Teaching, Mexicali, Ensenada…
Hi there! I hope you are well. This week was again an intense one. I am writing you from la Rumorosa, Baja California.
This week started in Mexico City where I gave some lessons at the Escuela Superior de Musica, where I studied my undergraduate. I have been teaching there whenever I am in Mexico, since like 3 or 4 years ago. I really enjoy giving some classes to the young students and really like to have a positive impact on them. That was on Tuesday and on Wednesday I gave also a very nice lesson to a young soprano that studies in Toluca. I met her last weekend during the lessons I gave there, and she really wanted to take a second lesson. I was very happy to see her strong will to come to Mexico City to take a lesson. She is very talented and young so, it is completely up to her if she wants to follow this path or she finds something else in life to do. The way she thinks right now, is completely committed to this profession and she wants to go to study abroad. I think she can, but as I know from my own experience, you have to be mentally really strong and ready to go through hard times as well as good times.
On Thursday I flew to Mexicali, Baja California, to visit my auntie and my cousins and the new addition to the family, the beautiful little Andre, and his dad Shaun. Andre is a little guy with so much brain, he is really smart and he will be a great human being with a big personality and very special. His dad is also a really nice guy, he use to be in the navy, so between opera and navy stories we have had plenty material to talk. Both worlds are miles apart from each other which is making such an enriching experience for us. I have to say, I have not been back in Mexicali since around 23 years ago. I lived here as a kid for like 7 years. Now being back feels so surreal and this part of Mexico is so different from the centre and south, which is where I normally travel when I visit my country. Mexicali is up north, right at the border with USA and about 2,600 Kilometres from the capital city of Mexico.
Today we travelled to Valle the Guadalupe where we visited a museum about the history and process of wine making in the region. Afterwards we drove to Ensenada where we had fish tacos and saw the sunset at the sea and had a nice walk with all the family, then we drove back to la Rumorosa and tomorrow we will make our way back to Mexicali.
The landscape in Baja California is like the cliché of Mexico, dry, full of sand and dust and really warm. From Mexicali to la Rumorosa you will find huge mountains made of only rocks, of every size and shape, it is really impressive and the highway use to be really dangerous, now is safer to drive but I still get some sweaty hands going up there. My auntie has a little house up in the mountain and yesterday we had a very nice carne asada and ate lots.
I keep learning from this travel, meeting my family is a very nice experience, because I do not see them at all and once a year is too little to get to know them how they are now. But this time I get more time to get to know them better and I am really grateful for it.
I keep doing my exercises, daily reading and morning pages. I hope you are well. Please take care and see you next week.
