Veracruz and Mexican food

Last weekend I went to Veracruz, which was absolutely beautiful and relaxing. Since there is apparently only one hostel in the city and because it has the absolute worst reviews of any hostel that I’ve ever read, I couldn’t bring myself to stay there. So I looked for deals on Expedia, and found a 3-star hotel for $67/night. I decided what the hell, so I booked it. Friday afternoon (the archives closed at 1pm so I didn’t feel at all guilty), I went to the bus station and bought a ticket for the next bus to Veracruz. Unfortunately, it didn’t leave until 4:30. It was only 1:30, so I spent 2 hours putzing around, drinking café, reading my novel. Then I went to the sala de espera. It turns out, though, that I was in the wrong waiting room – despite the fact that there was a sign for the bus company that I was traveling with there. After I was informed this by a driver of another company, I hauled ass across the bus station, only to just miss my bus. A lengthy exchange with a bus company manager resulted in my getting booked on the next bus (6:30 ugh!) for 50% of the ticket price. Due to these circumstances and bad weather and bad traffic, I didn’t get to my hotel in Veracruz until around 11pm. I decided to call it a night and start fresh the next day.

My friend Amber, who I met in Puebla at the hostel, and I had pre-arranged to meet the next morning for breakfast at a café called Samborcito (this is apparently a name that mocks the Mexican department store Sanborn’s). We both arrived at the scheduled time and had an absolutely delicious brunch of omelettes, muffins, papaya, a gorda negra (which is a type of Indian bread with black bean paste), coffee, glorious coffee, and veggies. Since I hadn’t had dinner the night before, I was ready to tuck in. After brunch, we went to the Aquarium, and then hopped on a bus to one of the “real” beaches further up the coast. We spent a fair amount of the day just walking on the beach, alternating that with sitting on the beach and drinking Mexican beer. We also had the experience of the Michelada, which is essentially beer mixed with lemonade and hot spices – refreshing upon first contact with the tongue but will burn the hell out of you on the way down. If you’re really thirsty, this is not what I recommend to quench your thirst. We ended the day at the Zocalo, had dinner there, and sat outside drinking, people watching, and chatting. The next day was more of the same, minus ending up at the Zocalo. I took a luxury bus back to Puebla in the afternoon, and got back feeling relaxed and refreshed – if a bit sunburnt.

This week has been good, if pretty quiet. The hostel is currently filled with annoying French couples. Even so, I have to admit that I really don’t want to go back to Mexico City tomorrow. I’ve really enjoyed being in Puebla with its paradoxical bustling tranquility. Research has gone well. I’ve met some great people here. I don’t get harassed too many times a day just because I’m a gringa and I’m traveling more or less on my own. I’ve eaten so well – so much cheese and mole poblano and salsa verde.

First Impressions of Puebla and a tribute to Quetzalcoatl

My last two evenings in DF were pretty uneventful. Mainly because at around 6:30pm on both Thursday and Friday it started thundering, lightening, and pouring down buckets of dirty, polluted Mexico City rain. Needless to say, this is not the kind of weather that inspires one to go out and do touristy things. And since I’ll be back in DF for another 2+ weeks, I’m not worried too much about it.

On Saturday morning I left Mexico City and came to the beautiful smaller city (about 2 million) of Puebla (also known as La Puebla de Los Angeles). Puebla is absolutely amazing. It reminds me of a Spanish city – maybe a bit of Sevilla – but with a Mexican twist or flare. It took me about two hours to get from the TAPO bus station in DF to the bus station in Puebla and another 15 minutes to get from there to my hostel. I immediately felt at home in Puebla because my taxi driver kept saying “vale.” (In case you don’t know, this is a very Spanish word that means ok. Spaniards use it ubiquitously, but if you’re friends with me you’ve probably also heard it.) I’ve never heard a Mexican say it before, so I felt that it was a good omen.

I arrived at my hostel (Santo Domingo) and discovered that I had a reservation this time and that the reviews weren’t lying about the rooms. My room is quite spacious. I have plenty of room to roll out my yoga mat, which I certainly didn’t in the YWCA. I also have my own bathroom with a shower and a sink. This has been my dream my whole hostelling life. If only the water ran hot instead of cold....

