Garett and I spent the past week in Mexico City, one of the largest cities in the world. It is enormous. When we flew in, I literally could not see the boundaries of the city from above–it looked like it stretched out to infinity.

We stayed in the Condesa/Hipodromo neighborhood. This was a good choice for us because it was (a little) less busy with many restaurants and parks. And so many sweet dogs! I saw a dog-walker with 12 of them at one point. It was a bit ridiculous; people were staring and pointing.

Here’s a park near our neighborhood.

Our first day here, we climbed up to see the palace in the Bosque de Chapultepec. It was a day where residents get to go for free, so we had lots of company! On our way there we saw a few monuments. Here is the Altar a La Patria

You can also see the monument from the top of the castle.

Mexico City has a ton of beautiful parks. I don’t know why I’m surprised–what would people do in the heat without any shade? There’s an army of people employed to take care of the parks–they all come out at night with their brooms. Other people help as well for free. Every morning that I’ve gone on a walk, I’ve seen older women and men hosing off the Hipodromo walking path and watering the plants.

In the castle gardens.

The castle has a few really cool murals; the one below was on the ceiling in a main foyer. For people who haven’t seen a lot of castle ceilings, this may just seem like whatever. But it’s a pretty big departure, usually ceilings have the Greco-Roman gods or Jesus and/or Mary crowning whoever the rulers of the day are. I have no idea what this one depicts, but it’s awesome. I love being rewarded for looking up.

And a picture of the colonizers. Before you say that it’s harsh to make them so ugly, check out this article. Here’s the gist: so many people were killed by the European colonizers that it may have caused an ICE AGE. Even if it’s not true, the fact that we even think it’s possible is pretty revealing.

We also went to Frida Kahlo’s house, “La Casa Azul.” It was as beautiful and lovely as the lady herself. Frida is a true inspiration–the amount of physical disability she dealt with is horrifying. Makes me want to vow never to complain again.

This is the best I could do. The place was swamped.

Frida’s bedroom.

The pillow says (I think): Wake up, sleeping heart. I guess it could be “Wake up the sleeping heart” with the article left out maybe. This sort of confusion is what happens when you forsake case endings, Spanish.

The beautiful kitchen.

Upon the recommendation of our friend, Nancy, we took a trip downtown to Cafe de Tacuba. It was a ton of fun! There was an entire band singing and playing string instruments. I get nervous taking pictures of people, so it’s a little blurry.

All the waitresses were wearing these white uniforms. I imagine they are traditional, but they looked a little Nurse Rached-y to me. Check out the combination of the old and new–the paintings of nature along the doors and corners with a depiction of nuns just visible in the other room.

I went to the Anthropology Museum on Wednesday. It was huge! There were so many distinct cultures in Mexico that it would take at least 3 or 4 trips to feel confident that I could identify where all the pots below came from. I’m going to post them anyway because I just love the emotions on the faces of the pots. It would be really fun to come up with captions for each one. Or you could match them with emojis.

If you look closely, you can see that the next one is winking! So sketchy.

Cray-cray dog with spinny eyes.

Also the Coyote Cabeza! I’m planning on using Coyote Cabeza as my Halo/COD/Fortnite gaming handle.

On Thursday, Garett and I hired Alejandro to take us to see Teotihuacan, one of the largest cities in Mesoamerica in the time leading up to the 6th or 7th century CE. There were maybe 125,000 people living in the city or its vicinity. The parts that we saw were the places reserved only for the nobility and for worship of the gods. Below, you can see the Temple/Pyramid of the Sun behind us and a volcano behind that. Alejandro was very specific about calling the buildings “temples” rather than “pyramids” because they were used to worship the gods. Pyramids were tombs.

Teotihuacan was abandoned in the 6th century for unknown reasons and then covered with dirt over the centuries. According to Alejandro, local people knew about it, but they kept quiet because they didn’t want the Spaniards pillaging it. Once Mexico was freed from Spain, they started excavations.

Here we are in front of the Temple of the Plumed Serpent.

But surprise! It’s not really a serpent–it’s a jaguar-serpent! And there are crocodiles as well. On the very bottom, there is a long snake that looks almost like a Chinese dragon. These guys deities were super scary, Alejandro said they demanded human as well as animal sacrifices.

We climbed the Temple of the Sun. Check out how small the people are below; it’s really high. And the stairs are exactly at a 45 degree angle, so they are quite steep. These buildings were all built with 90 and 45 degree angles at exact positions to reference the sun, moon, and stars.

The Temple of the Sun as seen from the Temple of the Moon. Everything would have been covered in plaster and painted in ancient times; the Temple of the Sun would have been red and orange.

We also saw a lot of frescoes. The ones below reference the “Ball Game.” The theory is that this game was a replication of the struggles of the Cosmos and thus winning and losing had dire consequences. One side–it’s not clear which–was sacrificed by either cutting off their heads or ripping out their hearts.

The long lines coming out from the men’s mouths are like speech bubbles for shouting. They all have sticks, so maybe it’s like field hockey but with death?

We also have statues of the players. To be honest, they don’t look like they are about to play to the death. The first one looks almost jovial.

By contrast, check out the Spaniards playing ball. This is from the castle game room. They are certainly not emulating the Cosmos; I mean, their balls have strings on them.

A few other images because I can’t resist. This is the Teotihuacan-ians having fun in their water mountain. They look like kids in a pool.

When I complained that we had seen no women in our art, Alejandro took me to see this terrifying goddess, a female form of Tlaloc, the god of rain and fertility.

And a crazy skull-death-wheel. With its tongue stuck out, it’s definitely mocking you.

Before we came, people warned us about the dangers of the city, but this has not been our experience at all. We’ve walked around in many parts of the city at dusk and at night and had no problems. There have also been many young women walking alone at night; to me, this is the gold standard of whether a city is safe. If you’re thinking about coming here, don’t let worries about safety stop you! It’s such a wonderful place.