You couldn’t pick a better home base to experience street food in Bangkok than Chinatown. I really enjoyed our little apartment, tucked behind a shopping mall into a surprisingly quiet area with a great view over the city.
Of course, it didn’t hurt that we were also in one of Bangkok’s best street food areas. We really enjoyed the street food tour we did – in fact, it inspired us to seek out street food tours in Hua Hin and Penang! – but we also found lots of great food on our own. Here are some of my favorites.
Did you know that croiffles (croissant waffles) are a thing now? I had never heard of them before, but they seem to be everywhere in SEA! These are from an adorable hidden cafe near our apartment.
The same cafe also had very beautiful drinks, like this matcha pineapple, and a great zodiac mural.
On the day we toured Wat Pho and the Royal Palace, we had lunch at Tonkin Annam. This Michelin recommended restaurant (e.g., not the same thing as Michelin starred, and a lot less expensive) was delicious if a little confusing! I’ve never been served rice paper without a way to get it wet and soften it before, and I’ve spent three months in Vietnam. But the flavors were great!
Going to show that Michelin Bib Gourmet restaurants abound in Bangkok, we also went to Tonchin Ramen. So good, although as you can see, definitely not a light meal.
Ironically, I preferred the version of stewed pork leg that we found on our own to the one on the tour. Admittedly, part of it is that it works better as a whole plate, accompanied by a tea egg, pickled mustard greens, rice, and fresh herbs. This was also ridiculously cheap – I don’t remember for sure, but I think it was under a dollar a plate.
Some of you may have heard my “magic door” game. Basically, you get five magic doors that can go to any restaurant in the world. You can always get a table, but you still have to pay for your meal and you can’t leave the restaurant (e.g., you can’t just use the door to travel for free.) Where do your doors go?
Well, I will have to give serious consideration to allotting one of mine to this alley in Bangkok. A little auntie is running a one-woman shop with a few folding tables and the best omelet-wrapped pad thai you could hope to eat. Perfect spice, perfect balance, perfect richness – just perfect. Just thinking about it now makes me want one a little bit, and I had an enormous plate of nasi kandar – about which more later! – for lunch.
This is Pa Tong Go, Chinese donuts that are often eaten for breakfast. The green sauce is a sweet pandan custard. Geoff and I were a little terrified when we got this plate to share. It looks like a lot of donuts! However, they’re so light and airy that the amount was just right. Delicious! However, the best part was that the shop was the cutest thing ever!
Not pictured: the owner’s angelic dog and the hojicha latte I had with them.
Bangkok has something of a reputation for being overwhelming. To be honest, I wasn’t expecting it to be one of my favorite cities. To my surprise, it won me over almost immediately. It has green space, amazing culture, great food – what’s not to like. Over the few days Geoff and I spent there, I developed a theory on why Bangkok has such a reputation for being exhausting and over the top. It’s simple – I think it gets less experienced travelers than other megacities in SEA. It’s hard to imagine the person who thinks Bangkok is more overwhelming than HCMC or Kuala Lumpur, but it’s much likelier to attract the new travelers who aren’t prepared for 90 degrees with 90 percent humidity, let alone the scooters.
The food, though – oh, the food! It won’t all fit into one post, so I’ve divided it into the food we tasted on a food tour, and some things we found on our own. And even then, I’m leaving out an awful lot of wonderful meals.
P.S. I’m normally pretty conservative about taking pictures of other people – it’s not nice to do without asking permission! Our tour guide did a great job of telling us when it was okay to take pictures (really famous vendors who are used to tourists) and when it wasn’t (in an area with a lot of private homes).
This little lady is a magician with chive pancakes! Over decades of experience, she’s honed her technique until each one is perfectly chewy on the inside, crispy on the outside, and absolutely stuffed with chives. Dipped in a dark soy sauce, I couldn’t get enough of these.
A Bangkok street food classic is stewed pork leg served over rice with a hard boiled egg, some fresh herbs, and preserved mustard greens. We actually ate this for breakfast the day before, although we got it from a different stall! Since the food tour would have us taste 15 (!??!!??!) things, this wasn’t served as a whole plate, but rather just the pork by itself. While the shop did a great job, it just wasn’t the same without the balance of the meal as a whole.
