Currency: Pesos (13 Pesos = 1 US Dollar)

Cheapest form of transportation: Subway for 2 pesos

• Expect the subway to be crowded and hot.  Also, expect people to constantly be selling a whole range of things in the subway cars.

Bring raincoats because it rains everyday (at least in September).

The Anthropology Museum is huge so plan to be in it for a day or more.

Go to Xochimilco (it´s worth it), but if you do, bring a group of people.

Pay after ordering and eating meals in any establishment, even street vendors.

Learn Spanish!

Things we liked:

Deenaree´s list…

• Food: Tamales
• Experience: Exploring the Teotihuacan Pyramids
• Something(s) to remember: Great hosts, mild weather, and lots of history and culture

Ben´s list…

• Food: Tortas
• Experience:  Exploring the Teotihuacan Pyramids
• Something to remember: The hot subway rides

Tamales

In describing the cuisine that we encountered, it is probably best to present the heirarchy of Mexico City´s eateries.  This would start with common street vendors.  Street vendors are armed with anything from full sidewalk stands that are permanent and are essentially small buildings without water or electricity, to tamales being sold from black plastic garbage sacks.  Most popular are tacos (we will get to those in a minute), tortas (those too!), hot dogs and quesadillas.  We were told, as a general rule, to avoid these stands at all costs as you could never be quite sure which disease you may contract from these unclean germ kingdoms.  However, one of our Couchsurfing hosts knew of a particularly good quesadilla joint that was known to be safe and quite appetizing, and we partook one evening for dinner.  Of course quesadillas are not two tortillas with American cheese smothered between as we would expect.  Here, they look like giant ravioli if you are Ben or homemade Hot Pockets if you are Deenaree.  Raw tortilla dough is filled with ingredients (not necessarily cheese), closed and deep fried.  It is safe to say they are not good for the choleserol, but quite tasty.

Market vendor

A step up from your typical street vendor is your market food vendors.  These are stalls at the local market which primarily serve as restaurants.  Food is about the same price as at street vendors, but a little more reliably clean.  We ate a morning breakfast at one of these vendors in Mercado Merced.  Mercado Merced is the largest market in Mexico City and is astoundingly huge.  Everything seems to be sold there and from the moment we got off the subway, we did not once find its bounds.  We settled on a restaurant that had a cute little girl doing the marketing, trying to entice people to come inside.  Once there, we decided to order a gordita (because it looked appetizing on the fryer) and a huarache (because every stall seemed to have them).  It turns out gorditas are like tortilla sandwiches, except the tortillas are almost as thick as pancakes.  A huarache is basically a Mexican pizza on a thick tortilla with meat, cheese and salsa toppings.  Both were delicious, and of course fried.

Tortas

Taco de Ojo

The final rung below a full-fledged restaurant is a cafe.  Cafes are in permanent buildings with water and electricity, but serve informal, inexpensive cuisine.  They are safer than the other options, but slightly more expensive as well.  One of our favorites was La Torta Brava, in the center of the city, right next to Zocalo.  Their specialties are tortas, which are basically sub sandwiches on hoagie rolls with local meats and cheeses for filling.  They also make delicious gringas, which are the similar to gorditas, but they use the regular tortillas instead of the thick ones.  Another favorite was our host’s recommended taco place in the city.  As may have guessed by now, tacos are not ground beef, cheese, lettuce and tomatoes.  Tacos at this shop come in two varieties: standard tacos and rico tacos.  Standard tacos are filled with the meat of your choice and a selection of half-a-dozen toppings like beans, cheese, potatoes, salsa and cacti.  The rico tacos are smaller, cheaper and stranger.  Your rico tacos are filled with meat only on a small corn tortilla.  Your selection of meats is what makes these interesting.  On top of the standard pork or beef, it is possible to order tripe, intestine, tongue, brain or eye.  You can even order a combination!  The beef eye tacos are particularly delectable.

As our time ends in Mexico City, we have had interesting and delicious experiences with the food in Mexico City.  Some food has been new, some unexpected, some enjoyed, and some not.  We have covered much of the local cuisine in Mexico City and know there is plenty more to find on our next trip.  Above all, we are certain that the only things we were quite clear about coming here, we only now truly understand.

We were told that the event starts the night before with the president´s speech at 11:00 p.m.  We arrived to the semi-crowded center early at 4:00 and listened to the bands playing and immersed ourselves in red, green, and white.  Everyone, but us, were in their Independence Day garb.  Mexican flag colors and ¨Viva Mexico¨ were painted on faces, sombreros, fake wigs, and clothes.  Deenaree got a kick out of the little children in traditional Mexican costumes, including this little boy with sombrero and fake mustache to top it off. 

