Taco Wednesday.

No, not Tuesday.  Wednesday.  I don't know why. At Mr. Jon's.

It's all you can eat for Q55. Lots and lots of choices for fillings: beef, chicken, pork, tofu, fajita vegetables, rice, frijole negra, sauces, shredded cheddar [rare in Panajachel], sour cream [very rare in Panajachel], sauteed piña, Pico de Gallo, flour tortillas, corn tortillas, tortilla chips, chicharron [fried pork belly], cowboy candy [sometimes; sweet pickled jalapenos]. It's become somewhat of a tradition for us. And becoming very popular. It's probably the most crowded restaurant on Santander on Wednesdays now, and likely to get worse as high season progresses.

Adam paying for his taco buffet.

Not many leftovers!

This Saturday is Decembriefest. [Just like it's not Wednesday,  it's not Oktoberfest]. Bratwurst, weisswurst, polish sausage, and more. GERMAN POTATOE SALAD! Sauerkraut. All homemade by Mr. Jon himself. He's a former Minnesotan and has written  a book on spices. He promises it will be good, and stresses not to miss it. He made about 40 pounds of each variety sausage, and has no idea how long they will last. This is the first time he's doing this. If successful,  he may try it on a semi-regular basis. Q12 [$1.65] for a simple sausage on a roll; Q15 [$2.05] for deluxe, with sauerkraut and/or other special fixings.

Move over Smokin' Joe's. We're  going elsewhere this Saturday after the meeting.

Sanitize Your Fruits And Vegetables.

I may have mentioned this before, but most fruits and vegetables get sanitized before consumption. One sister new to Panajachel didn't know this, and was sick for a week or so.

We generally use GSE,  grapefruit seed extract,  because it is the safest for consumption and adds the least unwanted flavor, especially for soft items like strawberries. GSE is the most expensive product but requires only a dozen or so drops in a quart of water. For something like strawberries,  I leave them in the plastic bag and thus conserve paid-for drinking water and GSE.

The second disinfectant tgat we use is a lemon based product. Less expensive, but can leave a lemony taste. We'll use this on hard skinned items that often get peeled anyway. We don't want to get "transfer" from handling and peeling.

The last disinfectant we use is a chlorine bleach based product. This is the least expensive option, but doesn't often get used because we feel it is the least safe for consumption. We might use it for large batches of stuff, just because we have it already.

All of these products are available in Panajachel,  though GSE can only be found in the higher-end grocery stores. Sanitizing fruits and vegetables is new for us here, but it was probably only a matter of time before we would have been doing it in Wisconsin [as many of you already are doing].

Rack full of goodies from the mercado drying after being sanitized.

The price break on most fruits and vegetables in the open market is around Q5 [$0.75], give or take a Q or two. Piña,  sandia [watermelon -- still haven't purchased one, have to carry it home on the moto], 2 rojo pimientos [red peppers], 4 aguacate [avocados],  pound of cebolla, zanahoria, o papas [onions, carrots, or potatoes].

Raquel bought the aguacate across the lake along with some leaf lettuce. There is an expat that grows it, so hopefully less likely to be contaminated. It still got sanitized. There is also an expat running a butcher shop across the lake where fresh and smoked meat and sausage can be found. [He also does a BBQ in Panajachel on Saturdays.]

Pickle.

Just a quick comparison of the cost of some items here. One of the things typically missing from the hamburgers in Panajachel is pickles. Funny how you get a tatse for something when they are scarce or expensive.

A pickled mix. Q139.75 or just under $20. Notice the toothpicks in the onions.

Another pickled mix. Q177.75 or just a bit over $24.

An olive and gherkin mix. Q226.75 or about $31.

All of these were about half gallon size jars. I noticed these when I was looking for ingredients for pizza. As much as I had a hankering for something salty sour, these were all out of my league. I settled for a small can of black olives and a pouch of green olives.

Ants!

This house has been fairly bug free throughout our occupation. Our previous place on Calle Rio had a bit of an ant infestation. The only thing we've regularly seen here is sun spiders. And the solo mosquito late at night when they buzz in your ear in the dark just so they can see you futilely slap yourself.

