Ready...go! I had to wait a week to accumulate enough to form a full entry here. Things have picked up, going well. I´ve met some cool people to hold cool conversations with, ranging in age from 19 to 42. The sorority girls who were on the same trips with me this past weekend were ridiculously annoying. I´m sure I was somewhat annoying as a 20 year old, but I highly doubt I was capable of that level of annoyance. I´m really enjoying the Spanish and my classes, and I´m growing increasingly anxious/excited about my language skills for Peru. I have my flights to Peru booked, so I´m way excited about that...I leave Mexico on Feb 12 at 6 am and get into Iquitos at 7 pm, with a stopover in Panama city as well as Lima. I can get halfway around the world in 12 hours...it seems strange that it will take me that long just to hop over the equator. But regardless, my return flight, open to change if anyone wants to come and travel with me at the end of May/beginning of June (shameless plea for travel companion) is June 10. But I hope I have reason to delay that date.
Ok, in flipped and reversed order of events (ie going backwards): Yesterday I went to Mexico City with a group from the school, and went to the Frida Kahlo museum, and the Dolores Olmedo Patiño museum and to Xochimilco, an area with waterways and canals that hark back to the days when Mexico City was an island. The two museums were amazing, mostly artwork of Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, and the Frida Kahlo museum is in the house she grew up in and lived in most of her life (la casa azul). Mom and Dad - definitely something you should do on your next trip here. The Dolores Olmedo museum was in this woman´s , Dolores Olmedo, house, which was a veritable mansion, and she had collected tons of art, a lot of Diego Rivera´s and Frida Kahlo´s work, and was a very wealthy socialite, so her house/museum was very cool as well. At Xochimilco, we took a boat ride (see pics tomorrow...), were serendaded by floating mariachi bands and played bumper boats with the many other boats in the canals.
On Saturday, I went to the pyramides of Teotihuacán. (check out that typing skill with the accents, btw). Had it been about 10 degrees warmer, and had there been no rain, and had there been no annoying sorority girls, it would have been a better day, but seeing the ruins was very cool, and climbing the two biggest pyramids (el sol y la luna) was fun, and provided a beautiful view from the top, complete with Mexico City smog. But for some reason, from Curenavaca to Teotihuacán, the temperature dropped and the rain came, and being in Mexico, I did not really expect it, so I was a little bit cold until I climbed the pyramides. Moving on. Saturday night I met up with some of the folks from the trip who attend another language school, for dinner, and I was by far the youngest person there, by at least 10-15 years. It´s sorta funny how I have more to talk about with these folks than with the other 20 somethings on the trip. Anyway, we went for dinner and saw some dancing in the town center (el zocalo, one in every town) before dinner. There were these older couples dancing, and the best way I can describe it is it was something from PBS. If the dancers from the Lawrence Welk Show had aged naturally and moved to Mexico, this is what they would be doing with their Saturday nights. It was kinda adorable. One couple was pretty cut-throat, though, you could tell they took this very seriously.
Friday night I went out for very rich Italian food with a guy from my classes and enjoyed some good banter about the problems of the globe. He has traveled very extensively, so I enjoyed the conversation.
Last week, a few "notable" events: I went with my host mom and we had massages for 60 pesos. With the current exchange rate, that´s roughly $6. Not $60, $6. The massages were by massage students, so they offer these really cheap massages in order to get their hours of practice in, so I´ve had better massages, but still, it was delightful.
I went to an arte museum here in Cuernavaca. The museum is of Robert Brady´s art collection, and is in his beautiful old house here. Robert Brady was an independently wealthy art collector who was American but lived in Cuernavaca and traveled the world collecting art, everything from african tribal masks to frida kahlo paintings, and stuff from all over Africa, South America, Mexico, some European stuff, Indonesia, etc. It was awesome, especially since its rumored that Mr. Brady was a very "flamboyant" man, so the way he displayed his art reflected that. No wall had barely an inch of open, unoccupied space, and the whole house was painted in very bright and vibrant colors. His global mask collection was awesome, something that Dad would definitely appreciate (see pics)!
The weekend before that was Acapulco. Acapulco was hot and sunny and empirically beautiful, but as I recall, very very touristy, so touristy that apparently the local economy requires two Wal-Marts, a Costco, and a Sam´s club to sustain it. It was a beach weekend, so I enjoyed being lazy and laying in the shade on the beach, as I don´t need to be any darker at the moment. I´m not the discoteque-going, tequilla-drinking gringa that usually enjoys the sort of places that Acapulco offers, so I had a relatively quiet weekend. The beaches were beautiful and the water warm, tho, so it was nice.
And I think that catches everyone up.