As the hours passed in the center, rain poured.  We thought about going back to the hotel room and coming to the square later, but decided to wait it out until sunset.  When the sun set, we were excited to reap the benefits of our wait.  Magically, as if someone somewhere had flipped on an imaginary switch,  the buildings around the square lit up like it was Christmastime.  Faces of famous Mexican historical figures and a giant eagle and serpent were brilliantly illuminated for all to observe.  It didn´t matter that we were nearly soaked to the bone, we excitedly took in the splendor and shot some pictures. 

At 11:00, the Mexican president spoke.  We watched him on our tv in the hotel room because it had gotten chilly outside.  We couldn´t understand what he said, but we heard him passionately say ¨Viva Mexico¨three times before waving the flag in front of a cheering crowd.  Then, there were fireworks and we stood on our balcony to watch them. 

In the morning, crowds lined the street under our balcony.  The location of our hotel, we learned, put us in a perfect spot to watch the parade.  It was a military parade that lasted almost two hours and included a grand display of military aircraft flying overhead every few minutes.  Although we were not Mexican citizens, we felt very fortunate to have been close observers to such a proud day for many.

While we explored and took pictures, we saw a mangy beagle coming towards us.  We attempted to hide the tortilla bag and shoo the dog away, but the smelly beast continued to follow us.  Every few feet, we took turns shooing the dog, but it followed us until we resigned to the fact that she was our new travel companion.   When it was time to climb the Pyramid of the Sun, the biggest pyramid of them all, we assumed that this was the end of the road for her.  However, as we climbed the steep steps, so did she.  We found relief when the security guards on the middle level caught her attention and played with her.  Maybe we have lost her!

Happy with our newfound freedom, we walked around this level to take some scenic pictures of the valley.  A few minutes later, we saw her running towards us.  It looked like she was there to stay.  She even climbed all the way to the top of the pyramid with us and watched as Ben tried to jump off (just kidding).  As you can see, she became a constant fixture in our Teotihuacan pictures. 

Coming down the pyramid was a terrifying ordeal for Deenaree who chose to cling to the makeshift railing in order to control the tremors she felt at such a high altitude.  The dog skillfully tried to maneuver her way from step to step, but came crashing straight down the last set providing laughs for Ben and the security guards who witnessed this from the bottom.

We continued walking down the long avenue to the last giant structure, the Pyramid of the Moon.  At this point, all three of us were exhausted, but we decided to go up anyway.  Our four-legged friend climbed with us and paused when we paused.  When we finally got to the top, we rested and enjoyed our rewards; breathtaking views for us and a couple of the tortillas for her.  After all, we had earned this.

Our only previous experience with Lucha Libre was through trailers for the Jack Black movie Nacho Libre and our quest to purchase souvenier masks on a previous trip to Baja California.  We were quite aware that it is a relatively popular pastime in Mexico and were intrigued to see what it was all about.

Our night started with a security search when we entered the Arena Mexico which resulted in the confiscation of our camera.  So, no photos to show for our experience and butterflies in our stomach during the event, wondering if we would get our camera back in one piece (we did).  We were led inside by “Acomodores” who showed us to better seats than we purchased for “a good tip”.

Arena Mexico was the venue for the matches, which is near the center of Mexico City.  The arena is oldish looking, with plenty of character to go with chipped paint and worn floors.  The seats in each section were colored differently to aid in finding your seat, which was not helpful to us in the least as no section numbers were provided.  The upper sections were cordoned off from the bottom level by 4 foot chain link fences, surely to slow any madman who gets a bit overexcited by the action in the ring.  The arena was quite small by US standards and probably held 8,000 spectators, although we were going to a lesser event and there were probably less than 4,000 in attendance.  The arena reminded Ben of a dollhouse sized version of Madison Square Garden.

The showcase for the evening consisted of six matches, leading up to the grand finale.  Perhaps the most entertaining match of the evening was a 3 on 3 match (plus one enano in a monkey costume) that seemed to feature one team of devils against a team of quite feminine men.  The leader of the feminine team, Maximo, was quite beloved by the audience.  He was sporting hot pink tights and a pink mohawk, and it is safe to say he is not on steroids.  He prances and dances and is known for humiliating his opponets by kissing them right before the final pin.  The match was hard fought, with the team of devils beating the feminine guys early on.  But near the end, all of the devlis were spectacularly thrown out of the ring and taking a beating, when out of nowhere the enano dressed as a monkey launched himself onto one of the unsuspecting devils for the final blow.  The crowd went wild, Maximo executed his kiss and the devils were vanquished.  Our night was over, but not before we were provided with a fascinating look into Mexican pop culture.