But now Raquel and I have noticed ants in our bathroom.  [Josh's is still apparently clear.] First in our medicine cabinet, then around our sink. Little teeny, tiny ants. We were squishing them to discourage them, moving some cosmetic argan oil they seemed attracted to, and spreading aromatic oils to try to repel them. Nothing seemed to be working. [They are tough little things, very difficult to crunch!]

Then one morning I noticed the thrush-like birds resident here circling in the sky, and was reminded of gulls in Sheboygan doing the same during ant hatchings. I watchwd more closely where our bathroom ants were coming from, and observed this:

Hot water faucet handle.

That is rust and a badly corroded screw that was under the top cap of the handle. But all of the specks around, under, and INSIDE the handle are ants! They had nested inside the hollow clear plastic handle.

I tried removing the handle but the screw was too corroded, so resorted to banging on it to knock the ants out. After about half an hour and several follow up sessions I killed most of the ants or flushed them down the drain. The few remaining ones left. Hopefully they haven't taken up residence somewhere more difficult to reach.

Cold Weather!

I'm  sure everyone back in Wisconsin is laughing at this post title. It's dipping below 60°F at night and very windy; but this is nothing compared to what many of you are experiencing.

Our thermometer showing 62°F outside AND inside.

There are five reasons I can call this cold:
1. There is no heat in the house. While you can turn on your furnace when it gets cold outside, we don't have that option. Pretty much what the temperature is outside is what the temperature is inside. Although we do have a fireplace, we haven't located and bought wood yet. Even then, the fireplace will only warm the living/dining room area. The bedrooms and bathrooms [showers!] are still chilly.
2. We didn't bring a lot of warm clothing. I have three hoodie sweatshirts.  Raquel has one or two, but they're the lighter type. Josh and Lydia have some sweatshirts as well. But none of us have any sort of coat or jacket [other than dress jackets]. We just weren't prepared for temperatures this cool. Raquel did buy a knit hat for Lydia,  and is on the lookout for one for herself.
3. Our only transport is by motos. We dont have the protection of a windshield and can't turn on the heater. At least it's not also raining!
4. This is the coldest others have experienced here. Although it's not a big sample pool, some in the congregation have been here over five years.
5. Our "hot" showers and "hot" baths are more warm than hot. At times the water can seem hot but it's just more than a trickle and after awhile it's not enough heat or volume to constitute a "hot" shower. We won't complain too much in this regard, since most of the natives swear by cold showers.

This morning I ran errands.  I dressed in jeans, a sweatshirt, shoes, and socks. The FIRST time I've worn pants and shoes other than service or meetings. [No, haven't gone au naturale,  just usually wear shorts and sandals.]

Electrical.

An old two-prong outlet.

Because they used metal conduit most of these are actually grounded and easily converted to three-prong. One of the first electrical modifications I did in this house was in Josh's bedroom; there were wires coming out of an outlet that had exposed [bare] connections! [I've subsequently used that wire for grounding my new receptacles; see below.]

Why three outlets on these old receptacles? I don't know that three cords could actually fit; maybe the older type. Surprisingly, though, these better fit our night lights than the newer receptacles.

New receptacle with nightlight barely fits coffee maker plug. Old three place receptacle was actually roomier. 

A new three-prong replacement outlet.

I've done seven of these so far. Most of of our electric devices have three-prong cords. The narrow slot is supposed to be the "hot" wire, but since the wires coming into the electrical box are generally the same color I sometimes mix up hot and neutral. The wiring to these outlets is all two-wire, with the metal conduit providing the ground. That means I had add a third wire to ground these plastic constructed receptacles back to the conduit.

New power conditioner and surge protection at the tv and blue ray player.

The power is so schitzy here that all devices should really be plugged into some sort of protection. This conditioner can constantly be heard clicking as the power fluctuates. So far haven't had any long unplanned power outages. Have had one planned power outage that lasted most of one day; some sort of maintenance work that affected the entire lake, twelve or more communities. 

