Taco Puppy!
Nov. 27th, 2014 07:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lupestripeWe arrived in Mexico City late last night after a mammoth 11 hour flight from Amsterdam, which had been preceded by a much shorter affair from Manchester. Indeed we barely noticed the length of the first flight as we got chatting to a chappie from Hull, who was flying to Kyiv to spend five days with some friends he knew. Having been to the city before, I was on hand to advise him on all of the sights to see in the city, although I did frequently mix it up with Minsk and Moscow. Well it was three and a half years ago since I was last in Ukraine.
If I were being honest, the 11 hour flight did not seem that long either, apart from the last hour when we were counting down the minutes until we landed. Mixing writing my journal with some in-flight TV and some tasty food proved to do the trick while the six beers I had (all 250ml cans though) definitely helped. I had wanted to have a few more beers but thought better of it, going through customs drunk is probably not a good idea. The range of films and TV wasn't particularly good and the couple in front of us who were kissing constantly were somewhat annoying but aside from this, the flight was pretty good although by the time we landed we were absolutely shattered. This is never a good time for customs fun but although the line was long, we got into the country pretty speedily, aided by the staff who checked the landing cards had been filled in correctly before we reached the customs desk. The lady was very friendly and soon we were at baggage reclaim, which was a mass of confusion as they had changed the belt from 17 to 22 without telling anyone or displaying it, while the conveyer spent most of the time stationary, with bags just piled up around it. It was Taneli who spotted my bag and soon we were off, although I had the delight of having all of my bags searched too before being let into the country.
It didn't take too long to find Cryn and his partner Misha, our hosts for the first part of the trip, although it did take us quite a while to reach their apartment, which is reasonably nearby. Mexico City has a population of over 25 million and it's a chaotic sprawl of a place. All of the main roads are frequently snarled with traffic and so it proved, even at 8.30pm, as we stopped at red light after successive red light so it took us over an hour to get to our destination. What doesn't help is that driving here is almost like a free-for-all and with no driving test to pass to be allowed to drive - you just need to queue for a license - it's easy to see why the road network is such a mess. They have tried building roads above roads (and even above roads again) to alleviate this problem but the city is growing at a far faster rate than the authorities can cope with, meaning they always seem to be on the back foot. What doesn't help are the itinerant salesmen and window washers at every stop light, who will sell you anything from a USB stick to a toffee apple. Some will walk between the cars attempting to clean the windscreen and you have to be quite firm, if not rude, to decline their services. In addition to this we saw various cyclists just dart carelessly across the road in front of oncoming traffic, not to mention people running across duel carriageways too. At one point on Thursday we saw a children's play area in the middle of a dual carriageway with no discernible access to it. The chaos of this city is very much like that of Manila, the other mega city to which I have been. Speaking of which, we saw another itinerant salesman on a bike riding around with a megaphone selling sweet corn, much akin to the balut salesmen in the Philippine capital. It sounds very much like the Muslim call to prayer I regularly heard in Indonesia when I was there in 2009.
Feeling jetlagged but wanting to adjust to local time, we opted to stay up a few hours on Wednesday evening and order a local takeaway, which consisted of the most delicious Mexican food I have ever tasted. Chicken soft tacos were accompanied by two hot sauces, chopped coriander, diced onion and sliced pineapple which you could apply to the tacos in any way you wanted. We also got some crispy cheese sheets, akin to the burnt layer of cheese you get when some of it drips from your cheese on toast and onto the pan underneath. All of this came with crispy nachos, chunky guacamole and a refried bean dip which was lightly spiced but was one of the best things I had ever tasted. The guys had bought me a few beers - a 2014 special reserve of one of the major brands here - as they, like Taneli, or more wine drinkers than beer. The other there shared a bottle of red - not one of the ones we had bought as presents for them - and we chatted a while about various things. For me, it was great to get to know them as I had never met them before, fearing it may be a little awkward staying in their house when none of us had met before. Fortunately everything was fine and it was great to get to know them properly after a few months of sporadic chat on social networks. This is very much a cat household, and me being a dog makes for an interesting dynamic. They have two real cats - a bouncy white and ginger one and a more moody black one - but they both seem to like me. As is always the case with me, I cannot help myself saying "kitty catty basket" whenever I see them for some reason. It's a compulsion. Cats do scare me a bit though as they jump about everywhere, with the ones here frequently perched on shelves to shock me when I see them at the last minute.
