Family History and El Rancho

All my ranch pictures are at the beginning, so I´m going to start with that (yesterday). We met Cecilio and Guadalupe on Friday. Cecilio is Edgar´s dad´s second cousin. His grandpa (also Cecilio) was shot when he was in his early 30´s. Cecilio´s dad was his only child. Edgar did the temple work already for Cecilio Sr. This Cecilio lives on a ranch, Yerba Buena. They invited us to come today. Edgar´s dad was driving out that way yesterday, so we went yesterday. It was better because we didn´t have to get the kids out of school. Cecilio and Lupe were not expecting us, but they dropped everything, called their kids to come. They all live close-by and share an outdoor shower and toilet. The women got making tortillas. They grow the corn that they grind to make the maza for their tortillas and they make tortillas every day. They were the best tortillas I´ve ever had. Edgar´s dad took steak and Cecilio started a fire and started grilling it. They had beans and homemade salsa and their own homemade queso fresco--cheese. It was heavenly. They have cows and chickens and dogs and cats--there was even a dead lizard (the kind you eat, Edgar told me--who knew you eat lizards?) that the kids liked playing with. They live right by a river and they swim in it, only when it´s hot. We were dying--sweating like crazy. I touched the water. It was warmer than Boulder Creek on its hottest day. They let us swim, but only if I got the kids heads wet (to prevent coughing). I didn´t understand how those two were related, but Edgar told me just to do it. I didn´t put water on my own head, but I did the kids. The funny thing is, that last night, in bed, I kept coughing. None of the kids did.

We had a great time. We were there about 4 hours and they acted like they had nothing to do but entertain us. They were so kind and so self-sufficient! I was really impressed and told Lupe so. She said she can do a lot of things, but she never learned to read. Her grand-daughter was there. She´s only 16, but she quit school after 7th grade. I don´t know why. Their school there goes to 9th grade.

Swimming in the river. Until 15 years ago, they didn´t have electricty or plumbing. Lupe washed clothes and children in this river. She has 8 kids!

The dead lizard. (We didn´t eat it.)

Most of the family that was there.

Their living room--a little blurry. It´s full of Lupe´s handiwork. She gave me a table runner she´d just finished to remember her by. She is so kind.

We gals in the kitchen (though I had nothing to contribute to the meal).

Cows here.

Lupe was very concerned about the safety of the children.

Cecilio barbequing.

There are amazing flowers all around their house. I love this picture of Marcos.

The outside of the house.

We had a wonderful time there. I felt like I´d stepped back in time. All the ancestors I´ve been researching lived on ranches. Now I feel like I know what their lives were like (a little).

We have been on the go. Friday we ate at Edgar´s dad´s again. We ate fish (people are very strict about not eating meat on Fridays here). The fish was looking at me, but it tasted very good. We met Rafael´s second cousin, Cecilio, and his wife, María Guadalupe.
We also drove around the outskirts of El Grullo. We saw sugar cane fields. The kids loved it because Edgar let them sit in the back of the truck.

On Saturday we went to El Limón--the town where Edgar´s dad grew up and where I´ve found the most family history information. We started out at the cemetery. It was kind of disappointing. When I was at home I thought that if I could only be here where all these people are buried (I have copies of the death certificates saying they are buried here), maybe I could find out more about them--like when they were married and when they were born. I realize now I was thinking of the well-groomed and thorough cemeteries we visit on Memorial Day in the Salt Lake Valley.

Here (and I guess anywhere) the quality of the grave depends on several things--how long ago the person died, how much money the family had then and how much they have now. There are all extremes.
I was standing in the same place when I took these pictures. The above grave is a mini church. It has names on it. The one below has some bricks holding the tin down. There are no names.

About half the graves are unmarked and when we got there, Edgar told me that his dad had heard that some of the family had extricated (is that the right word?) some of the older dead family members to make room for new ones. I still can´t believe that would be true. I think folks here respect their dead more than that. I started on one end and Edgar started on the other. We were looking for his great-grandparents, some of their children who died, and maybe even his great-great grandparents. We found nothing. It was hot and humid. Our kids were hungry and tired. I felt defeated. We went to visit Edgar´s dad´s cousin--María del Refugio Cobián.