New Furniture

 Many people suffer for years with their furniture here, especially living room furniture. Most of the couches and chairs we've experienced or heard about are wood with cushions -- basically outdoor patio furniture -- and uncomfortable. Or often the furniture is cheaply constructed with inferior materials that quickly wear out; cushions that compress and lose their cushioning,  fabrics that wear through. Our living room set in Jucanya was worn and stained, and we mentally cringed every time we sat on it.

Furniture is a big part of making a comfortable home. And  a comfortable home is one of the keys to enjoying your stay and making it long term.

0p

Our living room set.

There are several stores in Panajachel that sell furniture, but for sake of simplicity we bought from only one. This limited our selection to three living room sets, three price ranges; we bought the most expensive because it seemed the most comfortable.

Our new plush chair and our new TV with blue ray stereo system.

New dining room table and chairs. Cardboard Noah's ark in middle of table was consructed for a toy animal set Lydia just got. The kids have played here but hasn't been used for dining yet!

Outdoor hammock chairs. There are also two lie-down hammocks in the bag on the plastic chair. Haven't figured out a place to hang them yet; the trees in the yard aren't conveniently spaced. 

The old outdoor 'barby'.

We can smell carne [meat] roasting on an open flame from some of the hotel and small restaurants around our house. Really makes me want to fire this baby up! Now if I can only find decent meat and charcoal...

New washer and dryer.

To hook up the washer was relatively straight forward -- only had to replace the two-prong outlet for a three-prong outlet and connect the hoses. The dryer was almost a week long process: searching at 5 or 6 hardware and construction supply stores;  figuring first one way and then another way to vent it depending upon what I found available; communicating with our LP gas supplier to install a new tank, hose, and regulator. It's vented through the window screen; not ideal but works.

New L.P. gas supply for the dryer.

Washer hoses are hooked up into the wall behind.

New stove. Nice!

Purple stool is Lydia's.  It's supposed to be in the bathroom for washing hands at the sink, but ends up all over the house.

Bottles on the countertop to the right of the stove are STRICTLY medicinal!

New hose and regulator on our L.P. gas supply for stove and hot water. This is our third tank of gas in the six weeks we've been in this house! A bath tub and washer really add to the consumption.

The old stove. Broken grates and erratic flames.

Old built-in double wall oven and broiler. We kept smelling rotten dead animal odors until we figured this had a pilot light that needed delighting. Haven't used this yet, but having a pizza party tonight may try it.

Brand new state of the art refrigerator with linear converter [means it monitors and regulates how hard the compressor works depending upon actual need]. The doors beep if you [kids!] leave them open too long.

Let there be light!

Note the "semi-automatic" ice cube maker under the shelf in the freezer. Manually fill the trays with water, wait to freeze, flip a lever, and the cubes [hopefully] drop into the bin underneath. We'll see! 🤔

The old fridge didn't seal tight, so the freezer iced-up solid and dripped water across the floor constantly. It was dark and sort of scary inside -- what is THAT in there! I didn't realize how bad I hated that fridge until we replaced it.

There are still some furniture pieces that I would like to get: a decent coffee table; a larger tv stand; desks for study and play in the bedrooms; a work cart in the kitchen. But all-in-all we've been settling in and getting more comfortable. 

Casa Blanca.

Our house for the next year. Well make it a home!

Calle Monterey.  Really an u-shaped alley off the street.

Yard side of the house. The yard may be the best feature.

The back yard. That is a very fruitful lime tree just to the left of the post. There is nothing like having fresh limes every day!

Huge palm and pine tree; eucalyptus  visible just to the left.

The old cistern tower, no longer used. This can be Brett's private hot tub to bathe in. Did I say "hot"? Maybe after the sun heats up the water after several hours. No, I didn't forget about you,  Jordan. Have something special waiting...

Just for you,  Jordan. Suicide shower in the maid's quarters. Notice the bare electrical wires hanging there eagerly waiting for you...

Driveway and carport. Motos are extra.

Maid's quarters at end of driveway. Kitchen door to the right.

The kitchen.

