Yesterday I chatted for a while with two of the many police who patrol this neighbourhood from street corners. I kept getting, well, not lost, but was looking for an internet cafe and while I was walking around later they asked me how I did and we stopped and talked for a little while. They don´t seem to believe that the environment is in danger (this came up when in reply to the question about whether all the buildings are heated in Canada, I replied that yes, of course, it is very expensive and some areas of the country still rely a lot on fossil fuels which is not great for the environment. While walking in Los Viveros, that big park full of trees I walked by three or four times a group of about thirty people sometimes sitting and sometimes standing in a prayer meeting. It was rather interesting. The woman leading would pray in short phrases and they would repeat after her.
The couple staying in the guest house with the little girl are from Colombia (she) and Mexico (he). We had an enjoyable chat in the kitchen. They asked what I do so I said I´m a mental health support worker. They both smiled and each suggested I might apply therapy to the other, but I graciously declined, replying that I´m on vacation. Strange that it didn´t occur to me to ask what they do, since I´m usually the first to ask. But I think it´s also because of the exotic element about being here. I mean, that I am considered exotic because I am from a different culture and people are going to be curious.
There is also a beautiful plaza that looks exactly the way I would envision the quintessential Mexican plaza, neatly laid out paved walkways and trees, a fountain that unfortunately doesn´t work right now and the bust on a pedestal of Raul Anguilano, Artiste Universal, El Orgullo de Mexico. Or, Raul Anguilano (I might be misspelling his name, so Mexican readers please be patient with me) Universal Artist, the Pride of Mexico. Yesterday in this same square someone was playing bagpipes (Scottish music, no mariachi) and I told him he played very well and that my father was Scots. Later in this plaza there was a group of around a hundred people or so gathered round in a protest demonstration against the installation of parking meters in Coyoacan. One lady was circulating a petition and asked me to sign. I declined, since I´m only visiting and when I asked her if maybe the use of parking meters might help control congestion she gave me a rather pitying look, smiled and walked on. Interesting how much I learn around here since I speak Spanish.
I got up early this morning and went for a walk in the direction of the sun which made the pavement in front of me look like liquid light. I stopped in the Frieda Kahlo Park. There is a statue of her, quite large, up on a pedestal in a corner where she sits rather like an Aztec Princess. This left me thinking about how natural it was for ancient peoples to worship the sun since without it everything that lives would perish. I still don{t understand though why this would have led the Aztecs to practice human sacrifice. And then the Spaniards came and instead of just stopping them from this vile practice they introduced their own form of brutality. I wonder how things might have turned out had they all taken a more collaborative approach, say, ¨You stop sacrificing people and we´ll stop burning witches and heretics.¨
The ambiance here is not to be missed. These narrow streets, many with cobblestones, colourful building fronts spray painted in graffiti, the flowers everywhere, especially the bougainvillea, so shameless in it´s gigantic sprays of magenta, scarlet, purple and golden flowers, and the people everywhere often crowding sidewalk cafes and cantinas. I walked through a poorer area of town this morning as well but still, everything festooned with colour.
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