Adventures in Mountaineering

After a couple relaxing yet essentially uneventful weekends in Mexico City following my wonderful Christmas/New Year's home visit, I finally ventured out into the great unknown. Although we didn't reach the destination originally intended for our camping trip, my 4 hiking cuates (buddies) and I still walked an enjoyable line between arduous and relaxing this weekend.

The plan was to summit Tlaloc, a 4,100-meter high inactive volcano on the eastern rim of the Valley of Mexico. We took a 1.5-hour long bus ride towards Puebla, getting off at the unremarkable town of Río Frio, a tiny pocket of a community that, despite living at the base of Tlaloc, has a limited desire to climb the mountain (unless, of course, for illegal logging or sprinkling cow pies down on the woods like rain). We got off the bus and hopped in a cab with Pedro, who regaled us with tales of his unbridled passion for pizzas and Whoppers from San Francisco, all while taking us to a really far end of the mountain (or, a 7-plus hour hike to the summit). We hiked and hiked and hiked, occasionally seeking directions from villagers guiding donkeys burdened with firewood down the trail. With a 30-pound pack on my back and short stubby legs, I managed to remain in last place for most of the time. But the tasty pasta salad I was carrying was worth the hunchback.

We hiked uphill for a few hours, mostly on paths or in small riverbeds but sometimes through steep rocky brush. Realizing we'd never make it to the summit in this lifetime, we aimed for some pretty-looking cliffs instead. On the way, we found a nice flat clearing to set up camp, which just to happened to be positioned directly in front of Iztaccíhuatl and Popocatépetl, respectively the third and second highest mountains in all of Mexico. Distance but clear views could be seen of the snowy tops of La Malinche and Pico de Orizaba, Mexico's sixth and first highest peaks. You would have thought we'd aimed to find this spot, the view was so spectacular. Tents pitched and bonfire started, we sat around on fungus-y logs as the hot and sunny day blended into a clear chilly night. The mountains turned pink, then purple, then black as the sun set, and an impressive number of stars far exceeded the measly three or four bright spots that peek through the Mexico City smog at night. We even roasted smushed PB&Js in the fire, a last-ditch effort to both salvage the misshaped bread lumps and to simulate making s'mores. Nighttime involved me snuggling blissfully into my brand new sleeping bag (replete with a hood), until the wind against the tent sounded like angry cows laying more pies and the rock-solid ground slowly ruined my ethereal fetal position.

In the morning, we slept through the glaring bright sunrise until 9 a.m., then polished off the pasta salad and granola bars (er, and Snickers) before setting off on an amazingly easy and quick hike downhill (isn't that always the case?). On the breezy descent, we looked out across the valley and saw the summit, the faintest hint of Aztec ruins appearing through the pines. Then we (I) cursed Pedro and his affinity for hamburgers and disdain for the great outdoors. Our exit led us through the makeshift humble homes of the nondescript Río Frio; after stopping for a quick quesadilla break, we caught a bus back to Mexico City off the highway. And showered immediately after we got back.

Going out in Mexi style

It's incredibly hard to believe that this time last year, I was just coming back from a two-week trip in Mexico following my three-month internship with the Associated Press. This time around, I know for sure that I'm coming back to the D.F. and I have a job, no matter how dubious or lackluster it might be. End-of-the-year trips in Mexico have included a tranquil, lazy weekend in the colorful colonial city of Guanajuato, a toasty long weekend in Puerto Escondido with Matt and his parents (who stayed for 10 days, lucky), and a Sunday hike to Ajuso, a mountain just outside Mexico City and reachable by a series of 2-peso metro rides and 4-peso bus rides for a 1.5-hour journey. Here are some pics. Perhaps I'll add witty comments when I feel like it.

El Pípila in Guanajuato
Santa Fe hotel with the Peters in Puerto Escondido
Being cold in the forests of Ajusco.

Choonimals for Charity

As most of you probably know, my boyfriend Matt and five of his friends own Choonimals Clothing Company, a T-shirt company that prints "abstract" animals onto American Apparel gear. This December, the company is designating 10 percent of all sales to La Casa de la Sal, a Mexico City orphanage for children and teens living with HIV/AIDS.

We kicked off the event by making a US$500 donation and publishing a subsequent promotional video (www.choonimals.com/charity). The goal is to raise $500 more to make a second donation.

Five hundred bucks is certainly a lot of money for most people in Mexico - it's a lot of money for me. It was definitely a weird feeling when we purchased $500-worth of medicine for the pharmacy and left with around 10 small boxes of prescriptions that fit into one petite plastic bag. Considering the average cost per child there is 10,000 pesos a month (about $775), with 25 kids at the orphanage and 40 enrolled in the home-care program, 500 bucks is kind of a small clink in the proverbial bucket. The nurses, however, were incredibly happy with the work we were doing for the orphanage, and it was nice to know that at least they thought we were making a difference even if to me it felt like a trivial act of charity.

That said, buy some Choons and help the niños!

