As I promised I am going to share our experience having Thanksgiving in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. I've had people ask if "they" celebrate Thanksgiving in Mexico. Well, the answer is that Thanksgiving is a truly American holiday celebrated exclusively in the United States. It was a meal shared between the pilgrims and the indigenous people. I'm not sure what the menu looked like and after sharing a meal with my friends and neighbors here in Mexico, I wonder if we have it anywhere near correct.
Anyway, we were chatting about Thanksgiving one day and decided to invite the neighbors in our small apartment complex. Of course it is the end of November and usually the weather is wonderful, so we went with the "more the merrier" philosophy and invited friends of friends as well. Sheri and I were in charge of the turkey (we had to cook 2), stuffing, gravy, and Sheri's famous sweet potatoes. Stephanie was fixing a ham and cranberry sauce, Erik and Kalahari were in charge of mashed potatoes. After that, we told people to bring whatever they wanted. We heard promise of tamales and fresh tortillas. What showed up were beautiful salads, green bean casserole, home made pumpkin pie, key lime pie, chocolate cake, dinner rolls, apple/mango pie, quinoa salad, fresh sangria, red and white wines, coke, sprite, and flavored water along with a number of things I'm sure I'm forgetting.
The food was obviously delicious and mostly home made. But it wasn't the food that made the evening so special. It was the people. Several people mentioned that they had "never had 'that' before" indicating the whole turkey. Turkey is a common enough meat in Mexico, but most people do not have ovens, so a roasted whole turkey was something they had only seen pictures of as a US tradition. We were especially pleased that Alfredo and his family joined us. There are times in Mexico where the old ways are endearing and times where they are infuriating. Alfredo and his wife are hard working, wonderful people who are often treated badly by some of the elitist Mexican middle and upper class. We were so excited to have him and his family join us as equals at a table of Thanksgiving. How much more to be thankful for when he brought his children and his mother along. I can't think of anything to be more thankful for as I know that was a huge indication of the trust he has in our genuine friendship and our ability to provide a safe, non-threatening, non-class-based evening with all friends and family welcome at the same table.
Another highlight of the evening were meeting some of the neighbors from the US. It turns out that in one of the 14 apartments in our small complex there are two people from our home state of Washington. One from Seattle and one from Sunnyside, kind of cool since we are from the Yakima area. They are self proclaimed "anti-social" and although we have both lived there for over a year we had no idea that we were from the same state.
In addition, it was nice to spend time with other people that we definitely consider our Mexican family. Life here in Vallarta would not be the same without your guys.
Some of the neighbors said that we were like the pilgrims come to a new nation to share a meal. How heartwarming is that? I hope our presence here is a blessing for many years to come and that we continue to devvelop deep relationships with both the local people and the expats who now call this tropical paradise home. Beach Crossers is blessed to live here and as far as Thanksgiving goes, this is one for the memory books.
Beach wheelchair and mobility device rentals Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. Making Puerto Vallarta and the surrounding area accessible to everyone. Visit our site at Beachcrossers.com
Saturday, November 28, 2015
Tuesday, November 24, 2015
Beach Crossers mobility rentals in Vallarta continues to grow
We've blogged about starting a new wheelchair business in Puerto Vallarta and Nuevo Vallarta, but there is so much more to keeping it going.
When we started Beach Crossers we learned so much about all of the hoops you have to jump to have an international business. The banking, website, shopping cart and so on. The SSL, SEO, SAT, IRS, TRV, and other acronyms became common parts of our language.
Now that the beach wheelchair business has a year under our business belts there are new things to learn.
Understanding the cultural differences in the area we are working is a process. One of the things that has been interesting is that if we don't do business at a resort for a couple of months they think we are out of business and no longer call. We have to continually go back to each resort and remind them that our wheelchair rental business is still active and that we are around to assist their guests.
