Family means different things to different people.  To some, it is only their parents and siblings.  To others, it might mean several generations of people including aunts, uncles and cousins relatively removed from them.

That is the case in Mexico.  Even though I don’t meet them very often, on my dad’s side I know around a hundred people who fall into the category of “family”, even though I don’t always remember how exactly am I related to them.  On my mom’s side it’s easier, and I probably know less than fifty.

In family reunions, since I never knew who was who, I usually called people around my age “cousins” and adults “uncles” and “aunts”.  Even though there were some exceptions to the rule, it did work.

All this because I was chatting on MSN about the family with a cousin who is the granddaugher of a cousin of my grandmother on my father’s side.  And yes, she’s still family, and we still know about each other, even though she lives in a part of Mexico I seldom visit.