Posada at New House

We had a posada in our street last night. Normally, a posada is when a group of people, representing Mary and Joseph, go from house to house asking for lodging. This tradition started in Mexico in the 1500s as part of the church’s attempts to convert the local population and teach them about Christianity. The posada season runs for the 10 nights before Christmas.


In preparation, people decorate the street in front of their houses by stretching punched paper flags, paper lanterns, and balloons etc. across the street. At 5 PM, we found out that the posada would be in our street, two hours before it was supposed to start; and no one had put up any decorations. A little past 6:00, our neighbors across the street, who do this every year and had previously asked permission to attach the decorations to our house, started to put things up. No one else on the street had even started. By 6:20, others had started; and by 7:00 when the posada folks had left La Cruz church, the street was decorated, but it was too dark to take a picture. The posada got to our house around 7:15, 15 minutes ahead of time. In the states, the decorations would have been up a day ahead, and I was getting a little nervous, being a gringo, an old grumpy gringo.


The people in the group coming up the street sing traditional songs asking the people in selected houses for posada (lodgings) because Mary is pregnant, and there is no room in the inn. The people inside sing the traditional responses asking who these beggars are, and saying that there is no room and that Mary should just keep moving on (not a direct translation). Reluctantly, the group outside laments that they have been turned down and have to keep going until they can find a house with a kindhearted owner, etc. etc. The songs are pretty complex, so there are printed versions passed out by the church if the posada is organized by a church or that you can buy in the market if you are doing it on your own.

In our barrio (neighborhood), the posada starts at La Cruz church (where Santiago and a cross miraculously appeared in the sky and the Spanish conquered Querétaro in 1531). Our barrio is thus called La Cruz. La Cruz church is also known for being where Franciscan missionary friars were trained and from where they left for indigenous towns now in the United States in the 18th century, and where Emperor Maximilian made his last stand and was then held prisoner before his execution in the 19th century.

The group in the street, often numbering from a dozen to two or three dozen get turned down at all the houses but the last. The group in the street grows as people from inside each house join the folks in the street, and the expanded group sets off for the next house previously selected to be a stopping place.



Our neighbors across the street were one of three selected in our block of Damían Carmona to “host”.


While I was trying to take pictures of the friars leading the posada songs across the street, a vendor poked at my elbow. I ignored her (I thought it was a her) and took my pictures. When I was done I turned around to the vendor and found out that he was one of my students, Christian from Niños y Niñas, selling sparklers. So I took his picture with Christiane and bought some sparklers which we gave to two little girls whose sparklers had burned out.

At the last house of a posada, the people inside sing that they have lodging and Mary can rest and eat. The people outside sing their thanks and everyone goes inside to pray and eat, meet the neighbors and break a piñata. In Mexico City and Puebla years ago, there was no praying and we went straight to the drinking and eating. I think praying is more of a Querétaro tradition.

In barrio La Cruz, they go from house to house asking for a place to stay, but at the end, instead of a party at the last house, they give all the kids a bag of goodies, called an aguinaldo, paid for by the people in that street. Last night, there were several hundred people, mostly kids, which is a lot more than at the gallos celebration or that we ever saw in Mexico City or Puebla. The people in the last house made up pretty sizable bags with stuff that people in the barrio had donated, like tangerines, peanuts, sugar cane, candy and other stuff. This reminded me of Halloween in the states, but here they have it 10 nights running. Some people donated money to buy the bags and helped to fill them. There is a whole organization to do this that is run along the lines of a mayordomia where a mayordomo is selected by the barrio or church group to run that year’s posada for each street.


In front of the last house, Christiane was greeted by a number of her students and another one of mine from Niños y Niñas who were patiently waiting in line for their aguinaldo while the friars were praying. It was a long wait, and they were very patient.

