Payasos (Clowns) y la Feria

It’s been awhile since I last wrote, sorry about that. I believe I left off just before last weekend. Friday was nothing unusual, just went out to a very sophisticated club called Ezenza with Sheila, her host brother and his friends. Saturday, we went to a birthday party for the daughter of our school’s art teacher, Tere. The whole family is very sweet and artistic. Tere and her two daughters made almost all the clown-themed decorations. They also hired two clowns to give a show, which lasted almost two hours. The best part was when they had a pair of adults and a pair of children stand up and dance wearing hideous rubber masks.

Just before the party ended, the family passed out colored eggshells that were filled with confetti. The goal was to crack the egg on somebody’s head. It was highly amusing. I nailed Sheila but David Cano, an office staff member at the school (also the director’s son), was too tall and too evasive for me. What a great tradition.

Sunday, Sheila and I went to the fair I’d written about. We specifically timed our visit to catch several of the dance performances that were part of the free cultural program. Sadly, this wasn’t quite what I had expected. I thought at least some of the groups would be professional, but they were basically all kids or community organizations. Still, it was nice to see the costumes and get a taste of the local folk dances. One of the groups was “Arabic dancing,” and included the same two girls the Rotary Club of Obregon-Juarez had hired for their meeting a few weeks ago. It was a lot less awkward to see them onstage, instead of right across the table!

We also had a great time walking around the fair and buying food and gifts. I ate a pineapple-filled empanada that was amazing and then couldn’t resist a “platano macho” (basically an ENORMOUS banana) smothered in sprinkles and crema de leche. Mmmm…We finished out the night by listening to live salsa music at a café downtown.