Papirex
Apr 18, 2009, 12:31 PM
Post #2 of 19
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Robbers, nice to get your inquiry. I never encourage or discourage anyone to live here, but I will try to answer your queries as best I can. If you call Cuernavaca CV you really will confuse people, When I see CV, I immediately think of Ciudad Victoria. There are few Americans here, many of them live in the village of Tepotztlan, it is about 20 miles from Cuernavaca and many of them call Cuernavaca “Cuerna” and Tepotztlan “Tepotz” that seems ignorant and lazy to me. If a person is going to live in México I think they should at least learn to spell the names here. Typos are understandable, lazy shortcuts are not.
I never abbreviate the name of our city except when writing notes to myself. When I do that, I usually use either CVA or CVACA. Those are abbreviations used by two of the Mexican shipping companies here, they seem to be more logical to me.
We now live north of Avenida Universidad in the far northern part of the city, the climate here is never hot in the summer although it does get warm sometimes in the spring. We have been using one or two oscillating fans in the house lately, sometimes three, that is all that is ever needed to be comfortable here, no air conditioning is ever needed. We sleep with just a sheet on the bed in the spring and summer here, no blanket is needed or wanted. We just got our bi-monthly electric bill, it is $100 Pesos higher than usual. US$ 7.64 extra to be comfortable for two months is not a biggie.
It is never really cold in the winter here, I have never seen frost in Cuernavaca, although it does get cool on winter nights. 3 or 4 years ago during an exceptionally cold winter in México it did get down to 48-49º F, for a few nights, in normal winters, the temps never get lower than 59-60º F.. If we go out at night, a Windbreaker ® type jacket is all that is needed to be comfortable. I haven't needed to wear gloves outside since we moved here.
The first place we lived at here was in the Fraccionamiento of Burgos at the southern edge of the city, it is considered to be a part of Cuernavaca, but actually it is a part of the municipio of Temixco. Part of Burgos is gated, the part we lived in was not, although we had our own private police force, door to door peddlers had to register with our police and get a permit, and notify the police when they were in our area. In the year we lived there I think we only had salespeople ring our bell 3 times. We lived in a retorno (cul de sac) and the cops used to like to park in front of our house to take their breaks. It was a very safe area.
The thing that motivated us to move from that area was the heat in the spring and summer, and when the nearby farmers burned their cane fields every year there was always ash fall intermittently for a few weeks. I don't know what was in those ashes but when they dropped into our swimming pool there was always an algae bloom. It would take me a week to get the water clear again, just in time for the next ash fall.
One nice thing we enjoyed in Burgos was the butterflies. There are big white butterflies there with huge wingspreads. They vary from the size of a saucer, to the size of a salad plate, some of them are even as big as a dinner plate. I have only seen a couple of them where we live now and they were little guys, only about the size of a saucer.
The next place we lived was in the Colonia De la Selva in the north central area near Carlos and Charlie's restaurant. It was very nice there and close to everything, but the noise and dust from the Go-Cart track behind us was annoying. The clean air and noise abatement laws are not enforced here as is the case in most of México. We moved again.
The house we live in now is very nice, it was new when we moved in, we are the first occupants. It is a 15 or 20 minute drive through narrow, traffic choked streets to go shopping, out to dinner, etc. though. We plan to move somewhere in the north-central area again.
There are few English speaking foreigners here although it is often claimed that there are 5,000 Americans living here. I doubt if there are even 500 of us here. This is a Spanish speaking city. It is a rarity to find a fluent English speaking person in any government office, store, bank, or business here.
There is great shopping here within a few minutes drive from our house, from the little abbarotes and verdaduras to the city mercado to many supermarkets, restaurants, Liverpool and everything in between. There is a Sams Club and a Costco, Starbucks (Italian coffee company is better) and every kind of an American hamburger joint, Home Depot, Office Depot, Office Max, etc. We used to need to drive to México City to buy many things, that is seldom ever necessary in recent years.
I personally have been very lucky because we have become friends with a very fluent English speaking young woman named Bertha (pronounced Berta) that is now the Gerente of one of the Iusacell cell phone company offices here. Iusacell is king in the central highlands of México. Iusacell will furnish you a phone at no cost if you sign a one, two, or three year contract with them, or, they will program a phone that you own at no cost, and issue a new phone number for it so you may use their pre-paid phone cards. The cost of reprogramming a phone is waived when you buy your first $200 Peso phone card.
If you do move here I can put you in touch with Bertha if you want to check on the Iusacell service.
I am pretty sure it is illegal to live in Cuernavaca if you don't have at least one dog, or two cats.
More info about Cuernavaca here: http://www.clickoncuernavaca.com/ No message board anymore, too many jerks I think.
Rex
"The supreme happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved" - Victor Hugo
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