By 11pm (so 5am in the UK, 6am in Amsterdam) we were beyond tired and opted to head to bed, although jetlag can play weird games with your mind and I had rather fragmented sleep. It didn't help that I needed the toilet twice in the middle of the night but by 5.15am I was largely wide awake and couldn't get back to sleep. Still I guess six hours sleep under the circumstances could have been worse so I watched the sunrise over the view of the city from my window, waiting for everyone else to get up. Fortunately, we had planned an early start so I didn't have to wait too long and after a delicious sweet pastry for breakfast, we were soon on the road and heading north to the pyramids of Teotihuacan.
Starting in 200 BC, Teotihuacan was the first planned urban settlement in Mesoamerica, built as a result of a migration northwards due to a volcanic eruption. It was dominated by the Avenue of the Dead, with the Temple of the Moon at its eastern end. To the south stood the Temple of the Sun, with both temples set atop massive pyramids, both of which still stand today (sadly the temples have since been destroyed). These pyramids are famous throughout Mexico and there is nothing else like them in the Mexico City area (these were about 40km out in the adjoining state of Mexico). Consequently, they are quite a tourist attraction, which is one of the reasons why we wanted to get their early. It was a good call as school parties with children started to arrive halfway through our own excursion and while there was the usual bus load of Japanese tourists, the complex was largely desolate at such an early hour. There were a few people about but we did manage to climb the steep steps of the Temple of the Sun pyramid before being overwhelmed by the crowds or the strong sun, it got up to 21C in the afternoon today. The high altitude made climbing the pyramid tougher than it otherwise would have been but the panorama at the top was stunning, with small towns nestling in the foothills of extinct volcanoes, with the remains of the Teotihuacan complex mapped out below. Partly due to the exposed nature of the place, it was quite windy, and I enjoyed watching the wind blow a white hat off the head of a tourist, viewing it bouncing down the uneven sides of the structure. Indeed the pyramids are not a perfect pyramid shape - they were built in layers at various stages of construction until the site was abandoned between AD 700 and AD 750 - while there are frequent stones jutting out of the sides to prevent the structure slipping on the piled mud underneath which made the internal element. The attention to detail is quite remarkable though, with little stones embedded in the mortar while the airy basalt made for a very strong building material.
As befitting a tourist site, there were many people trying to sell tourist tat, both in little sheds on the road leading up to the complex and just wandering around the area itself. We saw one determined man harass an old Japanese lady for over five minutes for a particular item while we had to tell them firmly to go away nearly every other minute. This didn't really detract from our enjoyment of the pyramids though as it was all so wondrous, with the view from halfway up the Temple of the Moon (the top half was closed for some reason) down onto the main religious area of the city, which consisted of smaller pyramids facing into a central square or Quincunce, which is laid out to display the cosmological order of things according to tradition. While I was around this area, a German couple barged in front of me as I was reading a sign (I got quite obsessed with signs here) only to discover that they wanted to use me for shade. We also saw a range of interesting murals - one of a puma and some more in Quetzalpapolotl - while there were many fragmented examples in the modest museum around the back. The museum was a real delight as it had a range of pottery and ceramics created by the people of the city, and demonstrated just how cosmopolitan it was as they had contact with and influences from a range of other cities across what is now modern day Mexico and beyond. Charting these influences throughout the nine centuries of the city's existence I found fascinating while the scale model of the city with the Temple of the Sun looming large in the window in the background gave an excellent geographical perspective. Technology featured strongly with a complex irrigation system to keep 80,000 people fed at its peak while the open tombs with actual skeletons in situ did highlight the religious and funerary beliefs of this community, even if it was a little grizzly and voyeuristic to look over these bodies.