PICTURES:
Jill on her balcony in Acapulco
All sorts of strangely awesome art at the Robert Brady Museum
I´m having trouble adding other pictures, and I´m not sure if those above will come out very well...I will try and add pics from this past weekend tomorrow or later today...enjoy
Ready...go! I had to wait a week to accumulate enough to form a full entry here. Things have picked up, going well. I´ve met some cool people to hold cool conversations with, ranging in age from 19 to 42. The sorority girls who were on the same trips with me this past weekend were ridiculously annoying. I´m sure I was somewhat annoying as a 20 year old, but I highly doubt I was capable of that level of annoyance. I´m really enjoying the Spanish and my classes, and I´m growing increasingly anxious/excited about my language skills for Peru. I have my flights to Peru booked, so I´m way excited about that...I leave Mexico on Feb 12 at 6 am and get into Iquitos at 7 pm, with a stopover in Panama city as well as Lima. I can get halfway around the world in 12 hours...it seems strange that it will take me that long just to hop over the equator. But regardless, my return flight, open to change if anyone wants to come and travel with me at the end of May/beginning of June (shameless plea for travel companion) is June 10. But I hope I have reason to delay that date.
Ok, in flipped and reversed order of events (ie going backwards): Yesterday I went to Mexico City with a group from the school, and went to the Frida Kahlo museum, and the Dolores Olmedo Patiño museum and to Xochimilco, an area with waterways and canals that hark back to the days when Mexico City was an island. The two museums were amazing, mostly artwork of Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, and the Frida Kahlo museum is in the house she grew up in and lived in most of her life (la casa azul). Mom and Dad - definitely something you should do on your next trip here. The Dolores Olmedo museum was in this woman´s , Dolores Olmedo, house, which was a veritable mansion, and she had collected tons of art, a lot of Diego Rivera´s and Frida Kahlo´s work, and was a very wealthy socialite, so her house/museum was very cool as well. At Xochimilco, we took a boat ride (see pics tomorrow...), were serendaded by floating mariachi bands and played bumper boats with the many other boats in the canals.
On Saturday, I went to the pyramides of Teotihuacán. (check out that typing skill with the accents, btw). Had it been about 10 degrees warmer, and had there been no rain, and had there been no annoying sorority girls, it would have been a better day, but seeing the ruins was very cool, and climbing the two biggest pyramids (el sol y la luna) was fun, and provided a beautiful view from the top, complete with Mexico City smog. But for some reason, from Curenavaca to Teotihuacán, the temperature dropped and the rain came, and being in Mexico, I did not really expect it, so I was a little bit cold until I climbed the pyramides. Moving on. Saturday night I met up with some of the folks from the trip who attend another language school, for dinner, and I was by far the youngest person there, by at least 10-15 years. It´s sorta funny how I have more to talk about with these folks than with the other 20 somethings on the trip. Anyway, we went for dinner and saw some dancing in the town center (el zocalo, one in every town) before dinner. There were these older couples dancing, and the best way I can describe it is it was something from PBS. If the dancers from the Lawrence Welk Show had aged naturally and moved to Mexico, this is what they would be doing with their Saturday nights. It was kinda adorable. One couple was pretty cut-throat, though, you could tell they took this very seriously.
Friday night I went out for very rich Italian food with a guy from my classes and enjoyed some good banter about the problems of the globe. He has traveled very extensively, so I enjoyed the conversation.
Last week, a few "notable" events: I went with my host mom and we had massages for 60 pesos. With the current exchange rate, that´s roughly $6. Not $60, $6. The massages were by massage students, so they offer these really cheap massages in order to get their hours of practice in, so I´ve had better massages, but still, it was delightful.
I went to an arte museum here in Cuernavaca. The museum is of Robert Brady´s art collection, and is in his beautiful old house here. Robert Brady was an independently wealthy art collector who was American but lived in Cuernavaca and traveled the world collecting art, everything from african tribal masks to frida kahlo paintings, and stuff from all over Africa, South America, Mexico, some European stuff, Indonesia, etc. It was awesome, especially since its rumored that Mr. Brady was a very "flamboyant" man, so the way he displayed his art reflected that. No wall had barely an inch of open, unoccupied space, and the whole house was painted in very bright and vibrant colors. His global mask collection was awesome, something that Dad would definitely appreciate (see pics)!
The weekend before that was Acapulco. Acapulco was hot and sunny and empirically beautiful, but as I recall, very very touristy, so touristy that apparently the local economy requires two Wal-Marts, a Costco, and a Sam´s club to sustain it. It was a beach weekend, so I enjoyed being lazy and laying in the shade on the beach, as I don´t need to be any darker at the moment. I´m not the discoteque-going, tequilla-drinking gringa that usually enjoys the sort of places that Acapulco offers, so I had a relatively quiet weekend. The beaches were beautiful and the water warm, tho, so it was nice.
And I think that catches everyone up.
PICTURES:
Jill on her balcony in Acapulco
All sorts of strangely awesome art at the Robert Brady Museum
I´m having trouble adding other pictures, and I´m not sure if those above will come out very well...I will try and add pics from this past weekend tomorrow or later today...enjoy
1 comment:
Great entry - dad and I would certainly love the museums you saw. We told you about the movie, Frida, right? About Frida Kahlo's life, starring Salma Hayek. A great film -maybe somehow you can rent a Spanish version of it in Mexico or Peru and watch it. if not, when you get home. Thanks for the news - it's still gray, foggy, and 26 here!
Love, Mom
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