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September 29, 2008

Arrojo: Potable Water Plan 'Absurd'

Unfortunately, it is probably one of the things most associated with Mexico: don't drink the water.

One hears many different reasons cited for this. In the Yucatan, the water table is very near the surface, and lacking any percolation through a soil filter, contaminants get into it quite easily. In older colonial cities, the system for conducting both waste and water are old, and cracks in pipes are said to allow them to slosh into each other. Some say that pipes through the city are okay, but people do not maintain the pipes and water storage facilities in their buildings well enough to ensure that the water that arrives at their homes as potable can stay that way.

In any case, it is bad news for everyone living in Mexico that the water straight from the taps is deemed unfit for use. People cannot drink it, they cannot wash their vegetables in it, some do not put it in their bird baths, while others have to rotate their toothbrushes to an every-other-day cycle to make sure they are completely dry before being put into their mouths.

Neither of the workarounds is ideal. One can get water delivery, which requires being home at the right time a couple of days each week, arranging for it to be left with a neighbor who can pay for it (water services do not run accounts for customers; payment must be made upon receipt), or buying it at a store and lugging home the big 20 liter bottles. The other option is to buy a filter for the house. Those require monitoring to see when the filters need to be changed and a fair bit of faith that the filters are up to the task of removing all the nasty things in the water. Non-inline filters, like those mass-marketed devices with filters on top of plastic pitchers, might filter out contaminants just fine, but the containers might be made with bisphenol-a (BPA), a chemical that is causing some considerable fuss after studies emerged that suggest it is potentially carcinogenic.

For the 50% of the country living below the poverty line, neither solution is affordable, and they simply have to deal with drinking unsafe water. For many families, the combination of large households and high prices for bottled water would require budgeting 10% or more of their income for clean water. That puts it beyond the means of most Mexicans.

It would be far better for everyone, not to mention a great boon to the Ministry of Tourism, if the government could get the water cleaned up and drinkable straight from the tap. Many plans have been developed, debated and sometimes enacted to try and provide potable water to the people here, but the costs are high. In 2006, the director general of the National Water Commission, said that Mexico would need to pour around 30 billion pesos annually, for the next 25 years into water projects. That adds up to about USD $75 billion, and Mexico does not have that kind of money to waste.

That is why the criticism of Guadalajara's new plan to provide potable water to the city by Spanish expert Pedro Arrojo Agudo and its flimsy defense by the project's supervisor, Ricardo Robles Varela, is maddening. The problem is severe, the need for clean water is great, and it sounds like the solution being proffered by the state government will end up being a worthless waste of money that benefits only the plan's developers.

Megan Smith's article in this week's Guadalajara Reporter details Arrojo's review of the Arcediano dam project, which claims the water will end up costing USD $0.73-$0.83 per cubic meter to process and still will not be drinkable. The water of the Santiago River, which the Arcediano project will capture behind a curtain dam, is loaded with heavy metals, which Arrojo says cannot be treated in the single purification process that the project proposes. The high cost-per-cubic-meter estimates result from the water having to be pumped up 580 meters through pipes to a treatment plant. The article states that, "[Arrojo's] concerns echoed the key complaints from the Pan American Health Organization, which found high levels of toxins and heavy metals in the Santiago last year."

The state water commission's response is that they have sufficient studies to satisfy them that the treated water would be potable. Robles dismissed Arrojo's arguments as "uninformed." The article quotes him as saying, "It is important, when emitting an opinion, to know the particulars of the case. His problem is that he is from another culture." [emphasis mine]

What? Is he saying that an expert biologist that was awarded the Goldman Prize for Excellence in Protecting the Environment in 2003, does not understand because the science involved somehow differs between Spain and Mexico? Is he saying European standards for what constitutes potable water are different from those on this side of the Atlantic? Is he saying that a Spanish expert simply cannot understand that the local government can get away with foisting a big bureaucratic boondoggle on Mexicans with no penalties? I cannot think of any interpretation of Robles' comments that legitimately answer Arrojo's criticisms.

