After an entire month of loving on climate change all day, every day, the COP16/CMP6 climate conference in Cancun has finally come to its long-awaited end. As we all expected/feared, it didn't end neatly on the evening of Dec. 10 as the program suggested. Instead, it ran clear through Saturday until around 7 a.m. Three reporters (including moi) and a production team stayed behind to cover the conference throughout the night.
I had the extreme pleasure of fulfilling all my journalistic dreams and working on a video from an informal plenary session in which we edited out all the content with value and selected only the sound bytes where delegates praised and lauded Mexico and the COP16 President for the magnificent, marvelous, stupendous job she played in creating a "transparent and inclusive" environment throughout the negotiating process. As such, I didn't even really learn about what happened until I edited the translated copy of another reporter's stories on the final conclusions...a series of agreements called the Cancun Accords...Google it, I already forget it all. Bolivia provided the evening's entertainment by denouncing the entire process and all the agreements reached, although I think I missed the juiciest parts, because all the texts and Gchats I received from friends highlighted something interesting that I didn't see.
I was already tired throughout the day since on Thursday we stayed out until 3 a.m. getting tacos (we meaning everyone else, I tried to sleep in the car but failed). Then I got up at 8 to get to work by 10, and then stayed until nearly the next day. I believe I looked incredibly gorgeous after all that. Once we got back, I crashed, hung out by the pool and drank tequila with coworkers, got lunch, crashed again, and now I'm all clean and sparkly and ready to get my ACE OF BASE on!!!!!! That's right, the Swedes/Danes/Fins/(who knows?) you loved from 1992 are back and bigger than ever, performing at a free concert in the climate conference's village for civil society (i.e. us). I've decided that I will storm the stage and tackle them if they refuse to play the classics and try to impress us with some new album that no one wants to hear.
Now I have just a little over a week left in Mexico, and I may or may not hide in a Mayan pyramid and never come out.
Saturday, December 11, 2010
Saturday, December 4, 2010
Mexico's own climate conference
Things have started to balance out a bit as we all adjust to working together, working crazy hours, eating Chips Ahoy! for dinner and being paged like doctors at all hours of the day. There are good days and crazy days...like on Wednesday, when my first assignment wasn't until 6 p.m. and I got out of the office by midnight, or the time I had to cover 3 consecutive events (which means 3 videos, 3 text stories and 3 photo slideshows...which, thanks to the help of my news team, got done relatlively fast), or the time I spent 10 hours in a Playa del Carmen conference center watching bloggers, media experts and Mexico's most famous scientist ever, Mario Molina, sit in panel discussions.
The latter event was actually very interesting from a journalist point-of-view. The panelists talked about the role that media play in educating and influencing the public on climate change topics. Even in the climate stories I've written prior to the COP16, I struggled to find the delicate balance between celebrating efforts and initiatives and criticizing the fact that (surprise!) none of them have been implemented, or they don't reall work. Climate change is real, it is affecting us, and we must all change our lifestyles to lessen our impact, but how exactly does that translate to a run-of-the-mill news story whose purpose is not to preach or take a side?
Despite supposedly being the voice of an international conference filled with 25,000 participants and delegates from 193 countries, all of the stories that we cover at the COP16 news center have to do with the Mexican government. Really, I should feel stupid for being so surprised that a semi-official news center would actually just tow the national line, especially here. Every event is hosted or co-hosted by the Mexican government, and all of the interviews that are scheduled in advance are Mexican officials, scientists, environmentalists, you have it. But what is actually the most irritating is the quality of the website. We pour hours into making videos, photo slideshows and stories. The video and photo editors hardly eat or sleep because they spend all day in their freezing cold studios working, and the reporters are under pressure to file stories for an immediate turnaround. And then you look at the website, and you can't find things, or the organization is uninviting to random viewers, and it's disheartening to see that.
Anyway, that's my daily dose of bitching. It's Saturday, so I must be working!
