Ruminations of an Expatriate

As I mentioned a few days ago that I would , I spent new year eve at the Tavola Trattoria restaurant and stayed out later than I have since my thirtieth high school reunion ten years ago. I had spent my previous two new year eves here at home.

When I arrived at 9:30, no other customers had arrived and didn’t begin to arrive until after ten. Generally speaking folks here begin their partying or music events later and stay at it later, including the children, than that to which I am accustomed. (Many nightclub music performances don’t get underway until 9:30 or 10:00.) By 10:30 two of the three Tavola seating areas were full of celebrating families.

I spent the evening at a table with the restaurant owner, her mother and younger sister, a gringa from Chicago who teaches English here, and a friend of the owner and her ten year old daughter Nelany, a Hawaiian name meaning tranquil sky, as her mother informed me.

The was much dancing, which the young children seem to particularly enjoy; a delicious four course meal of appetizers, ravioli stuffed with four different cheeses and spinach, beef roast and mashed potatoes, and double chocolate cake; champagne; and sparklers for the strike of midnight. We were each also provided a glass with twelve grapes, one for each month. One makes a wish while eating each grape.

During the evening about a third of those present continually had their cell phones open, sending and receiving felicidades to and from their friends and families. At one point, Nelany asked her mother for her phones and her mother pulled three phones out of her purse, two of which were Nelany’s and only one hers, she assured me. She indicated that Nelany is familiar with all of the phone and her home computer functions while she, herself, was capable of only making calls and sending email.

At midnight the sparklers were lit and everyone in the restaurant got up and circulated to wish every other patron a happy new year, a wish accompanied by hugs, kisses, and hand shakes.

It was a wonderful evening.

There is apparently not the fondness for new year fireworks here, as I remember there is in Merida. There the explosions continued through the night. Here I heard only a couple of reports.

I should also note that the Chedraui store where I shop frequently put out racks of red and yellow bra/panty sets a week or so before new year eve.  I have since learned from reading “What I Do All Day” that the underwear is worn for luck, one color for luck in love and the other for money.

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