Q 1: I hear housing prices are outrageous in San Miguel.

A: When the housing bubble burst in the US, it also affected real estate sales and construction in San Miguel. Retirees who wanted to sell their homes in the US and buy or build in San Miguel with the proceeds of their house sale had to wait around for US buyers.

One realtor wrote a column in the local newspaper Atencion that in mid-2007 San Miguel is in a period of denial on realistic prices. The usual pattern for areas hit by a housing burst is for sellers to think their previous prices, maybe what their neighbor got for their house just a few months ago, are still realistic.

Eventually they come out of denial and realize that they must lower their prices if they want a sale now, or they can wait for an indefinite period in hopes housing prices will rise again.

Buyers, meanwhile, hear there the housing bubble has burst and start looking for the deals of five or ten years ago, also not realistic. They eventually get out of denial and realize exactly what the current real estate market is and what are realistic prices for what they want today.

When the market picks up again, there is an unrealistic meteoric rise in prices again as sellers who have held off on selling their homes suddenly put their homes back on the market at the top prices of the previous real estate boom, while buyers are still thinking in terms of five years ago. Eventually everyone comes out of denial and a true market value emerges.

(Or maybe we won’t have any more pendulum swings as in the past. Even realtors don’t know for sure. In Mexico so much happens in series of one.)

Even with the problems in real estate sales in the US, high demand areas still had higher prices. And in San Miguel, I hear often that homes at the very lowest ranges, even those up to $300,000, sell much faster than those over $300,000, and the very top of the line multi-million-dollars homes also still sell, even though there are fewer of them and thus fewer sales.

The dream remains of finding a cheap fixer upper in Centro, as Tony Cohan describes so vividly in On Mexican Time? He bought a $60,000 casa with a rentable casita on the property in Centro and wrote at length about the remodeling process, but at the end of the book, finished about 2001, Cohan wrote that even the casita would cost far more than $60,000. Today you could be talking more than a million dollars for the same spaciousness in Centro.

But you still might find a remodel for $80,000-$150,000 close by, and remodeling costs are low because labor costs are low. You could tear down whatever structures are on a piece of good property and build a nice place for under $200,000, in the 2,000-square-foot range. You can still find move-in quality condos under $200,000 very close to Centro.

Or you can spot what looks like a ruins in Centro and find the land alone is close to a million dollars because some Centro properties run deep and are much bigger than the narrow frontage would lead you to believe.

Or you can build outside SMA near nearby villages like Cieneguita or Atotonilco and come up with any price range you want.

As new areas of SMA become gentrified, like San Rafael and Santa Julia and even San Luis Rey, you will find cheaper prices and the same kinds of transitional problems of any area that is undergoing gentrification. You will have a very expensive house next to a shack with a noisy roof dog, loud parties, and teens hanging around at night next door.

Some newcomers to San Miguel want exactly the kind of neighborhood and lifestyle they left in the US, while some come ready to embrace a new way of life and understand and accept different values and customs.

The first will probably not be happy except in a gated gringo community. The second wouldn’t be caught dead in a gated gringo community. It’s up to you.

Those of us who are renters or who live in less expensive neighborhoods sometimes have very little contact with those who are buying the million-dollar homes. In the U.S., I didn't know any millionaires personally, I mixed mostly with people in my same economic level, and we moved on different planes from the rich. Same here, among Mexicans and foreigners alike.

(But I did sit down one day and look more closely at the assets and lifestyles of some of our friends, and here we do mix with some millionaires. Of course it isn’t as hard to be a millionaire these days, when a California house might have appreciated to near that if it were bought 30 years ago. Class differences definitely exist in San Miguel, among both Mexicans and expats, but I think there is a greater chance of crossing over these boundaries here than in the States.)

Real estate prices in San Miguel overall are probably cheaper than in the US for similar homes, but not as cheap as some expect. And we face the same fluctuations as the US.

Q 2: We're coming to San Miguel next January. Can we expect hot weather?

A. Have to warn you, it gets cold in San Miguel up here at 6,400 feet. December and January are our coldest months and it often does get below freezing a couple of nights a year, and some people lose some tender plants in their gardens. Those who live outside the city can get even colder temps, in the high 20s. Days can still be sunny and warm.

It hit 30 two nights last January and we didn't lose anything, but we're in a sheltered courtyard. But one year our three-story rubber plant had a brown halo around it for a few months until new leaves grew back.

Mexicans are bundled up in sweatshirts, sweatpants and jackets, while tourists still come in shorts but quickly add a jacket. But then Mexican school uniforms look awfully hot to me for all year long--sweat jackets, wool cardigans and knee socks even in May. Several charities collect sweaters, gloves and socks for the poor for the winter, particularly the aged ones who are seen on the streets begging.

During the day it usually still is in the 70s, often 80s, during the winter, and we wear short-sleeved cotton shirts and pants most days and change to jeans and sweaters as the sun goes down, adding a jacket later.

And a few days or a week in late January often it rains and is gray and cold for a week. SMA rainfall average is 27 inches a year. (Compare that to Phoenix, which averaged 7 inches of rain a year and is in a drought right now that is the worst in more than a century.)

SMA's rainy season is June-October, and usually a heavy shower falls in the late afternoon or early evening, and then it is perfect the rest of the day. You just duck into a restaurant for coffee until it passes if you didn't bring your umbrella.

The rains are so hard that the streets flood and you suddenly realize why the curbs are so high, as you can’t see them as the river washes down the hilly streets. Flow-through sandals are good!

Mexican building is heavy cement, so walls keep cool, great for summer but not for winter when it is bone-chilling cold. Most places don't have heat, or A/C, and they do use fireplaces, though I hate to use up wood since Mexico is depleting its trees.

Electricity is expensive (well, not compared to Phoenix) and power lines in the Centro areas weren't built for such heavy loads of all the modern electric appliances, so many apartments' electricity will blow if too many people plug in electric heaters. (Bring an electric blanket or a mattress warmer for your bed, a great investment, and much cheaper if bought in the US.) The more you use, the higher the rate, the opposite of what it is in the States.

Most gringos who live here in the winter go to propane heaters and have an extra line run from their propane tanks (which are on the roof, next to your water tank, and service your stove and hot water heater). You call for propane delivery and usually they come the same day.

Propane heaters can be very basic for under $200, or you can get fancy ones that look like fireplaces for $600+. Propane usually runs us $50 a month most of the year and $100 a month Nov-Feb. (For comparison, when we owned an old country church with high ceilings that we converted to a home in rural Michigan, our propane heating bill was $425 a month, and that was 20 years ago.)

Many tourists still think our winters are lovely compared to wherever they came from farther north. Many Canadians in particular come here for our winters and bask in our sun while Mexicans are bundled up. And Texans come here in July and August because we're cooler than much of the U.S. South.

Only the beach areas of Mexico are warm year-round, and they can get oppressively hot, muggy and buggy in the summer. So many people think Mexico is all alike, beaches and jungle, while it's as diverse as the U.S., on everything.

April and May are our hottest months and often it hits 100 for a few days, though not every year. After Phoenix's six months of the year over 100, we find it very pleasant even on the hottest days. It all depends on what you were used to when you come to SMA, and what your expectations are.

Overall, San Miguel has the best weather of anyplace in Mexico, we think! It feels the closest to LA of any place we've lived, and LA has absolutely the most perfect weather, though it has gray, cold winter days as well. Tourists showed up in shorts there in January, too, while the rest of us had on jackets.

Many tourists who happened to come to SMA only in a cold spell will tell you they froze to death here, so be forewarned. Dress in layers.

Q 3: Since you mentioned plants, what zone is SMA in for planting?

A. We don't exactly fit any zone in the U.S. seed catalogs' descriptions because we're at 6,400 feet, which counteracts our location farther south. Those who have checked into such things say SMA is closest to a 10 when you're choosing your garden and landscaping.

Remember, we're technically a desert, with only 27 inches of rain a year. Choose plants that don't require much water. Bougainvillea grows beautifully here and is everywhere. In spring when you look out over the city from a view point, the lavender jacaranda trees turn the entire city into a lilac mist. (Note that many residents become allergic to the jacarandas and don’t like spring for that reason.)

Poinsettia plants you put into the ground after Christmas may grow two stories high--we have red blossoms peeking in our windows from November to February.

Candelaria Day, February 2, is actually a religious day for the blessing of the seeds--farmers bring their seeds to church so that the priests can give them a good start on prosperous crops. That week, all of Park Juarez turns into a giant nursery, with maybe 100 stalls selling everything from herbs to fruit trees. Fancy orchids, bonzai trees, silly lawn ornaments, fertilizer, pots of all sizes--it is a photographer's delight as well as gardeners’ heaven.

Locals go into the same planting frenzy, snapping up everything, that we saw in rural Michigan at the nurseries each spring--but in Michigan we began planting heavily in May, while here it is in February. (In Phoenix we didn't plant much, we mainly used gravel and rocks for xeriscaping.)

At Candelaria we usually buy fresh herb plants for our kitchen window garden and a few new geraniums since our porch plants get leggy during the winter.

Kids borrow wheelbarrows and will approach you the moment you buy your first plant and offer to follow you around with the wheelbarrow as you buy here and there, and then they'll take your plants to your car or taxi, for a $1 tip or so. It's one of my favorite weeks of the year.

Q 4: I understand that most Mexican apartments come pretty much bare walls, or the furnishing are not so hot. What if you fix up your rental and then the landlord decides to raise your rent? Is there a cap on the rent increases you can be hit with?

A: Rents can be raised legally 10% a year, which can add up over the years.

Yes, a landlord could decide to now rent an improved apartment to a relative, same as in the U.S. I suppose you could write up a contract with a lawyer on the conditions under which you undertake improvements, but I doubt it would stand up in court if suddenly the landlord's family arrangements changed--his kid got married and needs a place, etc.

When we made improvements on our place we knew the history of the rentals here--all the tenants were stable and said the only rent increases have been to compensate for changes in the currency exchange. Rents go up with the new tenants. Everyone here has made significant changes in their apartments and people generally don't leave here unless they die. We don't make any complaints, we do all repairs ourselves, so we're no trouble or troublemakers.

Renting is always a risk, though problems can occur with home buying as well. We're flexible people and trust in our minds that we can handle just about anything that is thrown at us, so we don't worry about problems until they occur. If you want guarantees, owning a house might be more secure--but still, a hillside can fall down, a truck can run into your house, etc.

