log0phyle

Jan 22, 20216 min read

Life in Mexico: The Sights, Sounds, and Tastes of Mazatlan

Hi everyone!!

This was taken on Mom's 67th birthday!! Can you believe it? She's SO OLD!!! (I totally just said that because I know she reads these.) Love you, Mom! Maybe you can take COVID time to hone your photography skills. Or computer skills. Or anything with buttons, excluding clothing (you have a solid handle on that one). Ask "the Googles" how to do that and then handwrite those notes on paper. :)

Y'all, for real, she's a favorite. Not THE favorite, though, that is reserved for this yippy piece of nonsense. She is soooo spoiled. She's in the backpack I call "the Worm" where she stares at everyone judgingly since she is finally eye level with people.

What I'm learning about life:

As usual, I would like to share with you the life lessons I am learning as I explore how to become a better, more whole me. As I mentioned last week, I've been reviewing Jay Shetty. This guy got a business degree and then became a monk for three years. He is now sharing what he learned on that journey inward.

One theme, in particular, really struck me. I have his quotes below, but arranged them to form the cohesive lesson I took away.

We need to redefine what success means. Let's not make it about gratification, but gratitude. We speak about being healthy and our well-being, but act more like human 'doings' than human 'beings'. Therefore, instead of 'To-Do' lists we need 'To-Be' lists. Instead of thinking about what you want to do, think about who you want to be... We need to move away from what we want do in situations to who we want to be in situations.

We're so anxious about what will happen in the future that we don't enjoy the present. The result being, we don't live in the present or the future. We end up living, feeling like we're never going to die and then die never having truly lived.

We force ourselves out of bed to live the same day again and again and call it a life.

You don't know what you need in your life until you figure out who you are.

Keep hanging out with yourself until you are you again.

Luckily, we all have plenty of time do hang out with ourselves with COVID roaming the halls. That is the silver lining I choose to see in this craziness! Now, onto the fun pictures!

The Sights of Mazatlan:

There is a well-known diving cliff. There are people who do this for the tourists and they take up a collection for the brave soul who leaps forth into the water below. I definitely gave money and a loud HUZZAH!

Every other Saturday there are fireworks that I get to watch from the rooftop patio ("alberca") at my condo. Ironically, I did not get to see any fireworks on New Year's Eve because the alberca closes at 10pm. So, I set the alarm for 23:55, woke Mom and Mia up then watched these on my phone while listening to the ones outside. We drank a glass of sparkling wine and then we went back to sleep!

Every day that I go to the beach for lunch, I am treated to parasailers and other aquatic entertainment. I still get so excited watching these human-wielding balloons!

In addition to the action, the architecture and art here is just stunning! Here are some photos to attest to this! And just so you know, when you get to the picture of the cross, don't come for me! :) I did *not* alter the perspective of the cross in the wall; it's literally constructed sideways. Something else that Mom and I discuss is how the ocean changes colors based on the sky. On gorgeous, blue sky days (which is most days) the ocean looks so blue, but when the sky is gray the ocean looks gray. It seems obvious now that we see it, but it was not something we contemplated when we were landlocked.

The Sounds of Mazatlan:

The overarching sound of Mazatlan is construction. They are constructing everywhere. But - aside from that - the most common sound is the incredibly cheerful music of "las bandas". They are everywhere. They walk along the beach, trudging their instruments while walking on the sand in pants and long sleeve shirts (they really dress sharply for this!), and play LOUDLY to the merriment of most and the dismay of some expats.

I remember the second day I was here, I met an expat - an older man - who was telling me everything I would love and hate about Maz. He asked if I like Mariachi music. I told him that I really hadn't heard it so I would reserve my opinion. He immediately responded that I would hate it passionately. He disliked it when he moved here four years ago and has only grown to hate it even more since. I'm thinking, dude, you are in the wrong country then - feel free to leave. I refused to allow his negativity to color my experience with it and I LOVE IT! Seriously, every time I hear a tuba start umpa-ing I SMILE and cannot keep myself from bopping along with the joyous tune. It is one of my favorite things here! They just make me LOL - what do you think? Doesn't it make ya smile?

The opera man slays me. He goes to the tourist areas of Maz every weekend and sings. He makes me tear up when I listen to him sing his arias. BONUS: His golden retriever is the such a sweet goober who LOVES pets.

The Tastes of Mazatlan:

You guys.... the food... Maz is a fishing mecca for shrimp, marlin, octopus, and oysters. Shrimp, however, is its largest export and everyone is proud to say that Maz is the “shrimp capital of the world.” There are three amazing places to get this fresh-off-the-boat seafood: the fishermen's beach - you can buy tuna, marlin, lobster, octopus, and shrimp directly from the fisherman on the beach where all of the fishing boats dock, the shrimp ladies - there fishermen will take their haul to the shrimp ladies on the street so you can stroll for blocks peeking in bins with shrimp ranging in sizes from small to 'are you sure that's not a lobster?' size, and - lastly - Mercado Pino Suarez - which is a market with all fresh meat, seafood, and poultry.

One of these days I will buy some seafood from the fishermen on the beach. I will say that I have been to both the shrimp ladies and Pino Suarez, but I was a little too anxious and traumatized to remember to photograph them. As a recovering vegan, I still have trouble seeing and smelling previously alive things that are, now, freshly dead. I have had to sit in a corner thinking happy thoughts while mom shopped stepping over the blood on the market floor. I'm working on it so that I can take pictures for YOU! :)

Another famous export with which you may be familiar is Pacifico beer, whose brewing facility is right here! So refreshing with a lime on the beach! That is just smart hydration right there!

Anyway, I cannot get enough of the seafood and am allowing myself to be adventurous. Like buying and eating oysters right on the beach and drinking Mezcal for the first time for Mom's 67th birthday!

My favorite foods are cerviche (which I have loved since I was a kid) and the molcajetes.

Cerviche crudo (in the first picture) is raw seafood that is "cooked" by curing it with citrus. In my Puerto Rican household, we always used lemons, but here they use limes. Actually, they use lime for everything. I have yet to even FIND a lemon in the stores and when describing lemons to locals (yellow limes) they have no idea what we are talking about. You will see in a picture below that it is a challenge to find things without lime - like mayonnaise. They ALL have lime in it! You have to search very carefully to get stuff (like mayo) sans lime. It's a fun game.

Molacajetes (in the second picture) are stews that are served in stone hot pots. It very much reminds me of Korean bibimbap, but the flavor profile is TOTALLY different. Unlike the fermented, sweet, and tangy goodness of bibimbap, the molcajete is earthy with a tomato acidity and smoky subtly. They come all different ways with different ingredients. No two molcajetes are alike. And I like that!