Feed the Hungry/Road Race events

Sat, Oct 13 Art opening at Generator Gallery, Fábrica la Aurora, 154-9588

Sat, Oct 20 Drivers’ dinner, Casa de Sierra Nevada, Hospicio 23, 152-7040, US$150

Sun, Oct 21, 10am–4pm, Cars and drivers in the Jardín, free

Sun, Oct 21, 2pm, Raffle ticket drawing, Jardín, 25 pesos

Feed the Hungry is on the road to benefit hungry children
By Carol Sedestrom Ross

Feed the Hungry announces its sponsorship of the second annual Pan American Road Race Week, October 13 - 21. The first event, October 13, is an opening at the Generator Gallery located in Aurora.

Photos by Ricardo Vargas and Tom Hassler of last year’s race week will be featured and the famous LT Special race car will be on view. 

Visitors can buy raffle tickets to win a free ride in the LT Special driven by Mats Hammarlund, a well-known race driver and resident of San Miguel. Raffle tickets will go on sale October 13 and continue through October 21.

The drawing for six winners (three children, three adults) will be held at 2pm on Sunday in the Jardin. Tickets are 25 pesos each.

On Saturday, October 20, between 30 and 40 classic cars from the US will arrive in San Miguel. Feed the Hungry is proud to partner with Casa de Sierra Nevada, now owned by the luxury travel company Orient Express, to offer an exciting evening with cocktails and dinner. In addition, Nisha and her troop of aerialists, Gravity Works, will perform to the soft background music of Mexican marimbas. A limited number of tickets at US$150 are available for the drivers’ dinner by calling Feed the Hungry at 152-2402, or visiting the website www.feedthehungrysma.org  and using PayPal.

On Sunday, October 21, all the cars and drivers who are headed to the start of the race will be in the Jardin from 10am–4pm. The free car show is a wonderful opportunity to collect autographs and meet the drivers.

The original LT Special was built by hand, from scratch, by Juan Lerdo de Tejada in Mexico City in 1954—the only race car ever built in Mexico at that time. He wanted to take on the European sports cars which had been dominating La Carrera Panamericana for the past five years.

Unfortunately, the 1955 race was canceled by the Mexican government for safety reasons and consequently the LT Special never got to race on the open roads of La Carrera. It did race successfully on various road courses for many years. 

In the early 1990s, the car, now in terrible shape, was found by the son of the original owner and carefully rebuilt by Juan Lerdo de Tejada, Jr. Finally, 43 years after it was built, the Special got to stretch out and race on the open roads like it was intended to do when Juan raced it in the 1998 race. A minor accident kept the car from showing its true potential.

In 2002, Juan contacted Mats Hammarlund, now a full-time resident of San Miguel, to ask about building a replica of the original LT Special as he didn’t want to risk wrecking the original car in any other races. In 2003, the production of the LT Special replica began and in 2004 Mats and Eva raced the replica. They won almost every day and placed first in their class in the end. 

Mats, known fondly by road race drivers in Mexico as “El Vikingo Loco,” and his wife and co-driver Eva first read about La Carrera Panamericana in their hometown of Stockholm, Sweden in the late 1990s. They had been involved in road racing for years, visiting more than 50 countries in the quest for interesting races. They thought the tough and dangerous La Carrera sounded like fun. However, it was not until 2001, and a vacation trip to California, that they finally got involved in the internationally renowned Mexican Race.

Mats discovered a 1964 Chevrolet Chevelle that he thought would make a perfect entry; only cars built between 1940 and 1965 can enter La Carrera. He rebuilt the car, and they headed for Mexico with the car in tow. But when they arrived in Tuxtla Gutierrez (close to the border of Guatemala where the race started that year) and Mats fired up the Chevelle for a final check, he heard a noise that indicated big trouble. With only a few hours left before the start, he found the parts he needed, thanks to Eva’s Spanish, and at one o’clock Friday morning, the new engine fired up and was ready to go. They started the six-day race with only two hours of sleep. They finished a respectable fifth in the Historic class, but as Eva says, “It’s not so much about winning as it is about the people you meet, help and race with. That’s what we love about La Carrera Panamericana.”