We ended up staying far longer than we thought we would, and feeling hungry, we opted to get food in a restaurant nearby than risk being caught in traffic heading back into the heart of Mexico City. We decided on one near the pyramids and although it was a little touristy, with a full Mexican band and Mexican dancing providing entertainment, it served enough traditional local food for it to be a viable option for us. There were two large Mexican flags fluttering in the wind at the main entrance, with one fluttering so much it smacked me in the face. There was also European football on the TV, a bit of an initial headfuck as it was dark and evening there but light and lunchtime where I was, emphasising that I was a long way from home. We ate quite a bit. Cryn ordered the insect platter containing grasshoppers, worms and ant larvae, which locals pop into a tortilla and munch with salsas and guacamole. The grasshoppers and worms were served whole, in the case of the former, with legs attached which you could feel tickling their way down your throat as you ate them. They were largely tasteless but crispy, with the worms merely hollow but crispy. Only the larvae had a taste and that was probably because they were mixed with something to add a certain richness. Eating these insects is reasonably common in Mexico and the best way to do it is to wrap them in a tortilla and add guacamole and more palatable things and not think about what you are eating while you do it. This is all fine until the contents fall out of the tortilla mind. On my second attempt, folding at one end, I did quite well but at bites three and four I started to think about what I was eating and it became a little offputting. I still finished it though. I also enjoyed a starter of Aztec Soup, described as a liquid tortilla in a bowl with pork crackling which was soggy in this case when it should have been crispy, and chicken in mole and rice. Mole is a rich dark gravy made with cocoa and spiced. The sweetness and the spiciness was a rather odd combination but it was delicious, with the little kick at the end really adding to the completeness of the flavour. I also drank a nice crisp yet sweet local beer called Tecate, which I hope to try again sometime.
As we were already out and about, we decided to go to a lake on the other side of the city, meaning we had to drive down the longest street in Mexico which goes north-south through the city. On our way back, we spied the effects of the rapidly expanding city, with shanty dwellings clinging up the sides of some of the hills almost like humans are surrounding it like a colony of ants. These don't look particularly planned but the brightly painted buildings did look rather pretty in the sun. The houses out here were particularly small but interestingly nearly everyone had a car, despite the more modest nature of their surroundings. No wonder there is so much road trouble.
Approaching the city, we decided to try and avoid the traffic by going around the city, going through rundown neighbourhood that not even Cryn and Misha knew. Unfortunately this backfired somewhat as we swerved to miss a particularly deep pothole and failed, with an accompanying hissing sound coming from my corner of the car shortly afterwards. We had gouged a huge hole in the back left tyre. Fortunately there was a petrol station just two blocks away so we didn't have to stop on the side of the road in the bad neighbourhood with a good looking Mercedes. All of the petrol stations here are state owned, called Pemex, and have attendants to pump the gas. This means they can often help with things like a flat tyre, which they did in ten minutes. However, the replacement tyre was far thinner than the other three so we agreed with Cryn that going home would be the best option and to go to the lake another day.
If I were being honest, the 11 hour flight did not seem that long either, apart from the last hour when we were counting down the minutes until we landed. Mixing writing my journal with some in-flight TV and some tasty food proved to do the trick while the six beers I had (all 250ml cans though) definitely helped. I had wanted to have a few more beers but thought better of it, going through customs drunk is probably not a good idea. The range of films and TV wasn't particularly good and the couple in front of us who were kissing constantly were somewhat annoying but aside from this, the flight was pretty good although by the time we landed we were absolutely shattered. This is never a good time for customs fun but although the line was long, we got into the country pretty speedily, aided by the staff who checked the landing cards had been filled in correctly before we reached the customs desk. The lady was very friendly and soon we were at baggage reclaim, which was a mass of confusion as they had changed the belt from 17 to 22 without telling anyone or displaying it, while the conveyer spent most of the time stationary, with bags just piled up around it. It was Taneli who spotted my bag and soon we were off, although I had the delight of having all of my bags searched too before being let into the country.
It didn't take too long to find Cryn and his partner Misha, our hosts for the first part of the trip, although it did take us quite a while to reach their apartment, which is reasonably nearby. Mexico City has a population of over 25 million and it's a chaotic sprawl of a place. All of the main roads are frequently snarled with traffic and so it proved, even at 8.30pm, as we stopped at red light after successive red light so it took us over an hour to get to our destination. What doesn't help is that driving here is almost like a free-for-all and with no driving test to pass to be allowed to drive - you just need to queue for a license - it's easy to see why the road network is such a mess. They have tried building roads above roads (and even above roads again) to alleviate this problem but the city is growing at a far faster rate than the authorities can cope with, meaning they always seem to be on the back foot. What doesn't help are the itinerant salesmen and window washers at every stop light, who will sell you anything from a USB stick to a toffee apple. Some will walk between the cars attempting to clean the windscreen and you have to be quite firm, if not rude, to decline their services. In addition to this we saw various cyclists just dart carelessly across the road in front of oncoming traffic, not to mention people running across duel carriageways too. At one point on Thursday we saw a children's play area in the middle of a dual carriageway with no discernible access to it. The chaos of this city is very much like that of Manila, the other mega city to which I have been. Speaking of which, we saw another itinerant salesman on a bike riding around with a megaphone selling sweet corn, much akin to the balut salesmen in the Philippine capital. It sounds very much like the Muslim call to prayer I regularly heard in Indonesia when I was there in 2009.
