Interviews
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Working Gringos Come and meet Steve Creagh, expat who moved recently to Chelem from Vancouver, Canada and started a business with a Mexican partner…
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Working Gringos Grant Spradling first stayed in Merida in the 1980′s. Since then he has made Merida his permanent home and has gotten serious about his chosen profession of writing…
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Working Gringos Henry Vales was born in Mexico, spent his first thirteen years commuting back and forth between Mexico and Cuba, and then moved with his family to Miami. Now, after a lifetime spent as an American, he is back in Merida…
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Working Gringos Jette Virdi moved from England by herself to renovate a hacienda into an eco-friendly boutique hotel. She’s on her way to realizing her dream…
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Working Gringos We recently stumbled upon a website by local residents of Uman, a city on the southern outskirts of Merida. One of the features of this Spanish-language website is interviews with people born in Uman who live outside of the Yucatan…
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Working Gringos If you can do what you do anywhere in the world, Merida is a good place to do it. Ovi, a freelance commercial artist works out of his home…
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Working Gringos A first generation Mexican-American, Claudette Elizondo moved to Merida with her husband and two children to start a new life in a community that she feels is more authentic…
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Working Gringos This week, the School of Authentic Journalism is being held in various places on the Yucatan Peninsula. If you see reporters with microphones and videos on the streets of Merida or Playa del Carmen, this is who they are and what they’re doing…
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Doug Tanoury and Robin Young The new kid on the language school block is a big school with a short name, Habla. Doug Tanoury and Robin Young sat down with Marimar and Kurt, the owners of Habla, to find out what makes this new school so different…
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Working Gringos Oresztesz came to Merida pursuing a career in the hospitality industry… and found love, family and a work he is passionate about instead.
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Working Gringos Justin Spring is one of a growing number of expats that split their time between Mexico and the United States. Justin has recently started spending his winters in Merida, having moved his winter home from the other side of Mexico.
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Working Gringos Mark Arbour spends half his year in Merida, half in Canada. Between the two countries, he owns three businesses. He’s bullish on Mexico’s prospects, and even more so on the prospects of the Yucatan economy…
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Working Gringos A lot of expats come here to retire, right? But more and more, we are meeting expats who aren’t even close to retirement. Gregory Hokenson is an example of a young man who has come to the Yucatan for the opportunity and the adventure…
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Working Gringos Phillip is part of a small but growing number of under-30-somethings moving to Mexico (and the Yucatan) for the adventure and the challenge. Like most of us, Phillip has found more than he expected…
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Working Gringos Jorge Sosa grew up in California and moved back to Mexico when he was a teenager with his family. We have rarely met someone who straddles the gap between the cultures of Mexico and the USA as nimbly as Jorge…
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Working Gringos Elizabeth Arnott came to the Yucatan to retire and relax, and has ended up as busy as ever, making music and teaching it. She loves her life in the city, but gets away when she can to her country home near some of the area’s most beautiful cenotes…
Valerie Pickle has given her delightful name to her even more delightful restaurant, The Pickled Onion. Here’s Valerie’s story about how she came to be here in the Yucatan and how she finds life in the small town of Santa Elena…
Joanna Rosado has been an expat in Merida for over thirty years. She knows a lot about what it takes to live, work and thrive in the Yucatan…
Jennifer Lytle runs one of the most successful real estate agencies in Merida. She has a long history of living and traveling in Mexico and was one of the first people the Working Gringos met when they moved here…
Janice Fraser lived in the same town as the Working Gringos, San Luis Obispo in Central California. She made the move less than a year ago and now finds herself knee-deep in polvo, culture and adventure…
Sarah Bogdanski left New York to come to Merida for a taste of life abroad. But unlike most expatriates here, she has family in Yucatan who she has been visiting for most of her life…
Catriona Brown landed in Puerto Morelos with money in the bank and no specific plans. Five years later, she reflects back on the path to paradise…
Many students travel to Merida for a “study abroad” program, usually to attend the Autonomous University of Yucatan, known here as UADY. We recently interviewed a student who tells us immersion in the local culture is a way to “learn by living”…
An interview with a “Yucateco Abroad”, Eduardo Creel, because even when they live somewhere else, Yucatecos never forget where their heart is…
Lorena Pacheco was a very young expatriate when she first moved to Mexico. Now that she’s traveled around the world a bit, she’s decided Merida is the place to start her next business…
If you think you’re impulsive, meet one lady who only needed two days to leap from New York to Merida and open an art gallery…
Gus Gordon has been living and working in the Yucatan for 8 years. Read what he says about the hardest part of living here and the Yucatan’s greatest resource…
Many years ago, Ian Arthur’s father gave him two sound pieces of advice. So naturally, he listened to neither…
We are constantly delighted by the interesting people who have chosen to make their home in the Yucatan. Here is an interview with two award-winning illustrators of childrens books who live in Merida…
One of the many things we love about the Yucatan is the level of tolerance for those of us who just aren’t and never want to be “normal”. Elayne has a few things to say about that too…
Malcolm and Jillian are some of the first of a new wave of younger expatriates, moving to the Yucatan for high adventure and lower costs of living…
Another in our series of expatriate interviews, this time with Emily and Alfred who operate Macan Ché Bed and Breakfast in the “Yellow City” of Izamal…
The following is the first of what we hope are many interviews with "re-pats": Mexicans who have lived in the United States or elsewhere, and have chosen to return home to the Yucatan…
This entrepreneurial couple hails from London, England and has come to Yucatan to develop real estate and raise their children in a peaceful environment…
At the tender age of 27, having moved from city to city since graduation from college, Jason decided once again to quit another job in North Carolina and head to Mexico…
Ellyne and her Yucateco husband have come home to Merida to operate their bed and breakfast, Cascadas de Merida…
Trudy is an expatriate from Canada who has found a way to marry her love of all things Mayan with a new career path…
This is not an interview with Madeline. No it’s not. But thanks to her humble servant Violene, we gain some insight into the owner of Luz en Yucatan…
Anyone who has met Keith knows he is one of the sweetest people around. Here’s an interview with a leading real estate agent in Merida…
We met Chris on the Internet and discovered he has a passion for following his heart…
Arielle, an expatriate living in Playa del Carmen, is a one-stop shop for what ails you. Yoga anyone?..
We decided that in all good faith we couldn’t ask other expatriates moving to Yucatan for an interview if we hadn’t done it ourselves…