What A Difference Trees Make

 I have just arrived in Coyoacan after two weeks in Puebla.  Being away from home has been wearing on me the last couple of days and I am eager to return home but I am trying to contain this eagerness to return so that I don't miss whatever further blessings are here for me.  I had problems finding my bus at the terminal in Puebla and seven different employees gave me seven different directions which also didn't help much.  Then at the terminal in Mexico City the woman at the authorized taxi desk was a complete twit because I didn't know the name of the exact neighbourhood I was going to in Coyoacan.  A kind couple showed me a map posted and then when I got in the taxi the cab driver said it was the wrong neighbourhood (turned out he was right) and charged me an extra four bucks or fifty pesos, then forgot to give me change for the one hundred (eight dollars) peso note I gave him.  So it isn't a huge amount and I can absorb the loss but let's say I've had better days in Mexico and here in the Distrito Federal, or the Federal District of Mexico (which is a fancy name for metropolitan Mexico City) things are more expensive and one can easily get pesoed to death.  There is no guests' computer in the guest house where I'm staying and even though I have access to the kitchen, as a vegetarian it is difficult to negotiate myself around meat eaters for the short term and restaurants here are pricier than in Puebla.  Also in Puebla I always ate at the Zanahoria which serves good and economical vegetarian food.  The place has zero atmosphere but it has helped keep me alive.  Here in Coyoacan at a supermarket I had to shell out for overpriced nuts and dried fruit as well as bananas and oranges since the fruit offering in the place I have breakfast in Coyoacan is expensive and the dinners in other places, though meatless, aren't always nutritionally balanced so the nuts and fruit are to help keep me in reasonable health.
For two and a half hours on the bus from Puebla I had a pleasant and interesting conversation with a lady who is a high school teacher, all in Spanish.  When we got into Mexico City I really noticed the many trees, which are lacking in Puebla.  It is amazing what a difference trees can make for one's general health and wellbeing.
     I don't think I am going to continue to need to take these long trips in order to improve my Spanish (which has been up to now my real reason for going) and I just might stay home from now on or at least for a few years. I know, I've said this before, and once I'm back in Vancouver I hope that  this time I will come to my senses and stay there.  Budget travel is not for sissies and since that's all I can afford it might be better to give it up.  I'm not getting younger and the minor hardships are becoming somewhat less minor.  I just hope that once I get off the plane I don't find myself missing Mexico like I did last year.