Friday, August 11, 2006

Educating SMA's future residents

In the jardín on Wednesday I bumped into a Rick Keep. His wife, Linda Lowery, is a well-know children's author here. The Keep-Lowerys have lived here for many years, and of late have become concerned with the types of settlement that have become increasing popular here in San Miguel de Allende (SMA): large gated communities that attract people who aren't necessarily interested in Mexico or being involved with the Mexican people or the established expatriate community.

Last week Linda Lowery and Camie Sands launched an interesting business that you may have heard about in your local media, Simply San Miguel. Simply San Miguel offers a type of lifestyle tour for people who are visiting SMA with the purpose of settling here. These tours are full service, and will give tours of SMA and the surrounding area, hook potential buyers up with honest real estate agents (which is incredibly important if you want to buy a house here) and most interestingly, will educate potential expats about the history of this community, particularly its history of communitarian spirit and involvement (through charity work) with the community.

From reading the website, Simply San Miguel is about providing reliable information, and I’m certain Linda and Camie will do that, but it also will work to discourage certain types of settlement that the large community of expats would like to see less of here. Linda and I will meet later today to discuss the goals of the business, but I find what they’re trying to do here fascinating, and look forward to seeing what type of impact Simply San Miguel will have on the future growth and development of SMA.

No comments: