Category Archives: San Miguel de Allende

Memoirs -- fact and fiction, San Miguel de Allende, Writings

How I flunked driving exams in two countries in one month but — spoiler alert — aced them in the end

Within a month’s time, I have taken two driver’s license tests in two countries and passed both. But not exactly “with flying colors.”

My California driver’s license expired on April 10 and I tried unsuccessfully to line up an appointment to renew it in person. I just turned 74 and needed to take a new photo and the written test (and I incorrectly assumed that I’d need the driving one, too).

The problem was two-fold: My phone number is from Mexico and the DMV will not allow foreign numbers when you try to sign into the system. After repeated attempts and working with a human (I think) who promised to send me an access form to fill out and send back – he/it didn’t — I lost interest.

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photography, San Miguel de Allende, The Week in SMA

SMA Events for July 7-13: We’ve got festivals, music, authors, puppets and more for you

Is this an event? Oh yes, it is. Welcome to San Miguel’s much anticipated rainy season — performing almost nightly. When rain spoils your plans, be like this woman. Go with the flow. This photograph is by Randy Kremalak, who against his better judgment went out in the pouring rain and came back with this classic. See what happens when you throw reason to the wind? (Be wild … but wear a raincoat and don’t catch cold.)

Sorry if things look a little abbreviated this week. There are two major football/soccer tournaments going on and even if all my favorites — across the world — have been knocked out of contention, the playing has been superb. Copa America and Euro Cup — check them out. The style of playing in each tournament could not be more different from the other.

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San Miguel de Allende, The Week in SMA

SMA events June 30 to July 6: What a week! What a week!

Miss me? Sure you did. I’ve had fun these past few weeks but now I’m ready to have fun in San Miguel de Allende. Here is a sampling of some of the great events coming your way.

What off-season? Nobody takes a seasonal break in San Miguel anymore!

As always, this is just the tip of the tortilla. Check out the several events sites devoted to keeping you busy and entertained in San Miguel.

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San Miguel de Allende, The Week in SMA

SMA events, June 2-9: Parades of locos, a parade of planets

Quincenario en honor a San Antonio de Padua, the two-weeklong celebration of Saint Anthony began with a locos parade on Saturday, June 1, that ended up at the Parroquia San Antonio de Padua in Colonia San Antonio, as they will each night.

For two weeks, pilgrimages by groups of Locos will leave each evening from a different place in San Miguel and parade toward the Parish of San Antonio de Padua.

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Colonia San Antonio, photography, San Miguel de Allende

Sweet heated dreams are made of these … when it hits 99 degrees, we go dancing

How do they do it? How do they put on some of those costumes that look not only like a second and third layer of skin but a whole winter coat for a grizzly bear — and then head down the street dancing and twirling and skipping to the pulsations of Mega the Sound Systems Inc. on the back of a pickup truck?

Crazy, I tell you!

Locos, by name. This year, the Locos are earning their name and reputation for endurance, exuberance, perseverance, and any other “ences” you can think of. It is hot. Every single day. Hot. Come to think of it, I’ve never seen it rain on a Locos parade.

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Colonia San Antonio, San Miguel de Allende, The Week in SMA

SMA Events May 19-25: Who doesn’t love a parade … or three?

This week starts off with not one but three locos parades. Each leaves from a different location at staggard times but they will emerge and find their way back to Parroquia San Antonio de Padua where a towering soundsystem is set up.

There will be dancing food and music into the night. Don’t miss it.

At the other end of the week, the long-awaited memoir and photography of Ojala Ninos founder Elsmarie Norby, “It Is To Wonder,” is published and she will talk about her journey on Friday. Take my word for it: It is too wonderful.

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Colonia San Antonio, photography, San Miguel de Allende, Writings

… and suddenly a parade breaks out on Sunday in San Miguel de Allende

How can you tell if a parade is about to break out in San Miguel de Allende?

Sadly, if you are a gringo, you’re probably the last to know. Parades and processions, for the most part, are cultural. You may not be connected to the network that announces such things. So, pay attention. Follow these tips and you may end up on the sidewalk watching one of the most unique and exciting things to happen in this city.

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photography, San Miguel de Allende, Writings

Clean sweep

That must have been some party.

Early this morning, the limpia crew was all over the square in front of the Parroquia de San Miguel de Arcangel with brooms, buckets, and tanks of water. The bucketers would scoop and splash water on the stones and the sweepers descend on the water like hungry birds, sloshing it left and right, until only clean damp stone remains.

Splash and repeat. In the early morning breeze. The first in what feels like months.

While this is cleaning writ large, all over San Miguel de Allende in the morning, women (mostly) wash the sidewalks and streets in front of their homes. Same routine — water, bucket, and broom — as they have been doing for centuries.

Why the public square on a Sunday morning? I can’t say.

A messy party? Too much spilled and melted ice cream? Too much dust? In anticipation of the arrival of a wedding princess or social media queen? Simple hygiene?

You just never know, do you?

Unless you ask.

But why spoil the fun?

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Memoirs -- fact and fiction, San Miguel de Allende, Uncategorized, Writings

The perfume of sweaty youth and stale beer that was Hussong’s Cantina

Hussong’s Cantina on Ruiz Street in Ensenada, Baja, is one of those checklist places that anyone from San Diego had to visit at least once.

An original Caesar salad in Tijuana (or one of the more unsavory attractions), a margarita at the Rosarito Beach Hotel, a stop for lobster and a pitcher of margaritas in Puerto Nuevo, and a night at Hussong’s, ebbing and flowing with the tide of drunken masses.

Now that was a pretty good weekend.

Hussong’s was unique among cantinas. It wasn’t artificially constructed as some faux Mexican fantasy to pull in the tourists with campy decor and T-shirts. Hussong’s holds liquor license No. 2 in Ensenada and is in the same building John Hussong bought and gussied up in 1892.

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