I'm not sure what happens to the old rack cards that we drop off, but each time we visit they are completely out. Did they give them to guests? I don't think so because that would have resulted in at least a few calls. Maybe after another year they will keep our promotional materials. I actually wonder how long that will take.
There is some competition in town. We spotted another wheelchair accessible van. We've since found out that they charge far more than we do so we're not too worried about it. There is also another wheelchair rental company, but they've been around for years and rumor is that they don't answer their phones. We are trying to be uber available to the concierges and guests. We're also getting active in the expat medical community. I'll write again as the medical expo comes around. That is going to be an interesting experience.
Today we actually had 6 products rented at various resorts. That was a new record for us. Someday hopefully that will be our average. We are definitely going to need more scooters. It's weird, but when we started this business we thought that beach wheelchairs would be our primary product, but now we rent more scooters, power chairs, manual chairs and walkers. I would have thought people would bring those things with them when they travel, but it turns out that they always get damaged on the flight so people would rather rent. The accessible van has been really busy too. We are planning to have another before the season next year.
So for now I am thinking that quitting my teaching job in Washington State and moving to this tropical paradise of Puerto Vallarta, Mexico to start a mobility rental company has been a dream come true. I wish I had done this 10 years ago, but all things in their own time.
As a side note, as all of my friends back in the states are posting pictures of fresh snow I can honestly say I am thoroughly enjoying these warm temperatures and sunshine.
I will definitely write about celebrating Thanksgiving in my next blog. I am so very excited to share this holiday experience with my good friends and new family here in Mexico. They are equally excited and have begun to call us the pilgrims. It feels like a true Thanksgiving to have two cultures come together to share food and fellowship. I have so much to be thankful for.
When we started Beach Crossers we learned so much about all of the hoops you have to jump to have an international business. The banking, website, shopping cart and so on. The SSL, SEO, SAT, IRS, TRV, and other acronyms became common parts of our language.
Now that the beach wheelchair business has a year under our business belts there are new things to learn.
Understanding the cultural differences in the area we are working is a process. One of the things that has been interesting is that if we don't do business at a resort for a couple of months they think we are out of business and no longer call. We have to continually go back to each resort and remind them that our wheelchair rental business is still active and that we are around to assist their guests.
I'm not sure what happens to the old rack cards that we drop off, but each time we visit they are completely out. Did they give them to guests? I don't think so because that would have resulted in at least a few calls. Maybe after another year they will keep our promotional materials. I actually wonder how long that will take.
There is some competition in town. We spotted another wheelchair accessible van. We've since found out that they charge far more than we do so we're not too worried about it. There is also another wheelchair rental company, but they've been around for years and rumor is that they don't answer their phones. We are trying to be uber available to the concierges and guests. We're also getting active in the expat medical community. I'll write again as the medical expo comes around. That is going to be an interesting experience.
Today we actually had 6 products rented at various resorts. That was a new record for us. Someday hopefully that will be our average. We are definitely going to need more scooters. It's weird, but when we started this business we thought that beach wheelchairs would be our primary product, but now we rent more scooters, power chairs, manual chairs and walkers. I would have thought people would bring those things with them when they travel, but it turns out that they always get damaged on the flight so people would rather rent. The accessible van has been really busy too. We are planning to have another before the season next year.
So for now I am thinking that quitting my teaching job in Washington State and moving to this tropical paradise of Puerto Vallarta, Mexico to start a mobility rental company has been a dream come true. I wish I had done this 10 years ago, but all things in their own time.
As a side note, as all of my friends back in the states are posting pictures of fresh snow I can honestly say I am thoroughly enjoying these warm temperatures and sunshine.
I will definitely write about celebrating Thanksgiving in my next blog. I am so very excited to share this holiday experience with my good friends and new family here in Mexico. They are equally excited and have begun to call us the pilgrims. It feels like a true Thanksgiving to have two cultures come together to share food and fellowship. I have so much to be thankful for.
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