Wednesday, August 8, 2012

Blogging: Writing From Mérida




My friend Joanna van der Gracht de Rosado, author of one of my favorite blogs, Writing From Mérida, sent me an email not long ago.

Joanna had a technical problem that resulted in a large part of her blog, consisting of hundreds of posts, being inaccessible to her and lost. So, although she was able to salvage some of her old material, she is re-starting her blog at a new URL. I told her I would do what I can to help readers find her at the new address.

Joanna writes on a wide variety of topics having to do with Yucatán and Mexico. I've read interesting articles and commentary on arts and culture, history, politics and current events, issues concerning women, as well as notes about holidays,  food, family life, worthwhile causes and a host of other topics. But her posts typically revolve around aspects of writing or intercultural living.

A Canadian who some time back became a Mexican citizen, Joanna has published an interesting book, Magic Made in Mexico, which tells her story of nearly four decades living in this country. She writes honestly about the challenges she faced as a young foreign woman coming to Yucatán, meeting her husband-to-be Jorge, making a home and having a family, building a career and with Jorge founding a successful college. Along the way she has experienced successes and difficult times. From all this Joanna distilled many valuable lessons about intercultural living and making dreams come true. She has a fine way of interpreting Mexican life and culture for those of us who have less experience living here.

Joanna also is a tireless mover behind the annual Latin American Bloggers Conference, held every November somewhere in Southeast Mexico. It was through the conference that we became friends.

Even if we weren't friends I still would read Joanna's blog. It is an informative and thoughtful resource for people, particularly English-speaking foreigners, living or interested in Mexico. So by all means, if you didn't click on it above, check out Writing From Mérida now.


7 comments:

  1. I've read Joanna's and your blogs for quite a while now, and enjoy the Merida/Yucatan coverage you provide greatly! Thanks for the great writing! And here is hoping Ernesto did not affect you too much!
    Cheers!
    Dan in NC

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks for continuing to read, Dan.

      As far as Ernesto goes, we had a little rain and wind, but nothing very far out of the ordinary. It's sunny and nice in Merida this afternoon.

      Delete
    2. Geez, for a few minutes there I thought you had a son or daughter that got married in Norway.
      I've added the blog. When Steve gets here next week I'm going to get him to show me how to add blogs to my blogroll............

      Delete
  2. Hello Marc, Thank you for putting in a word for me... Yes, losing my blog was pretty upsetting. It is taking my former readers some time to catch up with the new one... but such is life, right? It's far more important to have good friends and luckily I do. Soon we'll get moving on plans for this year's Latin American Bloggers Conference

    Joanna

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  3. Thanks Marc, I am interested in reading Joanna's blog. It's always nice to hear about the experiences of other expats in Mexico and it sounds like Joanna has years of experiences to relate.

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  4. I don't understand about the lost blog...when I go to http://joannavandergrachtderosado.wordpress.com/ I see her blogs going back to Feb. 2010...??? Whereas on her new blog, http://writingfrommerida.wordpress.com/ there are only entries for July and Aug. 2012.

    ReplyDelete

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