Tag: Mexico City

Getting stuffed on the bounty of Mexico City

~ Chris ~ 3 Comments

Twenty-two tacos. That’s all I could devour over seven days in Mexico City before I hit taco fatigue, a malady that beats Montezuma’s revenge by a long shot. (I was gratefully spared that gastrointestinal massacre.) Too many tacos — poor me. But it happened: I burned out on the tortilla-wrapped meats and spices, even though they were otherworldly delicious. Al pastor remains a gastronomic god.

I knew I peaked during an exhaustive nighttime taco tour, which included a pitstop for a heady mezcal tasting. I could only devour seven of the tacos served — including a rather average one at the only taco stand in the world to earn a coveted Michelin star — and had to pass, bloatedly, on the final two. (That would have been nine tacos in three hours, if you’re counting.) I simply couldn’t finish, unless my tour mates wanted to see the feeble American provide a gut splash on the sidewalk. 

During my week in Mexico City, I wasn’t on a journey to eat as many tacos as possible. There was no quota. From the start, I wanted to leave room for an array of local delicacies, street food to fine dining, enchiladas to empanadas. Mission accomplished. Pizza even slipped into the plan. Thanks to its strong European tang, the city is famed for its prodigious pies. It was amazing.

The city surprises like that. CDMX, as they call it, is a sizzling melange of cultural influences, a vibrant swirl of art, cuisine, architecture (note the heavy Euro inspiration), lovely people, dogs, parks, museums (only second in the world for the sheer number of them, after London), sports, and, crap, a serious and grueling traffic problem. Don’t get me started. No, do. Some Uber rides took an hour, stop-starting, for just a few miles. The Ubers were nearly all dusty, dented beaters, but they muscled through and delivered. The streets — as clean as Tokyo. And there are no public trash cans. Pride reigns.

Located in the center of Mexico, the megalopolis sits 7,350 feet above sea level, which makes it higher than Denver, with thin air and temperate climes. It teems with life — 22 million people live there. That’s a lot of humanity, not to mention the multitude of pleased and pampered pups I saw all over the city.

I usually take wads of pictures of camera-happy hounds on my travels, but I only snapped a few this time. Here’s one, among a smattering of shots, a taco-y taste of CDMX. 

In line at the Frida Kahlo Museum. I forgot her name.
Frida Kahlo looking pensive, near the museum. The city bursts with street art.

Cooking up one of my favorites, pork tacos al pastor.

Al pastor up close. That’s marinade, not blood.

A cathedral in the City Centro.

The famous interior decor of the main post office.

The ludicrous circus-like spectacle of lucha libre: wrestling theater. The crowd of 7,000 goes wild at the backflipping, body-stomping, mask-wearing rivalries. It kind of gave me a headache, in a good way.

One of the better pizzas I’ve ever had, even in Italy. Perfection.

A typical park smack in the city. Joggers, yoga, musicians, dogs, salsa dancers.

Palace of Fine Arts (Palacio de Bellas Artes)

Rear is chicken taco al pastor. Front is octopus al pastor. Awesome.

Breakfast before a three-hour tour of the astounding Museum of Anthropology.

A random facade in City Centro.

Large tortilla chip with guacamole. On top: grasshoppers. Yes, delicious.

Making me a killer cocktail at Tlecān mezcal bar. It’s ranked #23 in the World’s 50 Best Bars 2025 and #3 in North America’s 50 Best Bars 2025. It, like Mexico City, lives up to the hype. Ultra-modern with a hearty, heartfelt nod to history.

Good news, bad news. What’re you gonna do?

~ Chris ~ 4 Comments

The dog smells like a bowl of stale Doritos. The nor’easter is splatting rain and blowing tree-tossing gusts. Our sociopathic “president” continues to appall on a daily basis (no, you’re not getting the Nobel, so shut up). And I have a zit on my forehead that’s festering like Mt. Vesuvius in 79 A.D.

Otherwise things are just super, grand and dandy, unless you consider that Diane Keaton, one of the most charming and beautiful creatures ever to grace the big screen, has died. Crushing. Long live Annie Hall.

