Mexico City: Scenes/ Adventures in Rhythm—Folkloric Violins

Last night I went to the Ballet Folklorico for the first time. The violins were out of tune there too, just like they are everywhere else I've heard in Mexico. Throughout the two-hour performance I kept trying to decide if this was done to be "authentic," or if for some reason in Mexico any two given violins are incapable of being in tune with one another. I could not decide.

One expert offers an explanation:

"Stanford (1984)...stresses the devastating effect the inclusion of the trumpet initially had on traditional ensembles, particularly in causing the role of the violin to atrophy. According to Stanford, the violin players in the first modern mariachi groups (after the inclusion of the trumpet) subsequently viewed their instrument as less important, and began to play out of tune and with less care. In small mariachi ensembles, the violin was retained only to complete the overall visual image."

Mexico City: Scenes—Mexican Yoga

Mexico City is: a car with its car alarm going off, parked in the middle of the crosswalk, in front of the Buddhist Center.

Antiquariana: Mexican Industry

It is almost incredible to speak what some write of Mexico and the cities adjoining to it, no place in the world at their first discovery more populous.... We have the same means, able bodies, pliant wits, matter of all sorts, wool, flax, iron, tin, lead, wood, etc., many excellent subjects to work upon, only industry is wanting.

-Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy, 1621

Mexico City: Scenes—Mexican Humor

Yesterday I was leaving my building when a neighbor whom I had a met a few times stopped me.

You look very serious, she said in Spanish.

Oh, I said. She was almost middle-aged, which I hadn't noticed before.

Phlegmatic, she said. That's what we say.

That's funny, I said. We don't really say that in English.

About the English, she said. We say they're very phlegmatic.

Actually I'm not English, I said. I'm American. We're happy.

Yes. But we say they're phlegmatic, the English.

Well, I said. I'm not English. Goodbye!

Mexico City: Scenes—Pico de Gallo

At some point during the last month the next-door neighbors acquired a rooster.

He sounds bored.

Mexico City: Scenes—Shady Slim

Today, Forbes magazine announced that the U.S. has the most millionaires of any country in the world, but that the richest man in the world lives in Mexico.

Mexico City: Scenes—Digital Pirates

Pirated CDs and DVDs can be bought everywhere in Mexico City: in street markets, on the Metro, in Metro stations, in front of Metro stations, in front of movie theaters. Today, after nearly a year in Mexico, I bought my first pirated DVD—a copy of an Oscar-nominated American film which was released in Mexico as "Spirit of Steel." It cost fifteen pesos, or about $1.25.

Will report back on the quality.

Mexico City: Scenes—Se Busca Fido

Mexicans love to carry their dogs. I think this is why they invented the Chihuahua.

On another note: Recently I had been puzzled by the sheer number of lost dog flyers up everywhere in Mexico City. Then I realized this is because Mexicans walk their dogs without leashes (when they are not carrying them).

Mexico City: Scenes—David in the Harem

Recently some friends convinced me to spend Saturday night with them at a place called Bulldog Cafe. It was a strange place because it in no way resembled a cafe, nor was it going in the least for the British pub theme I had expected after seeing the flag outside the  door that featured a British bulldog clad in a suit. Instead the interior was towering and cavernous, one side full of minarets and tiled arches and salt-shaker shaped doorways that made it look like the set for a B movie that takes place in some dusty Arab harem. It was basically a multistory nightclub with an endless bar and Dolce and Gabbana-wearing teenagers and strangely bright lights (seriously, I kept waiting for the lights to dim right up until the moment we left at three in the morning).

The main attraction of the night was a Black Eyed Peas cover band. Don't make me say that again. By the time they came on we had made our way to one of the balconies on the third floor, above stage right. From their we had an excellent view of the five-hundred person crowd and the Fergie impersonator's lyric sheets, which fell off their music stand and scattered themselves over the stage halfway through "My Humps." Then it turned out I had made my way into a "private party" area because a security guard told me I had to leave the private party area, which had been clearly demarcated by a pair of couches and some kids who were wearing nicer clothes than me. Strangely, the two female friends I had been standing next to on the balcony were not similarly threatened.