Everyone loves satay! This was right down the street from where we were staying. It was absolutely delicious.
Interestingly, the peanut sauce is an addition from Indonesia. Fusion is the best!
This is from Jek Pui, a very famous curry stall. Chinese sausage is an interesting addition from the location in Chinatown, and that vegetable you see isn’t potato – it’s winter melon! Geoff made the interesting point that when you get lychees in American green curries, it might be an attempt to mimic this. It was really pleasant, with the richness of potato and the sweetness of fruit. Their fame is justified.
Soup! This was a sukiyaki, cook to your preference situation. The broth was delicious.
Crickets, silk worms, and bamboo worms! This tour had really clever staging – the insects came out after we had eaten several ‘easy’ crowd-pleasing courses, and we were offered a shot of Thai whiskey with them! I’ve eaten all three of these animals before, so it was fun acting like I was a real cool dude while others on the tour were squeamish. For the record, I don’t really like silk worms. They have an underlying musky taste that I find unpleasant. However, bamboo worms and crickets are great! The best bamboo worms I ever ate were in Chiang Mai, where a little restaurant had a preparation that made them almost like Cheetos, and the best crickets I ever at were in Mexico City around the corner from Frieda Kahlo’s house, neatly perched next to some first-class guacamole and chips.
This soft serve might look boring, but it’s soy sauce flavored with a dark soy topping! It was surprisingly good, like a salted caramel.
Pa tong go, or Chinese donuts. These were served with a delicious pandan sauce. They were good, but Geoff and I found another pa tong go shop we liked even better – more about that in the next post!
I left out an entire stop at a seafood restaurant, and there was mango and sticky rice to end the tour. After that, it was time to roll home! What an absolute blast.
Well, at the time of writing this I’m back at home in the Pacific Northwest. Elani and my travel plans are generally fairly loose, but it’s fair to say that what plan there was, this wasn’t part of it. I’m not going to go into a ton of detail about it, since that’s this isn’t really the place, but will leave it at there was a health emergency in the family. I will also say that getting back from Malaysia on very short notice wasn’t particularly difficult and not really much more expensive then getting there was with plenty of advanced notice, so that’s a plus I suppose. As far as long we’ll be back for? Well…not sure. All can I really say is, that our default still going to be full time traveling, and this is an interruption to that, not a cessation of it.
But even though the first leg of our trip was significantly shorter then we intended, there’s to more to say about Kuala Lumpur (and Melaka, but I’ll leave that for another time). So let’s wind back the clock to a couple weeks ago. The first thing that you should know About Kuala Lumpur is that though the first word is spelled and said very close to the Koala (like the marsupial), they have nothing to do with each and there are no Koalas there (maybe in the zoo, but certainly not running wild). I wanted to get that out of the way because I still find that a little disappointing and I don’t want to get anyone’s hopes up. The next thing of note is that, being the political and financial center or Malaysia is a relatively recent turn of events (okay so Malaysia being an independent country is also fairly recent turn of events in all fairness) so the town has a very modern feel to it. Its skyline is dominated enormous skyscrapers full of roof top pools and gardens. The building we stayed in, which we picked for a being decently priced and having a good location, was 39 stories with a garden at the top ( and smaller gardens every 10 stories or so) and an infinity pool a couple stories down from that. Which was pretty cool, but looking around (from said infinity pool) it’s pretty easy to see that it was not by any stretch the tallest or fanciest building around.
View from our apartment – also only picture in this post where you can’t see the Petronas Towers.
I say that dump on where we were staying, it was great. I was actually quite fond of the view from our room on the 34th floor (called floor 33a, because the character for four is unlucky in Chinese). I mention it to point out that a building with 39 floors, multiple gardens, and a roof top pool, is pretty middle of the pack by the standards of downtown KL.
Infinity pool – oh yeah.