She was darling. She never married and she runs her own little shop in the town. She has cancer and has been pretty sick off and on for the last 6 years. She didn´t have much information for us, but she did remember her grandparetns. She said her grandpa was a grump, but that her grandma was a dear woman. I said, "Isn´t that always the way?" No offense to anyone intended. She said we should visit another woman (Rafael´s cousin on his mom´s side) who might know a lot.

This other cousin owns a store too. We went there, but she had gone to Guadalajara for the day. Her two sons were there. We told them who we were. I tried to buy chips and bananas for the kids, but they insisted on giving them to us for free. We´re cousins, after all. They directed us to their aunt--Edgar´s paternal grandma´s neice, Tía Trini. She was great. She has 10 kids and there were grandchildren all over the place. She made each of them come and shake our hands because we are their tíos. Our kids were outside playing with her grandkids. A aldy came buy selling something. She couldn´t see Edgar and me, but she talked to Tía Trini.

She said, "Who are these white kids?"

Tía Trini said, "Part of my family, that´s who."

"Well, why are they so white?"

"That´s just the way they are and they´re part of my family!"

She had valuable information for us. She told me where Edgar´s grandma was born. I hadn´t been able to find her. She said that the family had to move around a lot in those days because it was during the Mexican Revolution.

Next we went to the convent in El Limón to visit Rafael´s cousin, Elvira. She is a nun. I wasn´t sure if the kids could go in. The only convent I´ve been in was in Poland I didn´t have kids with me. The sister that opened the door was so kind and welcoming to our kids. She took us into a garden area. Edgar couldn´t remember Elvira´s name to ask for her, but I did. When she came, she looked confused.

She didn´t know us. Her mom is the last surviving child of her generation. She´s had a stroke and if not doing too well. Elvira takes care of her in the convent most of the time, but that day she was in Aútlan at the hospital. She told us she´d call when her mom is back so we could visit her. I told her I wanted to find out about her grandparents´birthdates. She told me she could go to the civil registry on Monday (yesterday) and get me copies of their birth certficates because they were registered in El Limón. She was such a dear woman, and seemed to be a pure, kind soul. The convent sells bread to make money. She gave the kids some. We were about to leave, and I asked her if she knew where her grandparents are buried in the cemetery. She did! She told us they are near where her sister is buried, so she knows. She said they are simple crosses, about in the middle of the upper section of the cemetery. I was so excited. We went back to the cemetery and looked and looked. There were a lot of unmarked crosses, or crosses where the writing has been worn off. The care-taker was there. He hasn´t worked there long, so he didn´t know where everything was. He was really old and he knew Edgar´s great-grandpa. He said he knows all his kids and grandkids too. He showed us one of Edgar´s great uncle´s graves. It was nice, but didn´t have a name anywhere. Weird. He didn´t know where Edgar´s great-grandparents are buried. We were all exhausted, hungrgy, sweaty, and really hot. Edgar promised me we´d return, and we came back to El Grullo.

A few other random pictures

¨Sunday night at the Plaza.

Another Tía. I don´t even remember her name.
Rubén and his finished homework. He obviously did the work himself. He was proud of it. I hope the teacher will be pleased. I saw another little one´s homework yesterday and it was obviously done by her mom.
Clean clothes! We finally broke down and paid to have our non-white clothes washed yesterday. It cost about $15 for three loads and we´re thrilled. After all, we are on vacation. Who has time for laundry?

Lists

I feel like everytime I post something on here I am so scattered, so I decided to make two lists today. My first list is

THINGS I LOVE IN MEXICO

1. Fast internet. It´s crazy that here, right across the street from our house with primitive plumbing, laundry facilities, and bare lightbulbs, I´m at this internet cafe with speedy internet. Most people in the US have much faster internet at home than I do though.

