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Living in Mexico – Six Years Later
Living in Mexico has it challenges and rewards. After years of living in Baja it is worth a look back to celebrate the changes.
Six years living in Mexico, how time has flown. Well, to be more specific, that time has been spent living in Baja California Sur. My living in Mexico has involved both learning and adapting to a new climate, a new culture and a new way of doing business.
The climate was the first adjustment I had to make. Having grown up in New England, Baja is just about as much like living on a different planet as one can get. I replaced summer green and winter white with soaring summer temperatures and winter beach time. There are still times I miss the sounds of a briskly flowing stream in the brown of Baja Summer.
Having arrived in the winter from San Diego, the weather was initially most palatable. Overnight lows only reach into the low 50’s in La Paz for the most part. Daytime highs can range from the upper 60’s to the low 80’s on special days. Summer heat comes around the middle of April, with the first days that broach 100°F. Days that warm are not the norm for that early in the season, but it give you a taste of the weather ahead.
That first summer was difficult, not knowing how to pace one’s self or schedule heavy tasks early in the morning. By the time temperatures and humidity peaked in late August some friends and I came up with an ode to the golden late evening sunsets. I don’t recall a bulk of the stanzas, but the final line was, “Goodnight, evil yellow orb, we will do battle again tomorrow.”
Those of you who live in Baja Sur know where this goes next. For those of you thinking of moving here, there is good news. You adjust. A few months later I awoke to find the house chilled down to a brisk 66°F. Despite my frosty New England background, I found my teeth chattering out of my head until the heat was turned on. I joked with my friends back home that was the ‘event’ that cost me my Vermont driver’s license. The second summer passed much easier, as you learn the techniques for living in this desert climate. You plan your day differently and learn to pace your daily activity to adapt to the weather. And you drink plenty of water.
One of my discoveries that second season was Baja summer nights. Being an avid sailor, I was annoyed by my hobby’s limits in the cold waters of Southern California. Even on the 4th of July when the sun goes down in California you have to put on a substantial jacket when out on the ocean. Here in La Paz, summer nights are the best part of the day and my new found love of ‘full moon sailing’ was born. The winds for sailing are often best at night during the still summer months and the full moon illumination on the Sea of Cortez is nothing less that spectacular. You can spend your days in an island anchorage, reading,fishing, snorkeling, swimming and more, where the cool breezes of The Sea make the heat less offensive. I could go on about summer recreation in The Sea, but that is another article.
Adjusting to the culture was probably easier than the weather. Being a very tall guy, I have always stuck out in a crowd, so being the only gringo in a store, restaurant or gathering went largely unnoticed. My father once noted in the grocery that ‘everyone is looking at us!’ I pointed out to him that it was more likely that they had never seen to men over six and a half feet tall in once place at one time before.
I have made great strides in my espanol by trying to emulsify and spent time with many new friends who spoke only Spanish, or just a hint of English. After six years my espanol is still a bit ugly, but I can communicate on most subjects, from business to idle conversation. One thing to accept is that no matter how long you live here or how excellent your Spanish becomes, you will never be Mexican. One has to be able to adjust to being a minority. Should I return to the country of my birth someday, it will certainly temper my treatment of immigrants.
With my work on the BajaInsider, I became familiar with the culture as well. The Mexican holidays provide a window into the cultural setting in Baja. Family is paramount. The focus is on today, not what is to come. Even the way they look at birthdays is different, where the birthday wish is feliz cumpleaños translating to congratulations on completing a year.
Being a working member of the gringo community makes me somewhat of a rarity. Most North Americans in Baja are retired. There is a slowly increasing number of those who have sought to open businesses, like restaurants, bars and service industries. But since employed work is virtually impossible to find and pays less than most would be willing to accept, there has not been a flood of working Americans headed to Baja. In fact, with the downturn in the economy, there has been an exodus of sales people who sought to make a quick buck in the once explosive Baja real estate market.
Yet being in business still means that time is valuable. The pace at which life and business move in Baja can wear on your last good nerve sometimes. Events and meetings rarely start on time and some employees believe that just getting to work, regardless of the hour, is a significant accomplishment in their day. I will add that this seems to be a Baja phenomenon. People educated in or from Mexico City and some other parts of the ‘interior’ (mainland Mexico) tend to find these local traits just as discomforting as I. Once you learn to accept these differences you find yourself absorbing the positive aspects of this and become more ‘tranquillo’ at heart. I no longer find myself shouting driving instructions through rolled up windows on the San Diego freeway.
There are other business practices to adapt to, from the use of facturas, the tax deductable receipts required, to the reversed power of the debtor and the creditor. Being an employer is a very different experience. In the states, the basic contract between employer and employee ends with the issue of every paycheck. You don’t produce and the next paycheck can contain something pink. Here in Mexico employers joke that after the initial 90 days, the employee owns you. Dismissing or laying off employee can be a delicate dance and will usually cost the employer some cash, in the form of a ‘finiquito’ or final payout based on time with the company.
Life has changed here in La Paz during my period of adapting too. The whole of Baja Sur has developed significantly in the 8 years I have been witness. Nearly every vacant lot, once blowing with trash and debris has been turned into a gleaming office building, new home or strip mall. Once run down adobe homes have been totally renovated into examples of fabulous classic Mexican architecture. New projects still seem to erupt from the sand on nearly a daily basis. This increase in growth and population has also lead to more rules. To my chagrin, dogs are no longer welcome to walk the Malecon or the islands in the Sea and parking tickets are no longer just an idle threat.
So, the bottom line, after six years of living year round in Baja Sur, would I do it again? Absolutely. Bob Dillon once sang, that ‘Everybody serves somebody’ and for every Yin there is a Yang. Things have proven neither better nor worse in the adjustment, just different, sometimes very different. Living in Mexico is still a positive experience for me and if you have the metal for that self-expansion and experience, living in Baja can be for you too. Always remember, no matter where you go, there you are.