Sarah: Mexico City - Lucha libre, Aztecs, Frida ..
Trip Start
Dec 27, 2007
1
6
80
Trip End
Dec 28, 2008
Mexico City,
Mexico
Sunday, January 20, 2008
We stayed in this cool hostel right in the town centre - the zocalo - overlooking one of the biggest plazas in the world AND the Templo Mayor of Tenochtitlan, the great Aztec Capital! Fantastic. A million people lived there at the height of Aztec power. The hostel was really cool, we met heaps of great people and hope to hook up with them around the world at various times. It had a bar and restaurant on the bottom floor and a terrace bar on the roof where you could get a 360° view of Mexico City, and, on our last day, (due to the winds that had swept away the ubiquitous smog) even see the ring of volcanic mountains that encircle the Valley of Mexico. (Only problem was that the terrace was on the 6th floor, our room was on the fifth, and the only quiet time was between 2am and 5:30am!)
We took a few tours - really cheap - with the hostel guides. First day just went for a look around the zocalo, saw heaps of indigenous people in full traditional dress either dancing or performing spiritual cleansing rituals on people by shrouding them in a perfumed smoke and bashing them with plants - sacred herbs that is. Really cool.
The second day we went to the houses of Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo, two of Mexico´s most famous artists. They had a pretty tumultuous relationship and whenever Diego was pissed off at Frida (maybe for not being happy about his latest fling) he would paint her as a prostitute in one of his murals on one of Mexico's most famous buildings. Ladies, be glad you´re not dating an artist!!! I didn´t realise how famous they were in their heyday. In the Casa Azul (Blue House) which has been turned into a musem, there are letters from people like Nelson Rockefeller and Helena Rubenstein and several famous actors and actresses of the day. AND, this was incredible for me - letters and books dedicatd to them from Leon Trotsky, because he actually stayed with them when he sought refuge in Mexico.
I stood in the room he slept in. I knew he was killed in Mexico but didn´t know he had stayed with them. It was amazing for me, somewone who´s always had an interest in Russian history, to kind of feel like I was "close" to this historical figure. By that I mean I was standing in a place he'd been in far from his own home and looking at works he had actually written, paper he had held. That's not to say that I worship the guy or his ideology, but it was just weird and cool to be in that situation.
That afternoon we went to Coyoacan, where the Nahua people had their amazing floating gardens on the lake that surrounded Tenochtitlan, and from where Hernan Cortes launched his brutal assault on the capital in 1519, and eventually destroyed it. We went to Xochimilco, where the last remaining Aztec canals are, and rode on a trajinero (canal boat/gondala) for a few hours, eating tacos and drinking beer while the mariachis rode by playing their festive music, and vendors of all kinds paddled by selling bbq corn, toffee apples, jewellery, photos, flowers... Absolutely wonderful afternoon. Lastly, we went to the UNAM (university) where the central library building is covered entirely in amazing mosaics by the Mexican artist Liam O´Gorman. There could be millions of tiles on it. Breathtaking.
Day two was Teotihuacan. That was incredible. Wow. The city covered about 25 sq km and we climbed to the top of the Piramide del Sol (sun), the third biggest pyramid in the world. Hard going. The engineering and civil planning evident in the city was very impressive, not to mention the scale of the buildings.
One night we went to a Lucha Libre show (Mexican WWF). It was cool. I wasn´t really that interested in the idea but I had a lot of fun. I was actually really impressed by the skill and athleticism of the luchadores (wrestlers). They weren´t monsters like the american pro wrestlers, apart from a couple, but the choreography and agility was pretty amazing. These were guys who weighed probably 120kg, doing back flips! From a dancer´s perspective it was intriguing. They must choreograph most of the moves, maybe a little bit of improv, although that would be pretty dangerous when you see what they do. So to learn each move, in combination, with six guys in the ring, and pull it off perfectly, giving the illusion of aggression and danger and pain, is admirable. I was sitting there thinking: it's kind of like a combination of gymnastics, mime, icehockey, trapeez, kickboxing, and, I suppose, wrestling. Great night anyway.
The last couple of days we spent in the Palacio Nacional, looking at MORE murals (for three hours) and the Palacio des Bellas Artes (fine arts) looking at yes, MORE murals - I love Mexican muralism, can you tell? The Palacio des Bellas Artes is probably the most beautiful building I have ever seen. Also went to the Bosque de Chapultepec (park) one of the biggest urban parks in the world, at 20 sq km. Houses the Museo de Antropologica, which has 22 halls, 5km of hallways would take you 2 weeks to see everything apparently - there´s some stats for you.
You know how I mentioned police last time? Well I have never seen so many police in my life! They roam the Centro Historico in packs of between 6 and 20. uh huh. No wonder we didn´t have any problems. There are: public security police, traffic police, city police, state police and military police. Oh, they have traffic lights but if they don´t have police at the intersections people just ignore the lights and you never get anywhere. Trying to cross the road - yes, at a big yellow zebra crossing - is interesting: you basically just start walking (make sure there´s a bunch of you) and the traffic (hopefully) moves out of the way to the other side of the street (all one way) but never really stops, they just try to avoid you.
Another thing we´ve seen a lot of is chicken (pollo) shops/ billboards advertising: pollo feliz, pollo rico, pollo loco, pollo frito, pollo rostido, pollo asado, (in order: happy chicken, rich chicken, crazy chicken, fried chicken, roasted chicken, bbq chicken)!
And, I forgot to mention this, but I saw a hummingbird! I´ve never seen one before. They´re so pretty: tiny little blue things, winds buzzing (fastest in the bird world I think), flitting in and out among the orange trees. That was a treat.
Now we are in Acapulco, but leaving today. It´s beautiful, and VERY hot. Yes, I got a little sunburnt. Moving on to Oaxaca today.