It sounds like Mexicans are going to have to foot the bill for yet another project that lines the pockets of individuals while providing no real results. When it is all said and done, nobody will be held accountable for the decision to spend millions of pesos for a phony solution to a dire problem. Everyone here just seems to accept such things with a shrug of the shoulders, and therefore nothing ever changes.

It is perhaps not entirely ironic that Megan's article appears in the paper directly below another announcing the reopening of the tunnel near our apartment on Avenida López Mateos. It was closed for the second time since its initial construction because the pipes installed the first time they had to tear it all apart and rebuild it all over again were still too small. Yes, this tunnel has been built, rebuilt and then rebuilt again because of incompetence. This last time took three months and cost MXN $30 million.

Yet, as the paper reports, "despite calls for heads to roll, no one in the previous state administration has been called to task to explain the original shoddy job."

...nor the subsequent shoddy work that had to be ripped out and replaced again.

Posted by crispy at 02:11 PM | Comments (0)

September 27, 2008

Sitio 37: Plaza del Sol-Chapalita

A local cab stand in Mexico is called a sitio. I have not heard this term used in other Spanish-speaking countries we have visited. They are actual little huts where a dispatcher sits and takes calls, and the cab drivers hang out and wait to be sent out. All the sitios are numbered by their locations around the city, although the numbering system is relatively arbitrary, apart from the older areas of town being serviced by lower-number sitios. Our local sitio is #37, and it services the colonias that are Chapalita colonias - Chapalita, Chapalita Oriente, Chapalita Sur - as well as the area near Plaza del Sol.

Although this will not be of much interest to the general reader here, I thought it might be handy for me to post the phone numbers of Sitio 37 on the blog for the few that are local. There are actually five different cab stands that belong to Sitio 37, and the one to call depends on which one is closest.

Posted by crispy at 06:09 PM | Comments (0)

September 25, 2008

...and people from OUT OF STATE!

The equivalent of the city council in Shawn's home town, Framingham, Massachusetts, has passed a new law that serves as a reminder of how ridiculous things have gotten in our native land, and just how glad I am not to be there.

An article in the Metro West Daily News reports that:

As of Sept. 1, a change in alcohol serving policy in town has made out-of-state IDs taboo in Framingham watering holes. Such identifications are not a valid proof of age when ordering a drink in town establishments, according to the new policy.

I would tend to think that this violates the full faith and credit clause of the constitution, but that old rag seems about as uniformly applied nowadays as the old testament. I would think that public reaction to this, where the time required to traverse entire states can be measured in minutes not hours, would be very negative. A lot of people from out of town come there. People work there that live in other states. There are a lot of corporate headquarters there, and lots of people coming there on business from away.

However, the first reader comment to the article further underscores why I'm so glad not to be there: people in the US seem to eat that stuff up!

I think it's a great idea! Now the 10,000 or so illegal aliens are not going to be able to drink in these establishments. Not that a lot of them do anyway.

If they could apply that law to the liquor stores it would even be better.
Of course if that happened most of the liquor stores would go out of business, because they sell a lot of liquor and beer to illegal aliens.

Of course, anyone with a passport - foreign or domestic - will be okay.

Posted by crispy at 10:02 AM | Comments (3)

September 24, 2008

Armchair Apartment Hunting

A couple of weeks ago, our friend Joseph mentioned that he was looking in the housing listings of the Friday supplement to Mural and he discovered that we could get an apartment pretty much anywhere in the city for the amount we are currently paying for our apartment in Colonia Chapalita.

We love our current neighbors and our building, but with the rent having been hiked 10% this year and the possibility of it going up another 10% next year, I figure there is no harm in looking to see what is available.

I keep forgetting to pick up a Mural on Friday, but there are online listings in another paper, El Informador. I have been having fun just looking through what's available out there, and I thought that readers might enjoy searching the listings to see what they could be getting for their money here in Guadalajara.

There are a lot of neighborhoods listed in the pull-down menu for the search, and not all of them are places you would want to live. I'll give instructions for doing a basic search first, but then I'll include links directly to searches for some specific neighborhoods, illustrated with Google Maps.