Dog Show celebrates 20th anniversary of San Miguel Kennel Club
By Jackie Hall

Dog Show San Miguel Kennel Club Sat, Oct 13, 10am Sun Oct 14, 9am Unidad Deportiva Across from Los Frailles Free

The San Miguel Kennel Club is set to celebrate its 20th anniversary with their annual Dog Show at Unidad Deportiva. The club was resuscitated 20 years ago by Lascelles de Premio Real, a Canadian that re-located to San Miguel after living in Mexico City for many years. 

Lascelles was responsible for reviving the Xoloitzcuintle, the famous Mexican hairless breed, to its current competition and breeding status. She traveled around Mexico for many years, finding examples of these dogs for breeding and essentially revived the lineage.

For this reason, the San Miguel Kennel Club is the only club in Mexico that has an award for Best Xoloitzcuintle called the Lascelles de Premio Real Award.

The San Miguel Kennel Club competes under Federación Canófila Mexicana, established by FCI from Belgium. All dogs are broken up into 10 groups for competition—herding, guard dogs, terriers, daschunds, primitive dogs, hunting, small animal hunting, retrievers, companions and sight hounds. Each group is awarded a Best in Show; then from the 10 Best in Show winners, one overall Best in Show is selected. The club expects to have over 300 entries vying for the trophy and Best in Show ribbon. The Saturday show starts at 10am and the Sunday show starts at 9am. Entrance is free and there will be tents set up on the show grounds with refreshments and beverages.

In addition to hosting the Dog Show, the San Miguel Kennel Club raises money each year to donate to the SPA and Amigos en Animales. This past year, US$1000 was given to both organizations.

The latest Casita Linda families
By Jean Gerber and Holly Wilmeth

Julieta and family celebrate their new home.

Filomena, Jose Luis and family sit for a minute in their new home.

Photos by Holly Wilmeth ©2007


Julieta and family

Julieta and her husband, Zeferino, along with their nine children have been living in Guerrero for four years (the age of her youngest child.) An uncle from her husband’s family gave them this small piece of land and it is here where their tiny one-room shack stands. It is made of bamboo walls and a tin roof that provides neither warmth nor protection from the rain.

All eleven people sleep here and in the center is the fire where their food is cooked. For water to wash, drink, cook and garden, they haul buckets from the well—more than a mile walk round-trip. While they don’t have a toilet, much less a shower or sink, they are very clean and their home and premises are neat and tidy.

When they first learned that Casita Linda was to build them a house—an actual cement house with a shower, sink, bunk beds and lights—they thought it was a joke. The neighbors laughed and no one would believe it until the Casita Linda volunteers arrived to pour the slab of cement for the foundation. “This means so much,” Julieta says, “it means I will get a full night’s sleep. I won’t have to stay awake making sure my children keep dry and all the water holes in the roof are sealed in the rainy season”.

Zeferino dreams of having all his children finish school, but just feeding his children takes every dime he makes.

Julieta tells us that her mother is in the same situation living next door in a bamboo shack, and her husband is an orphan, so they have never received any help until now. “This house will make the lives of our children better. We are simple people, but our children are very well behaved and educados.”


Filomena and Jose Luis

Señor Jose Luis has no words to describe how grateful he and his wife, Filomena, are. They have never had a home of their own, moving from place to place with their four children. Currently they are staying in a brother’s house but he is due to return from working in the US and they will have no place to go when he does.

At least they thought they had no place to go—until Casita Linda selected them to receive a home.

Initially, the family simply could not believe it was true. “How could it be true?” Jose Luis asks. But when all the volunteers came they got so excited they could hardly contain their enthusiasm. Jose Luis insists on helping the Casita Linda volunteers as much as possible, even taking off work so he can be on hand for the construction. For Jose Luis, an impoverished field worker, he could never have even dared to wish for a house for himself and his family—just making ends meet is hard enough under his circumstances. “This home means everything,” he gushes “It means stability and protection for me and my family.” Now, thanks to Casita Linda, its supporters and volunteers, the wish he was too scared to dream has come true.

Jean Gerber is the Executive Director of Casita Linda. Holly Wilmeth is a freelance documentary photographer and photojournalist. Her website is hollywilmeth.com.

