Mexico City's (Hidden) Treasures

An airline magazine article featured 5 quiet green spots in the city. Fortunately, the article did not include the secret garden in San Angel, so it can stay a bit of a secret. Over time, I've visited 4 of them. A pretty one is Plaza Gomez Feria, situated in a village neighborhood, whose street names refer to well-known painters. You'd never know you were in 25Mil Mexico City.

Next door is the Mixcoac quarter, which features a handsome church, which I failed to find. To compensate, I came across one of the many verdant courtyards behind high walls, in which some D.F. people are privileged to live. Wouldn't I like to have that key ...

A recurring pleasure in this city is to discover architectural details - of just about any period in the 19th and 20th century -which make you marvel, or smile. How about this 70's (?) letter box-cum-apartment bell/intercom system? So often, my eyes catch some such little treasure, but I don't capture it on camera.

Summer rain in Mexico

The most exciting thing on my routine commuter trip to Texcoco / CIMMYT - apart from being able to see Popo, the volcano, fuming - is the railroad crossing near the airport.  Once in a while, a very, very long cargo train moves slowly across the completely unprotected crossing, whilst the cars left, right, and center get ready to storm across first once the last cargo wagon has passed. 

As I write, a thunderstorm leaves its mark on Mexico City. T'is the rainy saison in Mexico, so a trip to Guarnevaca, the city of eternal spring, was a wet one. A friend of mine and I dropped into the local hacienda restaurant, enjoyed a Sunday pre-lunch drink whilst sitting under an awning, watching the rain wet the garden (and the peacocks). After a good half hour, we were taken to our table across the garden (under those parasols over there) and digested a very good lunch. Guernavaca is nothing to write home about, it's a pretty ugly city, nonetheless surrounded by beautiful hilly countryside, lying in an expansive valley, which you drive down from in serpentine fashion, coming from Mexico City. The pass between the two cities lies 3100 meters high.

Traffic, traffic, traffic, that's Mexico City, if you want to get around. If you stay in Condesa (where I live), no traffic to speak of (but the Thu-Fri-Sat bridge and tunnel crowd driving in to have some fun, blocking the avenues, as they have their cars valet-parked; I've yet to understand where all those cars are placed; somehow, the valets manage. Virtually every bar (!) has valet-parking). But if you want to go some other part of the city - generally there's a bit or a lot of traffic any day of the week. If 500,000 of the 25 million inhabitants want to move, I suppose that's enough to jam the roads a little. 

There you have it, endless clouds hovering over the endless city. Life goes on. The street sellers sell, the commuters hop into small buses at every corner, the metro runs (I've never yet hopped onto it) and the cars jamboree.

(First) Voyage to India

It's been a whirlwind tour of two states (Bihar and Madyhar Pradesh) in India and Delhi in between. There is so much, which the road movie I've stitched together does not get across:  The street noise (lot's of honking, like in Cairo really), how people move, the dare-devil driving in traffic, traffic, traffic and of course, the food, most of which I thoroughly enjoyed (the yoghurty stuff reminded me of Turkey-Iran, it's a vegetarian haven, the spiciness seems unique ...). I joined CIMMYT management in a tour of two of three research stations, which will become part of the Borlaug Institute of South Asia, a joint venture with the Government of India. India is the world's second largest producer of wheat. I do hope you enjoy the travelogue video (I apologize about the low resolution, but could not upload a higher quality version).

El Cairo

Cairo .... ; until May 2012, the closest I had gotten to this magical city was a Paul Temple adventure: The Sullivan Case, during which the Temples flew (!) to Cairo with a seaplane via Italy. I arrived with Lufthansa at 3 am in the morning. A huge airport, huge roads leading to it and a huge highway, which takes you into the centre. Two fishermen were working on the day's catch on the enormous bridge, which takes you across the Nile. When I arrived at the hotel, opposite the Goethe Institut, an all white villa in the middle of beige - that being Cairo's essential colour - a troupe of workers were polishing the lobby marble. No wonder, because this lobby was busy all day and evening, a place to meet and greet, an Arabian bazaar! Cairo's beige - dirty, bright, faded, gone - distinguishes it from Mexico City's more colorful hues, but otherwise it's just a big, with as much traffic and street life - and a dry climate.

After the first day of work and a good night's sleep, I woke up at 6, so I thought (it was 5 am), got dressed and walked through the lovely quarter, full of fascinating architecture, sleepy kiosk owners, straying cats and road sweepers, to the Nile, which was just waking up, all hazy. I didn't see much more of the city, but the movie attests to a road trip 2 hrs south to an agricultural research station, which we undertook on my third day there.

We rode on the eastern, deserty side of the Nile, as that was the faster route. Cairo did not want to end, but at some point, after passing the prison, where apparently Mubarak was held for a while, we did hit the desert - which contained brick factories with their high smokestacks. The desert looks just like the one around Abu Dhabi. Finally we came to the Nile again and crossed it, to enter its fertile surroundings. I hope to be there again!

Tiempo volcano

An odd feeling, driving along a toll road to work and watching an active volcano, which is spewing ash to the other side. 2400 m high Mexico City is surrounded by a more or less rectangular mountain range, which includes the Popo(catepetl).

Popo means 'the behind' in German. Popocatepl Square is one of my favorite places in Condesa, wish I could live there! But that is beside the point, when you drive along, watching white smoke rise from this 5000+ m high volcano; which makes you think of the unfathomable forces of nature, so much more powerful than we can imagine, despite our centuries of tampering with her (or it).Live web cam from the volcano