2. Gorgeous colorful houses. I wish this one were ours. It´s on a hill overlooking El Grullo. There´s a gorgeous view and flowers and trees all over the place.
3. Watching Edgar share his childhood with our kids. Yesterday he taught them to suck nectar from these flowers. Also yesterday when I was picking Lili up from school, Edgar´s first grade teacher (who taught at that same school, but is now retired and was picking up her grandkids) stopped me. She asked Edgar´s name. She had seen him that morning, dropping Lili off and recognized his face. She was a sweet little lady.
4. Having our whole family together all the time--especially having two full-time parents all the time. The other day Edgar said, "You know, the women here always do the laundry." I asked him what the men do here. "Work." And what are you doing here, Edgar? I think he got the point. He did the laundry yesterday, and this morning I woke up to him doing more. He´s a dear man. He even mopped and made it look like no big deal. The kids are loving all the time they have with him. If only we were independently wealthy and he didn´t have to work!
(From our trip to Augua Caliente the other day.)

5. The wildlife. I know chickens aren´t that out of the ordinary anywhere, but they are everywhere here. This is at Edgar´s Tía Malena´s house, where we visited yesterday. Marcos kept "bock-bocking" with the chickens.
(note also the little papaya tree in the background)

6. I love the vegetation! Amazing trees and flowers grow everywhere year-round and seemingly with very little effort.


7. It´s great to get to know Edgar´s family and friends here. Yesterday we visited his aunt, uncle, and cousins. One of the cousins looks a lot like Edgar´s sister, Elia. Here we are with most of them (the one that looks like Elia is taking the picture). They have a gorgeous view from their house on the hill.
(note the lima tree above us--limas are wonderful fruit, kind of like limes, except very sweet)

Below is Edgar´s friend, José Cruz and then his daughter Valeria. Rubén loved hugging her. He saw a man selling roses on the street the other day and said he´s going to buy all the girls a lot of roses when he´s "Big Kid Ruben Superman." Uh oh.

8. Saying good-bye before we even say hello. I haven´t gotten used to this yet. If you pass someone in the street and you aren´t planning to stop, you just say "Adíos," in a real friendly way. Yesterday I saw a mom of a kid from Rubén´s class at school. I said "Buenas Tardes," but she was already saying "Adíos." It´s kind of nice. I wonder if it would work for me when I´m at Wal-Mart and I´m trying to hurry and I run into someone I know. Could I just smile real big and say, "Bye!"?

9. I love how we are outside all the time. The kids love being outside and it seems like a breathe of fresh air to be out and about. Marcos is loving walking around outside.
10. THE SUNSHINE!
11. My hair is naturally curly here! I love what the humidity does for my parched Nevada-born skin, lips, and hair.

12. How clean everyone is here--especially since it takes so much effort! Every morning shopkeepers sweep and mop (even though they sweep and mop before they close). Everyone is so clean and pressed. It´s impressive.

13. I love the birds that accompany my scripture study in the morning. I love the fresh morning feeling here--well, anywhere.

14. I love, love, LOVE agua fresca! They have little stands here where they have fresh water made from real juice from exotic fruits. The other night, after Edgar´s Tía Bertha finally left, and I had put my pajamas on (again), Edgar asked me out for an agua fresca. I got dressed again, we locked the door (the kids were all asleep and we were only gone for 10 minutes maximum, I promise, Cor) and walked down the street to buy agua fresca. It was heaven! I had pineapple and Edgar had lime with kiwi. They are to die for!

THINGS I´M GLAD ARE TEMPORARY--I WON´T BE SAD TO LEAVE BEHIND WHEN WE GO HOME

1. Our water situation. I have become much better at conserving water. We went through our first purified water jug so quickly. Yesterday I washed strawberries in purified water and saved the water to rinse my boiled eggs in. Then I used the hot water from the boiled eggs to wash dishes. I was proud of myself. I have mindlessly flushed toilet paper down the toilet more than once (and not even because you dared me, Leigh). Some toilets seem more robust than ours, but ours seems terminally ill and as it struggles to flush, I´m afraid I´ve done it in. I also don´t like our shower here. The whole bathroom (which is all tile), gets wet and for hours after anyone takes a shower, I have to roll up my pants to enter the bathroom.