After unpacking a bit, I checked my email and then went and did some exploring. After a couple of hours I came back to use my private baño and consult my shitty guide book (which is so shitty I hadn’t bothered taking it with me earlier). That’s when I made my first friend of my trip: Guillaume. (Jaimie suggested that I hadn’t been making friends because I was putting out some sort of screw-off vibe since I’m in a good relationship place. I am in a good relationship place, but I just think the YWCA sucked.) So my new French friend and I made a pact to explore Puebla with his much better guidebook and to speak only Spanish to each other for the rest of the day. Gui was only in Puebla for yesterday and part of today, but since he’s doing an internship in Mexico City, I hope to see him again, once I’m back there in a couple of weeks. Anyway, we went back out and explored the Cathedral, the Zócalo, and the artist’s market. I found myself falling in love with the historic center of Puebla. I know I’m a dork, but it’s just so seventeenth and eighteenth century that I can’t help myself. After walking around for a couple of hours, having a couple of beers in the plaza, and walking around some more, we checked out one of the restaurants in Gui’s guide. I had some much spicier than anticipated food for dinner and a couple of Mexican beers. Delicious.

I got up relatively early today so that I could talk to Mark before he left Amsterdam for Freiberg, but somehow like ships in the night, we essentially missed each other. We only got to talk for a few minutes. Better than nothing. But I have to say that as much as I enjoy traveling, I’m pretty much over the whole being apart thing.

After a quick breakfast and a tragically weak cup of coffee, I decided to stop sulking and go out to Cholula. This proved to be a bit of an adventure. More so than getting to Puebla from Mexico City due to the inadequate signage at the bus stops and because I have the worst guidebook EVER (Seriously do not buy a Frommer’s guidebook. They suck! Pay the extra $7 for a LonelyPlanet.) It gives absolutely no instructions for traveling via bus around Colonial Puebla. After looking around on my own with no success for a bit, I asked some locals who pointed me in the right direction.

Once I arrived in Cholula I was overwhelmed. I thought that Puebla was full of churches, but Cholula allegedly has 365. There are so many churches of similar style that I could barely wrap my mind around it. Of course, Cholula is also home to the Great Pyramid. This is the widest pyramid in the world, although it’s hard to tell that now. This pyramid, dedicated to the worship of Quetzalcoatl, was almost two centuries old when it was razed by the Spanish conquistadors in the sixteenth century. And what better to build on top of what was once a Great Pyramid than a church. This one is the Nuestra Señora de los Remedios. (If you don’t have facebook, you can see pictures of this on my picassa site http://picasaweb.google.com/rachaelball ) After I got down from the top of the GP, I went through the archaeological zone. They actually allow you to go through one of the tunnels of the pyramid. I wouldn’t recommend it if you’re very much taller than I am or at all claustrophobic. It was a tight fit and a little bit on the creepy side. I eventually emerged back out into the light, climbed one of the smaller pyramid structures, and then watched a group of voladores (or flyers). I didn’t try to take any pictures of them, as I had limited success in capturing much when I’ve attempted to shoot them in the past. I ended up grabbing a bite to eat, and making my way back to Puebla.

So far, so good

Well, my trip got off to a pretty good start. I had a great time in Dallas. I flew through Dallas for the weekend on my way to Mexico because it was only about $30 more expensive than flying roundtrip through Columbus. Paying that extra $30 meant that I could go to my friend Shanda’s wedding and see Steve. I stayed with Steve, who, in case you don’t already know, was my college roommate for three years and has been one of my best friends for ten years now. He and I did a lot of growing together in our three years of living together, during one of which we had to share a bathroom – talk about a toiletry bomb – only strengthened our friendship. We haven’t lived together since he graduated OU and moved to the DFW area in 2002, yet somehow immediately, we fell back into many of our old roommate patterns. I have to say that his spare futon wasn’t as comfortable as the bed that I had in college, though...

Shanda’s wedding was beautiful. It was great to see her so happy and so in love with a guy who seems to be just as in love with her. It was my first time meeting Ryan, but I gave him my wholehearted seal of approval. And her dress was stunning! My girl Shanda and I have been friends for almost as long as Steve and I have. I met her my second year of college, when we were both working at Sears. Since we were both going to OU, both way too smart to be working with the other idiots who worked at Sears (with a few exceptions), and both were fun-loving, pretty girls, we got on like a house on fire from the start. It was also great to see our friend Justin. He, Shanda, and I used to go to OU football games together upon occasion. Despite the fact that he is a Republican, he and I can always talk football.