San Miguel’s long-term water supply
By Linda Whynman 

Presentation Don Patterson, Director of Ecology Tues, Oct 16, 4pm Villa Jacaranda 50 pesos, Free for Audubon members

The Audubon Society is hosting an informative presentation by Don Patterson, one of the officials concerned about water for the city of San Miguel and its environs. Don is Director of Ecology & the Environment for San Miguel and would like to share his long-term water strategy with us. To learn more, including how you can help, come to the Tuesday afternoon presentation. Don is presenting an overview of the city’s water problems and what is being done to solve them.

Some of the complex issues he deals with “require immediate action,” he says, such as the fact that 6,000 children are currently drinking contaminated water in this municipality. Others are more long-range but equally crucial and must be dealt with soon.

For example, Patterson says our aquifer is predicted to have trouble supplying water to the community within 20 years. When the aquifer (a limited supply of 25,000-year-old water) is no longer viable, then San Miguel will have to rely on surface water, and “if we’re going to be drinking lake water, we need to clean it up.”

Don told us that the city government is working with scientists at the University of Querétaro on diagnostic analyses, to be completed later this month, of the watershed in Los Picachos (one of the important parts of San Miguel’s watershed). Next year they will be working on analyses and plans for other areas. “We have to rehabilitate the watershed so that we will have the purest water possible,” he says.

One way of thinking about Patterson’s focus is what he terms “bio-hydraulic corridors” (a phrase that he uses to include surface and ground water systems as well as their flora and fauna). He is also working on “rainwater harvesting,” with Ecosystemscience Foundation, in the communities with the worst contaminates. These are man-made systems for collecting, filtering, storing and distributing rainwater. “For every liter we harvest from rain,” he says, “one less liter is taken from the aquifer.” Rainwater also has no arsenic or fluoride to contaminate children’s diets and rot their teeth. The city is also looking into filters that can remove contaminants from water.

Two years ago, San Miguel signed an agreement with the United Nations, to become one of 100 green cities. “We’re starting from scratch here,” he said. “San Miguel is only one percent green—the international norm is nine percent.” But they’re working on it; a master plan for a green corridor including Parque Landeta is coming up soon.

The city does get some funding for this work from the state and the federal government, but Mayor Correa has also created a Green Fund, which includes contributions from real estate developers in the community. All fines and fees, including your automobile emissions fee, go into the green fund.

Audubon is planning to help Patterson and San Miguel to achieve the water goals that are so essential for the town’s future. Obviously our goals of improved education and habitat restoration coincide with those of the municipality. Audubon’s slogan; “We’re not just for the birds,” tells our story.

Patterson, who recognizes Audubon as one of the larger NGOs in town, says, “If you have the good name of Audubon on a document, it helps.” He himself says of Audubon, “I look at you and I see an army.”

Come hear and see a man who’s making a difference in San Miguel. Audubon members enjoy free admission. Guests pay 50 pesos each. Membership will be available at the door for 300 pesos. This presentation is part of the monthly Audubon lecture series and the monies go toward paying a Peasma teacher and working on Parque Landeta.

Garden Club’s 2008 calendar now on sale
By Leigh Gersnoviez 

Fran Schiavo Rooftops, Jennifer Butz Inside, Kathy Simandl Desert, Kathy Simandl Panteons, Carmen Riojas Vista, Murray Friedman In the Afternoon, Murray Friedman Atotonilco, Sallie Kavetz Quiet, Sallie Kavetz Loving, Ivan McCartney-Mexquite, Alex Wypyszinksi Goatherder, Judith Jenya Pinkweed, Richard Cretcher Feathers 

With great pride, the Garden Club of San Miguel announces the sale of its new 2008 calendar. The always eagerly anticipated and popular calendar, featuring fabulous photographs of picturesque San Miguel and its environs, is now available through Garden Club members and at various locations throughout San Miguel.

This year the calendar was produced by a committee of Garden Club members, including Ann Mauze, Carrie McIver, Arden O’Rourke and Linda Whynman, who decided to expand the vision of the calendar beyond the traditional images of San Miguel. The Club sponsored the annual contest for photographs to be featured in the calendar and challenged photographers to shoot the unusual, or less photographed San Miguel, either place or perspective. Additionally the parameters of the contest were opened to those photographers who use their photographs as only a basis for creating an artistic vision through technical enhancement. The result is a calendar which we feel shows the incredible beauty and diversity of our community and at the same time embraces the evolving computer technology that allows interesting and beautiful transformation of standard photographs.