The latter event was actually very interesting from a journalist point-of-view. The panelists talked about the role that media play in educating and influencing the public on climate change topics. Even in the climate stories I've written prior to the COP16, I struggled to find the delicate balance between celebrating efforts and initiatives and criticizing the fact that (surprise!) none of them have been implemented, or they don't reall work. Climate change is real, it is affecting us, and we must all change our lifestyles to lessen our impact, but how exactly does that translate to a run-of-the-mill news story whose purpose is not to preach or take a side?
Despite supposedly being the voice of an international conference filled with 25,000 participants and delegates from 193 countries, all of the stories that we cover at the COP16 news center have to do with the Mexican government. Really, I should feel stupid for being so surprised that a semi-official news center would actually just tow the national line, especially here. Every event is hosted or co-hosted by the Mexican government, and all of the interviews that are scheduled in advance are Mexican officials, scientists, environmentalists, you have it. But what is actually the most irritating is the quality of the website. We pour hours into making videos, photo slideshows and stories. The video and photo editors hardly eat or sleep because they spend all day in their freezing cold studios working, and the reporters are under pressure to file stories for an immediate turnaround. And then you look at the website, and you can't find things, or the organization is uninviting to random viewers, and it's disheartening to see that.
Anyway, that's my daily dose of bitching. It's Saturday, so I must be working!
Monday, November 29, 2010
Crazy times with Climate Change
After Cuetzalan began the first day of the rest of my life (ok, month). For those who don't know, I'm one of five reporters in the COP16 News Center, which is a semi-official function of Mexico's Foreign Affairs Ministry. The COP16 is the UN-organized conference where diplomats and delegates get together to not reach any binding agreements regarding greenhouse gas emissions, alternative energy, and programs to mitigate and adapt to the effects of man-made climate change (i.e. global warming). This year it's in Cancun!
For the first week and a half, our team of 10 (reporters, editors, translators and the like) met for 10 to 12 (or 13) hours a day to practice, practice, practice producing multimedia reports for our website. We stalked people on the street, in parks, in their offices, to produce somewhat mindless videos and written stories on climate change, mostly to practice our production skills and familiarize ourselves with the language of the business.
Last Wednesday (Nov. 23?), we flew out together to Cancun. We're staying at an all-inclusive resort at one of the best beach spot's in the Caribbean city. It's incredibly bizarre to wake up each morning dressed to impress, laptop strung across the shoulder, stress levels set to explode, and see a bunch of lobster red, overweight tourists in tank tops and flip flops enjoying the beach and buffet. Our first afternoon, at least, we got to join them. Since then, however, it's been hectic, and as today (Nov. 29) is the first official day of the conference, it's only going to intensify.
Sunday was a very go-go-go kind of day, but I enjoyed it. My production team (cameraman, camera assistant, photographer and slighty-nuts production assisant) and I were rushed out of our bedrooms without breakfast to head north up to an archeological zone, where who knows what was happening. Once we arrived, not even the security guards knew what was happening, but as we walked past the gates, the camera dudes went racing up a sandy hill to where a huge group of people was standing. I scurried along in my pretty gold flats as they filled with rocks and sand. When I got up, I saw that the leader of an indigenous Mixe community from Oaxaca was performing the ritual sacrifice of a wild turkey to bless the inauguration of a Foreign Affairs-organized campsite for NGO workers and indigenous groups participating in the COP16. In retrospect, it was a little psychotic of me to ask that the cameras cover the actual slaughter, because of course we couldn't put that in my video, but at the time the ridiculousness of it all made me hysterically amused. Luis, the photographer, has an excellent picture of the neck and head splayed across a rock.
After the butchering, the Mixe leader passed around cups of mezcal, and the Foreign Affairs Secretary poured some on the turkey like any proper gangster would do. We hung around for a while waiting for an official to grace us with his presence, and finally bolted back to Cancunmesse, a convention center and one of two headquarters for high-level talks and events. There, we dropped off the van and caught a COP bus to the Moon Palace Hotel, the other HQ and home to our News Center. Which is in a basement. The space is normally used for training and hiring service personnel for the hotel (like cleaning ladies, waiters, cooks, etc). To get to the bathroom, we essentially walk through their complex, and it's still silly to me that when I take a break from a story and rush to pee, I run past neatly dressed Yucatecos in squeaky white sneakers and crisp uniforms.
