A boat docked in a tiny Mexican village. An American tourist complimented the Mexican fisherman on the quality of his fish and asked how long it took him to catch them.
"Not very long," answered the Mexican.
"But then, why didn't you stay out longer and catch more?" asked the American.
The Mexican explained that his small catch was sufficient to meet his needs and those of his family.
The American asked, "But what do you do with the rest of your time?"
"I sleep late, fish a little play with my children, and take a siesta with my wife. In the evening I go into the village to see my friends, play the guitar and sign a few songs . . . I have a full life."
The American interrupted, "I have an MBA from Harvard, and I can help you! You should start by fishing longer every day. You can then sel the extra fish you catch. With the extra revenue you can buy a bigger boat!"
"And after that?" asked the Mexican.
"With the extra money the larger boat will bring, you can buy a second one and a third one and so on until you have an entire fleet of trawlers. Instead of selling your fish to a middle man, you can then negotiate directly with the processing plants and maybe even open your own plant. You can then leave this little village and move to Mexico City, Los Angeles or even New York City! From there you can direct your huge new enterprise."
"How long would that take?" asked the Mexican.
"Twenty, perhaps twenty-five years," replied the American.
"And after that?"
"Afterwards? Well my friend that's when it gets really interesting," answered the American, laughing. "When your business gets really big, you can start selling stocks and make millions!"
"Millions? Really? And after that?" said the Mexican.
"After that you'll be able to retire, live in a tiny village near the coast, sleep late, play with yur children, catch a few fish, take a siesta with your wife and spend your evenings doing what you like and enjoying your friends."
And the moral is: Know where you're going in life . . . you may already be there.
I just read a tee shirt that said "the lower the latitude, the better my attitude." You settle in fast here. I was worried that Isla would not suit Tom Donovan, who is just a bundle of energy. He has ridden his bicycle cross country and run several marathons, and Tom & Eileen even did some of the Tour de France race route. But even he succumbed to the energy of this island.
One day Sandy asked me to walk to Centro and do two errands. I came back and she asked, "Did you do the first thing?"
I said Yes.
She asked, "Did you do the second thing," and I said "No, I forgot." And I did forget!
It is hot here, even in March, but you do have the sea breeze that cools you a little -- but it is wise to sit under a palapa or sombrilla.
The heat does affect you in a good way. Help me I am melting!
Musica and entertainment. There wasn't any in 1988. Now there are four groups of strolling mariachis. That is, if you call Gregorio a group. This is our amigo, Gregorio Sanchez.
He is the best singer on the island. He has 6 kids and one esposa, and he was a trumpet player in the Mexican Navy. For $5 U.S. he will play for an hour -- or what seems like an hour --when you are sitting and trying to eat in Centro. He has a beautiful voice and he accompanies himself with a sort-of new guitar. Wilma took his old one. We always ask him to please play "Besame Mucho" (kiss me a lot) and Kezia loves "Cinco Perros" where Gregorio barks through some of it. New tourists will always turn around alarmed at first, and then they stay and listen, and at the end of his serenade will fill his bag with coins. We especially look forward to seeing him every year. Maybe he is our favorite!
And don't forget the palm reader and the guy with the snake, the jugglers, the pole dancer and the drummers with the fire dancer and the peddlars and the street urchins and the leftover Carnival dancers.
There is a rose seller also. We were chatting on the calle with Glendi, a former waitress from Buccaneros, in Centro on Hildalgo, the street that is blocked off to traffic, where you can sit and eat in your short sleeve shirt and shorts in February and March very comfortably. She kept talking but stopped the rose seller and in Spanish purchased two roses. The roses were for us. How sweet was that?
On Valentine's Day there are roses everywhere. If you are feeling blue or lonely just go to Hidalgo street take a seat and people-watch.
Nothing is perfect and hurricane season is the only thing that can be a negative here. The first year we came in January. Later that same year, 1988, Gilbert hit. People ask "How long have you been coming here?" We say since Gilbert. Everyone knows when that hurricane hit. September 14, 1988. It was the second most intense hurricane ever observed in the Atlantic basin. In nine days it killed 341 people. Including 225 in Mexico. It condemned El Presedente Hotel, which sat as an ugly mess for 17 years until it opened again as the present day Avalon Reef Club at the very northern tip of Playa Norte. 5.5 billion dollars in damage through the Caymans, Jamaica, Haiti and Mexico, including the islands of Mujeres and Cozumel and the Yucatan peninsula, before finally shooting up into the United States.
