Musings on Mexico City

I've been going back and forth to Mexico city for about a month or so now and a few things have really jumped out at me. First off, I can't handle the water, period. I've gotten sick 2 out of the four weeks I was there. Once from drinking horchata with ice (I know, super dumb) and once from either a green salad, or a fish taco that turned out to be a ceviche taco. So thanks to my culinary escapades, and Moctezuma's brutal revenge, I have bought cipro there twice and let me tell ya it's expensive there. The pharmacies don't take my insurance, and it's been between $18-$30 depending on where I wet to get it and if I bought a 7 day or an 8 day course.



The second big thing that I've noticed is that in Mexico city the media images of beauty are completely different from how the average person looks. This isn't a difference in degree, this is a difference in ethnicity. Most of the people you see have the more indigenous look, and are a little shorter with darker skin and darker hair. All of the women in ads are tall, fair skinned, and much more European looking. I was really surprised about this, and I guess that this isn't a new thing for Mexico, but it must be tough being told that the standard of beauty is unattainable because of your ethnicity.



And finally the driving in mexico city. I've seen some interesting traffic in my travels, from high speeds on the freeways in germany and the south of france, to the ridiculousness of naples, bombay, and now mexico city. Mexico driving is somewhere between naples and bombay. People pay little or no attention to lights, stop signs and lanes, but they're also not as agressive as the neapolitans. This isn't to say that the mexican drivers are without the latin machismo, it's just that they're more civil than their neapolitan counterparts. The indians in mumbai are nicer, but the roads are more chaotic with all the rickshaw cabs buses, and occasional overloaded tempo. Hopping in a cab there is definitely an experiance and there are all sorts of little things to get used to. There are the little things like, one way streets just dictate the direction your car should face, not the direction of travel. and on busy streets if someone misses a turn they have no compunction about reversing till they get back to where they wanted to be. All in all, I'm really glad I take cabs when I'm down there, cause a rental car would be pretty high up on the list of bad ideas.