Today, I've been blessed with a 10:30 a.m. work call, which can only mean that I'll be in the office until 2 a.m.
Check out our stories here!
For the first week and a half, our team of 10 (reporters, editors, translators and the like) met for 10 to 12 (or 13) hours a day to practice, practice, practice producing multimedia reports for our website. We stalked people on the street, in parks, in their offices, to produce somewhat mindless videos and written stories on climate change, mostly to practice our production skills and familiarize ourselves with the language of the business.
Last Wednesday (Nov. 23?), we flew out together to Cancun. We're staying at an all-inclusive resort at one of the best beach spot's in the Caribbean city. It's incredibly bizarre to wake up each morning dressed to impress, laptop strung across the shoulder, stress levels set to explode, and see a bunch of lobster red, overweight tourists in tank tops and flip flops enjoying the beach and buffet. Our first afternoon, at least, we got to join them. Since then, however, it's been hectic, and as today (Nov. 29) is the first official day of the conference, it's only going to intensify.
Sunday was a very go-go-go kind of day, but I enjoyed it. My production team (cameraman, camera assistant, photographer and slighty-nuts production assisant) and I were rushed out of our bedrooms without breakfast to head north up to an archeological zone, where who knows what was happening. Once we arrived, not even the security guards knew what was happening, but as we walked past the gates, the camera dudes went racing up a sandy hill to where a huge group of people was standing. I scurried along in my pretty gold flats as they filled with rocks and sand. When I got up, I saw that the leader of an indigenous Mixe community from Oaxaca was performing the ritual sacrifice of a wild turkey to bless the inauguration of a Foreign Affairs-organized campsite for NGO workers and indigenous groups participating in the COP16. In retrospect, it was a little psychotic of me to ask that the cameras cover the actual slaughter, because of course we couldn't put that in my video, but at the time the ridiculousness of it all made me hysterically amused. Luis, the photographer, has an excellent picture of the neck and head splayed across a rock.
After the butchering, the Mixe leader passed around cups of mezcal, and the Foreign Affairs Secretary poured some on the turkey like any proper gangster would do. We hung around for a while waiting for an official to grace us with his presence, and finally bolted back to Cancunmesse, a convention center and one of two headquarters for high-level talks and events. There, we dropped off the van and caught a COP bus to the Moon Palace Hotel, the other HQ and home to our News Center. Which is in a basement. The space is normally used for training and hiring service personnel for the hotel (like cleaning ladies, waiters, cooks, etc). To get to the bathroom, we essentially walk through their complex, and it's still silly to me that when I take a break from a story and rush to pee, I run past neatly dressed Yucatecos in squeaky white sneakers and crisp uniforms.
Today, I've been blessed with a 10:30 a.m. work call, which can only mean that I'll be in the office until 2 a.m.
Check out our stories here!
Stupendous Spelunking in Cuetzalan
With my work on the COP16 News Center looming ahead, I made sure to make the most of my last weekend of freedom. Grant, Nick and I left DF at the splendid hour of 11:58 p.m. and headed 5 hours north to Cuetzalan, an ancient city in the state of Puebla. The name comes from quetzal, a beautiful bird whose peacock-like feathers were prized by the Aztecs. According to my 12 year old tour guide, quetzales are now extinct, but only since the 1980s. Way to go, cultural patrimony.
When we arrived around 5:30 a.m. to the posada, we awoke a sleeping man at the reception, who let us into a room with two double beds. Being a princess, I naturally got one to myself, but Nick was a little nervous that Grant would get the wrong idea, so in the morning, we went downstairs and asked for a triple.
We thought it would be obvious not to pay the full price on the double room, as we'd only slept in it for 3 hours. Wrong. We started bickering in Spanish with the lady at the front desk, who was like "hellz no," but fortunately Nick shifted approaches and asked gently if we couldn't reach a compromise. And it worked! Half price for the first night, and full price on a triple with ridiculously high ceilings and a bathroom with a shower head facing the toilet.