  1. Go to http://aviso.informador.com.mx/bienes-raices.
  2. Click on "Busqueda Avanzada."
  3. Under "Categoría," select "[3] Alquileres - Departamentos" in the pull-down menu to search for apartments. Select "[4] Alquileres - Casas" to search for houses.
  4. Under "Colonia," either leave the pull-down menu on "-todas las colonias-" to search through all the listings or select one of the many options to search a specific neighborhood.
  5. "Resultados por Página" means "Results per Page," and you can select 20, 30, or 50. If searching only one colonia, you probably will not even come close to any of these options.
  6. Click on the "Buscar Bienes Raíces" button, above the two pull-down menus to do a search.

Here are some things to know about what you will find in the results:

Want to just run some pre-programmed searches for some areas around town?

I have indicated the following areas on a customized Google Map of the Guadalajara metro area. Click on the colored areas below to show the name of that colonia.


View Larger Map

Posted by crispy at 06:14 PM | Comments (1)

September 22, 2008

Larry Orinovsky, Abstract Photographer


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Green and Yellow Texture, Larry Orinovsky

Back in college, my friend Brian took a photography class. Unfortunately, he and the instructor did not share the same concept of what the term 'photography' meant. The professor thought of it as pretty pictures of people and places, and Brian thought of it as something more, well, less specific. I thought Brian's photos were lovely and very creative. His professor disagreed. Brian's final grade was probably one of the worst Brian had during his time at USC, and it was not due to a lack of effort.

In my many years since college, I have come to realize that most people do not like vague. They are threatened by endings that are ambiguous. They are tormented by a lack of resolution. They loathe the abstract. Most people would rather look at pretty pictures than study something that they cannot quite make out, appreciating other aspects of the piece besides the blatent representation of the subject. Color, shape, texture, contrast and composition are just a few other elements that make up visual works of art, but many people seem absolutely unable to consider them unless they take place in the context of a picture of something, something specific.

For the minority of folks out there that can take a leap of faith and enjoy pictures that do not try to speak a thousand words, I would like to introduce you to the works of our dear friend Larry Orinovsky. You have heard about him in many of my previous entries because he and his partner Joseph were absolutely crucial to our relocation in Guadalajara, and they still figure enormously in the continuing Mexican experience. Each one of them merits his own entry with the sole purpose of being showered with praise as fun, smart, all-around fantastic people, but today I write to talk to you about Larry's photographs - abstract photographs.

If you are one of those faint-of-heart people that do not consider works by the likes of Arshile Gorky or Elizabeth Murray to be "real art," perhaps you had best turn back now. This is your last warning.


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Vertical Blinds, Larry Orinovsky

Larry got a new single-lens reflex camera last year, a digital one. Since then he has been taking a lot of photographs, some your standard subject-verb-object kind of photos, but also a lot of photographs with completely indeterminate visual subjects. He did some research online trying to find others that were taking abstract photographs and was surprised to find that there are hardly any. Sure, a lot of people claim to be doing abstract photography, but extreme close-ups do not count in my book. Larry shoots photos that are truly abstract, and no he doesn't manipulate the form of the images in Photoshop. All the abstraction is somehow done in-camera.

Yes, I must admit that I'm dying to know how he does it. I suspect that he might tell me if I asked, but I am afraid to ruin the mystery. I love to simply look at his photographs and lose myself in the emotions that they evoke. Something that has always interested me in Larry's work (he also paints) is his diversity. He may have a series of things that have the same style, but he is always experimenting with new things. Some of his works are like geometric patterns, while others are like satellite photos of Jupiter's moons.


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Cavern, Larry Orinovsky

Larry now has a web site where one can view several of his abstract pieces alongside some more "normal" works. Just check out ABSTRACCIONES By Larry Orinovsky. Larry loves feedback too, and he would very much like to hear what you think of his photographs. If you would like to send him an email with your comments, his address is right there on his home page.