2. Laundry! It piles up so quickly. Especially because we are outside a lot and the boys especially get very dirty.

3. My sad cell phone problems. I´m so bothered that I can´t get a signal here. Edgar took my phone to a cell phone place here today. The gal said that there´s only one tower here and that on cloudy days phones don´t work too well. There were a few more clouds yesterday, but not THAT many.

4. The kids´homework. I get resentful when they have homework. I guess we´re trying to fit too much in at once (I know, I´ve never been one to do that!). We are trying to get the kids educated, visit everyone, eat all the good food Edgar loves, have a vacation, and keep the house and clothes and children clean all at the same time. I think if the kids are at school the whole time, the teachers shouldn´t expect us to spend time outside of school on school. I know that´s irrational. We just have other stuff going on!

5. Night-time noises. The kids and Edgar sleep great, but I´m so at home here, I´ve brought my insomnia with me. It doesn´t help that we live in a commercial area. The band of El Grullo practices each night, starting around 10. They´re really good, but it´s bedtime. Church bells ring all night--at least from 4 am on. You can also hear a rooster at any given time. There´s also the occasional drunk singing his way home or someone driving by with obnoxious loud music in the middle of the night.

The positives are definitely outweighing the negatives. I´m sad at how fast our time is already passing. I love waking up each morning and remembering, "I´m in Mexico!"

Birthday and School in Mexico

I don´t want this to be underlined, but I´m very short on time and don´t know how to fix it.

Lili had a lovely birthday. Thanks for your calls. I don´t know who called because my caller ID and my voice mail don´t work here, so I´ll just assume you all called and I thank you. We spent the afternoon at Augua Caliente, a gorgeous natural hot spring made into a pool, or five pools. We were the only ones there (besides three cute older ladies) for most of the afternoon.

The trees are painted like this there. Edgar says they think it´s pretty.
At our house. _Lili bought this guitar with the money from Grandma and Grandpa. She loves it.
Agua Caliente. Ruben said it was a kingdom of swimming pools without a king and queen and guards.
Lili, Edgar, and Marcos. Ruben preferred playing with some other kids at the kid pool.
Ruben was teaching Lili to swim. He´s a good swimmer. They had a ball racing each other.

Marcos in his new swimsuit.

The kids also bought balls with their money from Grandma and Grandpa. Ruben´s popped.

Things have not gone as planned today. Edgar walked both the kids to school. I was going to do some laundry if he would mop. The whole house is tile, and believe it or not, is more intimidating to clean than even the clothes. He came back from taking Ruben to school and told me they were having a meeting with all the parents from 10-12! I didn´t have time for that. If I had known earlier, I could have planned, but the meeting was in 1/2 hour! Edgar ironed my clothes and told me we could have sandwiches for lunch (two of Lili´s "friends" invited themselves to our house to eat), and that he would do the laundry (no loss without a little gain) if I would go to the meeting.

