A Bit of Luck in Tonala

From JM's August 2010 log of the Chiripa buying trip to Mexico.

August 17, 2010. We have never had much luck in Tonala. The town on the outskirts of Guadalajara is reputed to be a major center of craft production. But we have always found it frustrating. There are a lot of workshops, but much of the production we've been able to find is kitchy grade B stuff--not the high quality traditional crafts that we seek.

Today we decided to give it one more try. We had a specific mission in mind: to find the workshop that creates interesting metal work under the name of Marco Polo Designs (we had failed to find it once before). 

The taxi dripped us on Alfereros street, where we had heard the workshop was located. But Alfereros is not a continuous street. It stops, changes names, travels several crooked blocks under its new alias, and then resumes liife under its original name. The house numbers follow no discernible order, and seem to be assigned by a random number generator.

Despite these difficulties, we persisted. Finally, after asking several friendly pedestrians and shopkeepers, and consulting with a helpful policeman, we found the little yellow house and workshop at Alfereros #8. We rang the bell, but there was no answer. Again . . . No response. Once more . . .  Nothing. It looked like yet another defeat in Tonala.

But we weren't quite ready to quit. After polking around the back streets for another hour or so, we returned One more time to Alfereros #8. This time the door opened, and a friendly figure emerged. He smiled when he saw us, and waved us in.

We ordered some really nice luminaries (table and wall), a big dancing Catrina skeleton, and other good metal pieces, including some clever geckos to climb all over your walls. Tonala is still hard to figure out, but it may be growing on us.