Then Hurricane Wilma came here in September of '06 and stayed for three days. It brought 185 mph winds. My oak trees in Marshfield move side to side at the top about 10 feet each way, and that is in 60 mph winds. It did $29,000,000 in damage. Especially in Cancun, just 8 miles away on the mainland. We have photos of everyone being evacuated from Isla -- everyone. It is weird because when they were leaving, the weather was still beautiful. It left 10 feet of snow drifts -- I mean sand drifts -- in front of Jax, and on the main street where the boats come in. It took the 60 foot Playa Norte beach and left it 3 feet wide. The island lost power and water for a month.
Palapas and roofs just blew away. Cement power poles and coconut palms broke in half. Rain was a major problem and everything flooded. Mario had to move everything to the second floor of his casa. He had 7 feet of water in his first floor. But everything else stayed dry. Then his corrugated metal roof blew off. His wife Ehdy said, "What will we do now?"
Mario said, "It is okay -- we are still alive."
Then his father died. He told me all of this four months later. I wondered how they managed to keep on living. I noticed that his two gold teeth were gone and figured out where they went.
Sandy and I started a Hurricane Wilma Fund. El Sarape allowed us to put posters up in their windows.
They were posters of photos we had taken of the island children. We raised $7,000 from friends and businesses, and arranged with Donna and Ziggy -- Zigifredo -- who live on Isla, to distribute it. We had developed a friendship with Ziggy when he was a waiter at his brother's Cafe Cito breakfast restaurant. At the time he was telling us about of the American girl he was in love with -- Oh my Donna! They eventually married and had children here. $7,000 may not sound like much money but most people here make between $60 to $100 per week and that is 6 days and 12 hours per day. Christmas Eve was especially sweet in Marshfield that year because we received an e-mail from Donna saying the last of the money had been distributed and we had made a real difference to the people of Isla. Thank you again to all of you that contributed. Even El Sarape gave money. We have been repaid with free coconuts, free songs, free drinks and big smiles and hugs and handshakes with a terrific, warm feeling inside that we made a difference.
This year Marnie's friend Jen came with us.
She will be coming back. She taught us the Bingo wave. That is when you wave your arms so that your flabby muscles still shake even after you have stopped moving your arms.
Our maid has written us a note it says "Bienvenidas a esta su casa en Isla. Mi nombre es Veronica." Then it basically says she will be happy to take food for tips. We will do more than that.
Bring your books if you come.
It is really too warm, even in their winter, to move around much. You really should buy a hammica and put it up on the day you arrive.
When we reach our room at Maria del Mar, "Cabanas," we turn the overhead fan on to to 5 and never shut it off.
Oh, by the way, there are no tennis courts or golf courses. Remember in "The Big Easy" when Dennis Quaid's mother says to his girlfriend, who is all sweaty, "Where you been, Chere?" and she says "Running." The mother's response was "RUNNING!?!" No one brings their running shoes to this island. You can rent a motor scooter for the day also. Oh look! There goes Chris on his motor scooter.
One of the nice things about coming here is that you can leave Boston in the morning and be at the playa in the warm blue water by mid-afternoon. They are flying more and more direct flights, which will get you from Boston in 5 hours or through Miami in around 8 or 9 hours. You can get a lot of reading done in that time. On the playa you might not be able to pay that much attention to your book with all the topless European women and the men in their banana hammocks, if you know what I mean.
I read 4 books this time. "The Day of Battle," one of a trilogy, this one WWII Sicily and Italy 1943-1944; "Water For Elephants," "Cuba," and a biography of Richard Harris. You know him from "Bob's World" and "A Man Called Horse" and 421 "Camelot" performances. And even the Harry Potter movies. Do you remember the tune MacArthur Park? His friends called him Dickie. The last movie I saw him in was Clint Eastwood's "The Unforgiven." He played English Bob, and Sheriff Gene Hackman beat the crap out of him for not checking his guns in when he arrived in town. In reality, he was living the end of his life in the posh Savoy Hotel in London. When they wheeled him out of the elevator at the Savoy, headed for the hospital, he hollered to everyone in the lobby, "It was the food!" Both of his former wives were at his side when he died.
Day trips from Isla Mujeres. There is a sign at the boat dock advertising day trips.
But mostly you just will not want to leave, even for a day.
But you will, and you will find out that even though you had a good time, you should have just rested on Playa Norte.
Maybe next year you will leave the island for a day.
Wednesday in Cancun is bullfight day. Sandy used to love the bullfights, go figure.
Usually we will rent a golf cart for the day on the island. Many people come to snorkel or to fish. The golf cart (seats four) costs $45 U.S. and it is finally regulated. Anywhere you rent, it should be the same price. We like to go to the very southern tip, Punta Sur, and sit and have a drink and look over at the skyline of the high-rise hotels of Cancun.