Lili´s friends are at our house now. On Monday, they helped her find the bathroom (they were the ones who asked me for toilet paper). On Tuesday Lili said she invited them to our house. I was surprised that Lili would and could do that in Spanish. I asked her what she said. She said all she had to say was "Si." They asked if they could come. They are in 6th grade and I guess they´re just intrigued with the new American girl (who doesn´t talk) and her chatty mother. Every day at lunchtime, they hang around while Lili eats. I wasn´t thrilled about having them come because I knew wouldn´t talk to them and that I would have to entertain them. Lili was so excited about it, though, and as I thought about it, I realized we would be speaking Spanish while they were there. I had wanted to blog this morning, but I had the parent meeting. It turns out, I left Edgar in charge at home. The girls were playing a ball game with Lili and I can blog for a spell.
These are Lili´s friends. They are cute girls. There names are Valeria and Roxana. Roxana lives with her grandma. The grandma met me today after school. I guess I didn´t understand her intention. I told her I would walk Roxana home later. I didn´t realize she wanted to see where we lived first (understandably). When Valeria finally finished jumping rope for her PE class (we had to wait about 15 minutes--she hurried as fast as she could and was all red-faced at the end), we took off. We had gone a few blocks, when Roxana said, "Can we wait for my grandma?" I hadn´t known Grandma was coming, but we waited for her to catch up. I tried to slow down so she could keep up. She was painfully slow. It´s tricky because we had to walk single file since the sidewalks are so narrow and there are a lot of pedestrians. We finally got to the house and I invited everyone in. Edgar was there and was as friendly as could be to Grandma. They got talking and she said, "I'm your tia!" I have learned that "tia" is not a strict term for aunt. It can be anyone with a familial connection. It turns out that Roxana´s grandma and Edgar´s grandparents were neighbors. We had a lovely chat and the grandma left, confident that her Roxana would come to no harm.

Yesterday I spent the morning in Lili´s classroom. It was a zoo! I´ve been rushing to get her there on time, but I´m going to stop hurrying. Kids were streaming in for the first 20 minutes or so. Moms were hanging around, bringing in breakfast, and about half of the kids were eating breakfast until 9:00 or so. The first hour I sat at the teacher´s desk. Bless his heart! He said I could sit there, but that the back is broken. Indeed it is. He has very little to work with, it seems. There was a clock on the wall that doesn´t work. He has 39 first graders all jammed in the little classroom. My father-in-law told us that kids who get expelled from another school get sent to Lili´s school. It would be hard for anyone, and the poor man has no classroom management skills. Lili had told me that a girl was mean to her. Yesterday and today the girl (Cynthia) sat by her and they seem to be friends now. Kids were constantly getting up and running around, smacking each other, screaming, and always at least talking. About half of them never know what´s going on. Many are slipping through the cracks. He gave them an assignment and was going around trying to help them. They had to copy something from the board. I decided to walk around too and help. Some kids don´t even know their letters. About 10 are doing great and get done quickly and then have to wait for the others. Some never do the assignment. One of these, Kevin, was just sitting there. I asked him which column from the board (they got to pick) he wanted to copy. The boy in front of him said, "He doesn´t know his letters!" I said, "I´ll help him." I helped Kevin along and he loved me. The rest of the morning, if wrote something down, he´d run over and show me. Kids started calling me "Maestra!" and they showed me their work and told on each other. It reminded me of my student teaching days in Chihuahua, and I thought, "Maybe I should come and volunteer every day. They certainly need me." I eventually got a headache though. The constant noise and chaos is grating and I don´t think it´s good for Lili for me to be there. She came and asked me to explain everything in English. She came and told me she had to go to the bathroom. I told her to ask the teacher.

I took cookies for the class for Lili´s birthday. When I asked the teacher, he said, "We do that here too!" Ha, Edgar. The teacher spent about 20 minutes on her birthday. The kids sang both versions of "Las Mañanitas" and he showed a little computer birthday e-card to the class. I let Lili pass out half the cookies. Kids started hiding them and saying they didn´t get one. Then they asked if they could have one for their brother, etc. I finally put the rest of the cookies away. Kids kept asking me how old Lili is and if she speaks English. I think they think she can´t talk. Sometimes I think she thinks she can´t talk.

I wish her school situation were different. I thought about trying to get her in a different school, but the other one that is kind-of within walking distance is the one I called first and they wouldn´t allow her to come for such a short time. I talked to the teacher about their reader and how it´s above Lili´s level (by then I knew it is above everyone´s level). He said three of them can read from it. I know Lili knows as much or more about Spanish phonics, reading, and writing than most of those kids. I don´t expect her to learn anything academic there, but she is hearing Spanish for 4 hours a day. That´s worth something. I guess it´s the best we can do for now. Tomorrow she doesn´t have class. I wish we´d known earlier. We would have gone to the beach this week. We are going to go next Thursday morning and the kids will miss two days of school.



