Thursday, February 2, 2012

Cultural misinformation

The casita is at the back of a property that includes two other apartments and another larger garden. Both places are substantially more expensive and quite a bit lovelier inside. The turnover of renters is frequent, most people stay from two weeks to two months.

When I arrived, the larger apartment housed a couple from England who are on a Round-The-World trip. They left a couple of weeks ago, and a couple from Buffalo, New York are there now. Their names are easy to remember:  Ben and Gerry!!  Neither of them are big fans of ice cream......

They also own a home in San Miguel de Allende. Gerry is a Unitarian, so we had an instantaneous connection as well as some acquaintances in common. Their home is rented until March, so they thought they'd try living somewhere else in Mexico for a while. Neither speak much (or any) Spanish. Gerry came with me to my class and now wants to take a beginner's class from one of the schools. I showed her the free Learn Spanish program on SpanishDICT.com and she loved it. I think she'll make some real progress here as there are so few English speakers....except of course, those of us who rent in the same complex!

Ben and Gerry had been over to the Cinepolis the day before. It's a multi-screen theater in the only indoor shopping center. They wanted to see the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (with subtitles in Spanish). The show was to start at 1:30, so we hiked the 2 miles over to the theater only to find it closed up. No signs or anything...... That should have been my first clue that we are not in the US anymore!!

We asked around and were told it opened at 2:30. But Gerry was certain she'd seen the time inside posted as 1:30. Finally they opened and the girl selling tickets was almost blank when I asked why the theater had been closed. She told me they opened at 2:30, looking at me like I was an idiot. Well, yes, I pointed at the times posted (which clearly showed the movie starting at 1:30) and she continued to look at me blankly. Finally I asked, what happened to the 1:30 show? She said curtly, that's Saturday and Sunday.

Nowhere did any sign say the posted time was for weekends only.....you're just supposed to know that I suppose. We shopped at Chedrauhui for a bit and walked back home. If there'd been an early show we might have stayed but the next movie started at 7:40.

Oh well. I got some shopping done and put in a four mile walk. Plus, going there and back I got to know Ben and Gerry. The day was hardly wasted.



No comments:

Post a Comment