You can decide to not put a penny into your rental and live dissatisfied in it just in case you might get booted, or you can make your environment around you pleasing and easy to use and enjoy every minute you're there, whether or not you might get booted.

Everything I've read says that Mexican renters put a lot into their places and then take everything with them when they go that they've added. So the next tenants expect to have to replace towel racks, light fixtures, etc., and then will take them all with them when they move on. Light fixtures are different from major construction, of course.

If we had to move, we'd take our new refrigerator and stove and fancy chandeliers that we put in, even though the place came "furnished." Who knows what junk the landlord could dig up to replace what we take? Crap was in here when we arrived. I think we'd even take the new hot water heater we put in.

Q 5: What about the large numbers of foreigners moving into San Miguel. Is the community changing because of it?

A. Just about every place on earth changes, and some Mexicans may regret the changes in their populations just as some U.S. residents regret the changes in their populations as Mexicans move to their cities. The Irish were resented when they arrived on U.S. shores during the Potato Famine. Europe is dealing with large numbers of Muslim immigrants. Every desirable place on earth faces influxes of new residents, whether with more money, or less money, or a different race or color or religion than the previous community.

Should you stay away from a desirable place to live that suits your needs because you will change the community? Should you not step into a river because you will change it?

I grew up in Detroit which went from around two million population in the early '60s to under a million today. Back in Detroit Wayne State University downtown did a study in the mid-'60s reporting on the way Detroit was resegregating from all-white areas to all-black.

The pattern was that an all-white area would panic when the first one or two blacks moved in, the first flurry of those most able to move out quickly did so, and then the area settled down to a gradual acceptance of the slow integration of more and more blacks, until the magical number of one-third blacks was reached.

At that point just about every white still left in the old neighborhood who could, up and moved out fast. It happened on my block. Meanwhile, I had moved further into the inner city. My folks fled to the suburbs.

Before the 1967 riot, Wayne State was predicting that Detroit would be an almost all black city within 20 years, and lo and behold, that happened.

I think that's kind of the way human groups operate. We tend to form our own enclaves, we can accept a few "others" joining us, and suddenly when enough "others" have joined so that we feel the possibility of being outnumbered, we panic and look for another place where we can feel "comfortable."

"We" does not mean me, or every one, just a kind of general pattern of comfort, and I'm not going to extend the pattern too far or to every instance, just offering it as something to think about. Those of us who move to Mexico probably would not fit that pattern, I think--we tend to be more open-minded and willing to leave our comfort zone.

When some magical number of Mexican immigrants "overloads" a formerly mostly white area, some sort of hackles go up and some people feel threatened and start to react. I think many in the African-American community were less than thrilled when Hispanics became the largest minority in the U.S. Mexicans in an old familiar neighborhood may not be thrilled when expats buy up all the vacancies.

Arizona is a strange state, generally known years ago for the live and let live conservativism of Barry Goldwater and John McCain, but becoming more and more cosmopolitan every day as retirees from all over the country with broader viewpoints move there.

But along the border where the vigilante movement arose, I think that magical number was reached and somewhere inside many people came the word, "Enough," and they started to react. I could feel some of that even in Phoenix when I lived there. And now some in the U.S. are pushing for a giant wall between the U.S. and Mexico which won't build good feelings between those on both sides.

Change happens. San Miguel would be changing one way or another even if not a single gringo had ever arrived. I'm seeing a few tour groups from China on our streets now, along with many German and Japanese groups and the U.S., Canadian, and British tourists. Some will undoubtedly move here. (By far the greatest number of tourists to San Miguel, however, are from other parts of Mexico.)

Personally I think the amount of money and jobs we bring compensates for the greater congestion and rising prices in some commodities. I don't expect anyone or anything or any city to stay the same. Other forces for change are at work within Mexico and throughout the world at all times.

Mario Llosa wrote a novel, The Story Teller, on how even being observed discreetly by anthropologists changed the Amazon River tribes forever. I don't fear change.

Someone in a recent letter to the editor in Atencion noted that development is not a bad thing for Mexico, even though some gringo newcomers may want it to stay just the way it was when they arrived: "I'm here, now close the door. Not in my backyard."

So many of our charities raise money for college scholarships for local youth, and what do these newly educated young people do when they come back to San Miguel--herd goats and sell embroidery in the Jardin? How do we keep these young people in San Miguel instead of watching them pay $2,500 to a coyote to smuggle them into the U.S.?

If you want to keep San Miguel "quaint," remember that "quaint" won't pay the rent for someone ambitious and educated who wants a better life for the future.

Q 6: Does everybody in San Miguel speak English? When I was there I'd say something to a Mexican in Spanish and he'd answer in English.

A: Wouldn't that be nice for some of us who are more language-challenged --but then one of the main advantages of living in a foreign country, seeing everything from the different perspective a new language brings, would be lost. (You can tell a lot about a culture by number of words or the phrasing about a topic: "The shelf fell"--I had nothing to do with it; even if I overloaded it that was not my responsibility that it fell. Life just happens. God wills it.)

I'd be missing out on double the number of word games and jokes, the teasing around the careful use of the word "huevos," for example. If everyone here spoke only English, I wouldn't be getting into all sorts of situations where I direly need to know Spanish better than I do.

Unfortunately, only those Mexicans aiming specifically at gringo clienteles or those who are from the higher classes and educated abroad, and those who worked in the States, are likely to actually be able to carry on a lengthy conversation in English.

I'd say less than 10% of those 70,000 Mexicans living inside SMA city limits and almost none of those other 60,000 Mexicans living in the larger region that is considered SMA can do so.

Lots of Mexicans will attempt to answer you in English but they know only a few words. If I say, "Buenas Tardes" to a guy on the street and he responds, "Hi, how are you?" that's probably just about all he knows and he wants to practice that little bit anyplace he can, just as I'm practicing my social pleasantries on him in Spanish.

There seems to be a trashing of San Miguel as totally overrun by gringos, most usually done by people who have only heard the stereotypes or who only visited or lived in Centro and never got outside into the majority of the city. We're still only 15% of the city population, 8% if you consider the larger SMA population.

Even in Centro the majority of Mexicans don't know more than a few words of English, though they may fool you by saying what you and everybody else usually needs to hear, a few stock responses to the few most common stock questions.

The "bilingual" waiter will understand if you say you want ice in your tea but he probably won't understand if you ask whether that ice was made from purified water, or whether there could be nuts in the sauce to which you are deathly allergic. He'll know the menu items in English and Spanish, but don't try to do a substitution of any complexity, or ask if the pasta is from whole grains or if the broccoli is organic or the salmon is farm-raised or imported from Alaska.

Sure, you can live in SMA and speak almost no Spanish and deal only with those Mexicans who do speak English and survive, and quite a few expats still do just that. But you'll certainly be insulated, and you'll be in danger of getting into a crisis at any moment.

Say you're hit by a car and you're trying to deal with police and lawyers and angry relatives of the driver and nurses who don't know what you're trying to say about your pain and no English-speaking doctor can be found. Say you're doing a simple business transaction but you misunderstand something crucial, like a no-refund policy.

Say you meet somebody you really want, or even need, to know, and you come across as an ignorant fool because you have come to Mexico expecting everyone to speak English for you. Say you've been robbed and you don't even know the word for "Help!"

Say your car breaks down and the only gas station anywhere around has only Spanish speakers, and you can't even communicate enough to find out where there is a phone or a phone directory. You can't tell a cab where you are to come get you because you can't read the directions or understand the guy at the gas station.

Say your dog is lost and the person who finds it and reads your phone number on its collar calls you up and you can't even understand what the finder is saying so you can get your dog back.

Say you want to eat at restaurants outside of Centro to save some money and they don't just have tacos on the menu. You don’t want to order tripe by mistake and you are stuck always ordering pollo instead of trying something more venturesome.

Say you've just had your credit card snatched by an ATM and the guy who does speak good English is out to lunch and you're in a hurry but the clerks don't have a clue just exactly what you are saying, and you can't figure out whether they're going to check the ATM right now or you can come back tomorrow or you should talk to your bank in the US.

I don't know of a single gringo who lives here for very long who still says there is absolutely no need to know any Spanish and all Mexicans here know English. All the language schools in town wouldn't be doing such a good business on gringos if we didn't realize we must learn Spanish and not all Mexicans are going to speak English for us. (But some gringos pay for their housekeeper to learn English rather than learn Spanish themselves.)

Friends who are fluent say it takes seven years of hard work and constant practice to actually become fluent. Ten weeks at Warren Hardy or four months at the Academia won't do it. in fact, the Warren Hardy website says that his four levels should be the beginning before you go into an immersion program.

Out of 130,000 permanent residents of the San Miguel region, only 7,000 are foreigners, mostly English-speaking. Of these, I'd guess 10% speak fluent Spanish, 20% can carry on a limited conversation, and another 50% have at least taken a class or two and can do the basics. My estimates only. If my guesses are right, that means "only" about 20% of foreigners know very little or no Spanish. That's 20% too many.

But I still hear those who dislike San Miguel saying that everybody here, foreign and local, speaks only English, and all the prices are in US dollars. No, only a few tourist-oriented shops list prices in dollars, and the expensive art galleries will list prices in both currencies.

Real estate prices aimed at gringos will most always be in dollars--$200,000 sounds bad enough, don’t even think of looking at a price that is 2.100.000,00 in pesos.)

Of course very few of the foreign tourists know Spanish, and we have plenty of them. Tourists are only here a short time; they can't be expected to be fluent before their vacation to any place. That's why tourist industries spring up to service those who do not speak the language in any desirable vacation area.

But remember that most tourists to San Miguel are from other parts of Mexico! This is a historic, beautiful city with lots going on at all times. Mexicans aren't just discovering San Miguel, they've known about this town and loved it for many years.

Again a very rough estimate: I'd say the 10% or so of SMA Mexicans who have many business dealings with foreigners speak very good English, maybe 5% of the others who have lived in the U.S. or who have been educated there can speak excellent English, and only a few of the rest of the Mexican population can say more than bare basics in English. Certainly the 60,000 Mexicans who live on the outskirts and the poorer Indians inside the city limits speak almost no English, though they may still say, "Hello" and "Okay."

If you want to do nothing more than just go to gringo-owned businesses and associate only with gringos, yes, you can get by with very little Spanish. But who'd want to do that?

Q 7: Isn't it harder for older retirees to learn Spanish than younger people?

