To Part 2 La Paz La Paz was almost unrecognizable. I’d enjoyed the small town atmosphere when I first visited it in 1980 but it now has the big city pretensions that I find far less appealing. Despite my reservations, the family enjoyed several days in La Paz in December 2007, wandering about the downtown […]
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We jounce for five hours in a pickup truck heading west from Tampico over the dusty Mexican plain to the Sierra Madre, up and up into a green world-peaks as sudden as the mountains of Moorea, tree-covered jagged ranges huge enough to be the molars of God, past coffee plantations, ramping bougainvillea, banana trees, crashing […]
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There are all kinds of heroes, from the international arena to the local, and in one’s own neighborhood or family. Most heroes are defined by courageous or exemplary behavior while facing extreme adversity or challenge. Each profession has heroes, too those who make significant contribution to advancing its purpose or goals. This is the story […]
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Frida Kahlo was a talented artist considered by many to be a modern master. She also was a tough lady, fighting physical adversity from early childhood. Her artwork provides a look into her tormented body and soul. Her colorful, graphic paintings mirror her life story. Both are controversial! She holds several firsts as a Mexican […]
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At the start of the Mexican Revolution (1910) painting in Mexico had reached an all-time low. The then President, Porfirio Diaz had been in power for more than 30 years and in the words of famous American art critic, Mackinley Helm, “nowhere else in the world, not even in Victorian England, had bad taste in […]
Continue Readingby Index Page © 2011 MEXICAN PRESIDENTS & HEADS OF STATE INDEPENDENCE PERIOD and EARLY REPUBLIC Emperor Agustín de Iturbide Agustín Itúrbide, Unappreciated Unknown 1822-23 Guadalupe Victoria (Felix Fernández) 1824-29 Vicente Guerrero 1829 José María Bocanegra (interim) 1829 Pedro Vélez, Luis Quintanar and Lucas Alamán, triumvirate 1829 Anastasio Bustamante 1830-32, 1837-39 and 1842 Melchor Múzquiz […]
Continue ReadingAnglo and Mexican sayings are often subtly different. For starters, consider your pet cat. In Canada or the U.S., cats are considered to have nine lives; in Mexico, however, cats only have seven (siete) lives. Perhaps they used up two lives as kittens just getting to be old enough to be a cat? Or perhaps the difference […]
Continue ReadingMexico once tried hard to prevent Americans from migrating to Texas. In recent years, considerable attention has focused on the U.S. government’s efforts to stem the flow of Mexicans migrating north of the border in search of jobs. But there was a time in history when the boot was, so to speak, very much on […]
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Mexico likes to celebrate, and this year it has two monumental events to celebrate. On the very day (September 16) of the Bicentenario, the Bicentenary celebrating Mexican independence — I leisurely looked over the collection of stamps of Mexico that I have accumulated over the past couple of decades. Celebrating independence from Spain is nothing new to […]
Continue ReadingThe city of Los Mochis (“Mochees”, as locals call it) in the northern state of Sinaloa, is one of Mexico’s newest cities. It dates back only as far as 1872, when a U.S. engineer, Albert Kimsey Owen (1847-1916) arrived. Owen envisaged the city as a U.S. colony centered on sugar-cane production in this previously unsettled […]
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