Fun Times

The activity that was the most fun for us this week, was going out to breakfast on Saturday with the Zapatas and their granddaughters who were visiting them this weekend. We went with them to the tianguis a while ago, so the girls have met us before. They were waiting for us in the lobby when we came down in the elevator, and as we stepped off, the girls ran over and threw their arms around us. That sure was good for our hearts! It’s been a long time since we’ve received such an enthusiastic welcome, and it makes us miss our grandchildren even more. We rode a bus and then walked a short way to a restaurant called La Casa de Toῆo, which is a chain of restaurants that serves authentic Mexican food. I asked the older of the girls what she liked best on the menu, and she said, “Sopes.” I was going to order a “sope de pollo” (chicken) but she corrected me to “carne” (meat.) She was right. It was delicious! We miss being around children, so it was a fun breakfast for us. By the time it was done, the girls were calling us “Tío” and “Tía” (Uncle and Aunt.)

After breakfast we walked a few blocks across a shopping center parking lot and then through a peaceful, sweet neighborhood to get to the tianguis. Going to the tianguis is becoming a regular Saturday activity. The produce there is so much better and fresher than the produce we find in any of the stores. Plus, the vendors there all call Ron “patron” or “jefe” (both of which mean “boss”) and me “linda” or “hermosa” (both of which mean beautiful.) We always head home with delicious fruit and raised self-esteem, so why would we miss it?

Russett potatoes are hard to come by in Mexico, so we have to settle for whites. Ron has handled that quite well for an Idaho potato farmer.

     

A few blocks from where we live is a horse racing track which we pass frequently in our comings and goings. It was closed due to Covid when we first arrived. Last week as we were driving past it, our Uber driver mentioned going there. Ron asked if it was open now, and the driver said it was. We thought that might make a fun outing, so we along with Pat Wright and the Alsops went Saturday afternoon. We had a funny thing happen when we arrived at the track. The usher who was showing us to our seats looked at our nametags, then turned to Ron and asked, “Elder, what are all of you doing here?” It turned out he was a member of the church and had never expected to see missionaries there. Ron assured him that we were there just to have fun watching the races and would not be betting. Although we didn’t bet, we did each choose a horse to cheer for in each race. I think we had as much fun cheering for our picks as did anyone who had money riding on the outcome. Pat was the definite winner. The horses she picked won every race. Even when she picked a 20 to 1 long shot, it came in first place! Between races we had a great time visiting, enjoying the beautiful weather, and eating some of the best onion rings I’ve ever had. We left after five races. By then we’d gone through five orders of onion rings, and it looked as if rain might be coming, so it seemed like a good time to head back home.

The man in the middle is the usher who was surprised to see missionaries at the racetrack.

     

The horses warming up before a race

     

These were as good as they look!

    

This week at the office, we celebrated Michelle’s birthday. She is such a beautiful person, and we love working with her. We really enjoy everyone we get to work with. We don’t know if that’s typical of most missions, but we feel very blessed because of it. Another fun thing from the office this week was that the story we covered on the humanitarian project in Pachuca was picked up by the Church’s global news site. They rewrote the article from the information in ours, but when they say, “reported the Church's Mexico Newsroom,” that’s our department. Here's a link to the story:

Humanitarian Project on Global Church News Site

One day this week we were out running errands, though it might be more correct to say we were “walking errands” because it involved a lot of walking. I’ll leave you with some of the photos I took so you can experience a little more of the city we live in.

      

These little guys are all over the place. They usually scurry off so fast that I can't get a good shot of them, but this one seemed to think if he stayed really still we wouldn't see him.

     

this cute little girl was sitting on the sidewalk selling candy, though she was so engrossed in her book that we had to get her attention to tell her we wanted to buy some. I wondered who would leave such a little girl alone doing this, but she didn't seem at all scared--until I pulled out my phone to take a picture. Before I did that, she was all smiles.

      

Mexico City has a lot of palm trees, but a disease has killed many of them. This crew was removing the dead trees along this avenue. It's sad to see.

     

We've been here ten months and there has never yet been a time when something hasn't been in bloom. Many of the flowers I see are ones we use as annuals in Idaho, but here they are perennials.