Later in the morning, we wandered around the tiny pueblo up steep streets and through a maze of market vendors.
Then we hired a 12-year-old gentleman to lead us down the highway, through a small annex town and out to Las Brisas, a beautiful waterfall whose natural wonder is amplified by the michelada (beer with spices) carts. 
All in all, the perfect way to spend my last sweet drop of freedom.
When we arrived around 5:30 a.m. to the posada, we awoke a sleeping man at the reception, who let us into a room with two double beds. Being a princess, I naturally got one to myself, but Nick was a little nervous that Grant would get the wrong idea, so in the morning, we went downstairs and asked for a triple.
We thought it would be obvious not to pay the full price on the double room, as we'd only slept in it for 3 hours. Wrong. We started bickering in Spanish with the lady at the front desk, who was like "hellz no," but fortunately Nick shifted approaches and asked gently if we couldn't reach a compromise. And it worked! Half price for the first night, and full price on a triple with ridiculously high ceilings and a bathroom with a shower head facing the toilet.Later in the morning, we wandered around the tiny pueblo up steep streets and through a maze of market vendors.
Then we hired a 12-year-old gentleman to lead us down the highway, through a small annex town and out to Las Brisas, a beautiful waterfall whose natural wonder is amplified by the michelada (beer with spices) carts. After Grant threw rocks at a hole in the waterfall's rock wall for a good 15 minutes, and after Nick skipped rocks with our guide's 10-year-old brother, the five of us went up and around to a second waterfall. Once we headed back into town and tipped our escorts, we went to a well-regarded restaurant across the narrow street from our posada. I thought I picked a winner when I ordered crepes with mushrooms, but it turns out, they had a different kind of mushroom in mind. They were long, chewy, earth-tasting strips in a blanket of crepe batter. At least the beers were cheap! 
On Sunday, we met up with Dario, who friends had recommended that I call about a spelunking excursion. For 250 pesos each, we got equipment, a 4-hour tour and an "esnack," which I think is amazing. From Dario's house, we headed past a landscape of tropical green hillsides and down to the entrance of a cave. We climbed through the narrow walls, slithered "Matrix"-style along rocks and cannonballed into icy, icy waters. It was an impressive amount of fun, especially since all the other caves I've been to before are grandiose mammoths where well-lit paved paths with handrails invite families to gaze at stalactites. At the end, we each enjoyed a Negrito (or, "little black person"), essentially a Twinkie stuffed with chocolate filling, exactly the kind of snack you'd expect to be handed after an outdoorsy, athletic adventure, right?
Next, we cleaned up at Dario's house. I had brought a small hand towel on the trip just in case, so I used it to wipe the mud off my legs. Then, I realized I was wearing a bathing suit, so I could just rinse off my entire body! Then, I realized that the towel I had been planning to use was streaked with mud, so I had to air dry for a bit and wipe off with my soggy clothes. Sexy. For lunch, more micheladas at a seafood restaurant, and then a later afternoon departure for DF.
On Sunday, we met up with Dario, who friends had recommended that I call about a spelunking excursion. For 250 pesos each, we got equipment, a 4-hour tour and an "esnack," which I think is amazing. From Dario's house, we headed past a landscape of tropical green hillsides and down to the entrance of a cave. We climbed through the narrow walls, slithered "Matrix"-style along rocks and cannonballed into icy, icy waters. It was an impressive amount of fun, especially since all the other caves I've been to before are grandiose mammoths where well-lit paved paths with handrails invite families to gaze at stalactites. At the end, we each enjoyed a Negrito (or, "little black person"), essentially a Twinkie stuffed with chocolate filling, exactly the kind of snack you'd expect to be handed after an outdoorsy, athletic adventure, right?
Next, we cleaned up at Dario's house. I had brought a small hand towel on the trip just in case, so I used it to wipe the mud off my legs. Then, I realized I was wearing a bathing suit, so I could just rinse off my entire body! Then, I realized that the towel I had been planning to use was streaked with mud, so I had to air dry for a bit and wipe off with my soggy clothes. Sexy. For lunch, more micheladas at a seafood restaurant, and then a later afternoon departure for DF.
