Yesterday, Saturday, August 15, 2009, marked our one-year anniversary of living here in Pátzcuaro. We celebrated with a fiesta familiar (family party) for about 40 of our Mexican friends to thank them for welcoming us into their community. We even had a DJ and music for dancing!
A family party means multiple generations. The oldest was 80 -- the great-grandmother of our friends Sandy and Alejandro's son, Leonardo. Norma (Leo's grandmother) is my age; she has a wonderful sense of humor -- we truly enjoy chatting together! The youngest was 16-months. To my great delight, the boys (about 6-8 of them) kicked a ball around in the backyard. It reminded me of our last house on Lake Waubeeka in Danbury, CT.
Samantha, the administrator at our language school, did the cooking, which was 100% traditional Mexican -- guacamole and frizole (bean) dips for totopos (tortilla chips), pozole (chicken-corn soup), corundas, tamales, we had it all! Plus atole (a hot, corn-based drink with milk and cinnamon -- yummy). Believe it or not, I introduced everyone in Spanish by telling our "recuerdos" (memories) of the role they played in welcoming us to Pátzcuaro -- to much good-natured laughter and applause as everyone learned of everyone else's role.
What a lovely group of people -- many really didn't know each other, but by the end of the evening, they were all interacting and everyone enjoyed themselves -- especially Reed and me!
The DJ was terrific. He played traditional Mexican songs and, at our request, kept the volume down so we could converse. Everyone -- young and old -- danced and thoroughly enjoyed themselves, that was clear! Reed, of course, charmed everyone with his dancing, and he made it a point to dance with every woman! Our friend Antonio has four daughters (23-12), and it was delightful to watch him dance with them.
One traditional dance seems to go on forever -- hands up in the air, dancing "sexy" (in English, with Spanish pronunciation!), and other moves I don't remember; finally, we all made a circle and each person takes a turn in the center of the circle, demonstrating their best moves to much high hilarity. It was a kick -- an absolute kick!
A family party means multiple generations. The oldest was 80 -- the great-grandmother of our friends Sandy and Alejandro's son, Leonardo. Norma (Leo's grandmother) is my age; she has a wonderful sense of humor -- we truly enjoy chatting together! The youngest was 16-months. To my great delight, the boys (about 6-8 of them) kicked a ball around in the backyard. It reminded me of our last house on Lake Waubeeka in Danbury, CT.
Samantha, the administrator at our language school, did the cooking, which was 100% traditional Mexican -- guacamole and frizole (bean) dips for totopos (tortilla chips), pozole (chicken-corn soup), corundas, tamales, we had it all! Plus atole (a hot, corn-based drink with milk and cinnamon -- yummy). Believe it or not, I introduced everyone in Spanish by telling our "recuerdos" (memories) of the role they played in welcoming us to Pátzcuaro -- to much good-natured laughter and applause as everyone learned of everyone else's role.
What a lovely group of people -- many really didn't know each other, but by the end of the evening, they were all interacting and everyone enjoyed themselves -- especially Reed and me!
The DJ was terrific. He played traditional Mexican songs and, at our request, kept the volume down so we could converse. Everyone -- young and old -- danced and thoroughly enjoyed themselves, that was clear! Reed, of course, charmed everyone with his dancing, and he made it a point to dance with every woman! Our friend Antonio has four daughters (23-12), and it was delightful to watch him dance with them.
One traditional dance seems to go on forever -- hands up in the air, dancing "sexy" (in English, with Spanish pronunciation!), and other moves I don't remember; finally, we all made a circle and each person takes a turn in the center of the circle, demonstrating their best moves to much high hilarity. It was a kick -- an absolute kick!
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