The other thing I think of as really characteristic of KL is the abundance of greenery in the middle of the city. Gardens on the sides or tops of building were actually quite common. But more than that there were quite a few large trees with wide canopies shading sidewalks, little corners of unpaved land that were packed full of dense foliage. Turns out having year round sun, heat, and rain causes plants to grow at a pretty alarming rate. Add in generous sprinkling of parks and public green spaces and the separation of nature and city doesn’t feel quite so stark as it does in many cities.
the concrete jungle meets the actual jungle
But let me get back to huge buildings for a moment. One of the truly spectacular additions to the skyline (I guess actually two of the additions to the skyline) is (are) the Petronas Towers. These buildings are one of the most beautiful buildings in a city full of beautiful buildings. They stand out in the cityscape not just because of their size, but because of their glorious architecture. But also kind of because of their size. They were after all the tallest buildings in the world from 1998 until 2004 (since then been supplanted twice now as the tallest city in Kuala Lumpur alone).
So Elani and I decided we really ought to take the tour of them. We didn’t last time we went to KL because it turns out you actually have to get your stuff together and get tickets several days in advance. But we did this time. And honestly …meh. One problem is that the one thing you don’t actually have a very good view of from the Petronas towers, is the Petronas towers. Another problem is that since it is such a popular tour you spend a good chunk of it lining up to get packed into an elevator, only to have just ten minutes at the next observation deck to keep the tour moving. It probably also didn’t help visibility was rather poor that day (most of our days in KL actually) thanks wild fire smoke blowing over from the island of Sumatra (sounds like the Indonesian government isn’t doing a great job on enforcing its restriction on land clearing fires, not that that’s how they would tell it).
View of one tower from the other
Long story short, if you find yourself in KL, do go to the square in front of the Petronas towers and strain your neck staring up at these triumphs of human ingenuity. But save your tour money and put it towards a cocktail and one of the several downtown rooftop bars that will afford you almost as good a view of the city and certainly a better view of the towers themselves while giving you chance to sit back and actually admire the view.
On our first morning, we had dosa for breakfast. These huge Indian flatbreads kind of resemble a crispy crepe made with fermented dough. I love them for their crispy texture and great sourdough-y flavor. My favorites, like the one below, have a potato-vegetable mix tucked inside.
Broadly speaking, food in Kuala Lumpur can be broadly divided into Malay, Chinese, Indian, Western, and fusion (just kidding – it’s all fusion to some extent. That’s what’s so great about it.) The pictures below are from a restaurant famous for its pork ribs. They were fantastic! Crispy, tender, and redolent of five spice. The vegetables we ordered with them were also delicious.
This is truly a city of dumplings. These ‘winged’ gyoza were amazing. Cucumber salad is also becoming one of my favorite side dishes to order from the Chinese restaurants.
There are several Nepalese restaurants near our apartment. Their momos (dumplings) were handmade, and so, so good! We saw a young man making them on our way out of the restaurant. His skill was truly grandmother-level.
We also ordered set meals from the Nepalese restaurant. Proceeding clockwise from the rice, this is pickled radish, yogurt, very plainly cooked okra, a vegetable curry, and a somewhat puzzling sauce/soup.
I’ll end today with a wonderfully comforting plate. There is a food court just by our apartment that mostly serves people working in the nearby Maybank building, although all are welcome. We were scooped up by a darling Malay woman who showed us the ropes, including shooing us to an open table (turns out tables are famously difficult to get at this food court!) This is a plate of rice, steamed mixed vegetables, two dishes of tempeh cooked with vegetables and sauce, and a piece of fried tempeh. After making sure I knew what I was getting into, she let me have some sambal, which is like a savory, chunky hot sauce. Spicy, but it makes the meal!
Of course, this is only a small fraction of what we’ve eaten so far. Other favorites include the “Maggi goreng” I’ve been making and a hojicha latte decorated with a foam bear! I’ll write about those in a future post.
Well now that Elani and I traveling again it’s time for me to put back on my “very intermittent armature travel blogger hat”. So, our first stop is Kuala Lumpur (which like they locals, I’ll be calling KL). Why KL you ask? Well honestly because we wanted to go to Malacca and the way to get there is fly into KL and take a bus. And instead of sleeping off over 24 hrs travel spread over two days and immediately getting on a bus for another three hours, we decided to hang out in KL for a couple weeks.
Not that KL doesn’t have plenty to recommend it. It’s a huge modern city, where you can find truly excellent Malay, Indian, and Chinese food (along with tons of others) at basically any price point to care to spend. I usually prefer the fairly cheap variety eaten at a plastic table and on those little square plastic stools that are ubiquitous across all SE Asia. Also, you know it’s full stunning modern architectural marvels (I’m currently looking at the second tallest building in the world from the wind of our condo), and all the world class museums and cultural events that you can expect from a global capital – if you’re into that sort of thing.