I go to Mexico City in precisely one month, though just days before that I have a dental appointment I’d rather not keep but will, because two of my teeth appear to be turning gray (this mad world!). I’m afraid I am becoming wizened.

If you squint really hard you can squeeze out some of the bad news and unfettered horrors — Gaza, Ukraine, the new Spike Lee movie — unfurling across the world. But it’s not easy, and almost certainly not possible.

But back to the one kernel of okay news, my vacation in Mexico City, a full week in November. I’ve been booking tours and making reservations with tentacular zeal. And I’ve also been uprooting prior plans. In an earlier post I mentioned that I registered for a tacos al pastor cooking class, a splurge and a mash note to my favorite taco. 

Well, I nixed the class (sorry, Anne R.!) for two expeditions: one a three-hour guided tour of the National Museum of Anthropology (sounds deadly, but I’m assured it’s essential) and the other a festive, three and a half-hour Tacos and Mezcal Tour, whose price tag I blush to share with you. Guess which tour I’m looking more forward to.

Other good news lurks. Fall has fallen, and despite the nor’easter, which is really quite mild in these parts, the weather is totally dreamy. Usually I’m abroad for Halloween — Europeans try very hard to get it down, though it’s still strictly amateur hour there — but I’ll be around this time and that’s a plus. 

I dig a good monster mash. I also like all the costumes that I can’t tell what the hell they’re supposed to be. Is that a ballerina werewolf? I hope some savvy kids deck out as Annie Hall: men’s tie, vest and khakis, and that wide-brimmed hat. Sartorial genius. They can flummox all their friends who still dress in Pokémon.

On a side note, what ever happened to the smashed pumpkins in the street? In my day, that was as mandatory as begging for goodies. Kids today. So thoughtful. Or clueless.

I guess in the end that’s also good news. Smashing Pumpkins is a great band — pay special attention to the superhuman drummer — but smashing pumpkins is just boneheaded vandalism. Thus I hesitantly cheer its extinction.

Good news and bad news will always share a table, so we’re kind of stuck. Israeli hostages are freed (yay). Diane Keaton dies (boo). Leaves are falling with the temperature (yay). Jeff Tweedy releases a solo triple album (boo). Paul Thomas Anderson’s new movie, “One Battle After Another,” is an apparent masterpiece (yay). Oh, and the dog. Yes, the dog. He really needs a bath (self-explanatory).

Diane Keaton as Annie Hall

Roaming Roma

~ Chris ~ Leave a comment

About that Mexico City trip I’m taking in November, I think I’m getting carried away. I’m there for a week and already I’ve booked four dinners and six tours, and I’m scanning more adventures in the heaving megalopolis, which goes by the sporty acronym CDMX. 

The gargantuan city is so overwhelming, with so much to see and eat, I feel I require more guidance and guardrails than on previous trips. I’m so fretful that I woke at 2 a.m. to make a pair of rarefied restaurant reservations just to make sure I secured them at the exact right time. (Scored!) 

But I’m also a loner, so, when it comes to tours, I really don’t want to get stuck with too many chatty chuckleheads from, say, Melbourne and Milwaukee. I can roll my eyes only so much. Still, I have six tours on my slate, a personal record, which could be a canny or foolhardy proposition. 

That said, I’m probably going to spend the rest of my time strolling the many neighborhoods solo and uncover my own delights. The place is frightfully big, so this expedition will either be sweetly exhilarating or operatically tragic. 

One of the tours I’ve booked is of the vibrant Roma area, billed as a paradise of local markets, parks, trendy restaurants, bars and hipster cafes. If that’s my sort of  thing — and it is, though I do love my grunge — it also evokes writer-director Alfonso Cuarón’s 2018 memory film “Roma,” set in the neighborhood during the much different 1970s, when the socio-political scene was uniquely combustible. (The area, incidentally, is named after Rome, Italy, as a tribute to its wealth and culture.)

The award-dappled movie is a languid stunner, an autobiographical portrait of growing up in Cuarón’s tight upper-middle class family, with special focus on the domestic help, namely Cleo, who, beyond sweeping up dog poop and making beds, takes care of Cuarón and his three gangly siblings.