So this morning I went to Ruben´s school meeting. It is 100 times better than Lili´s school. There are 22 kids in the class. Quite a few. And they all seem to be around Ruben´s age. The teacher is a bit condescending. The meeting was an opportunity for us to see the kids in action and note where they are falling behind. She would point out students´faults to their parents. That´s a little awkward in front of everyone. I realized that she and I have very different goals for Ruben. I was thrilled when I came in to see a girl grab a toy truck away from him and hear him say, "Es mio!" He´s speaking Spanish! The teacher let me know he doesn´t hold his pencil right. They were doing a counting activity and she was counting for him in English. No, honey, that´s not what we´re looking for. The child can already count in English. I can´t blame her. She´s just trying to do her job and she just wants Ruben to know what´s going on. Ruben has already learned the routine. When the bell rang, he said, "Now we go eat!" His personality is so different from Lili´s. He left immediately to go eat and then play and I didn´t see him again until
I went and found him to go home. Anyway, the teacher is very in-charge and the kids are always engaged it seems. The teacher had several requests for us parents. We need to bathe our kids every day and clean their ears and teach them to clean their noses. The school is in need of more erasers and toilet paper (big surprise). Ruben needs to bring his own cup if he wants a drink (they hadn´t told us). It´s just a good thing we had the meeting. The parents here at both schools seem to have plenty of time to give to their kids´schools. That´s good. There were 18 parents at the meeting. Perhaps the rest of them had more notice than I did.

I have got to go. We are going to walk Lili´s friends home and visit some of Edgar´s family. Maybe if we visit them, they won´t visit us. The last three nights, we´ve hoped to have family home evening and get the kids to bed early. Without fail, someone from his family has come to visit. I eventually just put the kids to bed. Then I sit by Edgar and try desperately not to fall asleep. His Tia Bertha is our most frequent visitor. She is so much like his mom! They look alike, talk alike, and both enjoy giving unsolicited advice about any topic. She told us last night that Marcos must drink warm water before bed and walk a lot to help his bronchitis. As you can see, Marcos is taking her advice:By the way, for an unknown reason, I can´t get a signal on my phone today. Hopefully, tomorrow the phone will be better!

Isn´t this lovely? It´s our neighbor´s house. I love how people here have the inside part of the house that melds right into the outside part. It is gorgeous here and we are loving it.

I only have 8 minutes until I need to go pick Ruben up from school. I woke him up this morning by saying "Buenos Dias." He automatically said, "¿Como estas?" I told him he needed to get up. He said, "Why?" I told him he had to go to school. That was all it took. He sat up and said, "I LOVE my school!"

Edgar (surprisingly) has different ideas than I do. Last night we walked to the really old, residential part of town. His friend, Jose Cruz, lives there in a cement/rock house he inherited from his grandparents. They are so poor and very nice. On their street a teenager was riding a burro--right there in town. I wanted to take a picture, but Edgar forbade me.

Here are some pictures I was able to take. This is Sunday night show-off time when everyone gussies (is that how you spell it?) and walks around the plaza. I was surprised Edgar let Lili wear shorts. They didn´t quite seem formal enough.
This is the back of Edgar´s dad´s house, under the mandarin orange tree. They are so delicious. We brought home a bunch of them. Do you think the men in this family will ever learn to smile?

Finally, a toilet at the bus station in Guadalajara. We had to pay 4 pesos to use it. Toilet paper cannot go down the drain here. It will get clogged. I keep forgetting to put it in the little toilet paper basket. All Edgar´s family has a toilet paper basket in the bathrooms--even in the USA.
By the way, Edgar tucked some toilet paper in Lili´s backpack this morning. He said the school can´t afford TP. I can´t complain. They´re educating our child at absolutely no cost to us.