See those pictures above? They are of Mexico City, a teeming mass of humanity and my favorite city in the world.
Tag: CDMX
Photo Locale of the Month – December 2018
2018 is coming to a close as I write this. I thought I would conclude the year – and this series – with a post that circles back to where it all began. This blog was created not long after I moved to Mexico City in 2012, a two-year experiment with numerous highs and lows, though certainly more of the former than the latter. My first photo locale feature, three years later, featured the city’s Chapultepec Castle. Twelve months after that, a follow-up post highlighted the visual wonders of the city’s Centro Histórico.
But there is much to be seen in a city this size that doesn’t fit easily into any single category. Like this blog, there is a veritable potpourri of eye candy throughout CDMX, ranging from dilapidated buildings to elegant roofcombs to market foodstuffs to haphazard graffiti to the Chilangos themselves, 22 million living, breathing human beings who give Mexico City its heart and soul. Enjoy this random Mexico City potpourri, Loyal Reader…and thanks!
Continue reading “Photo Locale of the Month – December 2018”
Top Ten Mexico City Museums
Mexico City, once the biggest city in the world and still the biggest city in the Americas, has more than enough museums to keep its 20 million + residents satisfied: over 100, the most of any city in the world.
An exact count is not really possible considering that new museums and galleries open every month, but seemingly every subject is covered. Do you like classic cars? Check out the Museo del Automóvil (Automobile Museum), in the south of the city. Are you fascinated by European decorative arts? You won’t want to miss Museo Franz Mayer, near the Alameda Central and home to a rich collection of tapestries, furnishings, and garments. Eager to learn more about the struggle for indigenous women’s rights? You should visit the Museo de la Mujer (Museum of the Woman), a few blocks east of Plaza Garibaldi. Curious about the agave harvest? The Museo del Tequila y El Mezcal, (Museum of Tequila and Mezcal) in Plaza Garibaldi itself, is for you – and admission includes a free tequila shot!
Some of the museums are real oddities. The delightful Museo de Arte Popular (Popular Art Museum), housed in an Art Deco firehouse south of the Alameda Central, displays fanciful alebrijes – colorful folk art sculptures that feature in an elaborate parade each October. The Museo de la Medicina (Museum of Medicine), near Plaza San Jacinto in the Centro Histórico, has more exhibits of aborted fetuses and genital warts than even the strongest stomach can handle. The adjacent Museo de la Inquisición (Inquisition Museum), which shares the same building, is of the disturbing-and-yet-I-can’t-avert-my-eyes variety. And Anahacualli, south of Coyoacán, is a cool and spooky stone hacienda that resembles an Aztec temple of sorts and that houses Diego Rivera’s formidable collection of pre-Hispanic idols.
I was inspired to write this post at the suggestion of my fellow blogger William, a retired English teacher who now spends half the year in Mexico City. (Life goals – en serio!) Check out his writings at ilovemexico2013.blogspot.com. In the meantime, here are my Top Ten Mexico City Museums:
Mexico on My Mind
Mother Nature has been angry lately. Flooding in Nepal, Bangladesh, and East India. Hurricanes Harvey, Katia, Irma, José, and Maria. Wildfires in California, Montana, Wyoming, and the Pacific Northwest. And no fewer than three earthquakes – one as recent as this morning – to strike Mexico in just 16 days.
It is Mexico, my one-time home for almost two wonderful years, about which I am especially worried.
The Walkability of Mexico City
You probably know that the entirety of Mexico City’s Centro Histórico is walkable, with a concrete grid of sidewalks connecting every inch of the city’s storied, teeming humanity between Lázaro Cárdenas (Eje Central) in the west, Anillo de Circunvalación in the east, Granaditas (Eje 1 Norte) in the north, and José María Izazaga in the south. If that isn’t enough, no fewer than 10 metro stations, one metrobús route, and a cable-powered trolebús (not to mention countless peseros) pass through those same storied streets, ferrying commuters hither and yon.
Wider, better-maintained sidewalks link the Centro Histórico with the city’s green lung, Bosque de Chapultepec, via Palacio de Bellas Artes and Paseo de Reforma, the city’s grandest thoroughfare. Plans are underway to build a seventh metrobús line that will supposedly run along Reforma, but since public transportation improvements move at a caracol’s pace in CDMX, I will believe it when I see it.
My casual stroll this past February along the Ferrocarril de Cuernavaca, a railway line-turned-walking and cycling path, prompted me to wax further nostalgic about the walkability of Mexico City in general…not just in the aforementioned city center area, but in outlying sections of the city as well. Traffic congestion has become such a problem that a recent CNN Money article named the city as having the second-worst traffic on the planet! To me, any chance to walk, rather than drive, is a welcome one.
A Reunion of Amigos
Q: What do an entrepreneur, a human resources executive, a high school English teacher, a middle school history and science teacher, and a graduate student have in common?
A: They live in Mexico City, and they are my friends.
My long-awaited (for me, at least) return to “CDMX” was a resounding success. I didn’t get to see everyone I wanted to see, nor was I able to hit up every one of my former stomping grounds, but on the whole, I was able to stroll through some of my favorite neighborhoods and spend time with old friends – even if it was just for a quick drink.
Would you like to meet them? (Apologies in advance to mis amigos for posting these pics – although I don’t think the content is anything too compromising.)
So why Mexico City?
So why Mexico City? “Why not?” would be a great reply to that oft-asked question, but of course there’s a bit more to it than that.
I took my first trip to Mexico City over Thanksgiving of 2002. Ten years ago. Though not my first international trip (I had previously set foot in Europe, Canad-ia, and Brazil), nor my first trip to Mexico (that would be a drunken 1998 road trip from San Diego to Tijuana; is there any other kind?), I now know that my 2002 Mexico City trip/holiday/vacation was the trip to change the course of my life to include more travel than anyone I’ve known. This was the trip because it was my first international trip alone, to a place just four hours from my former homes of LA and Chicago by plane, yet whole worlds apart.
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