July 29 2010
I would have preferred a cholo, but palm trees will do.
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Oso moved out to DF last month just in time to see us leave. It’s natural to wonder what Mexico City would have been like with my fiancee and a really good friend living in the city. It took a visit from David to enlighten my coffee ordering. Before him, it was puro americanos. After, cortaditos from Cafe Guardatiempo – a dingy cafe with no wifi about five minutes from my place – were the norm. It’s the type of experience that will be difficult to replicate in Los Angeles. David came out after a long flight from DC to wish us well and take the remainder of our belongings. Even after a sleep-depriving trip, he was able to muster enough energy for a proper farewell.
Anna ran the office from our living room and started with five permanent employees when she first started her job in Mexico City. Two years later, the office she built is bustling with over 100 local employees. Above, a few of her chamba-mates come out to salute her one last time.
The green VW beetle. Once a constant around the streets of Mexico City, the vehicles are sparse now, headed for extinction in 2012. The notorious green beetles, or “el vocho”, were transformed into maroon/gold in 2009 and are now sprinkled randomly throughout the city. Above, a green bug in Roma.
The most fascinated illustrations at the Mexico City Museum involve the canals and waterways once dominant in Mexico City. How this city became the second most populated in the world – on a base considered mush – is still something that boggles my mind. None of this is forgotten in the hundreds of sketches and paintings outlining the flourishing of urbanism and the receding of Mexico City’s canals. Above, a portrait of a plaza with canals to the right. Now imagine the collages, video portraits, and audio slideshows that will provide history lessons for Chilangos in the next century. The talk will surely revolve around the non-existence of water.
There is still lots to pack. If we could, we’d take this apartment with us to Los Angeles.
Last weekend in Mexico City/Dreaming of Los Angeles.
By normal standards of street beauty, Juan de la Barrera would be considered extraordinary. Arching branches cover the sidewalks overhead with intense green foliage. The houses are weathered with character. Its birds can be heard chirping because silence isn’t unordinary. It feels like a neighborhood in a giant city. Five minutes into my stroll and I came across an open lot. A wooden fence kept curious eyes away from whatever was being unearthed. But above the mangled concrete, the piles of dirt and the trash was an assortment of colors, text, swirls, and images. The neighborhood artists had found a giant canvas to play on. And what I am positive is an eyesore for some, is comfort and familiarity for me.
We were on our way to pick up moving boxes and I spotted them. A young man enjoying the few hours before the 5:30pm rains with his lady friend. She never moved, but he turned to look at me the moment I took the first photograph. This is when I feel the most exhilaration from this project. Immediately I feel vulnerable, shaky, rushed and overwhelmingly nervous. My instincts tell me to stop photographing, leave, get the hell out and don’t look back. It’s like being on the edge of a cliff and hoping you won’t look down. I motioned a thumbs up to the kid, but no response was returned. That’s when I realized he should be the nervous one. After all, I’m the stranger with a lens pointed at him.
In terms of style and ambiance, there better be some room for what we want.
It’s almost time to leave, so I’m walking around photographing possible artwork for our new place. I’m thinking the El Ángel would look great in my future office.
Sundays in Condesa are easy to manage when all you want is a simple stroll. The neighborhood is full of parks and green space, and almost all shops are closed for the day. It equals minimal traffic and unusually deadened noise pollution in the city. After a memorable evening, we needed a simple photo shoot and relaxation.
Our host decided his largest dinner party would be to say Adios! to us. The ambience was consistent with everything we’d ever experienced here; the aroma from the kitchen notified us there wouldn’t be many surprises. Tonight, like every dinner party here, would be delightful in the most raucous way. We greeted Michael and he told us Araceli had created a four-course meal she knew Anna would enjoy. Guts around the room immediately swooned. But she could have served anything for us tonight. Araceli is, without a doubt, Mozart in the kitchen. There is no other Republica de Cuba street quite like this one. For two years, we were granted the privilege to attend multiple dinner parties with some extraordinarily warm, intelligent and festive people. But as our friends sat, the candles flickering brilliantly enough to let me capture the evening through my lens, I began to realize that this would not be, could not be replicated anywhere else. The friendships, the music, the food, the preparations, the seating arrangements, the time-warping, the discussions, Araceli’s cooking, the laughter, records, rolodex, bow-ties, name cards, and Virgencita aprons, were all unique moments rapidly fleeting. Evenings like this – in the beautiful monstrosity of DF – would no longer be a regular occurrence in our lives. Like Anna said at the end of the evening, “It feels like an end of an era.”
