Monday, January 11, 2010

Our Christmas Vacation with Family and Friends in Mexico

By Allan Wall

My family and I spent Christmas vacation 2009 in Mexico.  When we lived in Mexico we would usually travel to the U.S. to spend Christmas here.  We recently moved to the U.S., and since my wife’s parents live in Mexico we now plan to go there during the season. And that’s what we’ve done, both this winter and last.

Our main focus was visiting my wife’s family.  We especially spent time with my suegros (suegros is the collective Spanish term for "mother-in-law and father-in-law,” which is a whole lot shorter to say in Spanish than in English).  It’s important that our kids spend time with their Mexican grandparents, now that they live so far away.   

The boys (now aged ten and seven) also watched a lot more television than they do at home, especially episodes of Bob Esponja (SpongeBob SquarePants) in Spanish.

The metropolitan area which we visited is the same one in which we formerly resided, so it affords us the opportunity to see what is changed and what remains the same.  Like construction, for example.

We also took the time to visit a local museum, which we’d never visited before.  This one was a privately-operated museum, with free admission.  It was a good one too, as are so many other fine museums I’ve visited in that metropolitan area and Mexico in general.

The security situation is always on one’s mind of course.  We didn’t have any problems, but we tried not to take chances either.  While visiting, it was not uncommon to see security personnel and their vehicles. There were municipal police, state police, federal police and the Mexican army.  The whole crime situation in Mexico is a troubling one and I really hate to see it deteriorate to the state it is in.  I sure hope it gets better.

However, life goes on. It was, after all, the season of Navidad, always a special time in Mexico, regardless of the political, economic, or security situation.  My wife and I visited a Christmas market.  A section of the street had been blocked off and a covered market was set up.  Vendors sold the various elements of the traditional Mexican nacimiento (Nativity scene), calendars (for the New Year) and artificial Christmas trees.  We purchased a nacimiento to take back home with us.

On Christmas Eve (Nochebuena) we attended the family festivities, held at my wife’s aunt’s house. There we ate the Christmas Eve turkey.  As for presents, the custom is for them to be opened at midnight.  However, by 11:30 p.m. the children (and not just ours) were already ripping their presents open.  We returned to our house in the wee hours of the morning, and went back to the aunt’s house at midday for another Christmas turkey. 

The conversations at these family gatherings are quite entertaining as my wife’s relatives are witty and humorous, and the chat moves along quite rapidly. 

We attended another family function on New Year’s Eve, at the house of my wife’s cousin.  After midnight (and even before) you could hear noise on the streets – fireworks and celebratory gunfire, to bring in the New Year of 2010.

Several of my wife’s male cousins are soccer experts. So I asked one about Mexico’s prospects for this year's World Cup in South Africa.  Not only is he not optimistic, but he also provided me with his perspective as to why the Mexican soccer team isn’t better.

We weren’t able to stay until the 6th of January, the Three Kings’ Day, when the customary Rosca de Reyes cake is eaten.  That’s because our school in the U.S. started back to class on January 4th (unlike the Mexican schools which wait until January 7th).  However, we did purchase four Rosca de Reyes cakes to take back to the U.S., three of which I shared with my students in an edible cultural lesson.  

Our highway trip back to the U.S. went smoothly, for which I´m grateful.  The only snag was the long wait at the border.  Since we now go to Mexico at Christmastime, we are returning along with the huge contingent of U.S.-resident Mexicans who visit Mexico and return, to the U.S., at the same time we do.   

To conclude, a New Year's wish: Let’s hope that in 2010 the security situation in Mexico really improves.

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Allan Wall, an educator, resided in Mexico for many years.  His website is located at www.allanwall.net.