Mexico City as tourists on speed

Jan 8

Houston

We arrived in Houston after 17 hours flying time from BKK. We needed to change planes in Tokyo and we had 10 minutes to board our next flight. Fortunately a rep from United was waiting for us, escorted us to our gate finding the shortest route through security and led us to the front of the boarding line. We scored an exit row for the long leg to Houston: 12 hours. We called our motel and the shuttle picked us up in short order.  After checking in we took a taxi to the post office to mail two packages to ourselves in Portland where good friends will hold them for us. We had packed the boxes with things we had purchased, tailored clothing from Thailand and our high school reunion clothes we wore in tin September before leaving the US.  It really helped to lighten our load. We still have three suitcases, a backpack, a computer bag with two laptops and another small carry-on; way more than our usual two small roller bags. We will be able to eliminate the one carry-on in addition to having lighter suitcases. Then we used the same taxi to take us to a pharmacy to replenish our stock of supplements, deodorant, hand lotion and the like.

Back to the hotel and I took a short nap while Ron cleaned up a spill in his dop kit. We were too tired to go out to dinner so ate a bad meal at a chain restaurant near the motel. Next came a good hot bath and soaking of weary bones before crawling into bed. We watched a film and crashed for the night at 10:00.

Jan 9

Mexico City - elevation 8,000 ft!

Ron was awake from 3:00-5:00. Up at 7:00 to shower, dress and pack and catch a short two hour flight for Mexico City. We took a taxi from the airport to our hotel and were worried for a few minutes because the address had no sign and the door was locked. We and our driver banged on some doors and it was finally opened.  Yes, this was the right place.  When we commented on it to the hotel office they replied that "it is part of the charm of the place". We ate lunch at a wonderful restaurant that was part of the hotel, part old family villa and part converted and added on neighboring property. But the structures open  onto a garden/courtyard with tables and chairs. The staff is the best and the restaurant serves three meals a day. We took it easy as the jet lag took its toll. That night we walked to a commercial district where we ate an unmemorable meal.

Jan 10

Breakfast at the hotel: huevos rancheros, yum. Browsed an antique market and then caught the metro to the presidential palace where we planned to view eight murals by Diego Rivera. Alas it is Saturday and government offices are closed. This is next door to the national Cathedral.  

Also, next to the palace is Templo Mayor, a fabulous ruin and museum about early pre-spanish Aztecs that date from the 1200s.  The temple was a succesion of at least 6 constructions, with subsequent ones built on top of the previous one.  In so doing the base of he temple became ever wider.  So as we look at the ruin today, we see a series of walls, each representing different versions of the temple, with the oldest and smallest towards the center.

From here we went to a museum dedicated to one mural of Rivera’s and it was incredible. It is called "Dream of a Sunday afternoon in the Alameda central". What an interesting artist. The mural is filled with figures: and commentary through depiction of social injustices. He particularly highlighted corrupt government and the Catholic Church at its worst with the inquisition, and other horrific deeds. The mural was originally made in a building that was destroyed in an earthquake; but miraculously the mural was unharmed.  It was subsequently moved to it's current location.

Then being in the mode of ‘tourists on speed’ we jumped on the metro to see the best museum we have ever been to: the Nacional Museo de Anthropologie. It is immense and so well presented. There was everything from how man migrated from Africa to other parts of the world including the New World. Then there were sections of the museum that covered various cultures in Mexico. There was a good balance of Spanish and English explanations. 

We knew there was no way to see the entire museum in an afternoon so we opted to pick and choose.

We allowed ourselves to NOT read everything that was available to us. We have learned that we get information overload and reach a point of non absorption. By 5:30 we couldn’t stand up any longer so walked back to the metro and headed for our hotel. Our hotel receptionist had recommended a place the night before but the line to get in was too long so we gave it a try tonight. Too funny. There is always a line but we got there early and it only took 10 minutes to get in. It is a madhouse filled with locals. The table had the menu emblazoned on it. Some kind of transfer mechanism onto Formica. Not our idea of fine dining but it was an experience.

One consistant thing we have witnessed since arrival is public canoodling with lots of smooching. It is everywhere and in our neighborhood it is straights and gays. Public display of affection is not seen in Asia but here it is ubiquitous. In addition to jet lag we have slept in a different bed for four nights: Phetchaburi, BKK, Houston and Mexico City. I never sleep well the first night in a new bed so try to imagine how cranky I am these days…

Jan 11

We had decided we wanted to see the ruins of Teotihuacan which is why we crammed so much into yesterday. We were picked up at 9:00 and there were eight in our tour group counting us: one American doc, a English director of TV ads, a woman from London who is starting her MBA, two Mexican women and an Argentinean man. It was a good group. It took a short time to get to our first stop which was an archeological site in Mexico City that represented the merger of the Spanish and Aztec cultures to create the Mexican culture. 

Next was about an hour or so away and it was a very high end craft shop with wonderful jewelry, exquisite masks with inlay of semi precious stones and many other items. We almost bought a mask and decided it was more money than we wanted to pay: $600 plus shipping and insurance. 

Finally we got to the ruins where we spent two hours on the site

which is enormous but wonderful. The monuments roughly cover 12 square miles. There were two pyramids: pyramid of the Sun and pyramid of the moon. Ron climbed to the second level of the Sun pyramid but I was suffering pain from all the walking and standing on concrete the day before and opted out of climbing thousands of steps.

In addition to the pyramids, there were plazas, the citadel which houses a temple, ruins of former residences and palaces. There were hordes of people there. We boarded our van and were driven to a good restaurant where we ate lunch before driving back to  Mexico City. We got back around 6:00, rested briefly and headed out to dinner. We found a restaurant that had been recommended but it was closed so we popped into a place a block away and had another non memorable meal.