Barrio La Cruz is a little unlike many other barrios in Querétaro in another way too. After the aguinaldos are handed out people drift back home, but stop on the way to visit neighbors who have opened their houses and prepared fruit punch and food for anyone who comes by, kind of an open-house block party. It seemed that most people were handing out food and that there was a dearth of people to accept it. So we stopped at our next-door neighbors’ house and at our neighbors’ house across the street for something to eat and drink and a chat.

We learned all about our neighbors, promised to help out for next year’s posada, and found out that our house and those on either side had been lived in or used by General Carranza, an early 20th century president and his men. This must have been during the 1910 revolution known in the states more for Pancho Villa and Emiliano Zapata. You just never know what you will find out around here.

House Finally Done!!

We moved into our new house at Damián Carmona Norte #11 on July 31, 2007, a date that will live in . . . , well for a long, long time in our memories at least.

What a relief. If you have not looked at the Before and After shots recently, I added a few since I first put up the photos in Flickr. There are a few more flowers in these. The red of our bougainvilla and canas are really set off by the ochre of the patio walls. We really lucked out on colors.

We have been cleaning and organizing ever since, and are pooped. Miguel and Alberto did a great job and despite the extra couple of months and the extra couple hundred thousand pesos, we are very pleased with what they were able to accomplish. The old owner, Alberto G., has apparently been coming by to check things on "his" house, and I think he is a little surprised at what we were able to do with it and still maintain its historic nature. Every door (all are glassed) has a different and interesting view.

I also added some pix to Flickr that Celine (C's niece, daughter of Claude and Marie José) took when she visited us a few months ago. I just happened on them again and thought they provided an interesting look at Querétaro, especially since she was here for less than 24 hours. The couple at Hacienda Juriquilla are Niels and Grace.

Niel's father was the archaeologist who discovered Tepexpan Man in 1947, the earliest human remains in the New World until that time. We are having a 60 year retrospective at the Tepexpan Museum (near Teotihuacan) on August 23. I did the website with a lot of help from Niels. Check it out here.

Now if we can find some money to finish paying the Social Security of the workers, attending our daughters' weddings and another niece's wedding in France, we will be able to survive 2007. I would hate to have to sell this house to make ends meet!

And life goes on despite the threat of world economic breakdown, rumors of unrest in Mexico, and especially despite the fact that George W. is trying his level best to destroy what used to make the US great.

House Update #6

On July 30 or 31, we will move into our new house. It has been a long 7 months since we started the renovations and an even longer 9 and a half months since we bought it, and it has been over a year since we made our first offer on it. Whew! I am tired just thinking about it.

Every thing is about finished so I went to the house today and took pictures based on what we saw before renovations began and posted BEFORE and AFTER shots to Flickr. I will post a few more next week after things get cleaned up a little more.

On August 18, we are planning on having a house warming with everyone we have ever met (well almost) in Querétaro, along with our architects, masons, electrician, some neighbors, etc. If they all come it will be well over 60 people.

This house is the nicest one we have ever owned, and more charming than most we lived in growing up. Only the one we lived in in Newport R.I. (near Cliff Walk) and the one my parents owned on Main St. Glastonbury, Connecticut (1745 Colonial), were nearly as neat as this one. It has a great mixture of traditional construction and basic layout with modern convenience and light. Our architect did a tremendous job of adding the nice little touches like the back patio floor and stairs, the rooftop terrace, and the skylights in the bathrooms and front bedroom; and he was very creative in adapting an old house to modern needs.

I just like to go there, with or without the workmen, and stare.

House Update #5

Since the last update (#4), about a month and a half ago, things have picked up speed as we have consistently had 10 people working. Click here for some recent photos.

All the tile in the baths and the kitchen; and the interior floors have been installed and grouted. They really look nice. The floors are of terra cotta tile and will need to be sealed, but that will wait until all the painting and other heavy work is done. The brick in the back patio is finished and a new drain has been installed. They are putting the quarried patio stones back in the main patio, now that the electrical and plumbing work is mostly done. We still need to install the light and plumbing fixtures. The light fixtures in the bedrooms, baths, study and kitchen will be modern; and in the living room, dining room and patios they will be traditional handicraft style which we bought in San Miguel de Allende, where there is really a wider selection even if the prices are a little higher.

