Jul 27, 2011

Catemaco video


About the extorsion of brujos, fat monkeys and the growth of ecotourism.

Jul 24, 2011

Catemaco Tourism is going down the tubes -9

You thought I forgot about the "Tubes"? WRONG
It's just that I seem to have more exciting things to do.
But you can read a draft here:

Meanwhile the photo is from a recent exhibition at city hall, and should accompany a fantasy article of the pre -hispanic history of Catemaco. In Spanish, of course.


Jul 17, 2011

La Punta of Catemaco


Take a look at the side of Catemaco City that most tourists never see:

from the bus station north to the Gorel restaurant (not the one on the Malecon)

Jul 7, 2011

Catemaco Pepper

Ever tried finding a decent pepper mill in Mexico?  After umpteen years of living with third rate substitutes, my good friend the Fool on the Hill, presented me what according to him was a marvel of German engineering.

For a while it worked great and  permeated my kitchen with the smell of fresh ground lemon pepper imported by the "Fool" from who knows where. The little marvel bit the dust, or should I say ground, a year or so back, and the Fool promptly replaced it with something that would satisfy an elephant in search of a dildo.

Today I made the mistake of  returning the original mill to the Fool, in case he needed spare parts.
He promptly proceeded to lecture me: 

"It is common knowledge among we pepper mill history buffs, that the Zassenhaus Pepper Mill has been around for ages and has been long considered the best. Actually, the mill was invented by a Swede living in Hamburg, who named the mill after his amigo “Hans Julius Zassenhaus”. This occurred just after the invention of Germans (also by Swedes), and in anticipation of the invention of pepper – by Swedes.
Sometime after I bought my original Zassenhaus Mill, many years ago, and prior to purchasing your mill, the Swedes relinquished their time honored right to technical production supervision (They did this after tiring of replacing millions of the little screw-type caps on the mills that the Germans kept losing.) Some German then took it upon himself to replace the metal gears with plastic (undoubtedly a German invention) gears. This accounts for your dysfunctional mill. Is strikes me as most apropos that you, a German, were the first in Mexican history to suffer a dysfunctional Zassenhaus mill.
"Du gamla, Du fria . . . Ja, jag vill leva, jag vill dö i Norden. . . . "

I'll be damned if I accept any more pepper mills from a Fool of Swedish ancestry!

Jul 6, 2011

Catemaco Aquarium


Catemaco is not just famous for its brujos and disappearing fauna and flora. Thousands of aquarium hobbyists  keep a piece of Catemaco in their tanks. Best know are the Catemaco Molly and  the Catemaco Platy. The video is of a rare Catemaco species, only discovered/described in 2003  Xiphophorus kallmani, a livebearing swordtail.

Jul 1, 2011

Catemaco Celebration of the Virgen del Carmen


July 14 - 24, 2011 - Catemaco
See the entire program here: (in Spanish)