All in all, the perfect way to spend my last sweet drop of freedom.Madre y Padre come to visit
It's been almost a month since Madre y Padre came to visit me in Mexico City, but it still deserves a dignified mention on my blog. My parents stayed at an excellente bed & breakfast, the Red Tree House, just south of Parque Mexico and about a 15 minute walk from my apartment. Mornings started with a delicious breakfast (I know, I was there eating all the pan dulce), and evenings ended with a wine happy hour and, if he had the better half of a glass, my dad serenading the room on the piano.The first afternoon they arrived, I took them on a walking tour of Roma and Condesa and to all the pretty parks in the neighborhood. At the last park, my dad admitted that his back had been killing him and that he can't walk for extended periods like that. Oops. On Sunday, we headed up to the Chapultepec Castle (where Matt proposed, how darling), then over to the beloved Anthropology and History Museum, where we skipped lunch and slammed chile-covered peanuts instead. At night we had a super fancy dinner (at a restaurant that was so fancy I'll never get to return) to celebrate John & Gretch's 29th wedding anniversary. Also darling.
Monday we took a road trip to Tepotzlan, in the state of Morelos, which was pleasantly free of DF crowds and angsty groups of adolescent students. Despite complaining of back pain earlier in the trip, my dad bested my mom and I throughout a steep, hour-long hike up to an Aztec pyramid. Fortunately he reminded us on various occassions, lest we forget :) After my parents devored a giant slab of salty cecina meat (pork? beef?), and I a soggy enchilada disappointment, we caught a coach bus back to DF and took a proper siesta. In the evening, the padres treated my friends to an evening of tacos and beer, and Lord help us, the Browns were playing.
Tuesday began with my parents waiting on me as I interviewed a source for a freelance story, then we headed to the Pachuca street market, where fruits, veggies, flowers and spongy cow stomach tissue are deliciously displayed. Next stop: Centro Histórico. Unfortunately, the grandeur of the Zócalo plaza and the billowing Mexican flag had been put aside for endless production equipment, which I later found out was for a crazy light show to celebrate the centennial of the start of the Mexican revolution. We passed through a labrynth of security to get to Mexico's Bicentennial Museum (this time for Mexican independence), which offered a very interesting but very long foray into Mexican history.
We put off lunch to have an early dinner at one of my favorite places to eat, whose name I can never remember. In Mexico, most restaurants have lunch menus, where you can get soup, rice, a main dish and dessert, plus fruit water, for 40 pesos. This place costs 85 pesos, but is infinitely more fancy. On Wednesday, the padres last day in DF, we headed south to Coyoacán. To my delight (I swear I didn't plan it) we had lunch at a vegetarian sidewalk café then checked out the Casa Azul, where Frida Khalo and Diego Rivera lived and got all Communist on each other. A walk through Coyoacán's historic little plaza ended with a mountain of pistachio ice cream for all. Qué rico.
Our last supper, if you will, was at the Taco Ladies, the infamous sidewalk eatery where the tables and chairs are plastic and foldable and the roof is a plastic tarp strung over a plastic tube framework. They actually serve quesadillas on their portable stove, but they're known universally as the Taco Ladies. And my, do they make a mean tortilla.
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
Hunger in Puebla, mishaps in Cholula
Fun title, huh? As my stay in Mexico is winding to a wistful close (Dec. 22 is my departure date), I'm trying to make sure that each weekend involves some sort of special Mexican adventure. Three weekends ago, me, Paul plus a handful of Mexicans, Frenchies and a New Zealander went to Malinalco, in the State of Mexico. The town really is a hidden gem. Craggy green mountains tower over the city center of two-story concrete buildings painted eccentric shades of red, orange, blue and yellow. Narrow streets lead mostly in the same directions: back onto the highway, through a crowded food market, or to the archeological site, where Aztec warriors came for spiritual training centuries before the Spanish "offered" Catholicism as a religious alternative.