I am clearly not the only one to admire his work. Since he started making his photographs available for sale, he has been busy trying to keep up with the demand for prints. Just recently, several mural-sized pieces sold that were on display at a local lounge; all of them were snapped up within just a few weeks.

Maybe Brian should give it another go.

Posted by crispy at 12:13 PM | Comments (4)

September 19, 2008

Dengue!

Local newspaper El Informador is reporting that the head of the Jalisco Department of Vectors and Zoonosis, Norma Jacobo Hernández, said that there are 250 probable cases of Dengue fever in the state, with the majority in the municipality of Zapopan, where Shawn and I live. A related article says the number of cases in Zapopan could be as high as 77.

Puerto Vallarta has the next highest number of cases reported in the state, coming in with 16.

Dengue fever is spread by mosquitoes and is found in tropical locations. The state health services recently launched a public awareness campaign instructing citizens to eliminate any standing water that might collect in receptacles outdoors and to change water in flower vases every three days to remove any potential breeding grounds for mosquitoes. The government began a program of spraying earlier in the month, and it is recommending that people wear repellent even when inside their homes.

Symptoms of Dengue fever include:

Posted by crispy at 01:04 PM | Comments (0)

September 18, 2008

The American Society of Jalisco

On Wednesday, I joined the American Society of Jalisco.

It is an organization that was formed 63 years ago to provide local information to expatriates and visitors from the United States, and to offer them a social outlet with fellow English-speakers. Nowadays one does not need to be a United States citizen to join, and they are actively trying to recruit a more diverse membership. Anyone can join and take advantage of the services the group offers.

Among the primary benefits of membership are:

The membership does tend to consist mostly of retirees, although they welcome anyone. The person that signed me up was completely cool about the fact that I have a husband living here with me, but I tend to find that homophobia is far less common among Americans living abroad than it is within the country itself. The organization also does a fair bit of charity work for local causes, and it serves as the meeting place for other groups such as Alcoholics Anonymous and Toastmasters.

Annual membership dues are MXN $300 for individuals and MXN $600 for families. The American Society of Jalisco is located at Avenida San Francisco 3332 (a few blocks off the glorieta where the Escultura La Estampida is located), and their phone number is (33) 3121-2395. They can be contacted by email as well: amsoc@megared.net.mx.

Posted by crispy at 04:20 AM | Comments (2)

September 13, 2008

National Pride

This coming Tuesday, the 16th of September, is Mexico's Independence Day.

In Mexico, the patriotism that is expressed is a lot different than that seen in the United States. Here, it's more akin to the scene from Casablanca where the patrons of Rick's Café Américain drown out the Nazis with a rousing version of La marseillaise. Mexicans' expressions of their national pride evoke the image of the scrappy underdog, refusing to go down without a fight, despite the overwhelming odds against it.

In contrast, our neighbors to the north seem to express their nationalistic sentiments more like the Team America theme song. They come across as a big bully that is going to kick some ass just to show everyone that they can.

Posted by crispy at 12:02 AM | Comments (0)

September 11, 2008

In Parque Chapultepec


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Chris and Aaron at the monument to the niños heroes in Parque Chapultepec

Posted by crispy at 01:20 AM | Comments (1)

September 10, 2008

Our Cable Sucks

I used to like our cable. Maybe it's because I didn't know any better and at first, the wide array of Mexican television thrilled me. I could see old Mexican films, wacky game shows, over-emoting telenovela stars and music channels that actually show music videos. Maybe I liked the company because they kept greatly increasing our Internet access speeds with only token (90 cents a month) price increases. Maybe I had better things to do with my time than watch TV.

I know. Everyone hates their cable company. Yet I have started to note that it is not just our cable company, but the channels themselves that are in fact responsible for a large share of the frustration.

We upgraded and paid extra to switch to digital cable. It is not yet going to be mandatory here in Mexico like in the United States, but the package allowed us to get Turner Classic Movies Latin America. Shawn really missed getting to see good films on TCM, and from the moment he learned that basic digital cable offered the Latin American version here (and confirmed that they carried the original soundtracks on the SAP), he was determined to get it. When we decided to finally get a digital video recorder, we decided it was time to upgrade to digital cable.

