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Jay  got his job with On Side today, along with all the necessary gear, plus a bottle of wine,t-shirts, hats, etc.  He has wanted to work for them from the time he was first sent there by the construction jobs pool.  He had been working for them through the pool for almost two months, but today he was officially hired.  This means he will be making more money and be offered courses in different aspects of the work.  When I told friends that Jay and May were moving to Vernon, many of them said they were happy for me but doubted he'd find work here.  I was dubious myself, but he was determined.  At first he went to the temporary jobs place every morning at 6:00am and took whatever they had.  When he finally was working quite regularly for On Side, he made sure he worked hard and showed them what he could do and how he was willing to learn.  And now he has a full time job in Vernon.  YAHOO!!!
On top of that Jin Hee's volleyball team won the regional championship today.
I have a horrible cold and have spent the last two days doing nothing but lie around and cough.  But in spite of that, today is a good day.

Jay and Jin Hee's certificates posted on the fridge. 

Breaking bad. Jay in all his gear. 

Ici ca bouge!

I can't write the title correctly in French on this iPad.  The iPhone I have allows me to hold down the 'c' key and choose from a selection the 'c' that suits the language I want, but this is a Korean pad which offers only a choice between English and Korean alphabets right on the keys; unless, and this is quite likely, I just don't know how to call up other alphabets. At any rate it's immaterial because I'm going to write in English.

Things are moving around here.  Jay continues to work long days, often with overtime, at On Side.  He really likes the work and continues to hope he will get hired on full time.  May has got and left two jobs, one in a coffee shop and the other in an Indian restaurant.  She doesn't think the service industry is for her, and I'm inclined to agree; although, it seems to me that the two places and their problems were a bit exceptional.  Now she is studying for hours on end trying to prepare for 2 tests, one which she is required to pass if she wants to work in the Boys' and Girls' Club Daycare and the other if she wants to get a licence to drive the new car Jay bought last weekend.  Now that Jay is working in the building trades, he needs a truck.  He found one of the kind he's been interested in for many years.  It's an old and supposedly unkillable Toyota.  He came to an arrangement with a local Kia dealership that might qualify him to work in an Arab bazar.  They took the Toyota car he had bought when they first arrived in Vernon in exchange for the truck,which was on their lot and a Kia family car for May.  A bit of money changed hands too.  This account of the deal lacks detail because I know nothing about trucks and cars so can't give model names, and of course the amount of money that changed hands in the deal is none of my business.  The same can be said for lots of what goes on among Jay, May and the girls.  We live well in close proximity mostly because they manage their affairs and I stick to mine, as much as possible.  It's working.  The girls have their teenage problems, especially Min Hee, but they are doing well, considering the turmoil they have experienced in the past months.  It's incredible to think that the family has been here fewer than 8 months and accomplished so much.  

The climate in Vernon continues to delight me.  There's hardly any snow in town and it's been raining lightly for days, but the cross country skiing at both Sovereign and Silver Star is excellent.  They've had snow. I got right back onto it as soon as I was home.  I'm more of a cool weather, fresh water and snow person than a hot climate, ocean and beach one.  

My Korean friend Lusia's daughter has a Korean friend at school who needs help with English, so I am going to tutor her for an hour and a half twice a week for the next few months.  I'm still tutoring Yulia, the determined Russian, for about an hour and a half twice a week too.  I really want to help her because the combination of her forceful nature and the college's excessively academic language program has put her into a very frustrating situation.  She can hardly speak English and yet she's in a course where she has to read complex sentences, write paragraphs and work until her brain aches without getting much of a sense of accomplishment.  Her family is working hard as is Jay's.  The immigrant experience is hopeful but not easy.

 

Skiing at Silver Star on Monday. That night I got drenched by rain walking home from the Towne Cinema. 

Flying home

I'm up in the air, looking down on the clouds and reminded of Joanie Mitchel. I've seen the clouds from both sides now on this trip.  The sun rarely shone for a full day while I was in Vallarta, but that's fine by me. The temperature was perfect, especially in the mornings and evenings.   Now we are flying over fuzzy, dry, brownish green sierras with very serpentine, narrow roads leading to tiny collections of houses and some winding beige rivers that appear to be dry.  My mind is turning to thoughts of snow and skiing at Sovereign with Miriam on Thursday.  