But so far we haven’t really been hitting up that many of the big sights. Still relaxing after all the hassles of getting our live squared away so we can be traveling full time again. That, and getting used to being in a bustling metropolis after three years mostly trying to avoid crowsd while we hunkered down in Bellingham.
I’ll write more soon. And Elani is planning on writing regularly too. In an effort to make it so I don’t get behind on the blog again, I’m going to be only doing a quick pass at editing (so, sorry for that in advance) and a lot of my photos will go straight to my facebook and instagram. Say what you like about social media, they make posting photos extremely easy. Stay tuned, Elani’s got a break down of the KL street food so far coming in the next couple of days.
So at the time of writing this (March 24th, 2020), Elani and I are back home in the Pacific Northwest. I’ve been trying to write in chronological order for this leg of the trip. But I’m always behind and this is pretty time-sensitive, so I’ll skip ahead and jump back and finish up later. The last stop before heading home was heading back to Tulum.
Our decision to come back was more about our concerns about lack of mobility and failing infrastructure than about health. All things being equal, staying in place in Tulum would have probably been a good idea. Staying put would have exposed us less to infection, and if we are infected already (which I have no reason to believe, but is the best assumption when trying to stop the spread of a disease) we would expose fewer other people to it. Honestly, if I am going to be ill, I’d much rather be somewhere with warm temperatures and plenty of sun and sea breezes. But of course, there were other practicalities to consider.
The first was maintaining our ability to head home if necessary. In some ways, heading home wasn’t very attractive, health-wise. There are far fewer cases in Mexico in general and the Yucatan in particular than back home, but that may be only a matter of time, or the numbers may be artificially low due to lack of testing. We had been making sure to keep an eye on the news both back home and in Mexico, and with the US State Department recommending that US nationals should either return immediately or plan on being abroad indefinitely and reports of Europeans and South Americans already being stuck in Mexico, it seemed like the door might be closing. I started checking flight options and flights were cheap and readily available, so it was a good time to go. In the four days since we’ve been back, flight options have already gotten a lot more sparse.
Being in Tulum as things intensified was sort of a weird experience. Shutdowns were just starting to happen. Mainly just in Cancun and major tourist attractions. But tourists were already thinning out. A couple of days before heading out, we hit the grocery store to make sure we didn’t have to go out if restaurants started closing. It was by far the busiest I’d seen it. People were stocking up on the things you’d expect, canned goods, rice, and beer. Plenty of toilet paper, in case you were wondering. In general, going out in town had an uncomfortable feel, like everyone was trying to enjoy themselves to cover up their nervousness about the future. Going through the Cancun and SeaTac airports was a bit of a grim experience, people were all nervous, scared and annoyed at having their vacations canceled. Some were wearing gloves or masks, many improvised and/or poorly worn (it’s a shame to use up a mask and not bother covering your nose with it – some people). I kept waiting for someone to cough and everyone to scatter like a gun went off – it didn’t happen, which is probably for the best, even if it would have cut the tension.
So, what’s next for me and Elani? Well, like everyone else, we just have to wait and see. We are planning to set out again once the all clear is given. Who knows when that will be? For now, spring is well on the way. Spring and summer in the Pacific Northwest is beautiful, and we’ll be home to enjoy that. And hey, I guess I’ll have plenty of time to catch up on the blog.
Mexico City, or CDMX, is HUGE. It’s the biggest city in North America, bigger even than NYC, and more than twice as big as LA. It’s also home to a great local food culture and plenty of imported traditions, both from the rest of Mexico and from the entire world. From street tacos that cost 25 pesos (USD 1.25) for five tacos to gourmet restaurants far, far beyond what Geoff and I want to spend, absolutely everything is here. You just have to find it.
And having found it, I photographed it. Then I devoured it.
Comfort Food for a Tired Evening: Pizza Nosferatu
Blueberry and roast beef pizza from Pizza Nosferatu. Taken by Elani
When we first arrived in Mexico City, we were both quite tired. I thought it would be nice to have something a little familiar for our first dinner. When I found Pizza Nosferatu during my restaurant research, I knew it was the one. Pizza and microbrews? Perfect for an evening when we wanted to treat ourselves a little bit.