Una Navidad Mexicana

Whereas the Christmas season in the United States is bombarded with commercialism, advertisements and 24-hour caroling, Christmas in Mexico is overwhelmed with a nonstop onslaught of seasonal festivities. From the end of November to early January, the central Zócalo plaza becomes the "world's largest" ice skating rink that's free to the public, and several main streets in the historical center are shut down so that posadas, similar to nativity scenes, can take over during the nine days leading up the Christmas Eve. The main Reforma thoroughfare is also dotted with Bethlehem-esque wood shacks, although these ones feature coolers of Pepsi products instead of a baby Jesus. In the middle of Reforma is the "world's tallest" Christmas tree. Listen to my friend Grant's story on World Vision report here.

It's hard to list all of the magical things that are going on around Mexico City during this holiday season because anywhere you look, a pointed and tinsely piñata will invariably be hanging from a tree, ceiling or rooftop. Jolly drivers will stick reindeer antler or a Santa hat out the windows or on the roof of their cars. Nativity scenes, complete with every farm animal imaginable and all of Bethlehem's residents, will appear out of nowhere, the carpets of straw and plastic figurines making passersby pause to gawk/cross themselves/reflect.

Tonight, I attended the Ballet Folklórico de México de Amalia Hernández (one of the most popular in Latin America)'s Christmas presentation, which included the Angel Gabriel defeating dancing devils and delivering the good news to Mary, plus the Three Wise Men offering mariachis and "china poblanas" to a proud Joseph and Mary and baby Hay-zeus. I intended to attach an audio clip, but apparently I'm not saavy enough/you can't do it. Regardless, I now have a fun-sounding track of some face-paced stomping and "ayayayayay"-style mariachi music.

Also, last night I purchased a Rosca de Reyes bread. The dessert is traditionally served on Jan. 6, the Three Kings Day, but after tasting one preemptively at a bakery chain I just had to have another. I think it's pretty much like fruitcake, but I've never had U.S. fruitcake so I'm only making a guess here. It's basically sweet bread with candied fruits on top and tiny holy figurines inside. According to tradition, at a Rosca celebration, family members will pass around the circular bread and cut their own slices. Whoever finds a figurine in their cake is charged with hosting a party sometime soon. Since I found two figurines and it was at during a tiny dinner party at my house, I'm going to assume that those cancel each other out. Here's what was left:

FELIZ NAVIDAD!

....and I'm back!

*Whew* That was a nice two-month long break. I'm sorry to have ever failed you readers like that. But now that The News decided it wasn't worth its time to maintain the Web site, looks like I'll have to write to you myself, since I can no longer post my latest stories on the blog, Maria's Storytime. However, I might copy/paste the Word documents up if I manage to feel so motivated.

Anyway, today on a wonderfully warm and sunny Saturday afternoon, I was working :/ It wasn't so bad, just an annual art fair for one of Mexico City's private U.S. schools. On the way out, though, I was struck by the contrast in the beautiful school I had just exited, the top-rate hospital I'd just passed by, and the slums immediately facing me across the street.

In the central part of the city, residents are mostly protected from the realities of the metropolis' outskirts. Sure, you see homeless people sleeping in the fetal position under a blanket outside a restaurant; you see children as young as 2 selling gum on the metro; you see families washing themselves in the street because the gov't cut off their water supply; you see mothers, fathers and progeny sitting in a pow-wow with a dingy change cup outstretched.

But where some of these people live, the actual slums, are usually out of plain sight. So I was a little surprised to be caught walking through a shabbier area relatively close to my neighborhood. Granted, this place is far from the worst Mexico City has to offer. I'm not even sure if the word "slum" qualifies. In any event, in the middle of an urban sprawl I heard roosters crowing, saw corrugated metal roofs secured into place by rocks, and saw a rampant lack of municipal attention to public spaces (think rebar poking out of the concrete step where you were about to put your foot). Anyway, here's some pictures while I'm still feeling like a social justice revolutionary.Nice glass roof, and then... (don't know why it's a link)Improvisational roof.

Silly, silly hijackers

In case you crawled under a rock yesterday, you've probably heard about the crazed Bolivian hijacker who yesterday threatened to blow up an Aeromexico plane flying into Mexico City from Cancún if he did not receive an audience with Presidente Felipe Calderón.

The initial reaction from the police and media was, of course, to assume that this was some kind of terrorist or drug-related attack. Four possible hijackers had been indicated and a cardboard box-bomb allegedly on board, so what else would you naturally assume?

The BBC London, in fact, called The News office asking for insider information on airport security in Mexico and if hijackings were normal here. I didn't feel qualified to speak as an expert, and as our most inside sources only speak Spanish and all of our English-speaking talent had been so swiftly kicked to the curb months ago, I had to tell a very disappointed Brit that we could offer him nothing. It felt pretty emasculating (can women be that?) to work for a local newspaper and tell a BBC London reporter that we're not actually a real newspaper, we just translate things from the wires (and offer stunningly awesome culture reporting).