Feeling jetlagged but wanting to adjust to local time, we opted to stay up a few hours on Wednesday evening and order a local takeaway, which consisted of the most delicious Mexican food I have ever tasted. Chicken soft tacos were accompanied by two hot sauces, chopped coriander, diced onion and sliced pineapple which you could apply to the tacos in any way you wanted. We also got some crispy cheese sheets, akin to the burnt layer of cheese you get when some of it drips from your cheese on toast and onto the pan underneath. All of this came with crispy nachos, chunky guacamole and a refried bean dip which was lightly spiced but was one of the best things I had ever tasted. The guys had bought me a few beers - a 2014 special reserve of one of the major brands here - as they, like Taneli, or more wine drinkers than beer. The other there shared a bottle of red - not one of the ones we had bought as presents for them - and we chatted a while about various things. For me, it was great to get to know them as I had never met them before, fearing it may be a little awkward staying in their house when none of us had met before. Fortunately everything was fine and it was great to get to know them properly after a few months of sporadic chat on social networks. This is very much a cat household, and me being a dog makes for an interesting dynamic. They have two real cats - a bouncy white and ginger one and a more moody black one - but they both seem to like me. As is always the case with me, I cannot help myself saying "kitty catty basket" whenever I see them for some reason. It's a compulsion. Cats do scare me a bit though as they jump about everywhere, with the ones here frequently perched on shelves to shock me when I see them at the last minute.
By 11pm (so 5am in the UK, 6am in Amsterdam) we were beyond tired and opted to head to bed, although jetlag can play weird games with your mind and I had rather fragmented sleep. It didn't help that I needed the toilet twice in the middle of the night but by 5.15am I was largely wide awake and couldn't get back to sleep. Still I guess six hours sleep under the circumstances could have been worse so I watched the sunrise over the view of the city from my window, waiting for everyone else to get up. Fortunately, we had planned an early start so I didn't have to wait too long and after a delicious sweet pastry for breakfast, we were soon on the road and heading north to the pyramids of Teotihuacan.
Starting in 200 BC, Teotihuacan was the first planned urban settlement in Mesoamerica, built as a result of a migration northwards due to a volcanic eruption. It was dominated by the Avenue of the Dead, with the Temple of the Moon at its eastern end. To the south stood the Temple of the Sun, with both temples set atop massive pyramids, both of which still stand today (sadly the temples have since been destroyed). These pyramids are famous throughout Mexico and there is nothing else like them in the Mexico City area (these were about 40km out in the adjoining state of Mexico). Consequently, they are quite a tourist attraction, which is one of the reasons why we wanted to get their early. It was a good call as school parties with children started to arrive halfway through our own excursion and while there was the usual bus load of Japanese tourists, the complex was largely desolate at such an early hour. There were a few people about but we did manage to climb the steep steps of the Temple of the Sun pyramid before being overwhelmed by the crowds or the strong sun, it got up to 21C in the afternoon today. The high altitude made climbing the pyramid tougher than it otherwise would have been but the panorama at the top was stunning, with small towns nestling in the foothills of extinct volcanoes, with the remains of the Teotihuacan complex mapped out below. Partly due to the exposed nature of the place, it was quite windy, and I enjoyed watching the wind blow a white hat off the head of a tourist, viewing it bouncing down the uneven sides of the structure. Indeed the pyramids are not a perfect pyramid shape - they were built in layers at various stages of construction until the site was abandoned between AD 700 and AD 750 - while there are frequent stones jutting out of the sides to prevent the structure slipping on the piled mud underneath which made the internal element. The attention to detail is quite remarkable though, with little stones embedded in the mortar while the airy basalt made for a very strong building material.