The next weekend I partied like the college student/Mexican I am no longer suited to be, and last weekend I met up with Texan Grant in Puebla, the capital city of a similarly named state about 2 hours east of Mexico City. It's a city that's so close to Mexico and such a standard stop along the tourist route, that somehow I managed to put it off until the very end. I hopped on a bus Saturday morning to Puebla's bus terminal, then rode a public bus through clogged traffic to the center. Grant and I (mostly I) marveled at the painted ceramic tiles (or azulejos) that bedazzle all the historic buildings around Puebla. Floral patterns and symmetric designs painted in deep blue glaze are most common, while others are yellow and green and equally mesmerizing. We stopped in the Alfeñique Museum, which details Puebla's history through maps, paintings and fancy French-influenced gowns. The ornate white molding on banisters and ceiling lends the museum the title alfeñique, a technique for making cooked sugar decorations, like those on a wedding cake or Day of the Dead skulls.
Next stop was a beautiful colonial church whose interior was nondescript, but whose facade was covered in more of the shiny ceramic tiles. By then, it was 1 p.m. and I was starving, but we were waiting for Grant's girlfriend to get out of a dentistry conference to get lunch with her and her classmates. So I bought a giant bag of popcorn covered in Valentina salsa from a little stand by the entrance, while Grant purchased the world's largest taco. Seriously, it was an entire serving of steak and fries, plus refried beans and cheese, on a mammoth tortilla. We headed into the Zócalo and dropped by the Casa de Cultura and the giant cathedral. The conference ran over, so we stopped by the Museo Bello and checked out Señor Bello's extensive collection of everything - keys, locks, chests, music stands, Chinese porcelain, oil paintings, bronze kitchenware, etc. - in his ritzy colonial mansion. I might've lessened the value of some pieces by leaning on them or touching them absentmindedly, but no one yelled at me, so at least I got away clean.
Finally, it came time for lunch. Well, for the others, at least. Just as had been the case on Friday night at a post-party taco joint, this taquería served only meat tacos. Usually a taco place will at least have tacos with boiled cactus (nopales) or mushroom fillings, but not this one. Just strange cuts like brain, tongue, intenstines and a mosaic of mystery meat. Defeated by hunger, I ordered a simple quesadilla. When it came with spare chunks of unidentifiable meat, I picked them out and forged onward. When it started dripping with oily, grayish meat juice, I sent it back. Just as I stood up to clarify I didn't want another one, a fresh quesadilla was served. It was speckled with red beef. The waitress and I eyed each other as I explained that a new meat-covered quesadilla was still not vegetarian friendly. She slowly pushed the meat around with her fork, as if to show me that it was removable (I know about the juice, lady!) before I walked away and left her plate in hand.
When the dentists left Puebla and returned to Mexico City, Grant and I headed to the crafts market so I could salivate over talavera pieces (a white and glazed type of earthenware, says Google). Of all the flower vases and mirrors and tea sets I fondled, I went home instead with a pocket-size candle holder. With my genetic disposition to shop fulfilled, we took a public bus to Cholula, a small city nearby. We wandered in the dark to the Zócalo, a very lively and charming place to be on a Saturday night, and got our bearings. We headed out to find a hotel that a Cholulan friend of a friend had recommended. Instead, we find a row of abandoned buildings on a street with no lights, and decided to use my guide book instead. The first place we found was pretty dingy, with just a double bed and a bathroom whose wall didn't quite reach the ceiling. The next place we tried was fancier, but completely booked. Apparently there was some sort of convention in Cholula that weekend. The receptionist made us a reservation at another hotel, and we walked around for an hour with no luck. Finally a cab driver we had asked earlier ran up to us with the directions and drove us there.
Our hotel was decent, but a bit much. Every room was really a suite, so for the two of us we had two bedrooms, a kitchen and a living room with concrete couches built into the wall. Then Grant read a follow-up text from our hotel-suggestor saying that the hotel was in San Andrés Cholula. That's when we realized that the city has two municipalities, and we were in San Pedro Cholula. But it was 10 p.m., I still hadn't eaten and Grant's head cold was increasing with every sniffle, so we stuck with the Zocalo and watched some "Evita" before bed.