A: I know a couple of gringos who got here after 60 and I would call them fluent after more than ten years here, though they'll still say they aren't. But one had a Mexican partner and he really, really worked at it with that incentive. The other had some exposure to Spanish when she worked at a hospital in a heavily Mexican area in the states so she at least had the sounds right.

Another guy around 65 I met here once had just gone through all four levels of Warren Hardy and now was off to a remote village in Guatemala for total immersion. He sounded fluent already to me, but what would I know? He also concentrated on getting all his news from Mexican TV and papers, doing his own immersion.

Learning another language over 60 is really, really hard for most of us, though. Seems to me that those gringos with the most money tend to be the most isolated and the least likely to become fluent.

If you can pay for all your services from the priciest Mexican companies, they're most likely to be the ones charging more partly because they do speak English well. They have learned how to be reassuringly competent and on time and such for gringos, catering to their dependency. You can even pay to have a house manager to handle "stuff" for you, meaning anything requiring Spanish.

But if you're on a lower income and you're struggling for the cheapest prices, you'll need to be in Mexican neighborhoods and stores and hiring Spanish-speaking workers, so you'd better learn Spanish.

Though the conventional wisdom is that older people can’t learn languages easily, there are also studies that say older people don’t really have that much harder of a time learning a new language--their greater motivation to work hard can compensate for the ease with which younger people can pick up words.

I’m becoming more and more convinced that it would be best to first get yourself immersed in a situation where you will pick up the sounds and the phrasing and the idioms more naturally, and then go on to grammar to try to understand what you already have grasped intuitively.

Older folks may think that we have to learn Spanish the way we were forced to learn English in the earlier grades, parsing sentences and knowing all the verb tenses. We’re more comfortable with that kind of format.

It may be easier, if more frightening, to immediately get involved with a project where you will be thrown in among Mexicans speaking only Spanish, and don’t worry if you’re going to make a lot of mistakes. Mexicans seem to be very appreciative if you are trying, and they will help you.

Yes, someone may laugh when you forget the difference between llegar, to arrive, llenar, to fill, and llevar, to take, and you tell the Pemex guy to take your tank and the waiter to arrive your leftovers and a friend you’ll take at noon.

If you confuse hombre, a man, and hombre, a shoulder, and hambre, hunger, someone won’t know if you’re saying you need a man, a shoulder to lean on, or you’re hungry—or all three. If you can laugh at yourself, you’ll survive.

Persistence seems to be the key. We took five different semesters of Spanish in various programs in 2002 and then got by in our Tarzan Spanish ("me need this," pointing) the next couple of years. Then we jumped back in with classes at the University of Leon and several other programs, and got overwhelmed again when we hit some sort of wall. I think it has to do with all those irregular past tense verbs.

While I’m recuperating from knee replacement surgeries in mid-2007, we’re going to rest from classes for a year or so and study what we have already been presented with and try to assimilate what we’ve already been taught. Then I think we’ll come back with some intensive work.

What we need to do is to watch more Spanish-language TV and films, read more Mexican newspapers, and seek out opportunities to speak frequently with native speakers. Until we do that, we’ll be stuck like Tarzan.

Q 8: Isn't SMA a quiet town of older retirees without much happening?

I don't know where that statement comes from but I hear it a lot, mostly from people who have never been here. This is the party town of all party towns for the Mexican population, fiestas and parades going on every time you turn around, and the gringo population is far more active than any group over 50 I've ever experienced.

This town rocks! Every day there are far more activities than any one person could get to, with live music and/or dancing going on each night in a dozen places for the nights when there aren't art openings, concerts and plays. I'd guess there are at least 75 classes going on each week someplace, and always somebody is leading a tour to someplace else in Mexico. And friends drop in all the time, and call you up when they're cooking a good meal. Often we have three party invitations a week.

But you wouldn't know it living out of Centro in one of those wealthier developments going up on the outskirts. Those who say there is nothing to do never venture out their doors or make a phone call. They'd probably say there was nothing to do in New York City.

Those who want to gripe and be miserable will gripe and be miserable no matter where they live. You bring your baggage with you when you come.

And there are a whole lot of younger gringos moving here as well, most with little money but a great attitude of openness and a willingness to join in and have fun, too. Yes, we have 80-year-olds still working and playing, but people find their own kinds of friends at whatever age level (or class, nationality, sexual orientation, politics) they prefer.

I probably should add that straight single gringas over 50 far outnumber straight single gringos in that age group. This is not Alaska. And so many Mexican men go north to work that there can be a shortage of eligible Mexican men, too, for both Mexican women and interested gringas.

But I see little of that desperate searching for a man, any man--there's so much to do here that you have only yourself to blame if you're bored or lonely. Women who decide to pick up and move to another country are usually courageous, open, multi-faceted fascinating people with great stories to tell!

Q 9: What are your favorite moderate and splurge restaurants? ("Cheap eats" restaurants that have offerings under $5 a person are on a separate web page)

The way to make a small fortune in San Miguel is to start with a large fortune and open a restaurant. (I first heard that adage in the '60s in Detroit, but it applies just about every place.) They come and go--my favorites listed here today may be gone tomorrow.

Always a good value is a restaurant's comida corrida, a one-price meal that usually includes a soup and/or salad, entree, a small dessert, and coffee, tea, or a fruit ade. Mexicans tend to eat their main meal in early afternoon--breakfast is desayuno, lunch is comida, and dinner is cena.

As in the States, you can get a feel for an expensive restaurant by going there for breakfast or lunch. There's a VIP card you can buy at La Conexion and other places throughout town which gets you 10-20% on selected restaurants and services, but we figured it out and it wouldn't pay for us--the "holes in the wall" don't take it!

We have our favorite splurge restaurants where our favorite dinner and a Diet Coke still will be not more than $15 each. These include Nirvana (big plate of wonderful arrachera and sides for $11), on Mesones across from Teatro Angela Peralta; and Harry's New Orleans, on Hidalgo 12, the first block north of the Jardin (my fried oysters plate is $14 now, and the chocolate truffle cake that now costs $7 is like eating a half pound of chocolate truffles.). But you can get lobster for $30 if you're not on a budget.

Sometimes to splurge we'll go to Casa Payo, Zacateros 21, or Tio Lucas, Mesones 103, for beef, since friends love those (Tio Lucas has live jazz after 9 pm).

Vivoli Café on Hernandez Macias south of Mesones is our favorite Italian restaurant, and we can either get a very large luncheon salad with a plate-sized grilled chicken breast for $6 for lunch, or spend $50 each easily for dinner. We love their prosciutto-covered pizza.

(Some like Romano's pizza, more people like Juanita's pizza on Orizaba, and probably the favorite pizza place in town is La Grotta on Quadrante in Centro. I like the fact La Grotta offers roquefort as an alternative cheese topping. Some people go out a ways to Gombo's in Col. Guadalupe--their deluxe pizza has all kinds of things like shrimp and pineapple, no pepperoni. And Domino’s and Pronto deliver all over.

We're spoiled: Norma makes the best pizza in town at home. Norma also makes SMA's best Chinese food, but there's always El Palacio Chino, Mesones 57, which is supposed to have excellent Peking duck on order. It’s not to our tastes, but one guy wrote to Atencion that it was the best Chinese restaurant he had ever been to!

Several other Chinese restaurants have come and gone, and the latest to open, in August, 2007, is on Zacateras just north of Ancha de San Antonio. It looks like a hole in the wall from the outside, but inside it’s like many of the better family Chinese restaurants across the country. It doesn’t compare to something in the LA or SF Chinatowns, but they make a mean hot and sour soup and can do decent dumplings and Mongolian beef, and I am delighted to have it here. Norma is more exacting and thinks it is just average.

Tao restaurant opened in early 2007 on Umaran, and it specializes in Japanese and Indian dishes. Dila’s on Ancha across from the south end of the Instituto has excellent Sri Lankan and Indian dishes—the owner is from Sri Lanka and also trained in Switzerland. Watch their heat levels.

El Pegaso, across from the Post Office at Corregidora 6, has corned beef and pastrami sandwiches (quality varies) and Kung Pao chicken and beef Thai salad. Their jalapeno poppers are really hot. Cool down with mile-high lemon meringue pie or their famous raspberry cream pie.

La Posadita is on Aldama around the corner from the Parroquia, and its second-story rooftop dining area gives a wonderful view of the city that is better than that of the diners at the more expensive La Capilla across the street. You can wave at them while your tab is probably a third of theirs, for very good Mexican food. It's still expensive enough to be a splurge for us, though.

We don't even think about going to the most pricey restaurants like the Sierra Nevada, La Andrea, Santa Monica, La Capilla, and Restaurante La Puertecita, not even for splurges. Not on Social Security.

But we will splurge at El Campanario on Canal across from Las Mongas convent and church, west of Hernandez Macias, excellent value for the prices. Friends who treated us there got us hooked.

Planta Baja in the same block gets raves from many. Have to say, I like their loaves of nutty rich bread served on a bread board before the meal the best of all their offerings.

Our average-priced restaurants include Ole Ole (Loreto 66) at $7 for a combination fajita plate, Barbecue Bob's on Ancha San Antonio for jerk chicken at around $5 a half chicken and sides, and Hecho en Mexico near the Instituto on Ancha San Antonio because of their salads and their vegetarian platter for around $7.

We love breakfast at Cafe la Parroquia and go many Sundays for brunch. It's at Jesus 11 in the same courtyard as El Tecolote bookstore, which is good, because there's often a wait for a table and you can duck into the bookstore in the meantime. Some dishes are in the inexpensive range--including their very large tamale gratinee casserole. Norma gets that, and I have chilaquiles with chicken served with homemade beans and tortillas (42 pesos), bread and jam, with coffee and a Diet Coke for 120 pesos total. Not totally inexpensive, but there's so much it's our main meal of the day. Closed Mondays, and they close at 4 most days, at 2 Sundays. At night it becomes La Brasserie, a more expensive restaurant—great salmon.

Mostly we eat in--Norma is a gourmet cook who makes better food than any restaurant in town.

Be sure to check out our "Cheap Eats" web page, which you can get to by clicking on the "Cheap Eats" button on the left side of all pages in our website.

Q 10: Would you recommend living in a gated expat community? So many are being built around San Miguel.

Having lived in several communes (LA in the early '70s), intentional communities (religious groups), and self-selected ghettos (i.e., areas almost totally gay, over-55 only retirement housing, etc.), I am now against anyone living totally within a narrow range of people, by choice or by restriction. Segregation by choice or by law is not healthy for minds and hearts, I think.

