After 9 years living in my little conservative town in Central Mexico, my relationship with the Mexican ended and I moved to an even smaller beach town. I like to call it the "City of Broken Hearts", as everyone, including me, has come here with a broken heart, in search of healing because of all the new age therapies, the calming ocean and unlimited resources of yoga and meditation you can find here. My life eerily unfolded just like Liz Gilbert in Eat, Pray, Love. I lost my business, my home and the love of my life, put everything I had in storage and arrived to the beach with nothing but a small suitcase for vacation and I never looked back…well, almost never, actually I looked back A LOT OKAY?! I had it good with the Mexican, I was a domestic goddess that worked part-time and travelled the rest of the time. Now I had to work harder than I ever would in my life.
I landed a job, a roommate and a boyfriend all in the first week, everything flowed so I knew it was meant to be…it was always my dream to live at the beach, but I didn't know it was going to be even more of a challenge. Now on my own in Mexico, I had to face a lot of change - I went from a stable, working, family environment to WTF is this craziness?
There are two things most expats do here at the beach: work in hotels or timeshares, I chose the hotel route. All hotel workers have to work 6 days a week here, with 4 days off a month what can you possibly do with your life? Management jobs are actually worse, not better as you might think, requiring you to work 12-14 hour days, remember Mexicans are used to arriving late and leaving late?
On my one day a week off, I mostly just wanted to sleep, but I had one day to get groceries, check email, do laundry, pay bills, do banking, no time for fun! I didn't do any yoga or even walk on the beach the first month. I was mourning my life as a housewife! It got dark here at 5 pm and if I was lucky and got to work the morning shift, I would get home at 4 and then have one hour and have to make the most of it, I needed time management baby!!! I desperately wanted balance in my life, and the new boyfriend wanted me to spend all my spare time with him and I didn't have the energy or time, I wanted to have part-time boyfriend only.
Everything was the opposite of what my life used to be - I went from dry to humid weather, I had no computer so I was back to internet cafes, I sold my car and got a bicycle and started taking the bus to work, no laundry machine so I was back to washing my clothes by hand, no stove so back to cooking on a hot plate and no Mexican, now I was living with a roommate and sleeping in a single bed - grrrrrr! I was back to the frugal life, feeling like I was in college again, sitting on a plastic stool and eating on my roommate's massage table in the living room!! When my sister saw the pictures of my apartment, she was so concerned about where I sat to eat dinner, I told her: "Don´t you know that us single gals eat standing up over the sink, that is why we stay skinny!". I was so busy that I didn't have time to think "woe is me" anymore. I went from working part-time to slave, I never had time to meet new friends and I hardly saw my roommate, I enjoyed chatting with my coworkers, as we all shared a common bond and understood each other. A lot of people that I met at work and at the beach were all running away from something traumatic that happened to them in another city in Mexico, it appeared that we all were in the same boat here, seeking emotional refuge in each other, wanting to start a new life.
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