Deceptively simple, “Roma” — shot in shimmery, Oscar-winning black and white that looks like quicksilver — is family drama at its most heightened and honest. Its verité verve is pure documentary immersion.

From the director of masterworks “Y tu mamá también,” “Gravity” and “Children of Men,” the movie examines with a flea comb the daily dynamics of living and loving together, and all the pain and joy that involves, including fatal frictions between husband and wife. 

And then there’s quiet, big-hearted Cleo, cooking and cleaning and embracing her role as part of the family — and in the process, becoming a sort of angelic savior keeping the clan together. The movie ranks #46 on the New York Times list of best films of the last 25 years.

The tour I booked has a lot to live up to.

(On Netflix.)

Wrestlemañia

~ Chris ~ Leave a comment

It’s billed as the “BEST NIGHT EVER,” comical hyperbole that actually might live up to the puffery. How? Why? Because we’re talking about an excursion starring tacos, beer, tequila and — wait for it — tickets to Lucha Libre wrestling at the main arena in Mexico City. All for $84. Bust the bank? Let’s bust some chops.

What is Lucha Libre? Poor dears. Much like the muscle-bound, spray-tanned, flamboyantly theatrical wrestling spectaculars in the States, this is Mexico’s native version, with its own zingy flourishes. It pops with spangled spandex, gasping acrobatics, high-flying punishments and, of course, glittery but menacing masks. It’s like a ‘roided-out Cirque du Soleil with pile-drivers instead of creepy puppets.  

You might know it from “Nacho Libre,” a 2006 Jack Black comedy I found flat, though some people swear by its broad satirical swipes at easy cultural targets. (And, really, any movie starring the frenzied Black, who looks like a stout, overstuffed burrito in his glistening wrestling regalia, can’t be all bad. Well, yes it can.)

The sport — more like “sports entertainment,” because these shows are about as real as a Bugs Bunny cartoon — is massively popular in Mexico and boasts a cast of characters who act out elaborate storylines of good vs. evil, much like in American professional wrestling. Villains are lustily jeered, heroes cheered, feuds and rivalries fanned, and the wrestlers, known as luchadores, egg-on the rowdy throngs. 

The clownish masks that fit snugly over the brawlers’ entire head denote their identity and persona, like superheroes. “Losing a mask in a match is a significant loss, sometimes even more devastating than losing a hair match where the loser shaves their head,” that according to the web. (Think about a hair match in American wrestling, where the men fling their Goldilocks in a weird kind of virile vanity. It would never happen.) 

Back to that BEST NIGHT EVER (Trumpian all-caps theirs), which unfolds when I visit Mexico City in November. Our small group meets at a cantina for tacos (al pastor, please!), beer, tequila and mezcal (another pour, please!) before we head to Arena Mexico, dubbed the Cathedral of Lucha Libre, holding 17,000 fans. 

It’s going to be bedlam, sheer madness. Fans going crazy, beer being hawked, wrestlers executing thunderous body thwumps that rattle the giant ring, masks all over the place. I’m not a big public noisemaker, but I understand our host gives us our own Lucha Libre masks. Maybe, just maybe, I’ll be whooping it up, too. I’m rooting for the villains. 

Revving up for Mexico

~ Chris ~ 4 Comments

With a trip to Mexico City planned for early November, I’ve been flipping through a couple of travel guides to see what I’m in for. (I smell tacos al pastor. Dog-ear that page!)

The place is ginormous, the sixth largest city in the world and the most populous city in North America, with 22 million people. I plan to weep as I inevitably get lost in the grand sprawling Spanish-speaking metropolis. What’s the Spanish word for “mommy”?

Yes, I am going to eat tacos on an epic scale and drink tequila and mezcal with stupid abandon and avoid the sun while lapping up kaleidoscopic art and archeological thingamabobs and trying to figure out why everyone’s so batshit about Frida Kahlo. 

There’s a Kahlo museum set in her childhood home or some such, but I’m more interested in the massive murals painted by her lecher hubby Diego Rivera — he had more mistresses than murals. Either way, it’ll be an art orgy.

