CDMX formerly known as DF

---

CDMX

You know you have been gone for too long when the city you were born in has changed it's name.

Formerly known as "el DF " the city that saw me grow up has not only a different size, a different name but also a different vibe.
It is almost impossible to imagine the size of such a metropolis until you are there to experience it yourself. Nadine's face was filled with a big question mark as we flew and flew and flew above Mexico city's airspace before we landed at Benito Juarez' airport, if we needed to describe the size in one word it would be, endless.
Coming back to CDMX brings nice memories time and time again, it also reminds me how lucky i am to live somewhere else, don't get me wrong, it is a beautiful place but it is way too big.
We were staying at Mexico City's SOHO area, "La Condesa", just around Amsterdam street ( how appropriate after living in the Netherlands for the past 30 years)
An art-deco " vecindad" old building that had been renewed and modernized, a few steps away from Parque Mexico, little shops, small cafes,restaurants and Insurgentes avenue.
First discovery was a delicious, healthy and close by one, El Ojo de Agua on Amsterdam avenue.
A small eatery specialized on juices and fruits, with super yummy sandwiches and salads, where you can also purchase prime quality fruits and veggies to take home.
M and M, Mango and Mamey, two fruits we became addicted to, me being a purist had the Mamey one, a fruit unknown in Europe, avocado shape, brownish thick, rough skin and a pinkish flesh inside with a jet black seed inside that reminded me of an Orca every time.
Nadine went for the tropical mix with Mango, Passion fruit, Guava one.
Wanting to detox ourselves we had a couple of salads, with chicken, avocado, zucchin, grapefruit and one with Cuitlacoche pasta, parmesan cheese, veggies and a yum-yum dressing.
After that we went for a stroll along Amsterdam avenue
The roads on the "avenue" are divided by a kind of an island full of trees that allows you to peacefully walk through it, passing its fountains and crossings, enjoying the art deco architecture of many buildings, you then could go to the Parque Mexico as we did. A big park with a nice setting, with big trees, palm trees and littles kiosks, people walking their dogs ( la condesa must have the largest dog population of Mexico we thought) passing vendors selling wood work, balloons and algodones ( sugar cotton) and other mexican sweets.
As the night and rain were falling we called it a day, tomorrow Frida Kahlo's house was waiting.
Coyoacan has always been one of the prettiest areas in the city, it gives you the feeling of being outside of the Metropol in a rural area, pebbled paved areas, low houses, trees and the famous plaza, just as the small town ones with its church, shops,ice cream parlors, fountains and benches.
We had made sure to buy the tickets on line prior of going to the " Casa Azul", since the late 90's Frida's status have surpassed the one of her late husband Diego Rivera's, the moment Madonna bought one of her paintings she became a cult artist, kind of Warhol level.
The last time i had been to the " museum" was in the very early 90's, back then you were inside there with maybe 8-10 people and you went to visit it more due to Diego than for her, now a days the place is packed like a zoo. When we arrived the queue to buy tickets went around the block and it had about an hour and a half wait to be able to get it, we suddenly felt like Vips as we descended from the Uber, walked to the secuity aka doorman,showed him our e-tickets and were in in less than a minute.
So if you want to save lots of time, buy them online, on that note, you MUST buy the ticket that gives you the right to take pics, yes, pics! With a camera, iphone, android, whatever, maybe even if you do pencil portraits too! I thought it was necessary only when taking pics for a commercial purpose or when using professional equipment but no-no.
