Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
¡Hola!,
So, our course starts tomorrow and from what we hear it is a pretty intense two weeks so we thought we'd do a quick update before we get into the first step of (mis)teaching a generation of Mexicans.
On Monday we went to Xochimilco. This is the furthest south of the centre we've been and has a beautiful network of canals. We took a boat out and after we had been given our two options decided to go for just an hour instead of 6 hours(!) The canals were really picturesque and, we thought, peaceful until we realised that Mexicans aren't just restricted to land when trying to constantly sell you stuff. We had a lot of boats coming up to us during the hour, trying to sell us flowers, chicken, or hold on to our boat while playing music. Other than that it was really cool, and there were quite a few huge Mexican famalies making a day of it so we got to listen to the music boats. That night we went to El Diez again for massive steaks and, a hailstone shower. It is the rainy season over here so it is really hot and sunny for the majority of the day, then once a day it will suddenly pelt down with rain for 15 minutes and then become sunny again - but this night it hailed instead. And everyone seemed to love it. We were trying to work it out, but I guess you wouldn't care so much if you knew a thunderstorm would only last 15 minutes - instead of in England when you'd think "oh God, will this ever end?!"
Tuesday, we went back to Chapultepec Park to go to the Archealogical Museum to see more stuff on the Maya and Teotihuacan which we really wanted to see after the pyramids. After that we went to Polenco for a drink. We're still investigating different areas and bars, and this area appeared quite swanky until we went to a bar where beers were 80p and people were ordering bottles of whisky and like 8 coke's for each person's round. Sar said it would be a bad idea, but I couldn't help but get a tequilla - which was a massive mistake. I guess even if your in tequilla country, if you go to a cheap bar it's not suddenly gonna taste amazing - and I sipped instead of downed it :(
We went to Coyoacan on Thursday "The Place of Coyotes" which is a place we definitely want to go back to. It's a gorgeous little town and we went to Leon Trotsky's and Frida Kahlo's houses which have now been turned into museums. Another place we really want to go back to is San Angel where we went to the street markets on Saturday. Well, Sar wants to go back a lot more so she can buy earrings and colourful cushion covers?!
And today - we went back to the Zocolo. All the museums are free on Sunday's so we went to the Templo Mayor Museum which was really cool and based around the central Aztec pyramid which stood before the Spanish destroyed it. This, and all the museums I want to come back to when I can actually speak Spanish because there is not a word of English in any of them! Here we also got some really good views of the city from the top floor of the Torre LatinAmericano building.
The Spanish is coming on, and we feel confident going into a cafe and ordering food. Sarah's doing a lot better than me! I'm going along with my technique that I know what should logically be the next part of the conversation. So, if I order steak, whatever Spanish they throw at me I know I need to say "medion" - if I'm buying something at a shop I know, whatever Spanish they throw at me, I need to say "si" and they will pack it in a bag. I'm just wondering how long I can last before I make a massive mistake!...
Hope you're all well. We'll try and put some photos up now.
Oh and lastly, as I'm listening to Michael Jackson as I'm writing this, another thing about this city is that people sell CD's on the tube - which they advertise by putting a huge speaker in their backpack and playing it out to the whole carriage. So here for the last two weeks whenever your on the tube you get Jacko blasted out to you during your journey...awesome.
Adios x
- comments