The magical cover entitled “Rooftops at Sunset” was based upon a photograph captured by Fran Schiavo using a Nikon 8800 on an evening walk returning home from the Charco. Fran is a full-time resident of San Miguel. She combines photography with digital painting to produce the images she prints on watercolor paper and canvas. To move from the initial photograph to the finished work, Fran removes detail using software filters, then blends colors and enhances shapes with digital brushes. Her work is available through Galería San Miguel on Plaza Principal opposite the Parroquia.

The January photograph entitled “Inside Jay’s Balloon” was photographed by Jennifer Butz using a Nikon digital just before she and the fine crew of her restaurant took flight to celebrate the one-month anniversary of her ownership.

 Jennifer is the owner of the Bagel Café on Correo and is a full-time resident. She is not a professional photographer, but says she has had the great good fortune to be in interesting and beautiful places where a good eye is enough. She gives a special thanks to Jay, owner of the balloon often seen aloft over San Miguel, for agreeing to let her submit the photo to the Garden Club for consideration.

The February vision entitled “Desert Dawn” was based upon a photograph taken by Kathy Simandl using a Pentax Optio S4 digital camera, 4 megapixels, and manipulated by applying digital filters to set a certain mood.

Kathy is a full-time resident of San Miguel whose principal occupation is writing, supported by her educational focus on literature and composition, and demonstrated by recent publishing credits. Her interest in photography is not quite as a professional, but with the advent of digital photography, Kathy has become an acolyte of the lens.

The March photograph is entitled “Vista Posterior Santuario Atotonilco.” Information about this photograph and photographer is not available at this time

The April photograph entitled “In the Afternoon All Dressed Up” was taken by Murray Friedman using a Nikon D50 digital SLR and was not really edited other than to crop and adjust some of the contrast.

Murray is a retired family physician who has been a full-time resident for 3½ years. He is the owner of Las Terrazas San Miguel, a four-casa B&B on Santo Domingo, and is currently interested in modifying his photographs, through a variety of shooting and editing techniques, to look like paintings. Although he still considers himself an amateur photographer, there was an exhibition of his photo portraits at an Aurora gallery last year.

The May photograph entitled “Quiet Moment” was captured by Sallie Kravetz using a Nikon digital SLR. It was shot in late afternoon light and shadow as the mounted policeman passed in front of the wonderful yellow expanse of the Biblioteca.

Sallie is based in Baltimore, Maryland, and frequently visits San Miguel. She has been a serious fine arts photographer, part-time, for many years. Since her retirement from academics last year, she has been pursuing her passion full time. Sallie’s guiding principle, which informs her vision, is found in the words of the poet Louise Bogan: “…no woman should be shamefaced in attempting to give back to the world, through her work, a portion of its lost heart.”

The June photograph entitled “Mesquite,” taken by Ivan McCartney, was shot in the open area off of Avenida Independencia, which is now being turned into a housing development.

It was taken with a Canon Powershot A420, a small digital point-and-shoot camera, using the black and white mode. Ivan has lived in San Miguel full time for the last 10 years. He is a retired disc jockey from Oklahoma and has been an amateur photographer for 20 years. He switched to digital photography only a year ago. Among his favorite things are Latin music, Mexican food and traveling.

The July photograph entitled “Goatherder” was taken by Alex Wypyszinski. Alex is retired from academic life, where he was a university professor on environmental subjects and consultant to major corporations.

He and his wife, Mary Ellen, also an amateur photographer, spend their summer months at Yellowstone Park where she is head of nursing care and he works in the Post Office. The rest of year they travel, spending several months in San Miguel and visiting children and grandchildren throughout the US.

The August vision entitled “Pinkweed in the Charco,” a place she loves, was taken by Judith Jenya using a Nikon Coolpix L5. She digitally manipulated the color to heighten the tones of the photographs using Picassa.