You can pretend you are wealthy and you can say, "I wonder what the poor people are doing today." People from Adams, Massachusetts thought that was a fun thing to say. No one that I knew in Adams had any money.
Or you can go to see the turtles at the tortuga farm.
Or eat somewhere else on the island outside of Centro. There is a small zoo near Pirate Mundaca's place.
Or you can walk along the beach and find conch shells or brain coral.
You can drink the water, and the ice is safe -- at least at the tourista restaurants. There is one down a dirt road, right across from the zoo, at the rotary. Order the mackerel, but be prepared to wait.
Hey, it's Mexico! Why do you want to rush anyway? They have the coldest cervezas on Isla.
Be careful at the local vendors. Don't drink the water when you are in the shower. "Don't Drink The Water" was the very first play Sandy and I ever saw at the South Shore Music Circus in Cohasset, way back in 1967. I got the tickets through the Navy's Special Services at South Weymouth Naval Air Station.
Of course, don't forget all the toilet paper goes in the waste basket. I know! But you get used to it. The island's septic system is not like ours at home.
You can take a tour of Isla Contoy, which is less than an hour towards the gulf. You can snorkel on the way over. Then explore a bit and have a terrific beach cooked meal before leaving. You can snorkel off Contoy also. Watch for the stingray that seems to know when lunch time is. The cooks will put the grills on the ground for cleaning. Iguanas and sand crabs come out of the jungle by the hundreds to feast.
No! I'm not exaggerating -- go see for yourself. I have asked you a million times not to exaggerate.
Strike up a conversation with your boatmates. You will be surprised to learn where they are from and how they chose Isla. Don't talk too much about yourself. They won't care anyway. I remember a tale from the book "How to Win Friends and Influence People" by Dale Carnegie. He once cornered a man he admired at a party and drilled him with questions all night long. The cornered man never once asked Carnegie anything about himself. When leaving, the cornered man said that it was really fun and interesting talking to him. Yah!
Characters. This Island attracts all kinds of people. Screenwriters, gays and lesbians, families, honeymooners, couples, teachers (especially all summer long), and as I said before, foreigners from everywhere. The local Mayan, Chiapas, Yucatan and Mexican people have their own stories for sure. Just because you see a peddlar on the playa walking up and down all sunny day long in the heat, do not think he or she doesn't have a good story or two.
Two years ago, on our last day alone together on Isla, I purchased a heart-shaped silver ring from Joseph William for Sandy. Hey! Don't take this lightly. It cost me $ 22 U.S.
His father was in the jewelry business, and he himself had a store on the island. He admired my Four Corners turquoise and silver ring right away. Sandy brought her heart ring this year. Joseph William recognized it right away. It is hard to believe that, but then he said something about my ring from Four Corners again, so maybe he did remember. I showed him a silver cleaning glove that I own and he seemed impressed. I gave him mine and will bring him two more, per his request, next winter. He gave up the store in Centro because rents are rising sharply -- and so now he just walks the beach with his jewelry case.
We met Selena and her brother when they were peddling on the playa years ago. Her brother's name is Francisco, just like Allan's. All Franciscos in Mexico are called Pancho.
Selena's English is really good now. "How are you? How is your vacation? How have you been?"
Felipe is the coconut seller on the playa. He has no competition. No one else wants the job. I bet he does pretty well. He hollers "Coco Loco, Coco Bello." You raise your hand and he comes over and pulls out his super sharp machete and cuts the top open and puts a straw in it.
You see that all over Belize and Costa Rica and Mexico. The machete and the rubber boots. Then he services the next customer, and then when he sees that you are through with the coconut milk, he comes back and cuts it wide open so you can eat the white fruita inside. He gets bored hollering "Coco Loco" and "Coco Bello," so sometimes he hollers what he sees such as "Coco Hippie" or "Coco Mama Mia" if he sees a topless women. He remembered our Wilma Fund efforts and this year the Coco bellas were free.
My favorite store on Isla is Aztlan, owned by Ana and Juan Carlos Pena. The photo shows another Mayan statue coming back to Marshfield.
The store is right on Hidalgo near Dos Amigos.
Women's liberation has hit Isla in the form of Hortensia Garcia. She has a little shop over near the youth hostel. The one on the east side of Centro, not the one on Hidalgo. She makes magic out of pareos. She can make you a shirt or a dress. She takes two measurements and she's got it figured out. This year she made two shirts for two grandchildren -- the Sylvesters' and ours.
Abel has been here. He just doesn't remember.
Her husband sweeps the street and walks in circles as Hortensia and her Niñas turn out the clothing.