Other than the wedding, Steve ran my ass ragged. We went out to the clubs and did some dancing on Friday night. After Shanda’s reception, we went out for a repeat performance. We didn’t get home until after 4am. I know that I stayed out until 6am a fair amount in Madrid, but I never did it after going out so late and getting so little sleep the night before. I also only did it once in heels that are fierce as the ones that I wore to Shanda’s wedding. (Note: it is a bad idea to go out dancing in shoes that you have never worn before.) On Sunday, we had to go to an open house for a property that Steve has listed and to an awards reception for the gay chorus that Steve is a member of. Then I had to help Steve with his homework.

On Monday, it was off to Mexico. My flight into Mexico City was delayed by about half an hour and it took about another hour to get through passport control, but other than that no complaints. Then I got to my hostel, where it seems I had made my reservation for August 9- August 17 instead of August 4 – August 9. Fortunately, there was no problem, and they even had single rooms available. (I had initially had to book a bed in a 4 bedroom dorm when my dates were wrong.) So I feel a little bit better about the security of my stuff when I’m out of the room and I’m sure that my quality of sleep will be a little bit higher during the rest of my stay here. Last night it was interrupted by a sort of mini-protest that was taking place outside one of the high-end hotels that’s a couple of blocks down the street. It seems that some people are opposed to other people being rich... I didn’t really have a very good vantage point, but I could hear the people on the bullhorns. Not that I really wanted to. Besides the potential for frequent sleep interruption from ambient noise, the other real disappointment is that there’s no wireless internet available for guests here. That really sucks because I miss Mark, and I really prefer it when I’m at least able to chat and skype with Mark for a little bit most every day. And because I have an addiction to facebook. (I haven’t even had a chance to look at more than a few of Dave’s Bike Rally photos yet!! Ay!!)

Anyway, after I checked in, I went and did a little bit of walking around. I’m pretty close to several of the main tourist attractions of Mexico City, and I’d probably be more excited about that if I hadn’t seen them before and if I weren’t traveling alone. I’ve been here before, and then, and now, I don’t feel very comfortable in my skin in this city. I guess it’s got to do with the fact that like any city of over 20 million people there’s a lot of filth, pollution, and crime. And it’s a crime of a more violent nature than I ever worried about in Madrid and on a scale that I don’t worry about in Columbus. Not to mention that my guidebook is like a croaking Cassandra, warning me not to even travel on the metro by myself as a woman. I think also that I feel so unenthused right now because I was used to traveling alone, but then I got a little bit spoiled by the trips that Mark and I made to Niagara Falls and to NYC. However, I did cowgirl up and went for a walk down past the Palacio de Bellas Artes to the Cathedral, the Aztec Templo Mayor, and the Zocolo the first day that I was here, and I have/get to walk through the Alameda Park to get to the Archivo Histórico del Distrito Federal, where I’m doing my first bit of research. I put in my first few hours of work yesterday.

The most reliable internet that I’ve found is in a Starbucks pretty close to my hostel and in between there and the AHDF. I’m planning on having my morning coffee and breakfast there the next couple of mornings and checking my email and facebook then. Going to the archives without coffee proved brutal yesterday, and I’m not keen to repeat that process.

On Saturday morning I’ll be leaving for two weeks in Puebla, and I am actually very excited about that! I haven’t been before and it’s supposed to just be a stunning city. It’s chock full of churches and has one of the largest cathedrals in Mexico. I’m excited to eat mole poblano in the place where it was created, chiles en nogada (chiles in walnut sauce), and marzipan that has been manipulated into any sort of religious shape. Por favor! Por Dios! I am also definitely doing little side trips out to Cholula and to Tlaxcala. Plus, for research purposes, Puebla supplanted Mexico City in terms of theatrical activities for a few decades during the middle of the seventeenth century.

I’m still debating my trip to Veracruz and one to the silver city of San Miguel de Allende, as well. Each of these would essentially have to be two day, one night trips (unless research is going extremely badly). Thoughts?