I thought we were going out on a bit of a limb, ordering this pizza combination, but it was absolutely amazing. It was served with mango puree and hot pepper oil, and somehow this combination was delicious.
To go or not to go: Go! Pizza Nosferatu is awesome. Recommended for everyone (it has lots of vegan and vegetarian options, too!)
A Fancy (and French!) Breakfast at Croque Monsieur
Avocado toast from Croque Monsieur. Taken by Elani
Geoff and I don’t usually go out for breakfast, but we do like to get fancy breakfast on Sundays sometimes. In our trendy neighborhood, La Condesa, there was a bustling cafe just around the corner. Croque Monsieur specializes in…you guessed it, but as a good millennial, I had to get the avocado toast. It was delicious. Check out that prosciutto and goat cheese!
To go or not to go: Go! If you sit outside, there will be adorable doggies next to you…lots of them.
Pizza Nosferatu II: Wildflower Boogaloo
Nosferatu again! Pizza with wildflowers and prosciutto arranged like roses. Taken by Elani
We liked Pizza Nosferatu so much that we went back! It didn’t hurt that it was nearby and had microbrews. I didn’t like this pizza as much as the first one. It was tasty, but it didn’t portion as well, and I didn’t think the flavors were as well balanced.
To go or not to go: Go! Maybe get a different pizza, though.
Lots of Walking to End Up Next Door: Salicornia
Smoked marlin tostadas from Salicornia Taken by Elani
One night when we didn’t really have groceries at home and didn’t feel like cooking anyway, we had an incredibly tough time finding somewhere to eat. We just wanted something cheap, easy, and nearby, which didn’t seem like it should be hard, but we tried two or three restaurants that were supposed to be open, but weren’t.
Finally, we went to Salicornia, just around the corner from our flat. It was definitely nearby, and reasonably easy, but not exactly as cheap as we had hoped. Oh well – two out of three isn’t bad. I had the smoked marlin tostadas, which were wonderful, not to mention a huge meal! The smoked marlin had the rich smokiness and dense texture of the best Pacific Northwest smoked salmon, while being a little drier and less oily. There were several salsas available, but I found myself skipping them to focus on the fish itself. I wish I could just buy smoked marlin in a grocery store – it was more than a little bit addictive.
To go or not to go: It’s not an incredibly cheap meal like some taco places are, but it sure was delicious!
Fusion in Juarez: Sushi Burritos from Burrushi
Something I’d heard about on Buzzfeed, but never tried before: a sushi burrito! Taken by Elani
It’s the sort of thing that shows up in Buzzfeed food quizzes, like a unicorn frappe or goth burger: the burrushi, or sushi burrito. It’s sushi ingredients wrapped up like a burrito, and while I had heard of them before, I’d certainly never seen one. But after Geoff and I struck out on cafe we had intended to visit (line of hipsters out the door and halfway down the block), I found Burrushi, a little hole in the wall with a great rating on Google Maps. What can I say, I have no defenses against ginger and soy sauce.
As for the actual experience of eating it…it was fine? Unfortunately, they used plain rice rather than seasoning it as you would for sushi or chirashi. And in all honesty, the burrito presentation is less convenient than either sushi rolls or chirashi. So while I enjoyed it, and I would eat another burrushi under some circumstances, I would always rather have any one of the more traditional forms.
To go or not to go: …Eh. It was fine. Don’t avoid it, but skip it if you have a better option.
Paletas from Mercado Roma
Fancy paletas are the best paletas! Taken by Elani
The Mercado Roma is a fancy market and food court in the Roma Norte neighborhood. We had some great empanadas there, but the paletas were what really blew me away!
To go or not to go: Definitely go, these are some delicious popsicles!
Insects and Mezcal at Corazon de Maguey
Detail of guacamole and chapuline (grasshopper!) Taken by Elani
Corazon de Maguey is famous for two things: great Oaxacan-influenced Mexican food, and great mezcals. Located in the same district as Frida Kahlo’s house, it’s worth a visit in its own right. The chapulines were nicely crunchy, and totally delicious with the guacamole!
