On The Move…

Woah, that week went by pretty quickly, no?  I am now at the Mexico City international airport waitingfor my flight back to Boston via Houston.  I am not terribly excited about these flights, because I am going to have to somehow produce two essays due tomorrow and the day after (and these are already the extended deadlines due to thesis).  On the brighter side, it looks like I might manage to catch the tail end of the first senior bar of the month 🙂

Today I only had time for a quick turn about the Chapultapec Park area and a visit to the stunning Museo de la Anthropologia.  Wow.  All museums should look like that, I think; architecturally striking yet not overpowering or inconvenient.  And the galleries were fabulously laid out, curated and displayed (at least to my non-expert eye).  Two thumbs up.

PS: Little known benefit of being multi-lingual – when visiting tourist sites a linguist is much more likely to be able to mooch off nearby guided tours.  I definitely listened in on a French group in the Toltec room this morning, and a couple of days ago I benefited from a Spanish teacher leading a school group around the Templo Mayor (very simple Spanish).  Thinking back, I recall listening to Mandarin guides in Japan and English guides everywhere else, of course.  Actually, being able to speak a language that you might not be expected to speak is better, because then the mooching seems a little less apparent 😉

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Yesterday I spent most of the day at Teotihuacan, the impressive, almost mythical Aztec city about an hour outside of Mexico City.  Breathtaking.  It was everything I expected, and perhaps a little bit more.  The highly recommended La Gruta restaurant, nestled in a subterranean grotto just outside Gate 5 of the archaelogical zone, made a nice finish to the day.  I spent the day exploring with a Japanese nurse who had spent the last two years volunteering in Honduras with the Japanese international aid agency (think USAID or Peace Corps).  It was hilarious trying to communicate with her, because she understood but could not really speak English, yet spoke fairly fluent Spanish.  So she would speak in Spanish, I would guess-translate into English and reply in my English-pidgin-Español-plus-random-Romance-language mixture.  After several hours I was confused enough that when taking a picture for some French tourists on the Pyramide de la Luna I think I said “Una, deux, treize!” :p

I didn´t make it to Puebla after all.  By the time I got to the bus station (7.30am) the next bus to Puebla would have been at 9am.  So I headed right back to Mexico City.  And on Sabado (Saturaday) everyone goes to the mercado to shop, and so did I.  Fastastic Mercado de Artesanias which again reminded me of Chatuchak in Bangkok.  I left with all kinds of great finds for friends and family, and yours truly, of course.  I think I was pretty good about not buying expensive, fragile or potentially un-useful things.

And of course on a Saturday night everyone comes out to play, and when in Rome etc.

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In a moment I will leave the Hostel Amigo to move to the Camino Real Mexico hotel across town, and hopefully tonight I will catch the famous Ballet Folclorio de Mexico.  And before that, maybe I´ll go to the anthopology museum nearby.

Hasta mañana!