Self-selection into a restricted area where others are not being kept out deliberately can be necessary for awhile, such as areas of the U.S. where many Mexican migrants settle to learn the language and customs and to be among the emotional and financial support of friends and family.

And if someone never feels safe leaving such supportive communities, so be it. I'm not going to tell some Mexican grandmother she ought to move out of northeast LA and into West Hollywood or Fairfax or Compton to broaden her horizons. But I'd advise a young Mexican migrant to the U.S. to leave the safety of a barrio and learn as much about the whole world as possible.

Norma has always said that everyone in the Midwest should have to live in Southern California for a couple of years, and everyone in Southern California should have to live in the Midwest for a couple of years. Stereotypes would be broken all over the place. When we lived in LA too many Angelenos thought life ended at the LA County line. Those in the beach cities often felt life ended at Sepulveda Blvd.

There's a famous New Yorker cartoon cover that depicts the entire U.S. as seen by those in Manhattan, with the middle of the country basically blank until a small area of activity is visible on the West Coast. Same concept.

So I personally think everybody should live in many places with many kinds of people and experience all that life has to offer. That includes not moving to any area and shutting one's self off from learning about all those around you. It makes for good neighbors, it makes for greater societal responsibility, and it makes it more possible to have a global outlook that encompasses the entire world. That's my own goal in life. Others may differ.

The danger in choosing to only live among other gringos in selective areas within Mexico is that it is too easy to lose consciousness of the entire country and other people so that you block them out of your awareness and become isolated and selfish.

People who do that are "Ugly Americans" in the eyes of the native people around them, who do notice that these gringo communities are isolationist. By human nature, anyone who sees one group of other people who choose to live away from other people and not interact, comes to the conclusion that the group which does not mix must not think that the other people are worth knowing. Resentments and suspicions build. The self-segregationists are seen as having a superiority complex.

It might not be that everyone in that self-segregated community is indeed guilty of feeling superior. They just might be afraid to meet others different from them. Or whatever. But especially when those with more money segregate themselves from those who don't have so much, those who don't have so much will not look too kindly on the self-segregationists.

Add the issues of color awareness--many Mexicans are very color conscious, just as many gringos are, if perhaps in different ways--and the political experience of Mexico with the United States and with the Spanish Conquest and the French occupation, I just think it is better to try to mix with the people you have come to live among, rather than in enclaves apart from them. Mexico is so glorious, why not enjoy the whole range of possibilities available to you? White bread alone is not good for anyone.

But if you are talking about the security of living in a gated community, notice that many Mexicans live in gated communities, with high walls, broken glass implanted in cement along the top of the walls, and decorative iron grillwork over the windows. These kinds of security measures are expected, and you will get used to them. You will be wise to add them to your house or apartment wherever you are.

We didn't want to add ironwork to our windows when we lived in Los Angeles but after five robberies in four years we were delighted to have them installed and feel free to leave our windows open during hot spells.

Q 11: Do you have any favorite inexpensive San Miguel hotels?

We haven't stayed in any of these ourselves but friends have told us about them. They run $25-50. There's even a hostal in Centro which costs maybe $12 a night. Hostal Alcatraz, Reloj 54, 152-8543.

The Hotel Sautto is one of the oldest establishments in SMA, the Sautto family being one of the original families from Spain that settled the area, and its courtyard was the backdrop for the baptismal scene in "And Starring Pancho Villa as Himself." Rooms are worn but comfortable, and the hotel is the closest to the Jardin of the inexpensive ones. Singles are as low as $40 a night, depending on the season, and there are a few kitchenettes. They're hard to contact and don't take credit cards. An upscale Italian dinner restaurant is on the premises and several breakfast places are within a block or two. Teatro Angela Peralta is across the street. Hotel Sautto, Hernandez Macias 59, 152-0051. It takes dogs and has security parking.

Las Monjas is a favorite of many people, with 64 rooms in many sizes--if one you're shown is dark ask if there is another with better lighting. It's down a hill a couple of blocks west of the Jardin, and they take credit cards. It's around $40 a night for a single. There's a restaurant and bar as well. Las Monjas means "the nuns," and the Las Monjas church and convent are nearby on Canal, adjoining Belles Artes which has many classes by the month open to visitors. Hotel Posada de las Monjas, Canal 37, 152-0171.

Parador de San Sabastian is across the street from the Academia Hispano Americana, one of the Spanish language institutes which offers intensive instruction. No credit cards or restaurant. Lovely courtyard. Parking in rear. Hotel Parador de San Sebastian, Mesones 7, 152-7084.

La Quinta Loreto also takes dogs and has parking, and it has some lovely apartments and casas for long-term residents, though there's a long waiting list. It takes credit cards and has a comfort food restaurant for breakfast and lunch on the beautiful spacious grounds Calle de Loreto 15, tucked in by the Artisans Alley, 152-0042.

The Hotel La Siesta has 29 hotel rooms as well as the RV park--see next FAQ.

Q 12: Any RV parks in San Miguel?

The Hotel La Siesta has an acre or two behind the hotel for RVs. It's on Salida a Celaya #82 (the extension of Ancha San Antonio when it leaves Centro, near the El Pipila glorieta--that's the roundabout with the statue of the guy with a slab of rock on his back), phone 152-0207.

The newest RV park is tucked into the same property as Weber’s tennis courts, at Callejon de San Antonio #12. They have about 12 RV spaces, not for the most huge motor homes, and the property seems very safe and secluded. Be prepared for tennis ball sounds, though.

Old directories will still have KDA listed (the D painted to look as much like the O in KOA as possible, but they were not a KOA camp). That one was out by Los Frailes but has closed.

We have friends who RV in Mexico, and they recommend that you take items like lawn chairs inside when you are gone or at night. Obviously you will not be able to drive an oversized vehicle of any kind through San Miguel's narrow streets, though the bus drivers seem to have it down pat. You can get a cab or bus fairly easily from La Siesta into town.

Q 13: Can you recommend any hotels in the $50-100 a night range?

A: Hotels that I have heard good things about in the $50-100 a night range include:

Posada San Francisco, Plaza Principal 2, 152-7213, www.naftaconnect.com/hsanfrancisco (right on the Jardin in Centro, two restaurants and bar and other services in courtyard, my number one pick).

Casa Calderoni B & B, Callejon del Pueblito 4A, 154-6007, www.casacalderoni.com (Owner is an artist and each room has the theme of a different artist).

La Mansion del Bosque, Aldama 65, 152-0277, www.infosma.com/mansion. (Owner has been in SMA something like 40 years and has a cookbook of her wonderful recipes from her restaurant, and it's right on Park Juarez).

Hotel Posada Carmina, Cuna de Allende 7, 152-0458, www.posadacarmina.com.

Mansion Virreyes Hotel, Canal 19, 152-3355, e-mail mansionvirreyes@prodigy.net.mx .

I personally haven't stayed in any of these but have had friends give me good reports.

Q 14: How much poverty is there in Mexico? What do you do about beggars?

A: San Miguel is a fairly prosperous town overall, largely because of the tourism and the expat population, but it is important to look at the larger picture. In June, 2005, the Mexican government released a study which was reported in the Mexico edition of the Miami Herald.

Some 49 million Mexicans, or 47 percent, live below what is identified as poverty, less than 1500 pesos a month. That works out to under $150 US a month or $1,800 US a year.

About 17 percent are identified as living in dire poverty, or under 750 pesos a month, or less than about $900 US a year.

Those figures were actually being celebrated as slight improvements in the Mexican poverty situation. Poverty in rural areas was decreasing, while that in cities was increasing, which analysts thought may be due to more poor people from the campos moving to cities rather than any real improvement in rural poverty.

The Mexican minimum wage is around 50 cents an hour, though it varies slightly by region and occupation. The highest paying jobs assigned a minimum wage, like news reporter, list a minimum wage of around $12 US a day. Unemployment among the most educated Mexican professionals can be higher than for laborers. Mexican doctors have been known to go north to install dry wall.

Just some statistics to keep in mind. You can see why many Mexicans try to get to the States to work where the minimum wage is ten times higher.

You will see beggars on the sidewalks, including very old women in native Indian dress, women with several children, blind men, men in wheelchairs, women missing limbs, and children selling chewing gum. More will be in Centro during weekends and fiestas.

We decided long ago that we'd better have a policy of what we could give so that we wouldn't be torn apart every time we were asked for money. So, being on Social Security without a lot of money, we decided we'd give the first five beggars we met each day two pesos each, around 20 cents. We don't give to the children, not wanting to encourage them to rely on begging. There is one woman with mangled, scarred unusable hands that we give five pesos to when we see her.

Atencion newspaper did an article on many of the beggars seen most frequently in Centro, and their life stories are heartbreaking. No one is faking it here.

Q 15: Does everyone have a maid and gardener? What do you pay?

A: We wouldn't even have considered having a maid but one was provided us in our first two rentals, for a few hours a week, to keep up the rental. Then we stumbled into a sharing arrangement with our neighbors who loved their maid and asked if we would consider hiring her three afternoons a week, alternating with them. They were afraid she'd find someone who would hire her every afternoon and leave them. That shared arrangement has been absolutely wonderful.

Someone suggested to us when we came that you should always know the maid's parents or family because if they do steal, and you are absolutely sure of it, you can go to their family and they will take care of it, in shame at the disgrace the maid has brought to the family. But we've never worried a minute--she has too many ties we know about. Besides, she's scrupulously honest.

After her three hours we often will hire her for additional time to show us how to make tamales, etc. She's showed us many things about life in Mexico--i.e., what those ugly grainy stones are for that we saw for sale (to get off a hard water ring—they’re pumice), and where to get some things cheaper.

We've both come from families of relatives who have been maids, and one family of my rural Michigan relatives worked at a hotel as housekeepers, gardeners, and kitchen assistants. So neither of us was any too happy about actually having a maid ourselves. We used to make the beds and wash the dishes before she came.

Now we are so thrilled to have this luxury, at $30 a week for 9 hours plus daily sweeping of the porch and steps. Being able to afford a housekeeper was definitely not a drawing point for us for Mexico but we sure got used to it fast. Norma probably wouldn't have gotten into cooking so much without the help in cleaning our kitchen thoroughly.

Someone did an informal survey on one of the SMA lists and found that most expats paid $2.50-$3.50 an hour for a maid or gardener, perhaps $5 an hour for someone who manages the house or has more responsibility. A small raise once a year is appreciated. Employers are expected to pay in cash on Friday or Saturday, and to pay 15 days salary (whatever you pay in a two-week period) as a Christmas bonus in cash before Dec. 20, and to allow sick days and holidays off, with two weeks paid vacation a year.

