Cada dia, una aventura nueva (Each day, a new adventure)

A few days ago it was buying water. People say you can't drink the water in Mexico. It is true. You can't drink the tap water. Instead, you buy a "garrafon", a large jug of water (like the kind that goes on water coolers) and that's your drinking water. Most hotels and restaurants have garrafones, so up to now we have been able to just drink water from those. Our apartment includes the tap water and the electricity but not drinking water. I did ask for the base for the garrafon (not a cooler, just a plastic base with a tap it goes on, or sometimes a metal stand that swivels down for pouring) and they brought us one. A couple days ago, Peter came down from the apartment early with me (his classes start an hour later than mine) and decided to buy the water. The water guy, like the gas guy, comes by every day yelling, "aguaaaaaaaaa! hay aguaaaaaaaa!" (the gas guy yells, "gaaaaaaaaas"). Peter approached him and managed to work out the transaction. Tadaa! Now we have water! When it runs out, we will trade in our empty garrafon for a new one.

Yesterday, it was returning stuff to the big store. It is not even worth going into that except to say that during the whole ordeal, what kept me patient was thinking that I didn't have anything else to be doing and that's kind of nice in its own way.

Today it was taking out the garbage. As I see it, most people leave their little bags (the size of plastic grocery bags) of garbage along the route of the garbage truck (and I don't know yet what day it comes), more or less in lumps. We asked our landlords where to leave the garbage and they described how to get to some dumpsters nearby. Down the street and around the corner in a parking lot. This afternoon as I headed down to a cafe, carrying the garbage to drop off, I stopped in the Bagel cafe to say to Sandra, Bene, and Chui, "Cada dia una aventura nueva!" To which Bene said, "Vas a tirar la basura?" ("You are going to throw out the garbage?") She understood.

I wonder what is equivalent back home. Calling PG&E to get gas started must be different than just waiting for the gas guy to come by so you can buy your tank. What else is something that one has to figure out back home?

On another note, Alex, the 4-year-old grandchild of the landlords, who lives with them along with his parents, visited us today. We were dealing with a leak in the base of the garafon, and he popped by to talk to his dad who was working on the apartment they are building over ours. I asked him what he was up to, and he told me he was gathering guavas so that they can make a great punch for Christmas. The family has fruit trees of every sort outside: key lime, lemon, guava, fig, peach, cherry, and more I'm not remembering, but most are not ripe right now. After a minute, Alex left and returned with his hands full of guavas, which he dumped on our couch before going for another load. He told us excitedly that now we could make the punch too! He explained that you put sugar cane in water, and also the guava. I think you would boil it.