# hang out?



## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

I will be in Colima Monday 11/4 for 5 days. Anyone want hang around sometime? Thanks - deborah


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## bajacooler (Sep 13, 2013)

*Curious abt Colima*

Let me know if you think it would be a safe interesting place to live!


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

*ummm*

ok but I was asking if there is someone to hang out with............ My husband is in jail and I need some moral support


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## GARYJ65 (Feb 9, 2013)

deborahc9133 said:


> ok but I was asking if there is someone to hang out with............ My husband is in jail and I need some moral support


How was it?
Did you get a lawer?


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## sparks (Jun 17, 2007)

bajacooler said:


> Let me know if you think it would be a safe interesting place to live!


Colima is safe and interesting but summers are very warm and humid.


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## bajacooler (Sep 13, 2013)

I am very sorry to hear about your troubles. I want to hear it turned out for the best. At least you are going to be in a safe place.


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

actually I am going tonight. My husband is originally from Mexico so he somewhat knows the system and speaks Spanish so communication is not an issue. Also, my brother in law in Los Angeles has a few connections so he is trying to cut a deal......I am going for moral support and the legwork that bro in law deals me to do. I will be happy to have him out, then I will strangle him (Kidding - I don't want to end up there either)


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

Yes! Colima is a great place!


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

Thanks for the support. I may post from there if I have some questions


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## GARYJ65 (Feb 9, 2013)

deborahc9133 said:


> Thanks for the support. I may post from there if I have some questions


I'm glad that you are much less worried now
I'm in Queretaro, but if I can be of any help, please contact me
Cheers


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

*Thx*

Gary - thanks so much for the support. It's funny how crisis can either bring a family close or make people angry. My husband and I have a huge extended family in Colima, but nobody seems to want to help, except our 24 year old nephew who is getting weary and he is getting angry at me. We have a empty family home that anyone from the states can stay in, and he says I cannot stay there alone (c'mon, I am 57 years old and have traveled the world). Also, I have a former ESL student in MX who offered to come to keep me company (25 years old and feels grateful to me). My nephew said that he cannot stay in the house with me. It may look fishy to them, but he is a kid my son's age and I feel like he is my son too! See how family can get with hard times? They treat me like I am dumb.


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## RVGRINGO (May 16, 2007)

You are, perhaps, crossing some cultural boundaries which should not be breached. You may find that you could be deprived of the use of the house, social interaction, or worse. Remember, you are, and always will be the outsider. If the family is very traditional, you will be expected to do as they indicate and to respect the wishes, even dictates, of the male family members, in particular. Yes, a different world that you are about to enter. Tread carefully.


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

I do not think she is looked at as an outsider at all. The OP is one of the women in the family and in Latin cultures, including mine, female do not stay alone with a male no matter what the age difference is.
The family would not want one of theirs to be the butt of gossips as it would reflect on them. Unfortunately for her she is looked at as one of the family members which can be nice but also very restrictive.
You will not see me moving close to my exended family, I cherish my freedom way too much.


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

I totally get what you are saying. But I have known these people for 25 years having gone to MX hundreds of times. The family house is owned by my brother in LA, who is a US citizen in the states for 50 years and he said ok for the house since we always stay there (in fact it is filled with our stuff because we are moving there in March). My student has visited us many times and knows my husband, in fact, when he visited, he was introduced to the family as much student. I think that I have been accepted and embraced by the family, and I am always culturally sensitive and respectful.

I am a strong, independent woman and I do not want to report to a 24 year old. I can't stop being who I am. I speak fluent Spanish and can navigate traveling since I have been there so much that it is very familiar.

I am taking direction from my bro in law and my husband. My bro in law is calling the shots and I will communicate with him. I respect him very much. I don't know if these facts make a difference.


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

thanks for that. My husband is from a very small town in Colima and gossip is rampant. We will not be living there but in the big city if Colima. They annoy my husband too. So no for my student? They don't want me to be alone, so I have a friend and they don't like that either. 

And what is the problem staying alone? I have travel alone many times. I know how to be safe, plus, I will always keep the doors locked. Like you, I want my freedom. I will visit with them in the day, but I want to be alone at night


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

I get the same flack in Chiapas from my indigenous friends and neighbors who cannot believe that I come alone without my husband. I always tell them that Ilike being alone because I can eat when I want to do not have to do anything for my husband and they laugh , sometimes they stay with me because they feel sorry for me.
When I go to Oaxaca I get the same thing. I am given a house and two or three kids to sleep with me as it is not right for a woman to be alone . At 6 am my friend´mother in law knocks at the door to make sure I will be ready to leave at 8am to go to the market with her and that I will be back with her cooking breakfast for the men by 9. 
I usually cook an the women watch ready to pounce if I make a mistake. They were very relieved when they saw me wash the chicken. They told me they could not believe that some American women who cooked for them did not wash the chicken so they decided we all some dirty habits and they had better watch us. 
If I wash clothes they come by with some excuse to check out if the clothes are properly washed and so on...Funny when on vacations and when you can escape it but not so funny if you live with it day in and day out,

I think your family will eventually get used to the fact that you want to be left alone, you will get criticized for it but they will eventually shrug it off..