We bought a new stove and a dishwasher which will be installed in the next week or so. The main question will be whether the gas company will accept our pipes or require that they install the pipes (on the outside of the walls) and hook up the stove and hot water heater on the roof.

The interior doors are all of wood, but since the doorways are all different widths and heights and because we want an “authentic” look, they have either been made by hand (hand hewn tongue in grove, all pegged together and no nails, and mortice and tenon) or are being adapted from the original exterior doors, which were also hand-made and pegged together. The carpenter has also repaired the original front window using the same methods as the original builder. It is really fascinating watching him work.

The doors leading to the patios will all be metal door frames with glass. And these are being installed even though we have not gotten the quarried threshold stones yet. It seems that the little village where the thresholds are being made has been cutoff from the outside world by the recent rains, making it impossible for trucks to get in and out.

All of the walls, inside and out, have now been stuccoed white, and only need to be painted. They look pretty good without paint. The 12-foot ceilings have all been painted.

The pergola on the roof was finished today, and they will start putting in the terra cotta floor tile tomorrow. We still need to tile the steps to the roof, put guard rails on the stairs and the puente (bridge), connect to the water tanks on the roof, put in the hot water heater, build and install the kitchen and master bathroom cabinets (by hand, of course), install the rest of the doors, put in the light and plumbing fixtures, paint, and few other things. We have told our architect and our landlord that we plan on moving in at the end of the month.

I hope they get it ready on time.

House Update #4

The upstairs bedroom with a new little room for our tinacos (water tanks) on top. Note our neighbor's tinaco, not too pretty; and presumably against the law in new construction and renovations. But hey, rules are meant to be broken, right?

After a month lost to INAH, we had a reduced crew of 2-4 for nearly a month, slowing down the process considerably. We are now 2-3 months behind the original estimate for one reason or another. BUT- things are looking up. The main patio is still a mess, but the bathrooms are being tiled, the walls are being stuccoed and painted, and the floor tiles are being installed. Here are some pictures.

Birds seem to be a theme. For the front guest bathroom we selected a simple blue, bird design, and for the upstairs guest room we selected a green/blue, bird design. These talavera bird designs are pretty much straight from the 13th century when they seem to have found their way from north Africa to Italy to Spain. You can still find them in Morocco, or you could 40 years ago.

We have to wait for the tiles for the kitchen, half-bath and master bath since the tiles had to be ordered from Dolores Hidalgo (la cuna de la revolución). They are really nothing special, but they make tiles down here as they are needed, all hand-made of course. The kitchen counter and wall designs will include yellow birds on a red background for highlighting and yellow tiles for the counter top. Most new "traditional" kitchens here seem to be bright red, blue or green, but we liked the yellow tiles which have a nice glow and warmth to them that you often don't get in recent Mexican kitchens. And besides we just did not want to be like everyone else.

The tiles in the half-bath in the study will have an abstract cobalt blue design on natural terra cotta, with an off-white tile for the counter top. We will not tile the walls, which we can do later if we want to.

Our master bath will be white and blue with two types of blue crosses, following a design that Christiane liked at the house (i.e. mansion where the sitting president of Mexcio who signed the Guadalupe Hidalgo treaty once lived) where she takes her culture classes. It will be somewhat sedate and formal (I hesitate to say distinguished) and easy to live with.

The patio will be brick set on edge in a series of concentric circles, a little modern, but it will really be spectacular when it is finished with large terra cotta flower pots and some bougainvilla.

The outside walls look so nice in plain white that I am tempted to leave them alone. But we will probably paint them off-white in the patios, except for one wall in San Francisco orange/red or something. With bougainvilla climbing up the walls, they too will be spectacular; and since bougainvilla blooms every other month down here and geraniums are always blooming, we will always have a wide variety of flowers to sit and enjoy. I can barely wait. But at least we are finally making progress again.