On the first day of my stay at the Hotel Suites La Siesta I felt as if I was right at home, the same two rooms and view that I had had five years ago.  There was no fridge this time, but when I commented on that to the maid she asked a man who works there for help and the two of them brought me a fridge and some plates, a knife and a fork.  The guy rolled in the fridge and plunked it down so roughly that I was surprised to find that it worked, which it did as long as you closed the door tightly in the only way possible, by using a latch of the type you usually see on bathroom stall doors in summer camps.  I tipped them both, happily unpacked my clothes and the food I had bought at Mega on the way over from Dick and Ellen's and settled in for a quiet night alone.  

On the second day as I was preparing to meet Barb at the cathedral, things took a turn for the worse.  The man at the front desk practically begged me to change rooms.  As his job seemed to be in jeopardy, I finally agreed.  The same two friendly staff members helped me move my stuff, including the food and rickety fridge from the fourth floor down to the second.  I happily tipped them again, settled in, had a shower and went to meet Barb at the Cathedral, where one wedding was ending and the bride for a second was arriving.  We watched the action, commenting on things that struck us as odd or interesting.  We left to walk for a while on the Malacon just as the second ceremony was about to begin.  We had drinks and dinner on the beach while the sun set and then took a taxi back to the hotel.  As soon as we entered the room, we were aware of an oder of toilet, not at all 'eau de toilette.'  I put water in the two obvious stench sources I could find in the bathroom, then stuffed them with plastic bags and shut the bathroom door.  The smell diminished as the night went on, but the next evening  when we returned we were greeted by the same stench.  I kept using that word to describe the smell because Barb found it quite amusing.  I went through the same procedures and again things improved.  This time; however, I went down and complained to the night watchman who of course could do nothing but said he would inform the jefe in the morning.  MILAGRO!  On my last night at La Siesta there was no stench.  The rooms had been thoroughly cleaned, a source I hadn't thought of had been blocked and the air was so redolent of cleaning products no other odour could have penetrated it anyway.  Unfortunately for Barb, she was not there to appreciate it.  After drinks and dinner with the Baughans and Danbrooks, I walked back to La Siesta and sat alone on the balcony in the fresh air and perfect temperature, looking out over the Bay of Banderas as the pirate ship arrived with a fresh crew of inebriates screaming in response to the commands of their captain.  This drunken frenzy precedes the setting off of fireworks every night as the ship approaches the Malecon.

This morning I was disappointed that the new coffee shop near the hotel, right across from the place where the woman sells her tamales wasn't open.  This bodes ill for its success since a coffee shop that isn't open by 8:45am will miss quite a few potential clients, at least it would in any place other than Mexico.  Barb and I had had a good cup there yesterday before she caught the bus home.  Unfortunately, the tamale lady wasn't there that day, so she didn't get to try those and I was never able to enjoy the two together.  As it was I bought a super sweet cappuccino from the nearby OXXO and drank it as I ate my tamale again on the Malecon. 

And now we're flying over some desperate looking desert in northern Mexico or the southern USA. 

A view of Los Arcos from the bottom of the trail in Mismaloya 

I saw part of a reception for this artist when I was walking around the city hall in Puerto Vallarta.  I wasn't sure who he was but since have discovered that he made the original 'Boy on the Seahorse' sculpture in 1968 when he was 18 years old.  He has since worked in many different areas of the arts and was being recognized for his contribution to Puerto Vallarta and art in Mexico in general.