I’m staying in the leafy, shady, unspeakably bougie La Condesa neighborhood, where a gorgeous park resides and is evidently the city’s dog capital, which makes me serene about the fact my hotel is charging me two year’s salary for a six day stay. Perros! 🐶

But my canine pals are just a bonus on a trip that promises heaps of highlights, be it the spectacular, art-stuffed Palacio de Belles Artes or insane, masked Lucha Libre wrestling; the lavish Catedral Metropolitana or self-explanatory Museum of Tequila and Mezcal. And, of course, street tacos out the wazoo.  

I really don’t know what to expect. When I was 14 we took a cruise down the Pacific Coast of Mexico, strictly beach stops — Cabo, Mazatlan, Acapulco. But Mexico City is a landlocked, high-altitude megalopolis teeming with fine dining, clubs, bars, galleries, museums and such. (Like any major city, it also has unfortunate pockets of crime and squalor that shouldn’t be ignored.) 

Mexico City. What am I doing? I ask that before almost every journey — Budapest, huh? — and almost always return enlightened, brightened. It’s about discovery, learning, seeing, and in this case, a lot about tacos al pastor. I’m seriously considering taking a $70 class on how to make these scrumptious finger foods while I’m there.

That sound you hear is me turning pages in my guide books with increasing excitement, the revelations and expectations. It’s all part of the trip — an expedition of the known and the unknown blended in a zesty imperative: show me what you’ve got.

Palacio de Belles Artes

Stuff, etc.

~ Chris ~ Leave a comment

One of the cats died recently. He was kind of the rotten cat, the one that shreds up the carpet, craps where he feels like it and was extra aloof, like an Aviator-wearing rock star who hates giving autographs. Anyway, we’re saddened and miss the ornery fellow. I’m not sure what to do with his ashes: urn them nicely or chuck them over the fence at the squirrels. 

I don’t trust social media as far as I can spit. If I had a girlfriend, I’d ask her, quite nicely of course, to get off that shit.

Voyeurism is the opiate of the masses, not religion. Think about that for about four seconds.

Just guess who I think embodies all of these descriptives: racist, greedy, venal, petty, megalomaniacal, misogynistic, heartless, rankly sophomoric, vulgarian scum. Bingo.

I’ve planned a trip to Mexico City for November, but I’m so traveled-out right now, the whole thing sounds terrible. Five months is far off, so I should be refreshed by then. Thing is, the weather runs in the mid-70s to 80 in November and I’m barely any good over 70. I hate the heat; I’m a San Francisco wuss. I read that t-shirts and shorts are frowned upon in Mexico City, and I’m not a fan of them either. It sounds like when I was in sweltering India and everyone was swaddled in jeans and long sleeves. I wore jeans with t-shirts and I sweated like swine. Drenched. Two showers a day. I don’t want any of that crap. Maybe I’ll push the trip to December. Or January. Or never.

What I’m reading: “Demon Copperhead,” Barbara Kingsolver’s gritty, funny, unsparing ode to Dickens’ “David Copperfield.” The novel won a Pulitzer last year and rollicks with knockabout wit and wisdom and with more than a dash of social commentary about the sorry state of many of our states (opioids, poverty, detox). The damn thing’s a cinder block so it’s taking me forever to plow through, but it’s worth it. The title character, a teenage boy, both tart and talented, is one for the ages. He’s like a super smart Pig-Pen from “Peanuts”: brilliant but with a cloud of flies and dust buzzing around him. It’s his lot. But he’s one wily fighter, a scrappy, red-headed hero (hence “Copperhead”) in a bedraggled, Dickensian wasteland.

The cat died; the dog thrives. Cubby the wonder mutt needs a bath and a haircut and those crunchy, coagulated eye boogers extracted, but otherwise the aging fella is in fine fettle. OK, he’s been doing the occasional “revenge pee” in the dining room, meaning when he feels abandoned he’ll whizz on the rug when no one’s around. Stealth urine is as bad as any urine, but it’s worse, because you know the scruffy rascal’s doing it with a puckish glint in his eye.