Since getting it, my biggest frustration has been the slow loss of SAP in English on nearly every channel that had it when we first signed up - Discovery Channel, The National Geographic Channel, Retro, and Fox. Calls to our Megacable's customer service to complain about this only get us the response that they are not to blame; they just pass on what they get from their upstream provider to their clients. For some reason, they can not be bothered to take it up with their upstream provider that they are no longer getting the level of service that they paid for. No, because the vast majority of their customers do not have a need for the SAP, they will do nothing about it.

Having to watch programming dubbed over into another language, scorched free of any ambient sound into a a sterile, lifeless soundtrack where the words do not match the lips of the actors is disturbing. Having nothing but that kind of viewing experience slowly makes you feel like you are going insane. Imagine if all the shows you could watch were like Hong Kong action films or the judging panel from Iron Chef; there is no connection between what your eyes see and what your ear hears, even if you understand what is being said.

As maddening as that is, our most recent annoyance with our cable comes from the Latin American versions of popular channels themselves. One would think it might even bother the majority of their customers, although I still doubt that many will complain about it.

This fresh hell comes in the form of channels carrying programs for which they show only a handful of episodes, repeating the same ones over and over, even though many more exist. We first noticed this with Discovery Travel and Living. They run one of our favorite shows, Globetrekker, an hour-long, in-depth travel program. The promotions for the show that they run even push the fact that there are over 100 episodes of it, but it seems that they only show, say, 10 different episodes in any period of 3 or 4 months. When they add new programs, they do not cycle all the old ones out. They add the new ones in drips and drabs, taking an old show out of rotation here and there.

We recently started getting The Big Bang Theory, which I watch because I think Jim Parsons is super hot. The only problem is, WB Latin America, the channel that shows it five times a week here, shows only four different episodes. Shawn and I have numbered them, and we make bets on which one will be the one on when they show it. "Will tonight be episode one again, or episode four?" What is even more frustrating is the fact that they run lots of ads showing scenes from episodes that are not these four. They tease us with thinking they are going to show a new one, but then it is just one of the four we have seen time and time again.

Just recently, we were delighted to find that we could watch Charlie's Angels at 2 am, Tuesdays and Thursdays, on TCM Latin America. We would wait up, snuggle up on the couch at five to two, and prepare ourselves for those golden opening strains of the theme song and the narrative explaining how the three little girls from the police academy came to work for Charles Townsend. It was the best 70s cheese we had gotten since they started carrying Wonder Woman. But soon our late-night ritual was soured when we realized they were only showing the first season, and even then, repeating the same few episodes over and over again.

I had been grousing about how we should switch from Megacable to SKY TV or maybe even some other alternative, but when the channels are the same on the competing carriers, what use would it be?

It is maddening because it is yet another case where, coming from the United States, one can see that the foreign product of American companies exported to Latin America is often astoundingly inferior, and they just do not seem to care. The green tea frappuccino at Starbucks® here is made without the melon syrup (and thus sucks rocks). Wal-Mart carries Gatorade® here, but only the nasty lemon-lime kind, not the more palatable orange. One can buy a T-Fal® iron here, but the warranty is only good in the United States and Canada. They want our cash and warm bodies in front of the tube, but they cannot be bothered to provide the same level of service and selection that they provide in the United States. It is imperialism of the worst kind.

As a citizen of the country where so many of these businesses come from, it is embarrassing that they have such terrible offerings in their products and services, especially when they are so expensive relative to local buying power. Of course, nobody here complains, so there is no reason to expect that foreign companies will shape up and improve their service. A couple of years ago, when Mexicans organized a one-day boycott of American products referred to as nada gringo or "nothing gringo," to protest the treatment Mexican immigrants to the United States were receiving, people just went out the day before and stocked up on all the American products they were not supposed to buy on the official boycott date. With consumer consciousness like that, what else can one expect?

Posted by crispy at 10:39 AM | Comments (4)