To go or not to go: Definitely go!
Mystery Flan
Flan with a spoon stuck in it. Taken by Elani
Geoff loves flan! It’s fine, but not my favorite. I’m afraid this is a mystery flan, though – I don’t remember where we bought it.
To go or not to go: If you can find the mystery flan, more power to you!
Hipster Tacos from Taqueria Orinoco
Five sauces and limes at a legendary taco spot: Taqueria Orinoco. Taken by Elani
We waited in quite a line to go to Taqueria Orinoco. We weren’t actually that dead set on it, it was more that we were really hungry and didn’t see anything else that looked good nearby. However, it was worth it in the end! Their sauces were amazing.
To go or not to go: Go, and even wait in line!
In the end, I left CDMX deeply impressed by its food culture. There’s great food to be found at all price points and in all styles. I might be biased, but one of my favorite meals was actually one Geoff and I made ourselves. For Christmas dinner, we roasted chicken breasts with potatoes, leeks, and carrots. It was simple, but delicious.
Our time in Mexico City (for the rest of this post, I’ll just use the abbreviation CDMX) lasted from the first part of December through the first week of January, meaning that’s where we were for the holidays. Traveling during the holidays is always pretty weird. Not as much for New Year’s Eve, since you can usually be somewhere with some sort of party going on, but being away from family during Christmas is sad. However, missing the months of gray rainy weather that’s winter in the Pacific Northwest is nice. I guess you can’t have your Christmas cake and eat it too.
Anyway, on to my story. CDMX (and Mexico in general, really) kicks off the Christmas season on December 12th with “the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe.” It actually kind of starts before then, since people from all over Mexico make the pilgrimage – by car, bike or foot – carrying pictures of the Virgin of Guadalupe, to her church in CDMX. I read something [citation needed] that said that around 2 million people would take mass there that day. So it’s kind of a big deal. We decided to make our way there. We went on the metro, not carrying pictures of the Virgin – just in case you were curious. It was an impressive sight, thousands of folks filling the courtyard of what is definitely one of the biggest churches I’ve ever seen. In addition to taking mass, many tribes of Native Mexicans come to perform traditional music and dances in the courtyard. I have no idea how that fits into the tradition, but it was very cool to see.
The Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe Taken by Elani
As for Christmas, being a Catholic nation, Mexico takes Christmas pretty seriously, and didn’t skimp on the decorations, lights, poinsettias and piñatas (they’re a Christmas thing in Mexico, who knew?) everywhere. The central square was particularly done up, and even had an ice skating rink. Is it freezing in CDMX at Christmas? Nope. So they substituted ice for some sort of plastic flooring that looked like you could skate okay on it. As for how Elani and I celebrated, well, it was just a quiet dinner at home. Someone else’s home, actually. We managed to score ourselves a house-sitting gig for that week, so that meant having a bit more space, a larger kitchen and two friendly cats to look after. We took advantage of actually having an oven and had roast chicken. Not the usual spread of a big family dinner, but a nice dinner none the less.
A Christmas tree made out of Poinsettias – for some reason Taken by Elani
New Year’s Eve was a bit more of a party. We headed down to the streets near the Angel of Independence where it was all going down. Block after block was packed, with loud music blearing. It was pretty cool to count down to midnight with thousands of other folks. But I must be getting old, because it was all a bit exhausting, and it wasn’t that long after midnight when we headed back to our apartment. One thing that was a bit disappointing was that they have evidently given up on the fireworks (well, the professional displays at any rate, there were plenty of amateur pyrotechnicians out that evening). I heard that a few years ago, the professional display actually hit one of the banking buildings nearby – apparently financial companies don’t like it when you hit their HQ with poorly aimed explosives. I guess you just can’t have any fun anymore. But it was still a good time, even if it was a little lacking in explosions.
The Angel of Independence in all her glory (and scaffolding) at New Years Taken by Elani
I didn’t come to Mexico City with an overwhelming desire to catch a Lucha Libre match (or show or whatever you call one). I’d looked up a few ‘best of’ lists on things to do in the city and it kept coming up. That got me to look into it, and I learned was that it was it was over the top spectacle, it was cheap (less than $15 USD per ticket, even after Ticketmaster’s BS fees), and you could drink during it. So really, it couldn’t go that badly. That being settled, I picked a Sunday evening and booked tickets for Elani and me.
