The New "Colonialists"

There have been many sweeps of foreigners into Mexico since Hernan Cortes and his cohorts landed in 1519, but the most recent invasion is a tranquil one, compounded of visitors on vacation and those who've found this land a pleasant place in which to live.

Until early in the 20th Century, few foreigners came here to live except for a few businessmen, diplomats, remittance men and a scattering of artists and writers. Then came a deluge of retirees seeking relatively luxurious living on budget incomes and, simply, people who've found delight in new scenes and ways of life in this most beautiful of countries just south of the border.

Now, "colonies" are being established in various parts of Mexico, but they are a new type, as people come to write and paint, spend sabbaticals or settle down to tranquil living.

Economically, Mexico is no longer the Bargain Paradise she once was but one can still live here comfortably on substantially less than what it would cost in the States. You can no longer buy a lot for $100 or a house for $4000 or even live comfortably as a couple on $200 a month unless you're pioneering souls who happen to have made a rare find which does happen.

You can still build a house tailored to your own tastes and needs for half to two-thirds of what it would cost you in the States. This means a house of stone or brick, thick-walled and of more than ample scale, with high ceilings and no need for air conditioning or central heating in most of the Central Plateau areas. It means individual touches of decor, fountains, fireplaces, landscaping, handcrafted furniture and fittings and trees given free from government nurseries. You can even indulge in vaulted ceilings, terrazzo floors, tile bathrooms and kitchens, stone terraces, colonial windows and a swimming pool, if that's your fancy.

You can have servants here; a cook, a maid and a handyman will cost you by the day approximately what you would pay for an hour of limited day help in the U.S. if you could get it.

You can keep a horse or two in stables behind your house and pay a pittance for shoeing, grooming and exercise although feed costs may be as high as they are up north. Feeding of small animals may cost more, because canned food is expensive and it is not always feasible nor cheap to buy fresh meat regularly. Veterinary care is inexpensive.

You can still get medical attention in your home! at low cost, and dentists' bills are nowhere near the astronomical things they are in the U.S.

You can entertain relatively lavishly at minimal cost, with catering, barboys, mariachi or marimba musicians.

Question: Why Mexico rather than some other country where costs may be as low or lower? Reasons are often complex, but some of them are self-evident. Climate, for one: the climate in much of Mexico is superb, and you can choose the weather you like best. Heat along the coasts and lowlands; desert for those who like the dry country; hills, mountains, clement weather with little or

by Lois Hobart

No intrusion of cold and snow in the temperate high plateau. Tropics, ocean, jungle or wide reaches of plains with towering mountains take your pick.

Besides all of this, together with high living standards with servants and fine housing on relatively modest incomes and the business opportunities of an expanding economy, there are many less tangible motives for moving to Mexico and sometimes these are the most potent. There is no dedication to the clock down here, no urgency of hour-and-minute, no feel of depersonalization or being lost in some vast machine.

In Mexico, individuality still reigns. There's a sense of renewed closeness to nature and the basic, fundamental values of life. Personal relationships are paramount, instead of lip service to what The Group thinks.

Mexico is a land of color, drama, unpredictability. It is still a country whose thriving arts and crafts can be seen through open doors as you walk the byways and watch carpenters, weavers, metal workers and other artisans at work. It is a place where pleasant surprise is always around the corner.

Where to go in Mexico? The coastal cities, with some exceptions, are primarily vacation spots for a few days or weeks of relaxing on the beach, of sunning, fishing, boating, scuba diving, where you can expect to encounter intense heat, masses of other vacationers and high prices in moderate, small or massive doses, according to your bent. In summer, when vacation comes, the northern cities of Mexico are usually hot and the southern ones rainy, so most foreigners prefer the central plateau, where the weather's mild and major cities never more than a few hours away in any direction.

Many people come here to immerse themselves in the native life, often in remote areas. Among them are anthropologists, archaeologists, engineers, ranchers, linguists and young people eager to experience a lifestyle closer to the basics than what they find up north. All these gravitate to beautiful or unusual small cities like Tehuacan, San Cristobal de las Casas, Tepoztlan, Amecameca, Fortin de las Flores.

And others, with various reasons, may tend to visit the industrial centers like San Luis Potosi, Leon, Monterrey, Queretaro. Wherever they go, whatever their objective, the Central Plateau draws the majority of visitors to Mexico. Many cities in this region have attracted foreigners who liked what they saw, stayed on as residents and left their stamp on the community.

In Taxco, the famous craftsman, William Spratling, revived the silver industry, took a profound interest in Mexican and precolumbian life, renewed the spirit of this mountain town. In San Cristobal de las Casas, the archaeologist Franz Blom settled long ago, and his widow continues as the prime-moving spirit of that city. Neill James, in Ajijic by Lake Chapala, devoted a good deal of her eventful life to the restoration of native crafts in the area where D. H. Lawrence, in earlier years, walked and looked and wrote.