Inside the spaces become small since this was a house in the early 1900's ( actually an Hacienda ) imagine showing your living room,kitchen,dining room to 20-30 people at the time, i don't know about your place, but in our place it would be crowded, and so it was here too, after seeing a couple of her paintings ( most of them are privately own or in MOMA or in a couple of small museums in Mexico) and a couple of sketches, pictures and articles you realize the museum goes beyond art.
It is more about Frida's " i don't give a #%^* attitude towards the high society in that time's Mexico ( btw, high class in Mexico now is far from high,unless it is high as in drugs high, but anyway.) The dresses she wore, provoking and at the same time promoting Mexico's folklore with her colorful Taraumara attire, her mustache and her adoration for a man that was a player, about her open bisexuality, about life and her acceptance of things as they are -accepting her accident, being crippled, in pain, physically and mentally, overcoming it all. About living life, no matter what.
It was too about her and Diego's relationship with Trotsky, about how they had intervened on his behalf with President Cardenas to get this Soviet rebel asylum and about how he ( Trotsky was betrayed and almost killed by David Alfaro Siqueiros, another famous Mexican painter and finally was killed by Ramon Mercader, an Spanish-born Soviet agent ) about how they lived and worked.
By the time you get to the patio with its volcanic stones and fountain you are either full of admiration, depressed or almost claustrophobic after going through the house-studio.
The flowers and open spaces outside bring air and a bit of calmth into your visit, adjacent to the garden and the house the museum has acquired the house next door and made it an exposition space, this time there was an exhibit about Frida's dresses, the Taraumara ones, the famous rebozos, her wired tops and heap prothesis together with some funky boots with a little bell to help her balance her legs ( after polio had affected her ) and some more sketches.
It was all in all a short story about a strong Mexican woman who became more famous than her famous husband, who became a cult and a huge icon, mustache and all....
Viva la vida!
We headed towards the main square passing by Coyoacan's Mercado where i wanted Nadine to try some other food besides grasshoppers but after giving it a thought we decided not to, after all she had just had an aerial infection and gotten antibiotics, last thing we wanted her to get was an stomach infection...-nevertheless we absorbed the scents of the foods, the colors of the fruits and candies, looked at some handcrafts in it.
It was nice to be back at la plaza, unfortunately i saw my plan B for food going up in smoke, the famous Guadalupana was closed! Coyoacan's one and only, oldest and best cantina had been shot down, darn!
We went quickly looking for another place ( as Nadine gets really grumpy when she's hungry) across the Church on the other side of the square a couple of nice restaurants had opened, right next to them the old ice cream parlors and the -corn on the cob and kernels ( Esquites) - shops were still there.
We passed the " Churros" selling cart and the fountain with the two coyotes ( they look as if they were shaking the water off their furs when the fountain is on, Coyoacan means place of Coyotes in Nahuatl ) and sat down to devour more, yes, Chapulines, Nadine had developed an addiction to them, after lunch we hopped back to the " main" square, to do what everyone in a different country or town should do, people watching from a bench.
The balloon vendor with his sponge bob, Minions, Unicorns and -heart shaped helium filled colored glad making items for kids and lovers- the skateboarding suicidal teen with his moves, the shoe shine booth with a cop in it getting his service boots done ( a very metaphorical image btw) young -too young- mothers with their strollers, kids playing football, the squirrel going up and down the trees and the lovers in the park ( that's us btw) 😊 it all happens in the main plaza, like a movie, for free, just as the best things in life....

