaign is the rise of the internet generation. A month or so ago, Peña Nieto visited a Jesuit run university in Mexico City. There he was booed and had to take shelter in a toilet until he could be smuggled out of the university. It was, of course, all filmed…

Later his team claimed the students weren’t students at all, but rent-a-protesters. The students made a video of 131 of them showing their student ID cards and posted it on YouTube. It was a hit in Mexico and spawned a new movement called #YoSoy132 or I am number 132. The movement has spread like wildfire in social networks like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

#YoSoy132 have been holding rallies all around the country, describing it as the Mexican Spring in allusion to the Arab Spring. If they all vote it could throw a spanner in the plans of the PRI. We’ll know this evening. 

Whoever wins, I suspect the drama is not over. First of all the outcome has to be accepted by the country. There will be legal challenges – for example for overspending and vote buying. The University Parish was even given a couple of computers by the PRI run State government. We accepted the gift – I don’t vote and the secretary votes for PAN!

The Parish of San Bernardino was also given computers – and some debit cards with around $90.00 charged on them. I think all the parishes got them. I can’t see how it’ll influence the election, but they don’t give these things out between elections!

Tensions run deep and with the corruption and vote rigging that’s characterised the election it may take a while for the dust to settle. We could be in for some interesting days!

Retreat and so on

It’s been a month since I wrote something for this blog. That’s not for the lack of anything to say! Life seems to be getting busier…

I’m slowly getting on top of the organization of the University Parish. We’ve organized a schedule of maintenance and sorted out a few of the pressing problems. I understand now, how each of the different groups work and we’re working on a new schedule for their meetings. It was a little chaotic for a while. The last director of the Centro de Proyección Universitaria (the University Parish) had three or four other jobs as well!

The refurbishment of the top floor (where the Marist Seminary will be) is progressing apace. It should be finished ahead of schedule around the middle of July. It'll be a relief to move in there - I wont have to commute from San Bernardino parish. It's not a great distance, but is a nuisance if I forget something. I'll be helping in the formation house once the seminarians (and the formator) arrive in August.

The Front of the Casa Hacienda "La Jordana

 

Last weekend I went on a “retreat” with 60 young people – “chavos” in the local vernacular. 28 of them formed the team that ran the retreat – with a little input from me and 32 were newbies. It was quite impressive. The retreatants ranged in age from 14 (although the minimum age is 15!) to 18.

The retreat was held at La Jordana – an old hacienda building and a couple of hectares which were given to the Society of Mary by the family of one of the local Marists some time ago. It’s situated in the middle of an open valley at about 2500 metres above sea level. That’s the height of Mount Taranaki/Egmont. La Jordana was used as a seminary for some years and recently as a Novitiate. Fr Peter McAfee SM from Whanganui was the last novice master there. 

The rains have begun, so the valley was quite green – it had been parched the last time I visited there. The valley is wide and open with small settlements dotted around the rolling hills. I imagine the majority of the locals are the descendants of the campesinos who used to work for the patron who owned the hacienda.

Across the valley from La Jordana

It’s a nice spot for youth retreats – spacious, fairly basic and far from shops and bars!

The team ran the retreat – giving most of the talks, leading games and so on, prayers, cooking and cleaning and even having perpetual adoration during waking hours! Well, to be accurate, they were in the chapel in front of the Blessed Sacrament, but I suspect there was a bit of conversation between them rather than with the Lord! They are teens! Still I was impressed by their seriousness and commitment. Not that there weren’t loads of activities and laughter.

I must have only slept about 8 hours in total the whole weekend, but it was great fun and I think the chavos got a lot out of it.

Los Chavos (and an ancient chap at the back centre!)

More photos of the retreat on the next entry.

HSM Retreat

HSM Retreat, a set on Flickr.

Odds and Ends

The day here begins at 6.30am when some kind soul rings the bell of the church (outside my window!) Actually it begins a bit earlier if you’re on the 7.00am Mass. That’s not so bad unless you’ve had a meeting that didn’t finish until 11.00pm the night before!

Toluca City on a hazy day - the Cathedral in the middle

Breakfast (desayuno) is at 8.00am. I was rather surprised to have Kellogg’s Cornflakes put in front of me the first morning. So breakfast is coffee (drip filter :-( ), bread or toast and cornflakes. There is great tropical fruit – and apples and stuff like that. Breakfast with sweet papaya has to be the best way to begin the day!

