Return to México


Cold and wet streets of Mexico City

The always-fascinating blog is back by popular demand!


I arrived just in time for the Día de los Reyes Magos (Day of the three kings) on January 5th when the kiddies get their presents from the three wise men and everyone eats a circular bread confection called the rosca de reyes similar to those on display at this stall in the Alameda Central park.

It´s been about seven months since the dramatic evacuation from Mexico to Disneyland due to the swine flu and for the most part everything is how I left it with the exception of anti bacterial hand sanitizer dispensers in every restaurant, shop, cinema and other establishment excepting the taco stands.


The new high-tech Federal Police headquarters is supposed to be part of the strategy to beat the narcos.

The war against drugs, which in Mexico does resemble a real war, continues to roll on without any end in sight. Yesterday was apparently the most violent day yet, with at least 69 deaths reported. That takes the total for the first nine days of the year to 283 and makes Ciudad Juárez, up on the border with Texas and where the most deaths occurred, a good bet to hold onto the crown of the city with the most violent deaths per 100,000 citizens, above Baghdad and Kabul.


When in Mexico City, the Café El Popular on 5 de Mayo is a great breakfast option as it´s cheap, tasty and open 24 hours so you´re never too early!

The other main stores floating around here at the moment seem to be the legalization of marriage and adoption for same-sex couples by the Mexico City government, a pair of women who tried the old chestnut of taking out multiple life insurance policies on their daughter/sister´s 20 year-old boyfriend who was foolish enough to knock back an international scholarship to stay here with his girlfriend only to then get murdered by the future in-laws, and depressing revisions of a year and decade that haven´t gone very well for Mexico. On the first issue, the Catholic Church is out in full force recommending that the ruling PRD party in Mexico City submit themselves to psychiatric help, arguing this confirms the party is acting on behalf of evil forces and explaining why homosexuality is deviant behavior (¨a dog doesn´t have sex with a dog of the same gender¨ is one example). They´re particularly scathing about exposing children to these people, which does bring to mind the old saying about those in glass houses. On the final point, I must say that Mexico is beginning to rival Peru in the pessimism stakes and the theme of Mexico as a mediocre country seems to crop up in opinion piece after opinion piece day after day in newspaper after newspaper. In fact, one article about how the first decade of the 21st century was one in which to ashamed of being Mexican even lamented that Mexico didn´t even enjoy the statistical success of Peru´s economic growth.


While Melbourne is just beginning to roll-out the ultra-expensive and sure to be a debacle Myki, for a charge of less than $1 the Mexico City Metro has its own rechargable card.

It has also been freezing cold and wet here over the past week, particularly at night. The hotel I´m staying at is all ok for the price, but it does not feature any kind of heating mechanism as far as I can tell and my glasses are fogging up every time I breath as I type this. The cold nights and the erratic internet (¨Yeah, the Internet has stopped working. Hopefully it will start up again soon¨ is the attitude to the fact it barely works for more than an hour at a time) are making me question whether it might be worth upgrading when the two weeks I´ve reserved here are up.


Back to the Biblioteca Nacional.

I have quite a lot of work to get through which has meant long days at the library, but overall I´m enjoying being back here more than I thought I would. I´ve been a little surprised at how much more I´m out and about staying at a hotel rather than having an apartment, but then I don´t get many channels and the Internet is unpredictable! This weekend has been pretty relaxed, involving visiting a museum today (Sunday) and heading off to see Avatar in 3D yesterday (which I enjoyed a lot more than I was really expecting to).


The good thing about the rain is that it clears away the thick winter pollution. Turns out there were mountains covered in snow nextdoor to the National Library behind all that haze!

The week ahead will involve much the same traipsing to and from the library and next weekend I´ve organized to head up to Real de Catorce in San Luís Potosí for a few days of wandering through the mountains. As there are few buses to that part of the world, I had the bright idea of catching the 20:30 bus on Thursday so I can theoretically sleep and arrive at Matehuala, where I have to change buses, at 4am. As the first bus to Real doesn´t leave until 8am, this may end up involving a long, cold wait and perhaps I should have gone with my first plan to head to sunny Baja California rather than further into the cold mountains. I was all set to book a flight but started coming across a lot of websites from annoying Americans (not that all Americans are annoying...) with information on Baja who I began to suspect I would end up surrounded by. Then I came across this as a reason the website owners kept going back to Baja and off to Real de Catorce it was:

¨How a person smiles or if they smile at all can unravel their own story....People sometimes hide behind a smile, not realizing we see through the disguise. Mexico doesn't hide behind it's steadfast smile. It is there for the taking. We receive smile after smile, everyday of our visit. Even in the face of adversity, we can depend on Mexico to give us the gift of a warm smile. And we respond with our hearts.¨


No hiding behind warm smiles here.

Well, that´s it for now. I´ll try to update this every week which will give me some motivation to do something each week for at least the sake of a photo!


Che Zapata!