Michael and I had a lovely time together in Mexico City, but it is not a place that I feel the need to re-visit any time soon. I can't tell you what I disliked about it, but it was just lacking something. Everywhere else that we have been so far had character or communicated a story, whereas I found Mexico City to be pretty grey and sparse in terms of its offerings. That may be an unfair observation as, granted, it is a huge city and we barely made a dent in it in 3 days, but we did visit all of the main sights and went to a few "nice spots" in different areas since it was MJ's birthday. It was also intriguingly (and irritatingly; shows how much we rest on our laurels!) the first time that we encountered a serious language barrier. No matter what standard of shop or restaurant, or level of authority a person held, hardly anyone spoke English (which was rather testing at times). I found the people in Mexico City to be the least helpful and friendly of the all the Central American countries that we have visited, which was a shame. I will admit that my general view may have been tainted by my fairly unpleasant and strung-out experience at our hotel, but I will go in to more detail about that later.
Other than that, it was wonderful to be there when we were as it was Independence Day on 15 September, which brought the whole city to life, as it was a bank holiday and there were free concerts everywhere; parades up and down the streets; people wandering around in traditional ponchos and sombreros with stick on moustaches; and fireworks in the evening, which produced a cheerful atmosphere that was nice to be a part of. This was also Michael's "new birthday", so not a bad day for celebrations to ensue!
The long:
Sunday:
After exactly 12 hours of travelling on various modes of transport, I think it's fair to say that when we touched down in Mexico City, neither of us were in the best birthday mood. Sadly, it had not been a smooth journey. We almost missed our flight from Guatemala City due to a bunch of false promises and broken English; I suppose, at least, that we should be grateful that we were not stranded there. I lost my beloved warm hoodie (my most treasured item of clothing since we have been travelling) in the rush to get off the shuttle bus and into the airport. Upon landing in Mexico City, I tried to inject some sparkle into the evening by buying us a bottle of Moet from Duty Free to enjoy in the room pre-dinner, only to find that our precious 2-hour time slot between landing until our celebratory dinner reservation was being drained by a totally unnecessary 40-minute wait at baggage reclaim. When we finally made it to the hotel with an hour to spare, reception were less than accommodating with regards to my urgent requests for ice and champagne flutes. In short, it was a disaster. To add salt to the wound, it turned out that the restaurant I had booked was a half hour's drive away and the kitchen closed at 10pm. I simply could not allow this stressful day and nightmare of an evening to be Michael's birthday celebrations. A very short exchange of words later, we agreed that it was best to have a wonderful relaxed "birthday" for him the following day, so that we could do it properly. With a new agenda in mind, all that was left for the evening was the small matter of getting some food in our tummies, which a quaint relaxed restaurant opposite our hotel managed to do very well, as we merrily guzzled up birthday pizza washed down with diet coke.
Monday:
After a nice long snooze, we awoke clear-headed and slightly more refreshed than the day before; progress already! Unfortunately, time pressure, rumbling stomachs and a bad recommendation left us eating the second birthday breakfast in a rather dank and cheap diner, which failed miserably on ambience, but gratefully (on my behalf) mostly made up for it with the food. At last, it was time to delve into Mexico City. We went head first in to the "old town", checking out a market, a beautiful park filled with sculptures and various grand monuments en route.
By early afternoon, the streets were chock-a-block with proud Mexicans wearing the national colours of green, red and white, merrily singing Mexican tunes and chattering excitedly in Spanish about the celebrations to come. We crossed paths with some fantastic street musicians that had an elderly man doing "the daddy dance" in front of them; I'm not sure if he was with them or not but it brought a smile to my face to see how much he was enjoying the music, and was a welcomed change of style from the usual street performers that you come across!
We had planned to pop in to the main cathedral and national palace, but it quickly transpired that this would not be happening today due to Independence Day festivities. It had, after all, seemed slightly over the top that we had had to queue for security screening just to visit these attractions. But we went with the flow and at least got to see the buildings from the outside instead, with the bonus of getting to be a part of the raucous crowd jiggling along to the concert staged in the centre of the main square.
It has slightly amazed me how many shoe polishers we have seen in Central America, with one always within close vicinity. I guess tradition has not yet overridden the associated class distinction the way it has in Europe.