Most Mexicans seem to lunch (almuerzo) about 2.30pm, some even later. In the community we have lunch, which is the main meal of the day, at the disgustingly early hour of 2.00pm (for Mexicans). It does makes for a long morning… We’ve been going out to local “restaurants” for almuerzo. These are small family run places, where you can get a “menu” for a fixed sum. You have the choice of several items in each course: soups or salads, then rice on its own or with fried plantain or spaghetti. The main course is some sort of meat with sauce – or tacos filled with meat and veg and drenched in sauce. The chilli is not put in the sauces (much), but available in various temperatures in little bowls on the table. And to finish a dessert – pale jelly or bananas drenched in cream. Mexicans lament that their diet isn’t very healthy – even as they tuck in!

Chiliquiles - the healthy alternative to muesli!

 

Dinner (cena) is not before 8.00pm. It is a very light meal – for us, usually taken on the run. I have a cuppa tea and toast usually. There is no morning or afternoon tea either. People are highly amused when I tell them of our eating hours – and the fact that we have little breaks for tea and scones (well, biscuits these days)!

A Pambazo. A bread roll, stuffed with potato, chorizo and cheese, covered in a chilli sauce and then deep fried.                                         This has to be good for you!

 

I have to confess that Montezuma has had his revenge on me (even though I did nothing to him!) I’m not sure what caused it. It could be a bug, change of climate, altitude or even just the travel. (Update: it seems to be a parasite – which I may have been carrying since I left Peru in 2003. Persistent little bugger!)

We’re at 2650 metres above sea-level here – and there’s an extinct volcano that towers over the city. At least I hope it is extinct – Popocatepetl is not that far away and it’s busy rumbling and spurting smoke and ash. The altitude, a couple of hundred metres higher than Taranaki, has an effect. For a couple of weeks, when I arrived I was a bit breathless if I did something too fast. The locals told me to drink loads of water – not sure how that was meant to help!

Xinantecatl - the extinct volcano above Toluca

The atmosphere here is incredibly dry. Everything dries quickly, including lips and skin. Increasing the water intake helps that. I must be drinking a couple of litres a day. It also means your washing dries quickly!

The mornings are cool – cool enough to put a jersey on. By 1.00pm the place is roasting – 27 degrees yesterday. The sun is very bright – less atmosphere above I guess– but doesn’t seem to burn. It reminds me a bit of how the climate is in the Peruvian Andes.

We’re entering the rainy season – summer – here. We have had a couple of good showers – but the place is dry, bone dry, in an hour or so. Apparently the campesinos plan to plant their crops around the city on the Feast of the Holy Cross – here celebrated on May 3^rd. The rains were expected to start then – but nothing. 

Sandy - cooking up the pambazos!

The days preceding the first showers were full of static electricity – great shocks when I shook hands with people. My shoes must be better insulated or something. We also had towering thunderstorms with lightning, but no rain. We’ve had a few hailstorms – which no one batted an eyelid at!

And a tremendous thunderstorm with hail and rain has just begun. I guess that really ends the dry spell!

Fiesta de San Bernardino de Siena

Fiesta de San Bernardino de Siena, a set on Flickr.

Yesterday was Ascension Sunday here in Mexico. It was also the feast day of St Bernard of Siena. In our parish that meant that we celebrated both - but mostly the Fiesta de San Bernardino de Siena! To make things a little more complicated, we also had the Bishop here to celebrate Confirmations...

The parish also tries to make a little money during the Fiesta - so all the parish groups organize stalls - mostly food. The youth from the Centro de Proyección Universitaria (which I found out this week is a non-geographical University Parish!) organized desserts: flan, brownies, strawberries and cream, cakes etc. These went on sale at 7.00am. And people were buying...

There was also a "Marriage Celebrant" - one of the lads dressed in an old red soutane and surplus who for a small fee "married" any couple amidst great hilarity! A popular activity was the greasy pole - teams attempted to climb it to retrieve prizes. A miracle no-one was killed - particularly the small children dancing around the bottom dodging the prizes as they were thrown down by the chap at the top!

All in all a successful day...