This was fine because I could content myself with sitting at an empty table in this empty third-floor gallery and, on a large television, watching music videos that did not correspond to the music being played. Every third video featured David Guetta.

Mexico City: Scenes—Lost Avocados

Dear Cleaning Lady:

Please stop putting my avocados in the refrigerator. If I had wanted my avocados to be cold and inedible, I would have put them there in the first place. I always thought Mexicans were avocado experts, but you have greatly injured this conviction and proven a disappointment to your country.

Sincerely,
A.D.

Mexico City: Scenes—Halloween

I kept telling people here how nothing can equal the pageantry of Halloween in New York City. But I have to stay that the folks of Mexico City impressed me mightily. We headed down to the main square of Coyoacan, a quiet and slightly traditional neighborhood in the south of the city. And it was madness.

At first, all we could see was this.

Then the lights went on, and we saw this.

Last-minute makeup adjustments in a truck window.

That's a real person.

Traditional Mexican pan de muerto. Some are ghost-shaped.

Sand painting in an ofrenda, or altar to the dead.

More of the ofrenda.

Then a costumed motorcycle gang showed up.

At one point while we were struggling through the throng some of my friends started saying, 'It's Changoleón! Take a picture! Take a picture! He's famous.' It took me awhile to realize they were talking about the damp guy in the Mickey Mouse sweatshirt. Apparently Changoleón is a beloved drunk who became famous after appearing on a Mexican reality TV show. There were fears that he had died in 2006, but he's still here, hanging around Coyoacan. His name means 'monkey-lion.'

These kids won.

The strangest thing was that the shopping mall where we parked had this huge Christmas scene in the lobby. I guess without Thanksgiving to conveniently mark the division between fall and winter, Mexicans can basically start gearing up for Christmas whenever they want.

Mexico City: Scenes

Horse topiary, near Metro Hospital General.

Kitchen of a friend and amateur herbal medicine practitioner.

El Chopo market.

Street-side altar, la Condesa.

Mexico City: Scenes: Mercado Merced and Centro Historico, August

 

 

 

Mexico City: Scenes—Party in a Salon

I went to a party at a hair salon. It was weird.

 

Mexico City: Scenes—Cleaning All the Windows

I haven't had much time alone during the past four weeks, and nearly all that I had was spent writing, so when I had some spare hours today I found that my room was in desperate need of tidying. Cleaning is alternately satisfying and depressing for me. On the one hand I can pretend that my life is organized and well decorated, and moves steadily forward to a soundtrack of Handel's Concerti Grossi. On the other hand I'm confronted with all its detritus, aimless scraps, and unsent postcards.

Mexico City: Scenes—New Sounds

I haven't posted anything in a while because I was working on a sound-and-word project (you could probably call it "music") with my brother. In a bit of a role reversal, he made the words and I made the music. But now it's finished and it will be featured as part of a group arts show that a friend in Brooklyn is organizing. It's this Friday. You should go. Yes, you.

 

The Davis Brothers' contribution to the show is three short word-and-sound pieces (vulgarly referred to as "songs"), with texts by my brother about Mexico City, and music by myself that mostly consists of sounds I recorded on the streets here.

Hopefully I will get back to posting more soon. However, for those of my avid readers who  thirst for more, slake yourself below on some pics from a recent trip to Teotihuacan.

Mexico City: Scenes—Portales Market

Mexico City: Scenes

Mexico City metro stations are inordinately large. The corridors seem designed to admit a military procession or a running of the bulls. It often takes five to seven minutes of hard walking to make a simple transfer between lines. Probably to compensate for this, the trains are too small.

The trains run on rubber tires and are very quiet when they pull up to the platform, but are less quiet inside, where the windows are left open due to a lack of air conditioning.

Mexico City: Scenes

Guy at a party.

 

Lucha libre poster (unrelated).

My neighborhood by day...

...and by night.

Not my neighborhood.

Centro Historico.

Centro Historico.

Mexico City: Scenes

 

Mexico City is justly famous for its many murals...

...which capture the spirit and history of the Mexican people...

 

...in all their nuances.