^ I personally thought that this was a great picture. By this point, it was late afternoon and most definitely time for that well-deserved birthday champerz. I gladly got straight to uncorking the bottle.
A little tipsy and jolly we put on our best garb for the night ahead. It was then that I realised my precious gold marble necklace that mum gave me for my birthday was missing from my jewellery box. After a thorough search, we came to the only possible conclusion that it had been stolen. I suppose I am to blame for not putting it in the safe but, at the same time, it was inside a box inside a zipped up rucksack, which requires some rather deceitful actions to steal if you ask me. And before you wonder, yes, I am absolutely sure that that is where I left it that very morning as I had deliberated wearing it that day and decided to save it for the evening. Regrettably, these things happen, and after hastily reporting it to reception to deal with tomorrow, put it out of my mind so that we could continue to enjoy the day.
Despite being a little low on customers, the restaurant that we chose for the big bday dinner was sublime. I mean seriously top quality stuff for seriously acceptable prices. It was an Argentinian restaurant (I see a theme forming here...) so, naturally, we ordered big slabs of meat and accompanying red vino. Everything from the decor to the service to the food was excellent. I could not have been happier that it all turned out ok!
Michael pussied out of pudding on account of being "too full"... come on man, it's your BIRTHDAY! Who doesn't want cake on their birthday?! Obviously I ordered the brownie. Thank god I did. It was the best fricking brownie of my life (I hope you understand the gravity of this statement). It was the perfect cross-breed of a fondant and brownie, in other words, soft and chewy and gooey, and served with the BEST possible complementing flavour of ice-cream imaginable, vanilla and caramel studded with whole pecans. Honestly, I would pay an extravagant amount of money to have that plate of food on tap.
I hope you enjoyed that little slice of food porn. It actually turned out for the best that Michael had chosen not to order pud as the wonderful little restaurant presented him with one regardless, and a very large tasty one at that!
With our food babies we waddled out of the restaurant and fell in to a cab to hit Hotel Habita rooftop bar for some drinks and a boogie. The place was full of Mexicans getting geared up for a big night of their own celebrations, creating a great atmosphere for us. At 11pm, the music was turned down as the crowd started shouting "Viva Mexico" over and over again, whilst fireworks exploded all over the city lighting up the sky from every direction. It was immense. The DJ was on top form and Michael and I were putting out our best moves. It was the perfect way to end a birthday evening.
Tuesday:
After a very long and frustrating conversation involving staff from hotel security; reception; the bar; the cleaner herself, and a poor fellow hotel resident, in an attempt to communicate what should have been a fairly simple conversation, it became blindingly obvious that the hotel had no interest in helping me recover my necklace, and simply wanted to abdicate themselves of any responsibility. So off we went.
Mexico City's street names are all named after places in the world (very cool if I may say so), which gave Michael and I a fun little morning mission!
Due to Independence Day, Tuesday was also a bank holiday and the streets were all cordoned off to pedestrians, which made exploring that bit easier. There was a huge police and army presence to control the crowds, which obviously provided me with the perfect picture opportunity!
We visited the famous and very beautiful Chapultepec Castle (along with hundreds of others), which is home to a lot of history and provides incredible views out over the city.
The 360 degree views that the castle enables makes you realise how truly vast Mexico City is, as the buildings back far up on to the mountains and volcanoes in the distance. Also, it was interesting to us how clearly you could pick out the more developed and upscale parts of the city. Avenue Reforma in particular stood out.
Both Michael and I agree that we could put up with living in the castle. I mean, it has its flaws, but we could make do. (We wish). The architecture, atrium, gardens and fountains combined make the place really rather spectacular, and the care taken to maintain it is evident every where you look.
We walked back to our hotel along Avenue Reforma, which is a very nice long straight street lined with palm trees, interspersed with roundabouts housing grand statues. One thing that you cannot fail to notice in Mexico City is how awful the road systems are, with traffic lights missing at busy intersections, resulting in both cars and pedestrians engaging in a very dangerous samba dance!
A short evening stroll and light dinner were in order after our few days of indulgence. It wasn't long before we hit the hay and I was dreaming of our next pit-stop, Cancun, and the heat I was so desperate for.
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