Day 2:
A must do when in Mexico city is go to Teotihuacan's Pyramids, if not it would be like going to Cairo and not visiting tutancammons resting place.
The pyramids are a good hour plus away from the city, in the state of Hidalgo, we opted to do the Uber thing, a bit decadent but thanks to the low value of the peso we also asked Miguel to wait for us ( as there's no way for you to get an Uber back once you are there and you would be the prey of the taxi world )
Teotihuacan is so huge you must make choices into what to visit, bring water with you, a hat and sweater, if you are planning to climb the pyramid of the sun bring an oxygen tank as well, there are 364 steps to the summit which is way less at the moon's pyramid, there you get a view longways of the " city" the bad news is, they don't allow people all the way to the moon's top anymore.
Hardcore as we are, we went up the Sun's ( although Nadine protested a bit) this was a first timer for both, i had been up the moon's ( back then you were allowed to go all the way up) but never to the Sun's top, call me lazy, call me smart, this time we went up, and up, and up, once you have caught some air you get to admire a great view, you see the corridor at both sides with its temples and buildings, you get to imagine how it was to live then in a city if this size ( i guess as in CDMX now ) where at the peak of it 200,000 people lived in, wow.
We came down to the square between the pyramids and admired the murals at one of the temples and headed towards the entrance where Miguel was ready to bring us back to the city.
Day 3:
One of the big things Mexico has to offer is Archeology, with it's treasures of the Maya, Aztec and other civilizations the place to visit is Museo de Antropologia at Chapultepec's park ( also known as CDMX's lungs, the central park of the city) the museum is so big you need at least 4 hrs to visit it, if you visit it and want to understand and learn something ( main reason we all do ) and need the info to be in something else rather than Spanish you should get the headphone tour, a BIG downside is that in most of the museum explanation is given only in Spanish ( writings below pics,etc) i guess the museum it's still prehistoric when it comes to interacting with it's guests. Anyway, after a trip through memory lane ( elementary school trips to it) and a lesson in my ancestors we headed to the Zocalo, the world's biggest square after the Red square in Moscow,.
One thing we underestimated was, rush hour in CDMX, if you are the-omg too much traffic complainer-in your own country feel free to come here for a lesson into what evening rush means, jeeezzz it took so long we had to skip dinner and only had a quick glimpse of the Catedral and the Palacio de Gobierno before walking towards Bellas Artes.
Here we were to watch the Folkloric ballet of Amalia Hernandez, this is like the Cirque du Soleil- folklore style, recognized all over the world and it has been touring for more than 50 years.
This dance show takes you through all the regions of México from North to South and East to West, not only entertaining you but also educating you with all the different styles, traditions and beauty Mèxico has to offer, no doubt that music enriches our souls and moves everything in us to feel happy, sad, joy and pride.
Viva México!
Dancing makes you hungry, at least watching it did, so we headed back to la Condesa.
The taxi drove via Avenida de la Reforma, -a Champs Elise like avenue- that passes through the city's biggestr monuments, Revolucion, Madero and " el Angel" it is beautiful street especially at night and especially slowly, this is a term the taxi driver kind of missed...he reminded us of Johnny the magician and our cross Bolivia adventure.
This guy was doing 100 km/hr at times, therefor we were at the Taqueria in the Condesa in no time.
Here some mouth-watering reading of the menu took place and like a little kid i wanted to order them all, also for Nadine to try of course.
Pastor con Piña, de Chorizo, de Bistec con queso, de rajas con queso, de Carnitas, just writing about it right now makes my taste buds go wild! If anything, it is food we miss the most when we are away from our roots, just like Germans miss their dark heavy bread.....
Day 4:
Was a lazy family day.
We went to my moms house where Nadine got a tour of the place that saw me grow, listened to some stories of my youth over tea and got to spend some time with La Mama before heading to the apartment as we needed to pack and get ready to fly to Boston Friday morning.
Very often we buy A and get B due to a partnership,nevertheless B is a very good choice to get for the amount of money paid, this was the case with us - we had booked United and were flying Aeromexico straight into Boston. Not a big difference from airline to airline if you ask me, however when it comes to checking in online is when the problem occurs, you can't not check in on neither, United says our partner is servicing and Aeromexico says you need to check in at the airport.
So there we were, way on time, last thing that i thought was that our selected seats ( through Expedia) were not granted, this to be discovered the moment we heard my name through the tannoy ( something we all once wanted to have, especially at the airport) passengers Mr. Sordo and Ms.Regel please approach the gate, the thing with the tannoy is, you don't understand a thing when the one is speaking, finally by the 3rd time as we were about to board i heard my name, huh? I say to Nadine, they are calling us, naaah she said, you are hearing things- something she says quite often if you ask me- so there i go, on my own to check, there's where i discovered that our emergency door seats for our 5 hr flight were not to be and, that I had been " randomly" selected to undergo an extraordinary security check.
Key words here : random, extraordinary and security, it is like receiving a call from a telemarketing saying you have won something for free.... Right, i could heard the rubber glove popping.
As Nadine and I approached the duo of " security" she was asked to please go sit down a couple of meters further, i was about to take one for the team, i thought.
The junior assistant asked me kindly if i minded opening my backpack as he opened his " my first CSI-kit" to pull a long Q-tip and started to rub it against my bag, my hands, AND.....
No-no-no, my shoes. 😉 searching and probably wishing the thing was about to turn blue, or red or whatever color it is that it turns saying I had been in contact with drugs. Thank goodness there were no coffeeshops around my apartment nor at work, otherwise some fragrances could have flown into my bag. I for my part kept my cool, hoping he was not going to ask me to bend over.
After having watched " El Dorado border control on tv " most probably it was the combination of a few factors:
A Mexican, with a Dutch passport flying out of México, after having been in South America ( Bolivia, coca nation of the world ), flying to the USA. Even I would have gone mmmhhhh, wait a minute wait a minute...., good we don't take these things personal, now do we?
After finding only Ibuprofen and chewing gum and noticing he was keeping all the other 150 passengers from boarding ( as all this took place on the worm that takes you to the plane) he had no choice but to let us go- not that we expected otherwise-
Just when we thought it was over we discovered who was seating behind us on our long-long flight....2 moms, 5 small kids, YES! FIVE!!!!!!
Now is when we wished we had drugs with us after all.....

---