mexico city, the heart of the aztec empire

monestary ruins
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culture on top of culture

mexico city is roughly-mixed blend of three main cultures: the aztecs who founded the city, the spanish who conquered and dominated it, and the mexicans who kicked out the spanish and are even now defining who they are as a mixture of the previous two cultures. you can see that blend everywhere you go.

the zócalo (spanish for "main plaza") is a perfect example of this. what dominates most is the gigantic spanish cathedral at one end and the national palace at the other end, spanish and mexican cutlures squarely facing off at each other. and just off to one side is the recently excavated foundations of the ancient aztec temple major, showing various layers of construction peeled back to reveal the top of the second of seven temples built there.

juan and benjiman corona
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surrounding these buildings and running for miles in several direction is a huge outdoor mercado, a flea-market style market with all the hustle and bustle of tens of thousands of shoppers and hawkers. this market has been happing very nearly on this same spot for over a thousand years. one gets a sense that the construction has changed, but the people have carried on as they always have.

we meet with the corona family

janina, rachel, and i all arrived at mexico city together, but rachel had to fly back to the UK. that left janina and i on our own, and she quickly made contact with the three brothers she and rachel had met on the ferry from baja california. sure, they said, we would be more than happy to host you for a visit.

diner in the palace of tiles
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and what amazing hosts they were! louis was busy but juan and benjamin (pronounced ben-HA-meen) had time to give us three days of whirlwind tours across mexico city.

day one was mexico university and its amazing murals and sculpture. on the edge of the university they showed us an amazing area of a natural lava bed surrounded by concrete standing stones. everywhere you go in mexico you can find lovers making out in public spaces, but this is even more true of the university, perhaps because love in a topic you can major in here.

aztec snake goddess
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we then swung by the house of Dolores Olmedo, a patron of diego rivera and frido kahlo, two of mexico's most famous artists. the house has been converted into a museum and gallery and was beautiful to behold. the grounds were roamed by peacocks and xolos, a rare hairless mexican dog that dates back to the aztecs. the museum has many fine examples of frida´s and diego´s works, and since that visit i have come to appreciate her art much more than before.

monestary ruins
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we followed this with a visit to plaza garibaldi, famous for its attraction of hundreds and hundreds of mariachi musicians in bands of four to twelve or more who will play you and your lover or friend any song you like for a low price. we had drinks at a famous cantina on the plaza and were serenaded with a dozen mariachi songs, some of which i even knew, like la cucaracha, la bamba, and the one that goes "ai, yai yai yai!" in descending tone.

on the second day we

the embarcedero boats in mexico city
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re were whisked off to the canals in the south side of the city. yes, canals. mexico city, when ruled by the aztecs, was a small island in a large lake connected to the mainland with three main bridges. over the years almost all of this lake has been landfilled and built upon, leaving just a one small swampy mudflat and a system of canals. these canals are a popular weekend getaway for the locals, and you can rent a garishly-painted flat-bottom barge by the hour and a guy with a pole pushes you along venice-style. what a treat! as you cruise along smaller boats pull along side you to offer goods a services. jewley punts with sem precious stones, taquerilla punts with stoves on-board selling tacos and quisedillas, even band punts with mariachi or marimaba bands willing to play you a song. neighboring barges contained romantic couples, families unpacking picnik basics for a day out, or packs of colleges kids ripping it up with bear and booze. it was very fun in a very silly way.

ancient hairless aztec dogs
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day three we zipped out to the edge of the city, where we explore a massive public forest. in the middle of the forest stands the ruins of an old monastery, complete with underground tunnels to explore.

after this was a visit to mexico's great city park, where we were able to talk our way into the water temple by claiming we were art students studying diego's murals.

we finished this day off with a visit to the national anthropology museum. this building alone would take several days to visit, it having a dozen rooms each exploring in delpth one of mexico's many ancient cultures. we limited our visit to the aztec room, where i met and fell in love with the goddess Coatlicue, she of the earth, fertility, and death. her statue was found just a few meters from the famous "aztec calander" (which isn't a calander at all), and they are the only two objects found in that area.

ancient hairless aztec dogs
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i really enjoyed staying with the coronas and meeting and talking in depth with juan and benjamin. it's pretty rare even in the states for me to meet people with such similar tastes as mine. juan and i have read many of the same books, seen the same movies, and even had similar tastes in music, especially given that my taste in books runs from science to scifi to history to philosophy to magical realism to politics. we even agree on the difference between certain books and the movies made from them; for instance carl sagan's contact (great book, horrid movie), like water for chocolate (both book and movie excellent), and the lord of the rings (great books, ok movies). benjamin was impressed to meet us as well, i think. mexico city is not the best city in the world to support sensitive, liberal, artistic, intellectual thinkers, and i do hope he and his brother get a chance to bust out and come visit "alta california" sometime soon.

snake head at the base of the aztec temple
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moving on

janina had plans to be on a farm near chiapas, and i needed to see oaxaca, so we parted ways. i stayed two more days in mexico city exploring the aztec temple and museum and the great mercado.

mexico city is certainly worth exploring again.

click "more photos" to see a lot more photos, or visit  my flickr page for all my photos.