If you are the full-time employer you are expected to pay into IMSS, the Mexican Social Security system. Read more about labor laws and your employees choosing to opt in or out of IMSS at www.rollybrook.com.

Mexican law favors the employee and the renter, and so you may be sued and lose if you fire someone without a very good, provable cause. Mexican miminum wage may be only around 50 cents US an hour, but very few people actually earn that little. Seems to me that $1.50 US an hour is the realistic minimum wage in SMA, with entry level police starting at $600 US a month, to give you an idea.

You will be known as a good or bad employer and you may be treated accordingly. Mexicans talk among themselves, just as gringos do.

Q 16: Isn't San Miguel kind of phony? I prefer the "real" Mexico.

A: Whenever a TV crew decides to find the "real" USA they head for the "heartland" and talk to some Midwest farmer usually spouting code terms for how terrible the folks in LA/NY/SF are for attempting to destroy American "values."

I lived 11 years in rural Midwest towns of under 2,000 population and will never live in any country's "heartland" again. I'm a NY/LA/SF kinda gal, and I enjoy others like me in SMA.

This morning Norma and I walked about two miles doing errands around San Juan de Dios Market and the church, and on Insurgentes and Pila Seca. We didn't see another gringo in two hours.

We spent our Social Security money in tiny Mexican-owned shops who didn't give a damn what we did the rest of the day just so they got a share of the money. They didn't want to be our friends, nor we theirs. Neither of us have any desire to have us in their lives.

This evening after the heat we'll get in another two miles walking to Villa Jacaranda to see some artsy film that didn’t make it to the SMA movie theaters, through the Jardin, past the new Italian gelato shop for a 15-peso dip of amaretto, and we'll see about half gringos, half Mexicans in our walk. Both parts of town are the "real" San Miguel.

Both San Miguel and Comonfort are the "real" Mexico, just as Baja and Chiapas and Juarez and Cancun are all the "real" Mexico. We're all real. Somebody in Manhattan dressed in chic black and working in a skyscraper is just as much a "real" U.S. citizen as the gay guy in a yellow Speedo in Provincetown or the muu-muu'd retiree in Palm Beach or the farmer in Dubuque or the lesbian mom in West Hollywood or the machinist in Detroit or the lobster fisherman in Maine or the sharecropper in Arkansas.

A Mexican in the top 1% of the economy living high in DF is just as much a real Mexican as the woman selling rattlesnake skins along Highway 57 or the farmer prodding his burros through a field or the woman frying grasshoppers in Oaxaca or the ceramist turning out dishes for export in Tonala or the university student hoping to become a professional violinist in Guanajuato. We're all "real." Why the need to assert anybody is more real than anyone else? To each her own.

We all change the world around us, even by stepping into a river and making ripples. The entire world is changing at an ever-more-rapid pace, and not all the change is bad. None of us is particularly important in the larger scheme of the universe.

The hardware store guy I bought some cup-hanging hooks from this morning and the woman who sold me bananas don't care whether I go see a U.S. film tonight at a gringo-owned hotel and don't especially want me at their Pentacostal church service tonight. I don't care if they go to that church service, or see a shaman, or pray the rosary tonight, and they're not very likely to come to the Villa Jacaranda tonight, either. That's just fine with both of us. We coexist. I don't think they want me to move next door to them, just as long as I keep dropping some money in their pockets when I spend. I can't afford to buy a house and I'll always be renting from a Mexican family, so I'm no threat there.

Not everyone likes it here. A couple of people I really liked didn't like SMA and have gone on, one gay guy even moving back to the Midwest because he couldn’t find a partner here. That's fine. Everyone has the right to pursue happiness. It’s like the children’s book, The Velveteen Rabbit. What makes someone or something real? Experiencing life, surviving and loving.

Q 17: Isn't walking hard in SMA, especially with all the hills?

A: San Miguel is built on a hillside. Some streets are really bad, others are flat for a mile.

When you check rental ads notice if they say something like "a flat walk to the Jardin." If you're in the northern half of the city, you'll find it's mostly flat easy walking. On the south side, which is actually the higher side, get up to Atascadero or Balcones, two of the richest areas, or the luxury homes south of Park Juarez, and you're likely to hit steep streets. If an ad says, "Great view," that tells you you'll be up a hill.

The hills aren't the only problem for walkers, the cobblestones and irregular sidewalks make it hard to walk. People call SMA, "The city of fallen women." Wear comfortable shoes and watch where you walk always. I twisted my knee the first day I arrived; many do. You also have to watch out for window ledges jutting out at forehead height, while you’re looking down for holes and ridges in the cobblestones.

But the more you walk, and walking is actually great fun here, the easier you will be able to walk and the healthier you'll be. In Phoenix I barely walked from home to car to store in 100+ heat six months of the year, but in SMA I walk at least 2 miles a day with no problems any more. Or at least I did until my arthritic knees got too bad and I had to cool it for awhile until I could have replacement surgeries and recover from that. I expect to be a walking fool again by early 2008.

Q 18: A related question, Isn't walking on cobblestones hazardous to your health?

A: It's official: SMA cobblestones make you healthier.

From my eight falls in four years on San Miguel's infamous if beautiful cobblestones, I wouldn't have said so, but here's the link and a few paragraphs from a new study about the health benefits of walking regularly on cobblestones.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/12/AR2005071200278.html

Study: Walking on Cobblestones Is Healthy
By WILLIAM McCALL
The Associated Press

>PORTLAND, Ore. -- The path to better health and lower blood pressure may be paved with cobblestones. When people over 60 walked on smooth, rounded cobblestones for just a half-hour a day over four months, they significantly lowered their blood pressure and improved their balance, a study showed. Behavioral researchers from the Oregon Research Institute investigated the health effects of cobblestones after observing people exercising and walking back and forth over traditional stone paths in China.... The results surprised Fisher and his fellow researchers, who expected to see some general improvement in health but also saw blood pressure drop measurably among the volunteers during the 16-week study.... Nearly all the 108 volunteers in the study said they felt better after the exercise. But only the half who walked the cobblestones showed significant improvement in balance, measures of mobility and blood pressure, Fisher said. He said the cobblestone walking paths are common in China, where traditional medicine teaches that the uneven surface of the stones stimulate "acupoints" on the soles of the feet. The theory is much like acupuncture, suggesting that distant and unrelated areas of the body are linked together at certain points and can be stimulated to improve physical and mental health....>

Q 19: How do I meet someone with my particular interests, say in yoga? Is there one central gathering spot like the Lake Chapala Society?

A: We've got at least 6,000 permanent gringo retiree residents here, too many for any one organization! (The other 1,000 or so permanent gringo residents are younger or still working. I'm just guessing at the numbers but they're somewhere near the mark.

Buy an Atencion as soon as you get here and see all the activities going on and which groups interest you. Ahead of time you can check the calendar at www.atencionsnmiguel.org and at http://www.portalsanmiguel.com. There are a couple of yoga classes where you can meet like-minded people, and other related kinds of groups like the Meditation Center. I've seen many notices for yoga classes.

There's always the Social Club which meets weekly at different people's homes. Go to the Unitarians meeting Sunday morning and in the announcements time say that you're looking for people to talk to, or other retirees in general, and over breakfast you'll meet a bunch. The Episcopalians at St. Paul's are very friendly to newcomers as well and have many activities there.

At La Conexion mailing service on Aldama a block south of the Jardin, you can find out about a social group that meets at different restaurants every Wednesday for lunch.

Where would people you want to meet likely hang out? Go there.

Just sit around in the Jardin and talk to people you think might be your kind of folks. It won't take long, you'll have plenty of new friends. Hope you enjoy San Miguel!

Q 20: Do you need a Mexican will if you have one in the U.S.?

A. For this answer I'll quote with permission an attorney who responded to this question on an SMA list. He also talks about the legal issues with domestic partners in Mexico, Barry H. Barnett, PC, http://www.barlaw.com/:

Short lesson on inheritance. I am not licensed in MX, nor in any State in the US except NM, IL & FL. This is NOT intended as legal advice, just offered to help which it may or may not accomplish.

First, there is a treaty between the US and MX that, in general, provides for the recognition of our respective contracts and agreements (a trust is a contract). HOWEVER, if the official with whom you are dealing is not aware of that fact and refuses to become aware of that fact, or, even if he/she is aware, you could experience challenges in seeing the provisions timely and fully implemented. Thus, for MX property that is not held in a manner that will pass the property outside the probate process (see below for discussion) it is prudent to have a MX Will. MX officials more readily understand and are comfortable with "their own" documents and there is less opportunity to question, inquire and otherwise delay the process. Delay equals increased time and expense. As I understand the pricing on Wills down here, the cost is relatively minor - especially when compared to the the asset(s) involved and the potential for hassle elimination down the road.

On the other hand, "you" will be dead --- if it takes 20 years to finish the process you will not care. We plan and prepare to a) control our assets; and b) reduce the hassle to our heirs. I am aware of no law that requires you to incur the expense in your lifetime to do either.

Now, for those who have life partners -- same gender or otherwise, the absence of the benefit of the provisions in the law applicable to "married" people require extra steps (and legal documents) to be considered and prepared if you and your partner are going to protect each other from your respective families when "you" are no longer able to interface with them. (Not that your particular family will be a problem, but many are, I have seen too many wasted, stupid fights when the "main player" has departed the scene.)

First and foremost life partners need to give each other Durable Power of Attorney, Medical Power of Attorney and execute a Living Will (it is called an Advanced Health Care Directive in NM and many places). Second, you need to be attentive to how your assets are held and have a Will in place to "catch" any oversights. If tax planning is NOT part of your concern or consideration, there is no reason for any childless couple to have to go through probate if their assets are structured correctly during their life time.

DPoA: This is a document that grants a person the ability to act on behalf of the granting person. Presumably you trust the person next to whom you close your eyes each night and thus giving a DPoA to that person should not be a problem. There are 2 ways in which these documents can be created: 1) Authority "springs" into existence upon the happening of a specified event (e.g., coma); or 2) authority exists immediately. My personal preference is for immediate authority. This not only eliminates a potential fight on whether the Dr. saying "yes" is correct, but allows the use of the document for convenience --- you are there, your partner is here and a document there needs to be signed--- with the DPoA at the ready, you do not need to have your partner go here, use overnight, or any other means to get the doucment there and back for signature. For those living here, my belief is that the real likely benefit of the DPoA is to bolster the rights of the partner to be present and in charge when the other becomes incapaciatated.

Durable Medical PoA: This document is similar to the DPoA, but is limited strictly to medical decisions. I generally do not recommend this document for "married" couples as the law establishes the "authority" that this document conveys. However, for gay and lesbian couples, and for heteros that are "living in sin" as we did so readily in my youth, the absence of this document (even if you have a DPoA) could result in the partner sitting in the hallway while the "family" is in the room.

AHCD: Living Will by another name. If you followed the news last year at all you know the problems well-meaning people can cause. Prepare one of these and sign it --- EITHER way you feel. If you don't want the plug pulled - say so. If you do -- say so. It will help ALOT, not only emotionally for those that must make the decision, but for the legal process in reducing the ability of an objecting party to drag things on for ever. Also, make certain you also address the provision of food and water -- you should indicate your preference for receiving or denying either or both. Remember, this document gets used when all hope is gone (in the medical profession). To pull the plug and then live for X more years (as did Karen Quinlen) achieves little. Denying food and/or hydration will insure your objective in pulling the plug is accomplished in 3 days to 21-30 days.

Wills: Wills are a necessary evil IF you want to alter the statutory scheme of inheritance OR you want to designate who "is in charge" of your estate. If you don't care about those things, a Will is not required, the laws of intestate succession will apply and results, probably not to dissimilar to what you were going to specify will happen. Generally speaking the Intestate succession laws pass property down, up, out --- to family members that can be found.

Probate: ONLY assets that have title that need to be passed on to someone need to be probated. Thus, with a little bit of planning (and implementation -- the best trust is useless if you don't take the time to put the assets into it) probate can be avoided.

For example, Joint Tenant with Right of Survivorship (JTRoS) means that ALL names (not limited just to 2 people) own equally the asset (car, house, bank account, brokerage account, etc.). When one JT dies, the remaining JTs, by operation of law, become the owners -- no probate is required. Thus, if you and your partner own all your collective assets that can be held (i.,e. those that have a piece of paper that represents ownership), when the first of you dies, the other will own everything and no "heir" can interfere.

Other planning devices that can avoid probate for the affected assets include:

POD: Pay on Death -- this type of ownership is general associated with financial institution accounts (bank, CDs, and brokerage). This designation can be changed as a son, daughter or other loved one gets to the top of your A list (or manages to get to the top of your S list and you want to put your A list people in title). In essence, this ownership says "I own it" when I die the POD designate(s) own it - give to them". You can have more than one POD person named - just remember that if you do not indicate A gets 20% and B gets 80% - A&B will each own 50%.

TOD: This a Transfer on Death -- this is very new and applies to real property. It is NOT available in all States. If it is available in a State where you own real property, you can have a TOD deed prepared and recorded. In that deed you indicate who gets the property when you are dead, IF you haven't otherwise sold the property before you die, revoked the TOD, or given the property to someone else. Again, it is important to be clear and careful on how you designate the recipient(s).

SIA: This is my favorite --- it ties to the best Will I have even seen written.....Being of sound mind and body I Spent It All before I died!

TRUSTS: Trusts are a rip-off IF you put one together to avoid probate. (Whoops, bias slipped!) In most states, probate is neither a major hassle, nor expensive (often times the Trust is more expensive to prepare than the probate -- AND -- the trust cost you money, the probate, cost you nothing - it just reduces what the heirs get.

HOWEVER, there are useful purposes for trusts: A) you are married and have an estate large enough that you can and want to take advantage of tax savings by "splitting" the estate upon the first to die to thus preserve that persons Estate and Gift Tax exclusion amount (now about $3 mill -- headed to ZERO inheritance tax in 2010 and then back to $1 Mill in 2011, unless they change the law AGAIN). Anyway, trusts can be used to preserve that aspect.

Another reason for a trust is that you have a special needs situation. That is, for example, a child that is going to need extra care and who is not capable of managing their own affairs. Another example in this category is if you wish to disown (disinherit) a child, you can make if far more difficult for that child to successfully challenge if you do so through a trust, than if you do so in a Will. The reason is mainly that a Will does not become viable until it is admitted to probate --- shortly before the challenge is mounted. On the other hand, your trust, presumably, will be in existence for years at the time the child discovers "payback is hell" and they have been cut out. A document that has been viable for years is just harder to challenge, if, for no other reason, psychological --- it has been around for a while.

The third reason to consider a trust is to exert control. Through a trust you can control the money for the lifetime of your children and all grandchildren that were alive at your death. A practical illustration would be something like the following. You are not certain when your kids will reach the age of financial reason and so to avoid them blowing it all on trips to Somewhere or their favorite sports car, you can put all the money in trust and give them only income from the time they reach 21 until say 35 (discretion in Trustee to allow access to principal for life events you define, if you want). Then at 35 they get 25% of the principal, at 40, 25%, and so on. Your Trustee can be given discretion to hold back income if the kids are, in your Trustee's opinion, not being responsible with it, etc. Similarly, you can give your Trustee discretion to allow invasion of principal for life events (birth of a child, buying a home, etc.) with guidelines and limitations you specify.

This is not an exhaustive discussion of estate planning, consult your own attorney and acccountant to discuss your personal situation.

Q 21: Would you recommend San Miguel to someone with a disability?

I would have to say no if the disability is one involving mobility. Most of Mexico is about where the U.S. was in the '50s on so many social issues, including awareness of disability rights.

Recent mayors have made sure that there are sidewalk cuts in Centro remodeling projects, but so many sidewalks are barely wide enough for one person, and doorway steps may halve even that narrow walkway. So many doorways have steps going up or even down from the sidewalk--my first day in San Miguel I fell down a stairwell into a small shop when I didn't see the drop in the sidewalk.

The sidewalks and cobblestones are so irregular, and stairs rarely have steps of the same height, one step being four inches high and the next a foot. I don't see how even a very well trained seeing eye dog could warn of changes in height along a sidewalk every few inches.

Sometimes a construction hole will be left in a sidewalk or street with only a few larger rocks to mark the hazards. Maybe one rock will be painted orange, maybe not. I see occasional people with walkers or in wheelchairs, or with white canes, but I think life here would be extremely frustrating and limited for someone with a mobility problem. But it is their own decision—is living in such a great city worth the extra effort?

We are at 6,400 feet altitude, which means some people with breathing problems like severe emphysema do not do well here. It seems that most people adjust to the higher altitude within a few days but it is best to take it easy the first few days here until you adjust. Friends have had to leave for lower land when their emphysema became severe.

If a person's disability requires very specialized medical care and supplies, they may be hard to come by in Mexico outside of Mexico City and Guadalajara. Those who are HIV+ need to have a very clear cut, reliable way to get their meds on their schedule, no delays allowed. You can do without a phone or electricity for a few days when there is a problem, but some conditions are not that forgiving in requiring continued treatments and medicines.

But every person is different. I have known people with disabilities who would tackle every obstacle just for the challenge, and who would be able to handle anything San Miguel put in front of them. They would relish the opportunity to feel the spirit, the mood, of the town and to bask in the feelings, sounds and smells of a fiesta. In no way would I want to limit someone who really wanted to experience San Miguel, just so they knew what challenges would be involved.

Q 22: What do you do about health care?

Every person has to evaluate his or her personal medical history and needs, plus read the fine print in any existing health insurance. The issue is highly complex. Health care in the U.S. is a crap shoot anyway, we have found. The ideal situation does not exist in the States nor here.

First, Medicare does not pay for care when you live outside the U.S. Both Democrats Abroad and Republicans Abroad are seeking to change that rule, and perhaps make Mexico a pilot study to see how extending Medicare outside the U.S. could work. But that day is not here yet.

Private insurance plans can be very expensive, and often do not cover pre-existing conditions. But if you have an excellent plan and can afford to keep it, read the fine print and make sure it will cover your needs in Mexico. IMSS, the Mexican Social Security, offers lowcost health insurance even to foreign residents, but you may not be accepted if you have pre-existing conditions, and there are many regulations. Even with pre-existing conditions, sometimes you can get coverage, though the pre-existing conditions may not be covered the first year or more. The first year the benefits offered are very limited, for example. With IMSS you go to an IMSS clinic first for most care, and the clinic may refer you to a government hospital. We're going to check out IMSS further soon.

The good news is that medical care here is far cheaper than in the U.S. and so we are able to self-insure--we pay cash out of pocket for all our expenses here at a lower cost than our copays were in the states! We have to have a backup savings for something major, and we'd go back to the States for a long-term medical crisis. I did in 2003 for an extremely unusual, lengthy, complicated surgery.

In San Miguel there are two hospitals. Hospital de la Fe is privately owned by some Mexican doctors and was built with fund-raising help from the expat community. To give you some examples of costs, I have gone to specialists there who charge $30-50 US, very little waiting, and you often receive a full hour or more of undivided attention. I spent two nights in a private room at $72 a night for a temporary intestinal blockage, and the total cost for 2 1/2 days was $270. Half of that was for antibiotics. I was given the same treatment I'd always gotten in a U.S. hospital for a blockage: a naso-gastric tube, IV feeding and antibiotics, and walking the halls to get the juices flowing.

Differences: the IV pole was gravity-only, not a fancy computerized IV pole, and it was so old I ended up carrying it, and then figuring out I needed to carry only the IV bags, when I walked the corridors. The thick plush blanket was far superior in warmth to U.S. hospital blankets--but I doubt if it got washed between each patient. The TV, of course, had only Spanish language stations, not cable or satellite U.S. stations.

Mexican hospitals expect that a friend or family member will accompany a patient and do all the little things that you can ring a buzzer for in a U.S. hospital--pillow fluffing, getting to the bathroom, washing up, eating assistance, etc. Often a cot or bed will be provided for that family member, with meals, at no extra cost.

I had to have a small outpatient operation another time at de la Fe, and that cost me $210 for the surgeon, use of an ER room for three hours, the biopsy and surgical supplies. Lunch was provided for both Norma and me. The downside: the surgery spotlight went out during the operation and the surgeon called a nurse who shook the light until it came back on. (In the U.S. if that had happened, I might have sued. But nobody sues here. Who would you sue? And how would they pay?)

In both experiences with de la Fe, the specialists I saw later in the U.S. said that the Mexican doctors had done everything right.

I also had a colonoscopy at Angeles Hospital in Queretaro, and for the internist and two anesthesiologists and a videotape of the complete procedure, the cost was $400. In the U.S. a colonscopy cost something like $4,000, and my insurance copay would have been more than $400.

