Touch logo above to return to the home page. Click here for the next journal entry.

2/10/01 11:30 AM Hotel Alameda, Morelia, Michoacan, Mexico

We arrived in Morelia at 5:00 am local time. The flight was long and crowded. Pretty bumpy too, but not extreme. I was sitting next to a very large man so I had to sit sort of twisted. The seating was assigned seemingly at random. Lily sat 8 rows ahead of me. The check in at SFO was a study in inefficiency. First, we all had to put our tickets together. Then we waited for additional people to show to check us in. Then we lined up the kids alphabetically then the adults and kids. All the luggage was checked in at once in a huge pile. It took over an hour and a half to check in. It would have gone much faster if we had all gone through the line individually. I must learn to relax and go with the flow.

When we got to the airport in Morelia they let us out the back as well as front, which was great since I was in the last row. We went down stairs onto the tarmac, Beatles-style. I felt like I should wave at someone from the top of the steps. The line at immigration and customs took another hour or so to get through. The officials were relatively straight-forward but there weren't many of them there so it took a while.

The ride into Morelia was interesting although it was dark (about 6:30). Lots of Pepsi and Coca Cola billboards. I guess it makes money everywhere. The streets of Morelia are very different. The buildings are not set back from the street more than 3 feet or so. It's like being a rat in a maze. The hotel we are in tonight, Hotel Alameda, is nice. Flavio and I are sharing a room with 3 of the boys. The kids will go to their host parents tonight.

We just woke up this hour so we're getting oriented. I'm writing this while waiting to get in the shower. I will try my hand at brushing my teeth using bottled water.

We had the most wonderful breakfast. $8, all you can eat in the hotel lobby. Only one dish had eggs which suited me just fine. Lots of completely new flavors and textures, all of them good. I wrote down the names of the foods for reference later.

All of us, kids and all, went to a children's park in Morelia to dump the kids on their poor host families. We had lunch and spent about 3 hours getting to know each other. Lily hit it off right away with Jeanette and her family. So did I. Her father, Martin, is a great guy. He learned some English in school about 15 years ago and was surprisingly adept after all that time without practice. Lily is in good hands. I am so proud of her. She tried out her Spanish gamely even though she felt awkward and tired. (We're all operating under sleep deprivation.) She got to know Jeanette and her sister right away. They spent most of the time at the park talking and playing together. She really took the lead in that department.

I am having a wonderful time. The food has been GREAT. The mothers of the host families all cooked a potluck. It was a recreation of the breakfast experience with more new food. The town is so colorful, old and just different that I want to take a picture every time I turn around. I am.

10:30 PM

The unexpected challenge was the Spanish keyboard. Windows in Spanish is no big deal, things are where you expect them, only in Spanish. Not so with the keyboard. Making the @ sign is done by holding the ALT key then 6 then 4 on the number pad. I gave up and had to ask on that one. I still don't know where the forward slash / sign is on the darn thing. The better solution is to get my laptop connected directly. I will work on that Sunday. It may have to wait until Monday though, as this place pretty much shuts down on Sunday.

Marcella has a digital camera with her. Aha! I will see what I can do tomorrow with it. She says she doesn't want to use it so I will.

The Bilingual Mamas and I went out for margaritas and cervezas tonight. The beer here is better. Sol, XX, and Corona all much better down here. More flavor. We also had some taco/taquito things that were fabulous. Ho-hum. More great food. The lesson I have learned so far : If you want good Mexican beer or food, go to Mexico. It was fun watching us get rummy/drunk/silly for a while and then break into blank stares and back to silly as fatigue and alcohol had its various effects. It is kind of strange being out drinking with a group of women. I want to have fun and get along but do I really want to be "one of the girls"? Guess I'm getting in touch with my feminine side.

Ted called Andi tonight to say he got the earlier email, so I guess this is working. Andi just got a message to call home with no explanation while we were at the bar and was a tad scared but got over it after calling home. This was about 30 minutes after I sent the darn thing. Pretty good.

Sunday we are to move to the Hotel Soledad. We walked over there tonight to have a look. The courtyard is in the center of the old stone buildings. Hopefully there is a picture of it with this email. Very nice. At 10 PM there were songbirds singing their hearts out inside a large bush or vine that climbs up the 2 story courtyard walls. I thought they must have recorded bird songs playing. After all, they should be sleeping. But Nancy Dorr pointed out some of their output on the ground below the bush. I suppose they could hire a guy to spray guano on the ground but that would not be too practical. It just sounds too nice to be true. If this place was available in Napa none of us could afford it. When you enter the courtyard you leave a pretty noisy bustling city behind you and actually have some "Soledad". We're all looking forward to the move although the place we are in is nice too.

No messages from the kids so I guess they're alright. We will go to their school Monday morning and see them there for a while. Some of the host parents (Lily's included) asked us if we wanted to come along with them on outings tomorrow but we all declined. We want them to get to know each other without us butting in. A few of the kids took the separation a bit harder than we expected but nothing traumatic. I'll let you know how they are doing when I see them.

Some words on the weather and such: Morelia is well south of the Tropic of Cancer which puts us south of Miami. I have asked various people what the elevation of Morelia is and the consensus seems to be about 2000 meters. (Note: I looked it up just now - 6329 ft.) The dry adiabatic standard lapse rate is the amount that an air mass cools as it rises. It's about 5 degrees F per 1000 feet. The temperature here feels like about 75 degrees. So at sea level in the same air mass the temperature would be about 107. Of course it isn't the same air mass at the ocean but anyway the point is that it is not as hot as you might expect. One effect of the latitude is a longer day however. Just as polar days are very short in the winter they are longer as you approach the Equator. Since the air is less dense here it does not insulate as well. When the sun does go down it gets dramatically cooler. Another effect is on us. We feel the altitude when climbing the spiral stone and tile staircase to our rooms. I'm going to try running tomorrow. That should be interesting. Healdsburg's elevation is about 200-300 ft.

I'm very glad I'm here. Too bad we had to take that plane ride to do it but it is worth it so far. Everyone's health seems good to date. I will spare everyone a daily bowel report. Goodnight.

--Bill Tomkovic