Judith has been a full-time resident of San Miguel since May 2006. She is a writer, has read for PEN and the Authors’ Sala, is a painter, having had a one-woman show in July and, of course, a photographer. She has had a photo published in Time magazine and had three one-woman shows of her photographs in Honolulu, Sarajevo and San Francisco. She shows and sells her paintings and photographs from her home, which is also a gallery at 31 Ignacio Ramirez in Mexiquito.

The September photograph entitled “Loving Arms” was taken by Sallie Kravetz using a Nikon digital SLR. It was shot during the festival of Archangel Michael as over 50 indigenous groups from all over Mexico danced their way to the Parroquia.

Using Photoshop, the background of the original photograph was layered with combinations of shots of San Miguel wall textures. The figures of the father and baby were masked to retain their clarity as the main visual and emotional focus. Sallie also took the May photograph. 

The October photograph entitled “Atotonilco Rodeo” was taken by Murray Friedman using a Nikon D50 digital SLR using a slow shutter speed to give the sense of motion. The April photograph is also Murray’s.

The November perception entitled “Panteones, Past and Present” was taken by Kathy Simandl using a Pentax Optio S4 digital camera, 4 megapixels, and enhanced utilizing a collage technique.

It is a blend of two separate shots, one of the present municipal cemetery, and one of the antiguo. Kathy’s personal information may be found under her entry for the February photograph. About photography, she adds that it is important to take lots of photos so that you stand a better chance of getting that One Best Shot—which you can then “artistically enhance” to evoke an even deeper response in the viewer.

The December photograph entitled “Feathers” was captured by Richard Cretcher at one of the September festivals using a Nikon 950 digital camera.

Richards says that you don’t have to be a good photographer with subjects like that around and to get the composition he wanted required only minor cropping. Richard has been a full-time resident of SMA for the last 10 years, but he and his wife Dorothy do spend three or four months in the winter at Vida del Mar (on the Pacific coast north of Manzanillo) to warm up. Richard says he has never considered himself a professional photographer, but has been involved in photography all his career, which involved research and education. Most recently Richard published a well received book on the wildflowers of San Miguel and regularly leads walking tours in the Charco to identify them.

This calendar is produced by the Garden Club of San Miguel de Allende, AC, which began in 1968 and has developed into an organization whose purpose is to promote interest in flowers, plants, gardens, floral arranging and to support civic, beautification and educational projects to benefit the city of San Miguel and surrounding areas. The proceeds of the sales of the calendar will be used to continue the Club’s ongoing commitment to civic improvement projects. The calendar is now available through Garden Club members and at Galeria Atenea, Biblioteca Tienda, Border Crossings, Casa de Papel, La Conexión, Casa de Café, Galeria San Miguel, Galeria Tesoros, El Colibri, Evangelina Salon de Belleza, Bagel Café, 7th Heaven, Solutions, Lagundi, Sollano 16, Casa Canal, Petit Four, Liberia la derive, Pepe Cerroblanco Joyeria, La Calaca, Centro Papelero de San Miguel, and Barro (Aurora).

University of León celebrates tenth anniversary 

First University Week, October 17–27, celebrates the tenth anniversary of the founding of the University of León branch campus in San Miguel. The event will involve students and educators in the accomplishment, development and participation in diverse activities, such as conferences, workshops, concerts and sports. Most events are held at “Plantel UDL,” the building on the north side of plaza civica, near the equestrian statue of Allende.

Conferences and workshops include quality of life debates, security in business, fiscal reform and violence. A symposium on globalization and education in Mexico is set mid-week at the Hotel Real de Minas. Students will exhibit photographs, experimental art, short films and architecture projects. An open-theme painting competition will feature guest judges. Concerts and sports include ballet folklorico, football and basketball tournaments, and a Charlotada, the only bull event San Miguel offers this month, even though the animals are small. 

University Week is the initiative of a group of students from all degree programs and is designed for students and faculty, for other campuses in the University of León system, and especially for the San Miguel community. The nonprofit event, the first in an annual series, will seek donations at some conferences to cover travel expenses for guest speakers. To ensure overall quality of the event, sponsors will be well received by the organizing committee, who will maximize opportunities for the public to enjoy the event in its entirety. For information, contact Luis Gerardo Medina Ramirez at 044 (415) 109-9989, or email gymoho@hotmail.com.