By Fernanda Noriega
There is a difference between tourists and travelers, just as there is a difference between visiting and residing somewhere. Certainly one can go to a place and take photos at tourist attractions, eat at the most iconic restaurant and walk through streets that you had only seen on postcards. It’s not all bad. But then there is the art of going to a place to get to know how life unfolds there and to mingle. It is the art of walking along streets as if you knew them, without fear of turning a corner, without carrying a map and just seeing where you are going to end up. That is precisely what sets Mary apart from others, she dwells in a place.
María José Márquez is a communicator, a writer, and she loves collecting stories. Her most recent literary creation is “Los Rotos,” a collection of some of the most endearing, ironic, mundane, romantic, and erotic stories that she has experienced. The book was presented at some locations in León, Guanajuato City, and in San Miguel de Allende. It was during this visit that María allowed herself to be captivated by the charms of San Miguel. When asked how she describes a perfect day in this beautiful town, she shares that she doesn’t have an exact formula to dictate what she does or doesn’t like to do. The magic for her lies in “walking, walking, walking. Over here and over there, enter all the doors that catch your attention, chat with people, and why not? Enjoy the absurd show of posi’ng in the middle of everything for a photo.” On any one day, María might visit all the art galleries that cross her path, stop at a bar for a “chela” if she happened to fancy their terrace. You might see her at the Craft Market choosing a little bracelet—one of those colored ones that she will later see and remember as “I bought it in San Miguel,” or having breakfast at the gordita stands in Atotonilco—which she describes as the best in the city. She could be having dinner at Mama Mía, “the point is to embrace the city, to get to know everything, admire everything and take in the beauty of the city,” she says. Then she concludes by saying that the most important thing is to collect one more story, and then to make sure that it feels like you’ve really lived it, you immortalize it with ink and paper.
