Cuidad de Mexico

We thought we made a mistake our first night in Mexico City.  I´ll be frank, the hostel was a disappointment.  All we saw in our future was a series of bare mattresses, fluorescent lighting, and terrifying bathrooms.  And while I´m sure we do have some of those things in our future, we learned that at a certain point, you get too tired to care.  Fortunately, for us and our bestie from Portland, Oregon, Victoria, it only took us one day of touring the incredible pyramids of Teotihuacan to be too tired to care.

50mgs of benadryl each was all it took to wake up refreshed and ready to visit Casa Azul.  Victoria had specifically pilgrimadged to Mexico City to see Frida Kahlo´s dresses, which were on view for the first time ever.  The collection was very inspiring.  Frida definitely had an eye for fashion because when I see similar shirts and dresses hanging in market stalls today, I am underwhelmed.  Somehow, she made the dresses pop.

Last Sunday, Rachelle, Victoria, and I visited Bosque de Chapultepec.  Many of the museums there are free on Sunday, so we visited the Museo de Arte Moderne.  We all enjoyed the exhibits of Fernando Garcia Correa´s repeatative patterns and Hector Garcia´s black and white photography of Mexico in the 50s and 60s.  It seemed like all of Mexico City was enjoying the sunshine and the fresh air.  Chapultepec definitely has a carnival atmosphere on the weekends.  Victoria bought coconut ice cream covered in chili powder.  Now if that doesn´t say party, I don´t know what does.  Later that day, we checked out of the hostel in Roma and walked our huge backpacks down to our homestay in Col de Valle.  I had told Rachelle that it would only be a mile, because that´s what I thought it would be.  Two plus miles later, we arrived at Thelma´s (pronounced Tellma) wonderfully clean and comfortable apartment.

Thelma´s apartment is just a few Metrobus stops away from our school.  Rachelle was placed in the high beginner class and I am in the beginner beginner class.  Rachelle is learning things like future, future progressive, and past tenses.  I am learning basic grammar and verb conjugation.  Strangely, its really bringing me back to 8th grade English class.  Thank you Mrs. Ross for your under appreciated work!  We are really enjoying our teachers and our international classmates.  Thelma serves us a full breakfast every morning before school.  Coffee, juice, bread and jam, fresh fruit with coconut sprinkles, and eggs with nopales (cactus) or cereal with coconut soy milk!  What?!

After school, we usually treat ourselves to a pastry or a fresh fruit cup with lime and chili and walk all over town.  We´ve covered the Centro Historico, the Zona Rosa, the Reforma, the Roma, the Condesa, Insurgentes Sur, and Obregon Avienda.

This weekend we were really ladies of leisure.  Yesterday, we took a 2 hour subway ride to Xochimilco where there is a 180km network of ancient canals.  We teamed up with a friendly Canadian couple, Nancy and John, and hired a private gondola for a one hour tour of the canals.  A one hour tour.  It is definitely not the huge beer that Rachelle and I shared talking, when I say that Xochimilco is a truely unique experience.  The gondolas are colorfully decorated and equiped with a table and chairs enough to seat 20.  Smaller boats float around selling beer, grilled corn, tacos, and mariachi songs.  It might have been the most relaxed hour of my life.  When we returned to the Salitre embarcadero, the 4 of us rode the colectivo to the artisan market.  It felt like everything went our way in Xochimilco.  It was  beautiful day and fortunate to meet Nancy and John.

After dinner we went to a ¨Twin Tones¨ show and met up with new friends, Arden, Jacobo, and Jamie.  We highly recommend that you check TT out.

Today we spent most of the day in Parque Mexico.  It is maybe our favorite park in the world!  From our bench the sounds of the Dixie Jazz Band drifted over to us, children made crafts and rode their bikes, vendors sold food, people walked their well behaved dogs off leash.  We feel very happy, healthy, and lucky!

If you read all the way to this point, thank you!  We will try to post more often.

Thank you for your love and good thoughts,

Meg and Rachelle

5 Comments

  1. rachelleleesmith

    Photos coming soon!

  2. Hi Meg and Rachelle,
    Thank you for that fantastic post. You really brought the places you’ve been to life. I can practically hear the mariachi bands playing over the sound of spanish conversations, while smelling coconut! Who knew it figured so prominently in Mexican cooking? Wish I could have gone to the exhibit of Kahlo dresses. Were you able to get any pictures of those beautifully embroidered goodies? Really glad you are meeting nice people along the way. That’s the cherry on top of all those wonderful experiences you’re having. Adios!
    Auntie Karen

  3. so amazing!!! glad you are having such an awesome time :D

  4. I hope we get to see pictures of Frida’s dresses. So excited to hear about your journey so far… & with so much more to come! Sending you both lots of love! XO, Sarah

    • rachelleleesmith

      photos were not allowed in the dress part…however, Victoria managed to sneak one on her phone…we’ll have to get it from her!

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