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Published: September 18th 2006
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Beautiful
One of my favorite pictures ¡Hola amigos!
I'm writing once again from Monterrey, but I spent the past 3 days in Guadalajara, celebrating Mexican Independence Day. This entails the top local government official (mayor/governor) giving the grito "¡Viva Mexico!" It's an amazing thing, central plazas all over Mexico packed with people all celebrating independence on the same night...
We got into GDL before noon, piled into another taxi-van and got to our hotel, unpacked a bit, and took a walking tour. (See photos.) At the end of the tour was a huge 3 story market that sells EVERYTHING. I heard the phrases "A sus ordenes..." (at your service) and "¿Que buscaban amigas?" (what were you looking for, friends?) several hundred times, I'm sure. You really could get lost in the market... and we did. Luckily, there are openings in the tent/ceilings, so we just looked for the steeple of the cathedral and followed it out.
Dinner on the hotel terrace was great. Tacos with ham, steak, sausage, and all the fixings.
When it came to the grito, sadly however, we were misinformed. We were told the Grito happens at midnight. Four friends and I found a great bar called Cuba Libre-- 10
Welcome
One of our first experiences in Guadalajara. Creepy whistle/baby doll lady. She spotted us from across the street in a sea of people, started blowing a high-pitched whistle, then came over, asked where we were all from, and started singing songs on her ukelele type instrument and dancing around in her gypsywear.
It was creepy and cultural at the same time. Relatively harmless, aside from the high pitched shrieks. cervezas for $80 pesos (or just under $8 US), made some new Mexican friends, and by the time we got back out to the square a few hours later around 11:30p.m., we found out the grito already happened. Disappointing, but there were plenty more things to enjoy in Guadalajara, or as I have come to know the city, Guad. 😊 I'll just have to come back to Mexico another September 15/16.
Following the grito, everyone celebrates-- heads out to eat, drink, and be merry. (I don't have pictures of the Guadalajaran night life, sorry amigos. Didn't want to lose my camera in a sea of Mexicans.) One of the guys that traveled in our group of 8 friends decided to buy a green and red sombrero. As if he doesn't already stand out with his 6'4" stature and blond hair. We stayed out until about 2 or 3a.m., but we knew it was bedtime when we asked the bartender if we could GIVE BACK the beers we hadn't opened yet. Lame. I know. Exhausted from waking up at 6a.m. that morning. Despite the sleepiness, we encountered a lot of friendly people-- one 50-something year old guy a the last
Soak it up
Matt is just soaking up the culture here. This is about 2 seconds before half of our group booked it across the street to get away from this women. place we went to kept looking over at us and shouting "U.S.A., Mexico, Estados Unidos... VIVA!!!!!!!"
Saturday, Christin, Ashley and I (after our included breakfast at the terrace restaurant of the hotel) decided to explore the vendor markets that line the plazas. We wandered the plaza for a couple hours, then met up with a few of the guys from Tec that stayed the weekend in a nearby hostel, and had lunch at the Oasis, which served everything from tacos to pizza to milkshakes to hot cakes.
After
comida Christin and I headed back down the street to check out some knockoff perfumes, which was fantastic. Dinner that night happened after searching for an open restaurant. Most places were closed, but luckily we found a hotel restaurant. We found a mariachi in one of the other rooms, and he came and serenaded us. He was amazing. He has been playing the guitar for over 30 years. That was one unforgettable experience.
Found a bar with live salsa music. Much to our enjoyment discovered most of the people there were men over the age of 50 with their wives, or younger women. One of my friends heard a
Viva
There are going to be a lot of buildings in the following slides. We took a walking tour of the city and there are so many government buildings, churches, theatres, etc... impossible to remember them all. But THIS building is where the Grito de Independencia ("VIVA MEXICO!) takes place every year. The governor stands on one of the balconies and leads the grito. rumor that men here will pay girls to dance with them for the night. Yea... remember folks, the word "to pay" is
pagar, not
pegar. Pegar means to hit. I think one of the guys I was with asked one of the men that works at the hotel if men here
se pegan a las mujeres para bailer con ellos (hit women to dance with them).
Tried finding a club where we could dance, but found out the hard way that Guadalajara doesn't have a central bar/club district like Monterrey does. We got back to our neck of the city around 2:30a.m., I headed back to the hotel and to bed while some my friends were still in the mood to dance. They met some friendly girls and found another bar to go to... since this is a family show, I'll just say that the girls they met weren't so interested in meeting men. The club was called Circus. Anyway, they now have a few interesting stories to share.
Sunday morning we went to mass at noon at the Cathedral. What an interesting experience. Something I will probably never forget: in the middle of the mass, a young
Sea of tents
One of several hundred tents in the various plazas in downtown Guadalajara. This particular tent belongs to supporters of Obrador, the presidential candidate who lost the recent election. If you want more information on current Mexican politics, Google has a ton. It's quite interesting actually, but I won't get into it here. Mexican girl came up to Aaron and began asking for money to eat. In the middle of mass. What do you do? It's disheartening seeing someone like that to begin with... It would be nice if I could help everyone I see, but what do you do? Everywhere you go in Mexico, in the world, there are less fortunate people. What do you do?
I wandered down to the jewelry vendors again for a few hours. Around 3pm we checked out of the hotel and headed back to the airport. Made it into Monterrey around 9:30p.m.
Also, I went to a Monterrey Rayados soccer game last weekend. I'd write about the experience, but my friend's
travelblog really does it more justice than I could ever.
I took a bunch of pictures, so please enjoy them!
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Nadia
non-member comment
Haha
I think I almost peed my pants laughing about the hot wheels. I want a car that I can run into strangers with. Oh wait, I live in the US, we do that every day. I hope you are doing well my dear.