The Boy on the Seahorse

A more recent sculpture by Zamarripa

Another of his more recent sculptures

La Penita

Barbara and I swam every day; although, it would be more accurate to say we bobbed up and down in the waves until we were salty and sandy and ready to bike back to her place or walk up to a beach restaurant in Guayabitus for a cold refreshing beer in the shade.  Barb hasn't been out in the kayak this year because the waves have been really rolling in every day.  One day when we were in the ocean, Barb became aware of the fact that some young people just a bit farther out than we were seemed to be in trouble.  I'm so blind I couldn't really see much and couldn't believe they were out deep enough to be in danger. Fortunately Barb kept moving towards them as quickly as possible.  She was just realizing that two of them were in trouble and wondering how she could help both and not get pulled under herself when a man and woman approached with boogie boards.  I saw them and heard the woman urging the man to go out with her to help.  He didn't seem to want to and the next thing I knew he had given his board to Barb who thought she was going to have to bring two in on it when the woman got her board to one of them and she and Barb brought them in.  I helped Barb with the girl as we approached shore.  She recovered quite quickly, but both boys were much slower to recover.  Barb had seen one go under for quite a while as she moved out to help.  Eventually some official police or something showed up, but the other woman, who turned out to be from Saskatchewan, was talking with us later and we all agreed that the beach in Guayabitus should have some means of helping people in trouble because without the boogie boards one of those young people at least could have drowned.  It reminded me of the time Jim and I brought in the man who was drowning south of Olas Altas on Christmas Day. 

The tides seem to be higher than in other years too, so the estuary next to Barb's house is more open to the ocean and there are even pelican fishing just outside her casita. There are also a couple of turkey vultures that perch on the wall of the casita at times this year.  The iguanas are still in the palm tree behind her place and the usual coots, stilts, egrets, herons, orioles, humming birds, etc.are endlessly entertaining.  We always had our coffee and sometimes lunch or a drink there in the breeze, watching the action on the estuary, in the sky and in the horse coral in the yard behind Barbara's.  There are a few horses, what look to be a couple of mules, some dogs that try to control them or just harass them with their barking and a few would be cowboys who put out food for the horses in pieces of old tire, keep small but amazingly bright fires going and generally live the cowboy dream.  With watching all that as well as the locals and gringos crossing the estuary on the swing bridge, there's never a dull moment on the casita.  

One day we took a collection of 'collectivos' to the beach at Chacala. It was an adventure.  We didn't swim but were entertained as we sat under a palapa on the beach by a group of musicians.  A lot of Mexicans hired them to play, and I gave them some money too because I was so enchanted that I took some pictures, including a video which I wanted to put on this blog but which seems to be too big for me to transfer from the iPhone.  These things and a bike ride into the pineapple fields, which ended before we had gone too far with Barb's getting a flat tire, were the highlights of my holiday in La Penita.  I always like being there.

I arrived back in Vallarta by bus on Wed.in time to have margaritas with Dick and Ellen and their friends.   I knew the man, Rick, who had played tennis with Jim.  We then joined other friends of theirs, a couple of whom Jim and I had known, for a Chinese dinner.  Thursday's dental work was a success.  I now have a porcelain crown.  The tooth was prepared and the crown digitally made and installed in less than two hours.  MILAGRO!  Dick, Ellen and I then went to dinner at Las Brujas, one of their favourite places.  We shared two orders of fajitas, one chicken and one shrimp, and still had lots left to give to the man who watches the door at their place.  I remember they always used to do this and they did it both nights I was with them this time.  They tell him where the food is from, so he has as good an idea as they do of what the restaurants are like in Vallarta.  They are a wonderful couple and very good friends.

Greater downtown La Penita.  The man with the wheelbarrow is carting off the outer layer of the sugar canes, which are then either pressed into juice or cut into inch long pieces, bagged and sold to be chewed on.  I bought a bag, which I now remember I only ate a bit of and left at Barbs. It's quite a tasty sweet juice but can't hold a candle to a cold beer.  I did buy a plastic glass full too.  It was an unappetizing greenish colour, but with the addition of the juice of half a lime was quite tasty.  I drank most of that.  

A turkey vulture on one of the beams at the top of Barb's casita.

Hard-working Pelicans resting on the roof of an abandoned building by the water in La Penita

The pineapple fields we were biking through before Barb got her flat.

Manta rays and fish pulled in by fishermen in Las Ayala, near La Penita.

Musicians on the beach at Chacala.