dealing with the noise

I remember a conversation that Husband and I had with some friends when we first moved here. These people are from New York City and we,as you know used to live in a suburban city and prior to that in a cabin in the forest. One of us had complained about the tremendous amount of noise here. Our friend looked incredulously at us and stated "I don't understand what you mean. It quiets down at night.".




Wow, they came from place where it is never quiet, not even in the wee hours of the evening. It's all a matter of perspective isn't it? Husband tells the story of when he first moved back to town. He had been living in the boonies and moved to a house on a third of an acre in a small town. He would hear people in the next door neighbor's yard and think they were in the house. When we lived in the canyon, we could hear when a car drove down our street, everyone would look out their doors to see who it was, if we didn't recognize the car from it's engine noise. From there we moved to town, Santa Rosa is actually a city of 157,985 residents but it is small potatoes compared to Mérida! According to Wikipedia this shot of Mérida was taken from the 16th floor of the Hyatt.


Here is downtown Santa Rosa. Incidentally all these photos are
courtesy of Wikipedia. This is Courthouse Square, there usually is a bit more traffic than this.




Well, just like Husband adapted to moving to town and after awhile didn't think that the neighbors were standing inside his house having their conversations, we have adapted to Mérida's noise. One thing that helps when some business is having a promotion,(it seems to be mandatory to rent the largest speakers available and to blare music and announcements at the loudest volume here when you are having a sale on motor oil or a special on deli items.) or the city is doing road work is foam earplugs!
I didn't like them at first, but now I do. They just mute the noise. I can still hear the traffic but it sounds far away. Another thing that helps is that we have heavy wooden doors when they are shut mid day for the heat, that also adds a filter for the noise. In the evening when we open the windows for air there is also less noise.
I guess my friends were right, it does quiet down at night, after all.