A friend had a tummy tuck and liposuction at de la Fe and paid $2,500 for everything, and was pleased with every aspect of her experience.

Another friend had a heart attack and was rushed to de la Fe, where doctors used the paddles to resuscitate him and saved his life. Three days in ICU I think cost $4,000. Angiogram, in Queretaro at Angeles Hospital: $3,000.

Another friend had emergency heart surgery and had to have a pacemaker. His total cost at Angeles was $65,000. He had it to pay. If he'd been able to ge to Houston it might have cost a quarter million dollars and his copay might hve still been $65,000. In the US someone facing a huge medical bill they can't pay might be able to declare bankruptcy afterward, but then what about the next huge medical bill? You can't declare bankrupcty only so often, I think every seven years. You can get screwed over health costs in the US as well as in Mexico.

Now, the other hospital in San Miguel is Hospital General, the government hospital, now a 60-bed new facility being built on the outskirts of town, on the Salida a Queretaro. The new hospital has an MRI and CT scan and is a class 2 facility, which means it can do just about everything short of a liver transplant.

I went to the previous Hospital General when it was in an older building on Relox and this is my experience. I woke up with rapid heart beat, tachycardia, after having had five cups of caffeinated coffee that day, and of course I jumped on the internet to read up on it. Once I was sure it was probably not serious but I should have an EKG to make sure, we decided to try Hospital General rather than de la Fe.

Hospital General has a program to train U.S. emergency doctors in Spanish in a hospital setting, so very often it is staffed by U.S.-trained ER doctors. The morning I went an English-speaking doctor was found to talk to me, but I don't think he was in the Spanish program, he was a native of San Miguel. I had to wait only a half hour, compared to as much as 16 hours we have waited in U.S. ER rooms.

I had written up my complex medical history on the computer and half a dozen doctors took turns reading it, maybe testing their English, surprised to find a patient bringing her own written-out medical history. I had the EKG, though the machine was not the sleek laptop-sized EKG machine I was used to in the states; this was a clunker. It worked fine, and I was presented with my own printout of my EKG to take with me to my followup doctor.

Patients are responsible for keeping their own medical records in Mexico, by the way. Not every doctor will even take notes while interviewing you, though some enter everything into their laptops and are connected with Mayo Clinic.

Total cost for an hour in the ER and my EKG? I almost fell over when the cashier said 61 pesos. That's $6. My last U.S. ER stay was around $2,000. With Medicare in the States, your basic copay charge for a hospital stay is around $900 just for starters.

I was telling a neighbor about the $6 and she said that was nothing, her friend fell and was taken by ambulance to Hospital General, where he was x-rayed and given a pain prescription. A taxi was called for him, the driver was told where to go to get the guy his medicine, and he was sent off with a total bill of, are you ready, $1! Ten pesos.

Someone wrote on one of the SMA e-mail lists that she received excellent trauma care in Hospital General after an accident, for $23 total cost. But another time she went with what she suspected was a broken bone in her foot, she got the x-rays promptly, but then she sat around for many hours before deciding to go home and handle it herself. She knew there isn't much a doctor can do for one of the numerous small bones in the foot, they tend to just heal themselves, and that's what she decided to do. So she had one very good experience and one not so good.

Another concern is blood supplies. SMA is not that big of a town, and so many times rare blood or a lot of blood has to be brought in from Celaya or Queretaro hospitals, if they have it. Mexicans often put an appeal out on the local radio station if someone suddenly needs a blood donor, and expats sometimes hit the local SMA e-mail lists. Several expats in the past have attempted to put together a blood bank but have not succeeded for very long, for many reasons. When we lived in rural Michigan, blood supplies were non-existent as well, and blood had to be driven in from 70 miles away in any emergency requiring blood, so this can be a real problem in the U.S. as well.

Now there are cases where someone dies because not enough of their rare blood type can be found, or there is a wrong diagnosis, but that happens in the U.S. as well. There is an excellent cardiologist in SMA, Dr. Alvarez, who friends tell me has charged as much as $80 a visit. What does a visit to a cardiologist in the U.S. run now? And can you get in right away? Can you get a doctor to make a house call? Several will come out to your house here.

When we were taking Vioxx it cost each of us around $55 a month, compared to $70 in the U.S., but now we are on indocin, brand name Malival here, which is in the Advil/Aleve/NSAID family and which has been on the market for decades. It costs about $10 a month. We use nopales cactus capsules at $5 a month instead of Lipitor for $50 a month for cholesterol control and so far they seem just as effective. We go to a lab on Hidalgo whenever we want to have a cholesterol test, no prescription needed, to keep track.

I have written on my blog about my more recent experience at the new Hospital General, again with rapid and irregular heart beat, but this time they kept me four hours and administered four drugs by IV push. With an xray and continuous EKG monitoring, and frequent attendance by an English-speaking young woman doctor who also worked at Hospital Angeles in Queretaro, my total bill was $500 USD. That was after a means-test interview by a social worker to determine my ability to pay. The ER visit alone starts at $6.30 USD.  Two prescriptions filled in the hospital pharmacy came to $1.80. They only had two out of the four drugs I was prescribed, and the others came to $50 USD at Farmacia Guadalajara, but at least two were cheap.

I've also written at length on my blog about my decision to have a knee replaced with Dr. Michael Schmidt in Queretaro. He is an orthopedic surgeon known worldwide. To have the surgery in his own small hospital above his clinic was $6,500 USD, to have it at the private Hospital Angeles would have been $20,000 USD, and to have it in the US would have been at least $40,000. Even though Medicare would have covered much of the medical costs in the US, the expenses of traveling back and forth to the US, boarding the pets, paying for a motel and restaurant meals, and all the copays could very well have been more than $6,500. It was so much easier to have it here, and I was very satisfied with the entire experience.

So those are the pros and cons of health care in San Miguel.

Q 23: Can you give some other examples of prices?

Here is my shopping list from a recent trip to Gigante, the major supermarket in town until November, 2006. Then a new Mega/Comercial Mexicana, affiliated with Costco, opened at the El Pipila glorieta at the end of Ancha de San Antonio, but I haven't typed up one of our receipts from there yet. The prices seem comparable. Another major supermarket, a SuperGigante, came to town in December, 2006, but the new Mega is far more popular. We do most of our shopping at the little shops and mercados in town to keep our money in the community, and we also enjoy walking and shopping each day for the freshest of produce. This is a sample price list from the fall of 2006:

Fibra Max cereal, large box, $3.50 US
Box of cereal, Extra brand, 2.62
Box of cereal, Crusti brand, like granola,3.35
2-liter plastic bottle Diet pepsi, 1.20
grapefruit, kilo (2.2 pounds), .49
fresh mushrooms, kilo, 2.55
large can of whole mushrooms, 1.25
fresh carrots, kilo, .49
yellow sweet pepper, kilo, .99
green sweet pepper, kilo .97
orange sweet pepper, kilo, 5.20 (bought one at 1.10)
plastic bag of dried hibiscus blossoms to make several gallons of jamaica tea, 1.55
12 extra large brown eggs, 1.05
small mamey, a melon, .75
large plastic bag of already-sliced coleslaw mix, 3.55
(We didn't notice the price, would have bought a whole cabbage and sliced it ourselves for around .50)
small can of sliced pickled jalapenos for nachos, .40
roll of Ritz crackers, 75 mg, .18
Campbell's can of condensed soup from squash flowers, 1.23
Campbell's can of condensed chicken soup with fine noodles, 1.23
fresh limes, kilo, .61
carton of low-fat crema, similar to sour cream, 1.20
tin of Brunswick picante sardines, .90
pound of unsalted butter, 1.62
two 40-watt light bulbs, .43
big yellow onions, hard to find, kilo, .62
plastic bottle of low-fat yogurt drink, .57
large canned corn, .88
liter bottle of green salsa, 1.40
cantaloupe, kilo, 1.09
package of dried laurel leaves, spices (bay leaf), .89
fancy whole-grain mustard, small jar, 1.39

There are all-you-can-eat Mexican buffets for $3.50-5 many places. A raw chicken sells for around $1.20 a pound and a whole nicely-spiced rotisserie chicken with a few tortillas and chiles is $5.50 at many shops along the street.

At Tuesday Market you can find all kinds of new and used clothes for low prices, as well as some that are over-priced. A friend stumbled upon an Anne Klein silk skirt for $2.50. I get most of my clothes at Girasol for $20-25 for nice cotton blouses and slacks, plus T-shirt material scoop neck shirts from many shops for $5. Mexican style jackets are as low as $11, and again, you can always find good used clothes at garage sales. Or you can go to Darla and similar gringa-oriented top of the line boutiques and pay $500 for a dress.

A pound of ground coffee is around $4 in a neighborhood shop, up to $8 in a gourmet coffee boutique.

We get 20-pound bags of Costco cat food, good quality, for around $11, and the rest of the Costco prices are pretty close to the US, except for imported stuff. English-language magazines will have a couple dollars tacked on to the price.

Most lectures around town are around $5. Top notch entertainment at Teatro Angela Peralto can be free, or average around $15-20 for the best seats down to $5-10 for the third level. Lots of freeloaders make the rounds of the art gallery openings solely for the free wine and appetizers. Older movies at the Biblioteca are around $5. Lots of free stuff happens many nights at the Jardin.

A paleta (fruit bar) at Dolphy's on the Jardin is 90 cents, or only 45 cents farther out. Dolphy's has a one-scoop small sundae for $1.90. Or, you can buy a two-scoop sundae of deluxe ice cream at Santa Clara for $5. Domino's has two-fer Tuesdays, the basic prices similar to the U.S.

You can get used paperbacks from lots of people, or there are second hand books at Tecolote bookstore, many for very little, or at garage sales. New books will cost more at Tecolote than in the States because of duty and shipping. Cable TV is as low as $22 but we paid around $50 with a lot of English language channels. We had DSL through cable before, too. Now we're on Satellite DISH TV, and it cost something like $700 for dish and installation, and around $50 a month for a hundred channels, and $150 or so for a year's service contract and the legal connection to US channels. (Some illegal services exist.)

High Speed internet through TelMex using Prodigy Infinitum is around $50 a month, and we pay $17 a month for Vonage for our long distance phone service for 500 minutes to or from the States. The basic TelMex bill is around $18 a month.