Dining room and living room. Notice fireplace to the right. For those chill 60° evenings.

Joshie's bedroom.

His closet. One of the best features of the house, a rare find in Panajachel,  closet space.

Joshie's bathroom with steeping tub and shower.

Our bedroom. Dida sleeps in the twin to the left.

Other half of our bedroom. Bunk beds will be relocated to other rooms for visitor use.

Our closet space. Shelves had to be lined, they are dirty particle board in rough shape. Hanging space is in adequate but will be added to once I find Menards.

Our bathroom. Loosely hanging sink and constantly dripping shower are bonus features.

I've already started to do some repair work even in my sickly condition, mostly elecrical to remove some exposed wiring and to install the washer. Although most of the outlets are two-slotted, they are grounded. The boxes are metal and connected to the breaker box with metal conduit. So switching over to three-slotted outlets is fairly simple. Bzzzzt! Oh, yeah. Turn off the breaker, Jordan!

Don't Scream!

Me after five or six days of being sick. Have barely gotten up, haven't showered, shaved, or even changed. Stink! That tee-shirt smells like the gym uniform in the locker next to yours in high school.

One positive, have probably lost a lot of weight. Who has a scale?

Have since shaved, showered, and changed. Have hooked up new washer successfully,  but not yet dryer, so haven't done laundry. Hopefully today!

We Robbed a Bank.

And these are the getaway vehicles.

We had to Western Union money down to buy our motos. I won't say how much in this open forum, but those are ten thousand Q packets. Since the bank didn't have enough B's, they gave us partial in $'s. That's okay,  except Western Union exchanged at 7.2 Q per $, and the bank exchanged back at 7.45 Q per dollar. Current exchange rates have held fairly consistently at 7.3 Q per $. So we lost about an additional $43 dollars because of the banks currency shortage. I wasn't going to bicker; I was just glad to get the cash. The clerks and tellers only spoke Spanish. Besides, the two guards each had shotguns.

We went to the Yamaha shop to pick up Raquel's scooter. The owner's wife  wouldn't accept the cash because it was a "bank holiday"!!! [Hadn't we just come from the bank?!] She let us take the scooter anyway, because Andy, who purchased cycles from the owner previously, vouched for us.  We went to the Pulsar shop -- both shops are owned by Emilio -- so I could pick up my moto. It wasn't ready.  Come back the next day.

The next day, I went back to the Pulsar shop. His assistant there counted out the money, and accepted the dollars without hesitation [first concern], and initially gave an exchange of 7.2Q per $, then she changed it to 7.0Q per dollar. Goodbye another 400Q! [$54]. But I got my bike, and again wasn't going to quibble. I got my bike!🤣

Not over yet. Emilio called that night and said "trouble with money!" Now what? Was some counterfeit? Would his bank not accept $'s? Not accept $20's? Come back tomorrow. Worry all night.

Next day. His assistant [niece], had miscounted and we were 900Q short. I had been somewhat overwhelmed already in those few days, so had never written down the exact amount we had. I should have. But wasn't sure if he was going to accept the $, or if he did, what exchange rate he would give. In the end I trusted him and gave him the difference since he had trusted us and given us the scooter. At last the ordeal would be over. [Andy did go back and talked to her (Betty), and wss going to talk to Emilio also.]

NIT is not neat.

In order to purchase the motos,  I had to get a NIT [neet]. It's a tax ID, basically for yearly license and registration. Friends had gotten one the week before and it took them only about 15 minutes. Fill out a form, give a complete copy of your passport, and your done. Copied my passport after finding a tienda with a copy machine and showing the clerk how I wanted it [put 2 per page and not waste paper!]. Less than 4Q!

Went to the NIT office, waited 15 minutes, and then was told in Spanish I did not understand that they had just modernized and the form could be filled out online at home. He gave me a printout of the announcement with a web address. After some finagling and false starts, finally figured out the Spanish form. What district do we live in? Solola. Why isn't it in the drop down menu? Why is "only the" in the drop down? Oh, yeah. I cheated and had Google translate the online form into English. Solo La means only the. So I got it all figured out, even got the house address off the electric meter outside.

