We left last Friday around 11 at night and "slept" on the bus all night. The program (and trip) coordinators decided it wasn't necessary to give us the itinerary till we were on the bus, so we got the fun little surprise that we were actually going to a little town before heading to el DF (Distrito Federal, like District of Columbia). It's called Taxco, in the state of Guerrero. It's exciting to be able to say I've been in this place I've read about. Anyways, it's an adorable colonial town that used to have a ton of mining, and I think still does--it's famous for silver production. We went to a fake mine (cuz the real one is too dangerous for tourists), took a tour of the city, and just wandered around. Actually, I can't really remember what we did, so...picture time!
In the morning, Jessi, Eva, Christie, and I went looking for an OXXO (the store that's generally stuck to gas stations-- either that or 7-11). It was so neat just to get to see the city a little bit on our own.
Here's roomieface and I in the main plaza...a necessity for any Latin American town. In the background are some adornos that have been hanging up all around Mexico for the past few weeks. Tuesday was independence day (hold your horses, I'm getting there) so in the weeks leading up to it, there was a great increase in the amount of red and green decorations.
This next picture isn't exactly an essential part of this weekend, but it's amusing...That night in Taxco, we were on our own for finding dinner, so we wandered around again and found this pizza place, where we ordered pizza al pastor (including the same meat that's in the tacos I'm obsessed with and pineapple). There was some special with a large pizza and 2.5 liter coke that we ordered, and between like 7 of us, it cost $3 USD a pop. This is what they meant when they said "large":
Oh yeah... we finished that.The next day we went to Mexico City. I think these pictures are going to be out of order, but whatevs. Something else we did (that wasn't in the city, hence my disclaimer) was go to this town called Xochimilco to ride some Mexican gondola-type things. Interrupting myself, I really like saying Xochimilco...and just seeing street signs pointing to towns with crazy Nahuatl names. So it involved floating around for an hour, maybe, and the whole time, vendors were floating by trying to get us to buy food, blankets, mariachi services, etc. We took them up on the latter. Quality entertainment, I must say. Here are all the empty boats waiting to be taken out.
We also went to Teotihuacan, which was so freaking exciting for the LASP major in me. This was another thing that I've read about for years and I finally got to see it! Trivia time: Teotihuacan was the largest prehispanic city in the Americas. haha, anyways, here I am on top of a pyramid:
Here's a fun tidbit: the pyramid behind me, although it doesn't look like it so much in this picture, is the same shape as the mountain behind it. From certain angles, it looks like the mountain is the pyramid's shadow.The night of the 15th, we went to this place called Coyoacan. We were going to do the grito in the main plaza of Mexico City, but our lovely coordinators decided that would be too difficult, dangerous, whatever, so no. Coyoacan basically looked like the state fair, but with more red and green and better food. I had tamales. Yum! Eva, Jessi, and I got to the plaza at 11:03, so we missed the grito, which was very disappointing. I guess that just means I have to come back to Mexico next September. Here we are in the plaza:
Back in el DF, on the actual independence day, we went to el centro historico, or "el centro histerico," as one of my professors called it. There was a military parade, where we couldn't really see much, but oh well. Mom, I thought you might enjoy this one. Enlarge to see why...
Here's the Zocalo, the big plaza where the president comes out and does some famous yelling at midnight of the 16th. AKA where we were not:
In the same block as the Zocalo are some Aztec ruins-- crazy. I had learned that when the Spaniards came in 1510 (I think???), they destroyed the Templo Mayor and built a cathedral on top of it, but it was really neat to be standing in the center of this city and see both the ruins and the church side by side.
I think the last notable thing we did was go to the Anthropology Museum, apparently one of the best museums in the world. My favorite part was this amazing Aztec calendar. Swoon!
So that was what we did in Mexico... I hope that makes up for not posting anything for a month. :)
Ready for the Spanish leccioncita? I'm not sure I have the definition quite right, but I just learned the phrase "que chafa," which, I think, if talking about a product, means "how cheap," as in poorly made (or a knockoff). Or I think it can be used as a response to a situation or whatever, meaning "lame."
Welp, that's all for now. So far today I've just been laying around...and it's glorious. Last night I went to my friend Tere's housewarming party (unfortunately, Spanish doesn't have an equally cute word). It involved everyone hanging out on the floor cuz she doesn't have furniture yet :), Uno, and lots of Spanish, which is really nice because I feel like I'm around so much English, mostly because of my international friends. Today some of the same people and I are going camping in this place called Tala. Should be interesting, especially considering the fact that I haven't been camping in a really long time. And right before, I think Edgar's going to come over to see if we can figure out how to make chilaquiles, a food I believe I raved about in the last post. In other news, the second parcial is coming to a close, AKA this week and next are going to be filled with exams. Excellent. Bueno, thanks for reading, I'll be impressed by those that got all the way through--sorry I'm a rambler. De todos modos, I hope you're doing well! Let me know what exciting things are going on in the US. Love!
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