A five-gallon bottle of purified water delivered to our house is $2, including tip, and we use two or three a week. You can get a haircut from a Mexican haircutter for as low as $2.50, or you can go to Christine, a Brit with 20 years experience in London and Mexico City and she used to cut the hair of Margaret Thatcher, for $25. A few gringo-oriented boutiques charge $40 a haircut. Our favorite costs $8 a haircut.

The daily English-language newspaper, the Mexican edition of the Miami Herald, is 70 cents if you buy from a newsstand or the two stands in the Jardin, or 80 cents if you buy from a guy taking it door to door, restaurant to restaurant. The weekly Atencion with an excellent calendar is 80 cents. Other publications with calendars are freebies.

To have a pet spayed at the Society for the Protection of Animals is $27, or the top vet in town charges $40-70 depending on sex and age and shots needed. Poor Mexicans can get their pets sterilized for free at the occasional spaying weekends by Amigos de Animales.

Teeth cleaning at Dr. Jorge Vargas was $40; a simple cavity repair and x-ray was $45.

But a printer cartridge for an HP photo printer is much higher--$35-45 for each of the three cartridges I need for my phto printer. Electronics seem to be higher overall. You can get a small TV for $90 that would be $75 in the States, or a huge flat screen monster for $5000. Computers cost more overall, though you can have a good basic system built for you here for around $600, not including monitor and printer.

A small stove and oven is around $200 in the local appliance stores, and an excellent standard size one is $400-600, or you can pay $1,000+ for a luxury model. A small fridge is as low as $250, all the way to $1,500 for a deluxe double door one.

A friend bought a stripped four-door Ford Escort for $8,500 US. Tiny cars you see a lot here are even cheaper. But many models are more expensive here.

If you want to live in luxury with products from the States you may need about as much money as you spend in the States for a luxury lifestyle. Or, you can live very simply for far less than you could in the States. Remember, 47% of the Mexican population lives on less than $1,800 a year.

Q 24: Is San Miguel accepting of gay and lesbian lifestyles?

San Miguel is an artsy knd of town full of free thinkers who accept everybody, though we have a few expats who bring more judgmental attitudes from the States. We are totally accepted here and I have not run into a single word of negativity in SMA, less than I experienced in the gay ghettos of Los Angeles! Lots of gays and lesbians and a few bi's live here and some I think may consider themselves transgendered, though I haven't met them personally yet.

It isn't like LA where we immediately sought out the gay and lesbian communities and were fairly segregated within them. There was one gay SMA bar that was only open late Saturday nights, 100 Angeles, and then it was closed for a couple of years. It briefly reopened as Proud, which then changed its name to El Rincon del Alebrijes, but it doesn't seem to be open now. Maybe next week, maybe not. Ity's a straight young Mexican club at this moment. It was mainly frequented by Mexican gay men after midnight Saturday nights, after the nightspot had a glorious very integrated reopening.

We miss having a gay bar in town, but there are plenty of other places to enjoy dancing. Lesbians have no problems dancing in public--but then women dancing together are more accepted anyplace. Back in rural Michigan the men rarely danced so it was normal for only women to be on the dance floor at patries and wedding. Gay men don't feel quite that open, though there are numerous gringo benefits and parties where they do.

One of our first experiences in San Miguel, on Virgin of Guadelupe Day, we happened across a Mexican rock band playing on the steps of the Parroquia, the main church in Centro, and about a dozen young gringos who looked like U.S. hippies of the '60s were dancing their hearts out. A blonde 50-ish woman I think was straight was dancing like a fool alone, occasionally convincing another woman or man, gringo or Mexican, of any age, to join her on the floor. We joined right in and not a glare did we see. Fireworks exploded overhead in the cool night and I was in heaven. Have to say I've danced more here than I did in Phoenix!

My gay male friends say that there is a section of the beach at Puerto Vallerta that is almost totally gay and they love it, go there every winter The Lonely Planet Mexico guides give the locations of gay bars in many Mexican cities and say that we're more accepted than you might expect.

Of course the official Catholic line in this Catholic country is very much anti-gay, but the fiestas which have strong pre-Hispanic Indian roots often have men and women cross-dressing. Day of the Locos in June features a parade that has some elements that look like a gay pride march! Part of that is just the shock value of the day, everyone is trying to be outrageous as they can, they're not doing it to be transvestites, they're just having fun. But we can blend right into that, if you enjoy that.

Mexican Catholicism is not like U.S. Catholicism--I've heard it said that it's both the most Catholic and the least Catholic country in the world. Pagan roots run deep. Some of the lecturers in town have claimed that Catholicism did not overpower paganism and swallow it up, paganism just took the parts of Catholicism which fit into paganism and ignored the rest.

I am sure there must be considerable hostility on the part of traditional Mexicans who find their young men and women caught up in the gay scene in one way or another, and I bet some gay bashing does occur. A gay man here might get roughed up just as in the States in the wrong place at the wrong time. I'm not totally pollyannaish, I just haven't encountered it personally.

And not all gays and lesbians here are as out as I am--many still don't want to chance any discrimination, or are in positions where they think being open will hurt them professionally or whatever. They whisper the G and L words. Just like in any U.S. city.

Do gay and lesbian Mexicans mix much with expat gays and lesbians? Some do, some don't. My lesbianism is a small part of the total of who I am, and I make friends usually on the basis of that totality. A Mexican lesbian and I who had nothing else in common but our sexuality would have no reason to be friends, even if my Spanish were better. The straight Mexican man in my art class who is my age, who paints in a similar style, who can give me help when I can't seem to get the perspective right and I can help him point out where there needs to be more contrast, who enjoys the same music, who laughs at the same things, just might turn into a friend even if I'm looking up words on my pocket translator to communicate.

I am sure that there are still gays being killed in Mexico because of their sexuality, just as still happens in the States, though it is much worse in most of the world. There is plenty of very-closeted gay life here, my gaydar tells me that, and my gringo friends who do have gay and lesbian Mexican friends tell me that.

Mexican lesbians do not feel all that safe, far as I can tell, and a seminal book around 1985, "This Bridge Called My Back," about lesbians of color and edited by two Mexican-American Latinas, was full of information about how they came out of a culture which was highly homophobic.

The gay acceptance many of us open U.S. gays and lesbians feel is in some ways real, some ways an illusion, the polite front gringos often get when we are doing something outrageous or incomprehensible in Mexican eyes.

I personally have not had a single nasty look, much less any comments, from any Mexicans here, just the usual trash from a few uptight Americans who bring their bigotry with them. The worst anti-lesbian comment we ever heard came from a gay male gringo. But I know of at least one gay gringo who moved to Mexico and then left partly because he felt the antagonism when two guys walked down the street with their arms around each other or holding hands. But he'd get that in most of the States as well. I know other gay gringos and Mexicans who live in San Miguel and who are very open, even outrageously so, and love it here.

Few straight people knew anything about how lesbians and gays were discriminated against in the U.S. before Stonewall in 1969 brought about our equality movement and our publishing explosion to go with it, telling our stories that we had never dared tell before. Before, we were "The love that dare not speak its name." Now we've been called, "The love that will not shut up." I don't think Mexico has reached that point yet!

Q 25: How are the swimming and fishing? Are the beaches white sand?

A. So many people think everything in Mexico is on the beach! San Miguel is right about in the center of Mexico, hundreds of miles from either the Atlantic or the Pacific. We have a lake but you wouldn't want to go swimming or fishing in it. It photographs beautifully at sunset, though.

We do have excellent swimming because of the thermal (hot tubs!) area nearby, and hotel swimming pools in town that allow public access for a fee or to guests. On the road to Dolores Hidalgo, maybe five miles out of SMA, are my two favorite public pools, La Gruto and Taboada. La Gruta has a series of three caves, getting hotter and darker as you go farther in through narrow tunnels between the caves. I like the cave atmosphere, though it makes Norma claustrophobic. La Gruta can be rented at night, 6 pm to midnight, for private parties. Cost is 2000 pesos (around $190 US) for up to 10 people. No food or drinks can be brought in--if you want refreshments you can have the resort cater the party. But I can see a birthday party or something at a restaurant moving out to La Gruta to end the night. You can even swim nude. Reservations through Sra Flor de Maria Perez, 185-2099.

For real swimming, Taboada (also called Agua Magica) has a thermal Olympic-sized pool with laps, a big hot tub and a children's pool, with a picnic area and light refreshments. At various times groups of women have organized aerobics swimming lessons there, but these groups come and go. Several hotels on the same road, including near the Pemex station at Atotonilco, advertise their spas and various luxury services. I think the daily use fee is around $5 at these spots. There are buses out to that area, which will require an additional lengthy walk, or you can take a cab--negotiate a price first. You'd have to call a cab from the pool for the return trip, and telephoning for a cab means the fare will be double.

Santa Domingo Sports Club, in the condo complex past Las Casas school on Santo Domingo, has a 25-meter covered and heated pool, open for lap swimming 8-2 and 7-8. You can pay by the month, around $45, or $4 a day, and you can also pay for swimming lessons the other hours. Sometimes there are water aerobics classes there.

The Malanquin golf club has a pool but I've heard the charge is something like $20 a day if you're not a member. The luxury Hotel Mission de Los Angeles at the entrance to Los Frailes neighborhood just outside of town charges $7 a day, $25 a month for its large pool, I have heard. Hotel La Aldea on Ancha de San Antonio is cheaper, around $4 a day. I have also heard that Villa Santa Monica adjoining Parque Juarez and Real de Minas on Ancho de San Antonio at Stirling Dickinson will allow luncheon guests to swim for free that day. I haven't used any of these pools, I love Taboada and La Gruta.

Q 26: I can't stand to see the sight of stray dogs. Isn't anybody doing something about them?

This is another "five blind men describe an elephant" situation. In Centro and the wealthier areas I get the impression that there are fewer strays, and those that are stray, are often fed. One stray dog was so popular that many people kept picking her up and taking her in to be sterilized--finally someone got her a collar, "I've already been sterilized, thanks." I know so many expats who feed many stray dogs and cats and often pay to have the the animals sterilized if they can be caught.

In rural areas I often see stray dogs who are in terrible shape. Sometimes they run in packs. Many Mexicans are afraid of big dogs because of their experiences encountering starving packs. It is not possible to speak about all Mexicans, or all anybody, for that matter, and Mexicans have as varied opinions about animals as those in the U.S. do.

It's often said that attitudes toward social issues in Mexico are similar to the attitudes of the U.S. in the '50s, and I know animal abuse was fairly casual when I was growing up