If you could have some of the fammily kids or a teenage girl stay with you , you would make them feel better.
As far as a young man or any man..no a good idea- Borrow kids and sleep with them if a male friend stay there and that maybe ok.
Good luck!


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

Ok I will not have my 24 year old student help me....

I want to just say F it and stay in a hotel. How would it be to say that I want to stay in the town where the jail is (about 30 minutes from my husband's town is?) I can use the excuse that I want to be near it. Otherwise my nephew has to drive me back and forth everyday for 2 visits a day or I take the local bus 2 x a day. I can visit to the town sometimes -----do you think that this is ok? I just want to be left alone to write, read and watch movies. 

I look at it this way ------ if they (or anyone for that matter) came to the US for a visit, I would expect that they do things their cultural way and who am I to judge? If I want to be alone, so be it. It is not an meant as an insult, and this does not mean I ignore them - I will visit them. I also brought them lots of US stuff for each family and their kids (chocolate, sun flower seeds, ink for my nephews printer since he printed out emails notes to my husband. My point is, I interact with them. I feel like just staying in a hotel --- if they think it is weird - then ok. Maybe I will meet a female friend too.


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

Your best solution is a female friend no doubt. Staying in a hotel close to the jail is not a bad solution since you are doing it to be close to your husband and frankly at this point I would do what I feel like as long as you do not break the tabou of having a male around. 
They probably will think that staying in a hotel is wasteful when you could be driven there but sometimes you need to put your foot down.


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## RVGRINGO (May 16, 2007)

I am reminded of the need for a certain government agency to get a certain tribal group out of a certain country. These folks were quickly installed in an apartment building in a certain southern state, where they immediately settled into their cultural ways; washing in the toilet, and starting the cooking fire in the center of the living room floor. Some things are hard to change and most of us do not live the two or three generations for the changes to happen.


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

Funny the same thing happened in Paris and in the south of France when they installed North African from the Mahgreb in high rises back in the 50´s.


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

I can visit from 9-11 and 4-6 everyday, so my nephew would have to take time from his business. I will stay in the house tomorrow night and then say that my husband said to stay in a hotel. He knows me and how private I am. He feels his family is intrusive too - he has lived in the US for 50 years + US citizen - so he is used to American culture


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

Yes it is hard to go home after living in a different culture for many years. Everyone in my family tells me I could not live there and I know they are right. I value my freedom way too much.
At the hotel you will feel free and will be able to have your privacy , it probably will be a whole lot easier for you in this stressful time. This would be my exact reaction.


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

Yeah and 30 bucks is nothing. I will compromise and stay with them tomorrow night and then say my husband wants me close by. They cannot say anything to that since they don't want to make him angry because he gives them money etc. good tactic


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

Very good you are just following your husband´s wishes and they will get that!


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

By the way if I were in your shoes I would not give any warning, I would go to see my husband and tell the nephew on your way back that your husband want you to be closer and on the following trip that day check in the hotel..no point giving them something to worry or talk about before it happens.


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## Hound Dog (Jan 18, 2009)

I love this thread about intercultural misunderstandings. There fore, I have decided to recount the REFRIGERATOR STORY:

I grew up in Alabama and, while a young man in my 20s, spent quite a bit of time living in some ancient crappy Left Bank hotel, since torn down, next to the Cluny Ruins and half a block from the famed BLVD San Michele. I made my living in Paris n the streets selling the _New York Times _which in then 60s was trying to break the English langiuage newspaper monopoly then held by the_ International Herald Tribune_. Those were fun times for a young guy but, eventually, I headed back to my home in Alabama.

Then, a few years later, I met and married a French woman from Paris while living in Alabama and this was 42 years ago and, at that point in my life, I finally began´over the years, to understand Frenchj culture but it took a long time and, thus the mundane refrigerator story which, I thiink gets to the bottom of the essence of cultural differences seemingly so petty on the surface but so important in reailty.

I have spent countless times as a guest of my wife´s extended family all over France since the early 1970s as has she of my Alabama family so it is not that we are inexperienced in these intercultural matters.

In Alabama, if one is a guest in a home there, one feels free to "raid the refrigerator" at any time of the day or night for a drink or food leftovers as long as one observes a couple of rules. (1) Never take the last of anything and (2) Replace what you took the next day when stores open. So, while staying at my sister-in-law´s house in Paris. I wolud often raid that refrigerator for sustenance without so much as a thought that this was socially inappropriate as long as I replaced what I had taken the coming day. After our last visit with my sister-in-law in her apartment in Paris and upon our return to Mexico, my wife informed me that taking anything from the refrigerator at all at any time was not to be done -* ever*. An entirely different social etiquette than Alabama and - mind you - this was 41 years after we were married and after many visits to relatives in both Alabama and France.