As befitting a tourist site, there were many people trying to sell tourist tat, both in little sheds on the road leading up to the complex and just wandering around the area itself. We saw one determined man harass an old Japanese lady for over five minutes for a particular item while we had to tell them firmly to go away nearly every other minute. This didn't really detract from our enjoyment of the pyramids though as it was all so wondrous, with the view from halfway up the Temple of the Moon (the top half was closed for some reason) down onto the main religious area of the city, which consisted of smaller pyramids facing into a central square or Quincunce, which is laid out to display the cosmological order of things according to tradition. While I was around this area, a German couple barged in front of me as I was reading a sign (I got quite obsessed with signs here) only to discover that they wanted to use me for shade. We also saw a range of interesting murals - one of a puma and some more in Quetzalpapolotl - while there were many fragmented examples in the modest museum around the back. The museum was a real delight as it had a range of pottery and ceramics created by the people of the city, and demonstrated just how cosmopolitan it was as they had contact with and influences from a range of other cities across what is now modern day Mexico and beyond. Charting these influences throughout the nine centuries of the city's existence I found fascinating while the scale model of the city with the Temple of the Sun looming large in the window in the background gave an excellent geographical perspective. Technology featured strongly with a complex irrigation system to keep 80,000 people fed at its peak while the open tombs with actual skeletons in situ did highlight the religious and funerary beliefs of this community, even if it was a little grizzly and voyeuristic to look over these bodies.
We ended up staying far longer than we thought we would, and feeling hungry, we opted to get food in a restaurant nearby than risk being caught in traffic heading back into the heart of Mexico City. We decided on one near the pyramids and although it was a little touristy, with a full Mexican band and Mexican dancing providing entertainment, it served enough traditional local food for it to be a viable option for us. There were two large Mexican flags fluttering in the wind at the main entrance, with one fluttering so much it smacked me in the face. There was also European football on the TV, a bit of an initial headfuck as it was dark and evening there but light and lunchtime where I was, emphasising that I was a long way from home. We ate quite a bit. Cryn ordered the insect platter containing grasshoppers, worms and ant larvae, which locals pop into a tortilla and munch with salsas and guacamole. The grasshoppers and worms were served whole, in the case of the former, with legs attached which you could feel tickling their way down your throat as you ate them. They were largely tasteless but crispy, with the worms merely hollow but crispy. Only the larvae had a taste and that was probably because they were mixed with something to add a certain richness. Eating these insects is reasonably common in Mexico and the best way to do it is to wrap them in a tortilla and add guacamole and more palatable things and not think about what you are eating while you do it. This is all fine until the contents fall out of the tortilla mind. On my second attempt, folding at one end, I did quite well but at bites three and four I started to think about what I was eating and it became a little offputting. I still finished it though. I also enjoyed a starter of Aztec Soup, described as a liquid tortilla in a bowl with pork crackling which was soggy in this case when it should have been crispy, and chicken in mole and rice. Mole is a rich dark gravy made with cocoa and spiced. The sweetness and the spiciness was a rather odd combination but it was delicious, with the little kick at the end really adding to the completeness of the flavour. I also drank a nice crisp yet sweet local beer called Tecate, which I hope to try again sometime.
As we were already out and about, we decided to go to a lake on the other side of the city, meaning we had to drive down the longest street in Mexico which goes north-south through the city. On our way back, we spied the effects of the rapidly expanding city, with shanty dwellings clinging up the sides of some of the hills almost like humans are surrounding it like a colony of ants. These don't look particularly planned but the brightly painted buildings did look rather pretty in the sun. The houses out here were particularly small but interestingly nearly everyone had a car, despite the more modest nature of their surroundings. No wonder there is so much road trouble.
Approaching the city, we decided to try and avoid the traffic by going around the city, going through rundown neighbourhood that not even Cryn and Misha knew. Unfortunately this backfired somewhat as we swerved to miss a particularly deep pothole and failed, with an accompanying hissing sound coming from my corner of the car shortly afterwards. We had gouged a huge hole in the back left tyre. Fortunately there was a petrol station just two blocks away so we didn't have to stop on the side of the road in the bad neighbourhood with a good looking Mercedes. All of the petrol stations here are state owned, called Pemex, and have attendants to pump the gas. This means they can often help with things like a flat tyre, which they did in ten minutes. However, the replacement tyre was far thinner than the other three so we agreed with Cryn that going home would be the best option and to go to the lake another day.