I walked through Chapultepec market and found a man calling out challengers to find which bottle cap was hiding his little marble. The stench of raw meat was heavy in the air. I stood and watched for a few minutes. A man with a mullet bit his lip and stared nervously at the caps shifting back-and-forth. Another man stood and gazed at everyone else. A woman with child allowed a few seconds of gawking and then scurried along. I took my camera out and didn’t even get the lens cap off before a stern reprimand was leveled on my ass. “Quita tu pinche cámara! “Put away your fucking camera!” The man, with a towel now draped over the bottle caps, shot eyes of death at me. I smiled nervously and went on my way without saying a word. My face was down, my camera hidden from sight and inspiration sunk into my hard, cold shell. He was right. Why was I trying to get photographs of a scam? Who the hell was I? I stopped to get a cup of coffee and read a free magazine DF bookstores were giving out. I came to this sketch and felt better. I left energized, grabbed my camera and came to this scene.
Conejoblanco was empty. I had the entire store to photograph without anyone interrupting me. The hardwood cracked, my shutter echoed, but no one came up. I went from room to room until I got to the bathroom. There were books everywhere. In the sink. In the tub. On the toilet. I reached over for Peter Kuper’s “Diarios De Oaxaca.” The sketches were riddled with images of Mixtecos and soldiers. Finally I heard a voice. A customer walked in asking for a collection of someone for someone. I put the book down. My private time was over.
I recognized the street corner. I had stopped there with my friends last April when it was a cafe. The place – scrapped from my memory – maintained a beautiful espresso machine and served a perfect cortadito. Now the corner was home to La Nacional and it’s mezcal joint, La Botica. I looked into the restaurant and didn’t see anyone I knew. An open door adjacent to La Nacional looked more like a storage area for the restaurant, but then I saw the caballitos. We looked in and Alexis was there. The bottles of mezcal were plenty, but I could already feel an overwhelming sense of indecision coming on. The menu, written on a piece of what looked to be rain-soaked cardboard, made things a little easier. Osito ordered “el mas suave” and I went for the same. The first sip was earthy and robust. The second made me say “damn” and wince like the first time I ever tried absinthe. I took periodic chugs of my beer, but it only made me drink everything else faster. I switched to a cocktail laced with worm salt and, suddenly, everything became extremely clear. Mezcal, the artisanal badge of honor for the hip in Mexico City, wasn’t going to win me over this night.
The Tuesday tianguis down the street from my place is the type of experience I want in my back pocket wherever I go: La Señora with her “tengo nopalitos” shout; the pomegranate seller always telling me to put a little salt and lemon on the seeds and then chase it with tequila; the free fruit samples; the battered codfish tacos with extra large tortillas for lunch. You know what I really want? I want people to offer me free samples of jicama, aguacate, mango, and melon wherever I shop. The vendors here do it right. Above, Osito on the hunt for what would become stir-fry goodness.
The sound of a whip cracking through dense air is chilling. The sight of a man on stilts, with a ski mask, dressed in a full-length garb the color of blood, and cracking the whip is almost unbelievable. He stood there snapping a giant orange lash through the air, facing a manifestacion on the opposing corner of Donceles street. I took a few photographs from behind, contemplating whether I should move along the sidewalk to get a view from the front. Then he stopped, pivoted and came toward me in what would be considered a sprint on stilts. How he moved so fast on those things, on cobblestone, amazed me. Why he was doing what he was doing is still a mystery.
Paul The Octopus was right all along, and Spanish fans were grateful. Spain beat the Netherlands 1-0 in extra time for their first World Cup title in the nation’s history. In Mexico City, fans packed La Glorieta de la Cibeles – a replica of the Cibeles fountain in Madrid, and waived flags, drank booze, hissed with excitement, and expressed semi-uncomfortable admiration for replicas of the World Cup trophy. Mexican police stood guard, but all was harmless. Above, three Spanish soccer fans celebrate by yelling in my direction. More photos here.
Milk, packaged behind this phenomenal door – adjacent to an auto shop – ready to be delivered every day. |
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