Intercultural maraiges are fun and very educational but surprises are in store down the line.


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

Thx!!


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

The whole thing is making me a bit angry that I am being treated like I am helpless. My nephew told me that "jail is not an adventure or a game". Really?????? I taught ESL in a state prison in Pennsylvania for 5 years, 8 hours a day. I certainly know the conditions of a prison - punk!


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## citlali (Mar 4, 2013)

At this point Iwould not hit the newphew but "run away runaway" I am sure he is his macho self and is trying to help a damsel in distress so better stay away rather than get mad.
Once alone in the hotel you will feel totally liberated. Been there done that!


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## GARYJ65 (Feb 9, 2013)

deborahc9133 said:


> The whole thing is making me a bit angry that I am being treated like I am helpless. My nephew told me that "jail is not an adventure or a game". Really?????? I taught ESL in a state prison in Pennsylvania for 5 years, 8 hours a day. I certainly know the conditions of a prison - punk!


Many people, not only Mexicans, think they know everything
This applies mostly for my kind: MEN
Many times I'm included there


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

Indeed.......!!!! If only women ran the world............. oh how things would be so much better


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

The thing that bugs me is that he is my son's age! Dude, get the hell away from me.


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## GARYJ65 (Feb 9, 2013)

deborahc9133 said:


> Indeed.......!!!! If only women ran the world............. oh how things would be so much better


Not so much as that,
sometimes men over react, some other, women do the same thing
It's the salt and pepper of life isn't it?


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## GARYJ65 (Feb 9, 2013)

Don't get angry about that, consider your nephew's age and immaturity and stay away from what bothers you, as in any other situation
One cannot change the world as it is

Life is way too short as to give importance to things that just, are not important


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

ok guilty as charged (never mind the pun). Me? Over react? Never (lie)


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

oh BTY why am I labeled a senior expat?????


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## lagoloo (Apr 12, 2011)

That's supposed to distinguish you from the Newbies. 

That refrigerator story of Hound Dog's isn't quite accurate. Where I was raised in the States, a guest never, ever entered the fridge without asking the host's permission..........so there you go.
Lots of little differences, such as whether it's okay to drop by your house without calling first.


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## deborahc9133 (Nov 27, 2010)

Oh perhaps choose a different label? (LOL)


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## Hound Dog (Jan 18, 2009)

_


deborahc9133 said:



The whole thing is making me a bit angry that I am being treated like I am helpless. My nephew told me that "jail is not an adventure or a game". Really?????? I taught ESL in a state prison in Pennsylvania for 5 years, 8 hours a day. I certainly know the conditions of a prison - punk!

Click to expand...

_
I understand and sympathize deborah but as my wife citlali advises, get the hell out of the family home and move into a hotel no matter how modest, while trying to help your spouse if for no other reason than the sake of your ongoing marraige. After all, it is your spouse with whom you may (still) hope to maintain a long terrm relationship, not his hick extended family who have never been 10 kilometers beyond Podunk and treat you like an idiot without justification. 

When my wife from Paris came to Alabama to teach for a year and married a fellow from that land of which most of her French familiy living in rural France had never heard, they thought she was nuts. Well she was nuts to marry me but they had no notion as to why that was a fact. Provincial people less traveled are typically intolerant all over the world. To hell with them if their eyes do not see beyond the borders of Hooterville. You and I can´t open them.


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## Isla Verde (Oct 19, 2011)

GARYJ65 said:


> Not so much as that,
> sometimes men over react, some other, women do the same thing
> It's the salt and pepper of life isn't it?


Overreact? Moi?


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## Hound Dog (Jan 18, 2009)

[_QUOTE=lagoloo;2246601]That's supposed to distinguish you from the Newbies. 

That refrigerator story of Hound Dog's isn't quite accurate. Where I was raised in the States, a guest never, ever entered the fridge without asking the host's permission..........so there you go.
Lots of little differences, such as whether it's okay to drop by your house without calling first.[/QUOTE]_

Now, just a minute lagoloo; a guest in the home? How about a son-in-law who married their daughter,sibling/cousin in 1971 and had spent countless hours on numerous visits to their homes all over France from Marseilles to Lille and whose family had also welcomed my wife´s extended family into our homes in Alabama, California and Mexico to say nothing of taking them on road trips from Utah to the Alabama Coast to the ruins at Toniná and Palenque and on to the Lacandon Forest. People with whom I have spent extended visits and who have visited me over and over again more times than I can recall. In other words; family - not hosts. Not only my refrigerator but my wallet and homes were always open to them without reservation and they never had to call to say they were dropping by nor did I feel the need to a call them before showing up although courtesy dictated doing so and so I did as did they. But if they or I needed a cerveza or apple juice from the refrigerator at 3:00AM, then it was gone as far as I was concerned but to be replaced when the stores opened later that day. 

In my native Alabama this is elementary while in France it is more controversial. What the hell do I care; I live in Mexico.


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