Sunday morning was far more successful. We ambled through an indoor market, pointing disgustedly at pig snouts and giant vats of cow head soup, then visited a cathedral, a history museum and a convent whose chapel has nearly 50 domes...crazy! Probably one of the most unique religious spaces we've seen in Mexico though. From there, we headed up to the giant colonial church sitting hilariously on top of a massive Aztec pyramid. Unfortunately, the pyramid is still buried, so the true irony of the matter isn't as obvious. Around the pyramid's base, however, is a well-kept archeological site with temples, palace walls and a courtyard for people in Aztec costumes to dance in a big circle while gringos take pictures.
Determined to see the second municipality - which is populated more by university and exchange students, plus hippies - we walked the lengthy journey to San Pedro. We ordered pizza at an eclectic restaurant around the city square, which naturally came with pork rinds on top (the 15-year-old waiter misinformed us that tlalitos was an Italian lettuce). After lunch, we asked a lady at an ice cream stand in the street if she could point out the taxi stop. Her customer then whipped out a walkie-talkie mid scoop and called us a cab. We're still not sure if she works with the cabs, or if this is a normal occurance.
We made it home in one piece, however, and then I tried to make veggie burgers as a battle cry against all carnivorous encounters I'd had that weekend. Absentmindedly I blended the ingredients into a veggie burger pancake batter that refuses to cook on the stove or in the oven.
Maria: 0. Meat: 4
The next weekend I partied like the college student/Mexican I am no longer suited to be, and last weekend I met up with Texan Grant in Puebla, the capital city of a similarly named state about 2 hours east of Mexico City. It's a city that's so close to Mexico and such a standard stop along the tourist route, that somehow I managed to put it off until the very end. I hopped on a bus Saturday morning to Puebla's bus terminal, then rode a public bus through clogged traffic to the center. Grant and I (mostly I) marveled at the painted ceramic tiles (or azulejos) that bedazzle all the historic buildings around Puebla. Floral patterns and symmetric designs painted in deep blue glaze are most common, while others are yellow and green and equally mesmerizing. We stopped in the Alfeñique Museum, which details Puebla's history through maps, paintings and fancy French-influenced gowns. The ornate white molding on banisters and ceiling lends the museum the title alfeñique, a technique for making cooked sugar decorations, like those on a wedding cake or Day of the Dead skulls.
Next stop was a beautiful colonial church whose interior was nondescript, but whose facade was covered in more of the shiny ceramic tiles. By then, it was 1 p.m. and I was starving, but we were waiting for Grant's girlfriend to get out of a dentistry conference to get lunch with her and her classmates. So I bought a giant bag of popcorn covered in Valentina salsa from a little stand by the entrance, while Grant purchased the world's largest taco. Seriously, it was an entire serving of steak and fries, plus refried beans and cheese, on a mammoth tortilla. We headed into the Zócalo and dropped by the Casa de Cultura and the giant cathedral. The conference ran over, so we stopped by the Museo Bello and checked out Señor Bello's extensive collection of everything - keys, locks, chests, music stands, Chinese porcelain, oil paintings, bronze kitchenware, etc. - in his ritzy colonial mansion. I might've lessened the value of some pieces by leaning on them or touching them absentmindedly, but no one yelled at me, so at least I got away clean.
Finally, it came time for lunch. Well, for the others, at least. Just as had been the case on Friday night at a post-party taco joint, this taquería served only meat tacos. Usually a taco place will at least have tacos with boiled cactus (nopales) or mushroom fillings, but not this one. Just strange cuts like brain, tongue, intenstines and a mosaic of mystery meat. Defeated by hunger, I ordered a simple quesadilla. When it came with spare chunks of unidentifiable meat, I picked them out and forged onward. When it started dripping with oily, grayish meat juice, I sent it back. Just as I stood up to clarify I didn't want another one, a fresh quesadilla was served. It was speckled with red beef. The waitress and I eyed each other as I explained that a new meat-covered quesadilla was still not vegetarian friendly. She slowly pushed the meat around with her fork, as if to show me that it was removable (I know about the juice, lady!) before I walked away and left her plate in hand.
When the dentists left Puebla and returned to Mexico City, Grant and I headed to the crafts market so I could salivate over talavera pieces (a white and glazed type of earthenware, says Google). Of all the flower vases and mirrors and tea sets I fondled, I went home instead with a pocket-size candle holder. With my genetic disposition to shop fulfilled, we took a public bus to Cholula, a small city nearby. We wandered in the dark to the Zócalo, a very lively and charming place to be on a Saturday night, and got our bearings. We headed out to find a hotel that a Cholulan friend of a friend had recommended. Instead, we find a row of abandoned buildings on a street with no lights, and decided to use my guide book instead. The first place we found was pretty dingy, with just a double bed and a bathroom whose wall didn't quite reach the ceiling. The next place we tried was fancier, but completely booked. Apparently there was some sort of convention in Cholula that weekend. The receptionist made us a reservation at another hotel, and we walked around for an hour with no luck. Finally a cab driver we had asked earlier ran up to us with the directions and drove us there.
Our hotel was decent, but a bit much. Every room was really a suite, so for the two of us we had two bedrooms, a kitchen and a living room with concrete couches built into the wall. Then Grant read a follow-up text from our hotel-suggestor saying that the hotel was in San Andrés Cholula. That's when we realized that the city has two municipalities, and we were in San Pedro Cholula. But it was 10 p.m., I still hadn't eaten and Grant's head cold was increasing with every sniffle, so we stuck with the Zocalo and watched some "Evita" before bed.
Sunday morning was far more successful. We ambled through an indoor market, pointing disgustedly at pig snouts and giant vats of cow head soup, then visited a cathedral, a history museum and a convent whose chapel has nearly 50 domes...crazy! Probably one of the most unique religious spaces we've seen in Mexico though. From there, we headed up to the giant colonial church sitting hilariously on top of a massive Aztec pyramid. Unfortunately, the pyramid is still buried, so the true irony of the matter isn't as obvious. Around the pyramid's base, however, is a well-kept archeological site with temples, palace walls and a courtyard for people in Aztec costumes to dance in a big circle while gringos take pictures.
Determined to see the second municipality - which is populated more by university and exchange students, plus hippies - we walked the lengthy journey to San Pedro. We ordered pizza at an eclectic restaurant around the city square, which naturally came with pork rinds on top (the 15-year-old waiter misinformed us that tlalitos was an Italian lettuce). After lunch, we asked a lady at an ice cream stand in the street if she could point out the taxi stop. Her customer then whipped out a walkie-talkie mid scoop and called us a cab. We're still not sure if she works with the cabs, or if this is a normal occurance.
We made it home in one piece, however, and then I tried to make veggie burgers as a battle cry against all carnivorous encounters I'd had that weekend. Absentmindedly I blended the ingredients into a veggie burger pancake batter that refuses to cook on the stove or in the oven.
Maria: 0. Meat: 4
Overnight Climate Change Expert
While I've always had a particular interest in environment-related issues, I've never paid too much attention to climate change policy. But now it's my job to know these things, so consider me an overnight expert. Last month, I signed a contract to participate in a news team for the official web site of the COP16 climate change summit in Cancún. I'll spend about 2.5 weeks in the city of spring break fame reporting on the various conferences and revelations, all while bossing around a photographer and cameraman to oblige my journalistic whims. The entire project is a month long, which means I get two paychecks, which means: Yay. All expenses are covered, and we get an allowance for two beers a day, naturally.
To reiterate my position as an expert, I wrote my first paid freelance piece for a non-Mexican publication last week. Read: Yay. It's for SolveClimate News, an online service focused on all things environment and climate change, and the story was also picked up by Reuters.
Read the story here.
To reiterate my position as an expert, I wrote my first paid freelance piece for a non-Mexican publication last week. Read: Yay. It's for SolveClimate News, an online service focused on all things environment and climate change, and the story was also picked up by Reuters.
Read the story here.
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