Back to the hijacker: As the day progressed, the 104 passengers were released and later the 7 crew members. In the end, there was just one hijacker. His purported accomplices? The Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Apparently the Bolivian man, a Christian pastor who had been living in Mexico for years, had received a message from God that horrible things would happen to Mexico on 9/09/09, as the numbers' reflection spells out the sign of the Devil: 666.

In the end, no harm, no foul. Except for that apocalyptic goblin that ate everyone but gringos yesterday. Time to finally open some Chipotle and Panera franchises down here? I think so, too.

The Turtle Whisperer's Tale

Another weekend, another beach adventure, as the story goes.

The last weekend of August, Matt, Paul, Humberto, Jeff (Matt's friend from home) and I hopped on that infamous 1 a.m. bus ride down to a station just outside Acapulco. We cabbed into Bonfil while two of the boys picked up a rental car at the airport. From there, we drove about three hours east in sticky heat to a beach with no name (or at least one that I don't know).

After driving through small, run-down towns and the thick greenery, we pulled up to an empty field, marred only by a tiny dirt path and a small shack constructed of 2x4s and dried palm fronds.
The seemingly random spot was actually our destination - a couple months ago when the boys were out surfing at a nearby spot, they drifted down the coast and serendipitously landed in front of the house. Seeing a head bobbing around in this virtually uncivilized place, they walked up the beach to the house and met the Turtle Whisperer and his wife Victoria.

TW had moved to this isolated spot around four years ago as civil employee charged with caring for the sea turtles and keeping their eggs safe. The government has since cut him from the payroll, but the couple continue living without any electricity, plumbing or transportation to look after the turtles. Their only income, it seems, is the benevolence of others.

The boys had all had a great time on their last visit, so, unannounced, we decided to stop by for an overnight on their sandy "front yard." Even though we literally dropped in out of nowhere, the couple greeted us as if we were their next-door neighbors stopping by for an evening chat. Their genuinely warm and welcome greeting was a little disarming - I think when I meet people who radiate kindness and warmth, it underscores my tendency to be defensive and cold at first.

We set down our backpacks and tents under their frond-thatched awning and immediately bounded off for the muddy-brown water, hence why Paul has deemed the beach "Chocolate." It's a nice little reminder that even in the middle of nowhere, litter and trash will inevitably wash up on shore - unless Victoria was the one who was chucking individual sandals into the ocean and waiting to see where they'd end up.

Their house was beautiful despite being barebones, it was evident they took great pride in their small piece of property. The main house was split into two sand-floor rooms: the first was the kitchen and living area, and the second their bedroom, both decorated with hundreds of seashell windchimes.

A few steps outside was the bathroom, which for being just a hole above the sand was an elaborately constructed wood-slatted building. The small hut was sectioned off into a shower area and a men's and women's bathroom, with a communal stone basin serving as the sink. The toilet was just a wood crate with a round hole in the middle (the women's with an actual toilet seat), and whatever was henceforth produced landed onto the sand below. A nearby bucket could be filled with sand to cover the 'organic' offerings, and TW sprinkled talc on it each night to fend off the bugs. (Sidenote: just outside the hut was a fresh-water well. Mmmm).

A few hours after arriving, Paul and Humberto drove into town to pick up some freshly caught red-snapper, vegetables and Modelo beer. The couple generously prepared us dinner with the supplies we'd bought and sat down to eat with us at the long, wooden table. During the meal, it started to rain and two giant rainbows appeared in the sky, one visible from both ends. Being techno-gringos, we of course got up to snap millions of pictures, and the couple just laughed a bit and reminded us that they get rainbows there every night.

After the meal, we sat around under the awning drinking our Modelo and wondering why no one had thought to bring bug spray. Even though I was wearing jeans and a hooded sweatshirt, the mosquitoes found a way to my flesh by biting me at least 20 times on each foot. The rain had made the tents damp and chilly, but sleeping on the beach always breaks my insomniac spell like none other.

In the morning, TW and Victoria offered us a heaping breakfast of eggs 'a la mexicana' with tomatoes and onions (I was tempted to ask if they were turtle eggs, but that felt pretty evil), as well as refried beans, rice and the classic Mexican pick-me-up, instant Nescafé. After the boys squeezed in one last surf (I have since retired), we handed the couple a 500-peso thank-you and packed up the rental car. After a thorough hugging session, they repeatedly insisted that we return. I realize I just said that we gave them money, but I like to think that if they were all about the money, they wouldn't be able to speak to turtles, then, would they?

In the end, I felt very warm and fuzzy. I wish I could just go on fun, exciting adventures and offer people my wit, charm and pesos along the way. As of lately, my only charitable giving has consisted of a few coins here and there when the mood strikes me or when I feel guilty about being virtually uncharitable in the day-to-day. It took me about a week to become practically desensitized and indifferent to the poverty and misfortune around me - otherwise, how could you handle living here? Maybe the Turtle Whisperer has all the answers.