In case it wasn’t apparent, Lucha Libre isn’t a sport. It’s more like a soap opera with body slams instead of cheesy dialog, although there is some of that too. There are good guys and bad guys, and it’s not too hard to figure out who’s who. There are also ongoing plot lines. Not being a follower of it, I didn’t really understand them, but you don’t really need to. There’s some drama can only be solved by getting half naked and wrestling. If you need more than that, you’re probably missing the point.
Though this isn’t a sport in the sense that it’s not a competition to determine a winner (that’s clearly already been decided well in advance), the players are very much athletes. Some of the action is pretty silly – punches come nowhere near to landing and the attacks that do land are usually full on open palm slaps to the pecs – there were some downright amazing acrobatics. Arm locks starting from the ropes that turn into a flipping slam to the mat. Throws done from a spinning handstand. Slamming an ‘opponent’ by climbing the ropes and jumping into the pit next to the mat. Yeah, everyone is cooperating to make it happen, but still, doing that safely takes skill, and that’s fun to watch. I also really appreciated the minimal brutality. No fake blood, no real attempt to make the hits look realistic. The emphasis is really on the acrobatics and drama.
It certainly wasn’t highbrow entertainment, but it was fun to turn my brain off, have a beer, root for the good guy, boo the bad guy and enjoy some entertainment that really doesn’t try to be more than it is. Seeing it didn’t turn me into a diehard fan or anything, but being there in person was definitely an experience, and I could see catching another show if I have another evening free in Mexico City.
After Tulum, it was time to catch a short flight to Mexico City. We stayed there from mid December through the first week of January, so just under a month. We wanted somewhere interesting to spend the holidays, and there certainly is no end of things to do there. I’ll write some posts about individual experiences, but first I wanted to just write a little about my general impression of the city.
First, it’s worth noting that Mexico City (or CDMX as it commonly abbreviated) is huge. It is actually the largest city I’ve ever been in for any real amount of time (spending a night in a hotel next to London Heathrow hardly counts, I think). It’s actually North America’s largest city. And being that big, it had all the sorts of things you can expect from a big city, like any kind of food you could want, terrible traffic, a great metro system (cheap too, at 5 pesos a ride), and more museums then you could shake a stick at. It also has an enormous park at its center that puts New York’s Central Park to shame (in area if nothing else). CDMX also has a complex and at times tumultuous history. I’m not going to go into it now, but if you have some free time, it’s a Wikipedia rabbit hole worth going down, and it colors the city even today.
But all that wasn’t really what I noticed first, the first thing that left its impression on me was how cold it got. I mean, not cold, cold, but it dropped below 50F a few nights, and after wearing t-shirt and shorts for a month in the Yucatan, wearing a winter coat is a rude surprise. The other thing was the air quality. The air there is naturally thin and dry thanks to the high altitude and desert climate, and when you add a dense layer of urban smog, it’s honestly pretty miserable. I felt at least vaguely ill for a month, and I’m pretty sure it was due to the air. So yeah, that kind of sucked.
CDMX has a long history, but it still feels more “unsettled” then most US cities. It’s just hasn’t been that long since its colonial past, and it’s still working towards becoming a modern, stable democracy. It felt safe in the neighborhoods we were in, but there was an edge of security and enough police presence to tell that that safety is only a few decades old. It also is trying to reverse some of the cultural damage the Spanish did during the colonial period and take pride in its rich indigenous history while still maintaining the religion and traditions brought by the Spanish. In short, it has a varied, rich and still very much evolving cultural landscape, and that shows through beautifully in its art, music and food scenes.
All that said, the thing that still lingers more is how similar it feels to the United States. There’s a lot of cultural cross-pollution going on. The USA and Mexico are both former new world colonies and in the grand scheme of things, they just aren’t that far apart. Beyond that, there has been a lot of people and culture going over both borders for a long time now. And being here, there’s a real “American-ness” that is shared across the continent. It’s hard to put my finger on just what defines it, but it’s there. It’d be nice if we – as a country – could acknowledge it and embrace a bit more of a regional identity like Europe does. On the other hand, it took them a long time to get there, so maybe we will one day, too.