Back to the NIT office. They won't accept electronic copy [so much for modernizing]  and can't print it out for me. What? Print shop next door?  Okay, let's go! Print shop: email it to us. I don't have email on my tablet without internet. Won't allow me to connect to theirs or don't have wifi. I'll Bluetooth to my phone. Now I can email? No, need account password. Not going to happen even if I knew it. Finally they found a phone with Bluetooth and transferred and printed the form.

Back to the NIT office. Wait. Here's the form. Wait, excitedly. No, form is wrong. Where? Just wrong. Do it again. What? Where? Print shop next door. Okay, let's go. Print shop: you can't use our terminal,  but one of workers will do it for you. What's your email password? Don't know. Nevermind. Here's the form. Wait. Type,  type, type. Some questions, some answers. They set up a whole new gmail for me to get my NIT form. Hope they don't steal my identity! Turns out I had filled out my address wrong, substituted "district A" for "Zone 4".

Back to the NIT office.  Everything's fine.  Here's your NIT. Here's also all the copied blank pages of your passport. We just want the important ones.

To the Yamaha shop next door. Here's my NIT.  We need copies of every single page of your passport, including the blank unimportant ones. And we're keeping your NIT.  No your not! Back to the print shop. Copy passort important pages only,  others got back from NIT office,  and multiple copies of NIT.

Back to the Yamaha shop.  Banks are closed. See paragraph above.

That's why I had gotten somewhat careless about the cash. I was just mentally exhausted.  A whole new bureaucracy in a whole new language in a whole new environment. And may have already started to get sick. It was all just too much.

But, I got my moto!😆

World Traveler.

After we came in February, I started doing more internet search on Panajachel,  especially on YouTube. One of the best was HoboTraveler. Turns out he had been here at the time, and Raquel even saw him at La Palapas for the barbecue. Typically he says he doesn't stay more than two or three months in place, but he stayed over half a year in Panajachel due to some business interests here. He left about 3 days before our return.

I figuratively stumbled across this one day on Santander in front of Pollo Express. He's been in Panajachel before, so this must be from one of his previous visits. I'll have to find out the story about this!

HoboTraveler provided a lot of good information regarding bartering mindset, food, lodging, and just getting around and dealing with this lifestyle.

Thank you, ALG.

Glass of tinto at Guajimbo's.

My beautiful wife of 25 years enjoying red wine. I still stare at her across the table, just not as often with two kids, especially la Mona, the little monkey.

Sorry for not posting.

It's been over two weeks since our last post.

☹The internet has been down.
🤔😏😑😃We bought motos.
😖🤒🤧We've been sick.
🙄😒🙂We moved.
😊😞🙃😕😄We had no internet.
😀😯😓😅We bought furniture.
🤤😭😥🤕I'm still sick.

There's a story behind each of these that I'll write later. Meanwhile interpret the emojis. Nothing seems to happen easily here, everything has its ups and downs.

Here's  La Mona enjoying a fresa [strawberry] and banano licuado [smoothy] con leche [with milk] at Deli Paraiso[?] on Santander near the lake. These smoothies are delicious and nutritious,  but probably not good for diabetes.

Mom enjoying her coffee.

Brother enjoying hid licuado while reading. Notice how he sucks out of the side of his mouth so the straw doesn't obstruct his vision.

My Golden Milk. Turmeric and warmed macadamia milk, not as exciting as advertised. But then, health food...

And here's a picture of the green police tuk-tuk I promised in an earlier blog.

Raquel was told the proper spelling was tuc-tuc and Spanish pronunciation was tuke-tuke; but googling, tuc-tuc seems to be a name from a British company and its not pronunciation, it's parroting the sound of the 2-cycle engine: tuck-tuck-tuck...

It's after 2AM and can't sleep as sick as I have been. My mind is racing with all of the things I feel I have to do and the things I want to do. This is a partial list of planned posts, but for many of these I haven't felt good enough to take photos. Perhaps tomorrow. I'll look through my archives and see what I did take and blog about those.