Some tourista put her on the internet, and now golf carts line the street and she is busy in a place where day trippers don't normally wander.
Life is good under the palm trees in the shade on Calle Carlos Lazo.
Not to be outdone, Maria Lopez sells delicious, salty pepitas on Playa Norte. Every day she takes the ferry across from Cancun. She prefers the lenta, the slow boat. She always says that it is mucho calor and we always buy her a Coca. Coca in glass bottles taste so good here. The island children love Fanta. "Fahn-tah."
I swear the Kahlua is way better here also. Probably they use a different sweetener in both the Coca Cola and the Kahlua -- real sugar.
Here is a photo of Aloy.
For a long time he would carry his huge basket of popcorn on his back and walk up and down peddling it. A couple of years ago he started parking himself and a bottle or two of cerveza on the street leading to Playa Norte. One of his legs is really messed up. Probably it was a birth defect. Anyway one of his shoes has about a six inch lift in it. That doesn't make that much sense because when he would do the beach, he would basically drag that whole leg. Maybe it was for selling more popcorn. I know his wife makes it down in the Colonies. Sometimes at the end of his day he only makes it to Casa Blanca for sexual favors. That will be the nights that his esposa will lock him out and he has to sleep in the hammica. It is the best popcorn. I smother mine in his hot sauce and sal.
I don't know any thing about this tall, white-bearded guy with the hat.A Davy Crockett wanna-be. He is out at night,and waves and smiles to everyone. Rumor has it that he was either an economist or a veterinarian for a very long time until he finally retired here.
Elements is both a restaurant, breakfast only, and a 4-room hotel.
Cesar is from Peru and Lisa is from Austria. They met here. I told you this place is magic. I once went on a swimming pool appointment over in Brockton. They were both black, and spoke in beautiful English. I asked them where they were from. She said, "St. Martin, the French side, Marigot." He said he was from Martinique. I said "Okay, how and where do a girl from St. Martin and a guy from Martinique meet?" They said Paris.
Colors of Mexico. The light here is as good as in the south west of the United States.
On one arrival, when we had been carrying and lugging our luggage all over some foreign country south of Mexico, Sandy said at Puerto Juarez, eight miles across from Isla, "Bob, just give the porters a couple of dollars and let them carry the bags to the pier." I did. We had a nice cruise across. Tom, Eileen, their bags, Sandy and me. No bags. The porter never put them on board. Welcome to Mexico. Three boats later they arrived. No problemo!
I love this photo of me with the Silverado Kid.
Yah, it is Steve Silva from portuguese New Bedford. He loved being called the Silverado Kid. We worked together for 20-some years in the stamped concrete business. His first time here, he brought Kim. Then he married Kim and her three kids and her Mom. For a while they came here more often than us. They would stay in the Hotel Belmar over Rolandi's restaurant, because it had a hot tub and a television. Then they broke up. He brought his new girlfriend here. She didn't like it. This year, while sitting at Rolandi's, don't Kim and her new husband come over to say hello. Strange world. That is why I have my own and it is called Bob's World. If you have received this then you are a loved member of Club Bacon. I wonder how the Silverado kid is doing. I miss him. We have not spoken in three years. He loves Sandy, and told me so.
Mexico City Mexicans look much different than the Mayan. One of those is Ursula, who works at Color de Verano. It is a great place for dessert at the end of a terrible day. It is very different-looking than most of the restaurants here. It is shiny with a lot of glass and chrome, and we just call it The Miami Beach Place. Or Ursula's. It is right under the island light house next to Jax.
The Virgin of Guadalupe. You see the images everywhere. Here it is on this azul wall on the piazza of this casa near Hortensias.
The images are on hats. Ballcaps are called "cachueha." If you wear it backwards, you are called a Zonzo (moron). Almost all the locals wear their motor bike hats backwards. At the mercado they sell the local shopping bags. They are called bolsas. Kezia has a beautiful one with the Virgin embroidered on it. They are made of 100% plastico. Juan Diego, a young indigenous Indian in Villa de Guadalupe Hidalgo back in 1531, had a vision appear to him as a young woman with black hair and dark skin. The Virgin of Guadalupe. She is bigger here than even Pancho Villa or Che Guevara.
I just saw the front page of the local paper, "Por Esto." It says Fidel has finally stepped down. "POR ESTO!" The old men holler down the calles and avenues, "POR ESTO!" Buy a newspaper from me. "Por Esto!"
Annie and Cody and their son Ben have just joined us for a day on the playa. It is their first time here. They have rented a beautiful house up near Punta Sur. It is called Casa Mariposa, house of the butterfly. It has a swimming pool in the front yard with a wooden bridge going over the middle of it to reach the front door. Ben is six. Tom and I try our best to engage him in conversation but he keeps his distance. Marnie and Jen break right through. All three settle right in.
Annie is a yoga student of Kezia's and Marnie's. She had overheard them talking to Samantha about Isla and made a note to check it out. Mario says "joga" and his daughter's name is "Yesicca." Annie and Cody own Zuma, the Mexican restaurant in Faneuil Hall.
When the day is closing, Annie says, "Ben, it is time to go." Ben replies, "Can I stay with them?"
It is not always like that. One year a newly-arrived little boy on the beach crossed his arms and said to his worn out, burned out Mom and Dad, "I don't care what you say, I am not going to like it here." To my dismay, yesterday I heard a woman say, about her return home, "We have the excitement of seeing our dogs."
Friends come and go during the weeks that we are here. It is really fun to meet them when they arrive and sad after to see them off, but we adjust. Even after 41 years of being married it is still nice to be alone, but not for too long.
Allan and John went to church on Domingo.
I walked them down and eventually, after wandering around Centro, sat outside in the vocala and listened to the musica pouring out of the church. It was mucho calor. There are only two churches on the island -- one is in Centro and one is in the Colonies.
Now the last of our friends have gone back to The States, and Sandy says that she would like to go to Mass. "Okay, I 'll join you," I say. We both grew up Catholic. I was quite religious when I was growing up in the valley.
"From this valley they say you are going.
I will miss your bright eyes and sweet smile"
An old Western tune. Tom Egan's dad's favorite. Janis and John (my brother), Sandy and I saw Michael Martin Murphy sing it at Johnny D's. Wow, was it ever a great show. "Red River Valley."
Whoops! Anyway, I talked the whole first string of the Adams Memorial High School football team into attending a Novena. It was right before our showdown with the champion team of Berkshire County, Drury from North Adams. The field was frozen and somewhat muddy. We held them or they held us to a 0 to 0 draw. The non-Catholics were upset that the Novena didn't work. My Dad was there. He said the opposing linebacker hit me so hard when I was pass blocking -- I played offensive guard and defensive line backer -- that I did a somersault and landed on my feet. He didn't reach our quarter back. Mike Skrockie was his name. He actually had a chain around his waist and then it traveled up to his shoulder that kept it from going too high and causing him pain in his dislocated shoulder. I am so glad he wasn't at full strength. I have a news photo of my Dad making a shoe string tackle against Drury in 1938.
Oh! Earth to Bob. I'm back. I am in church in Mexico and the Mass is really different -- at least it sounds different. It is not in Ingles or Latin, but Spanish or maybe it's Mayan. How would I know! Everyone comes in early and stays late. When you kneel, you do so on the floor. It is so overcrowded that people are standing in the aisles. They still do the "Dominic go frisk them" thing. And when you do the "Peace be with you" part, people come from two aisles away to hug you or shake your hand. I think they actually mean it. All this hugging freaks me out. It is not natural is it?
Oh, do you know what else they do? When the bells are ringing before communion they stand erect and hold their arms out like a Jesus statue. Eyes closed. It is pretty cool, actually. Also Marnie says it is a joga position.The music is provided by an hombre with a guitar and a very robust, young, very loud choir. The whole church is loud. I mean everyone is really getting into it. Everyone participates. Not like gospel, just everyone is involved and participating.
After church it is helado time. All the little ice cream carts are positioned outside. Life is especially sweet on Sunday morning here on Isla Mujeres.
I asked Eileen Hickey what she was thinking the very first time she landed on Isla. She said, like everyone else says, "It's like coming home." And seeing she had never been before, that is quite a statement. But that is a standard, general statement that Isla lovers make.
Right now at Rhodes on the Pawtuxet, at the Mardi Gras Ball, the dance floor is filled and people are dancing and laughing and having a wonderful time. All of our traveling friends are back in The States. Sandy and I are outside on the deck of our room at Cabanas. It is warm. Stars are shining. The outside ceiling fan is turning. We miss the dancing and the people, but we would rather be here than anywhere.
Last week on Wednesday there was a full moon and an eclipse.
Eight miles out to sea is a great place to star watch. When the eclipse happened, the ocean dropped from 3 feet to 1 inch, revealing hundreds of star fish.
"Esta es la fierra de Dios y maria Santisimo"
This place is 7th Heaven . . . this is never never land
Amor ,
Tocino
"Well I hope you understand.
I just had to go back to the island
And watch the sun go down
And hear the sea roll in."
Leon Russell
Click here to listen
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My house looks like this tropical paradise - www.srmconcrete.com
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