Mexico City: Scenes—Pico de Gallo

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

He sounds bored.

Something like Something: Comedians...with Strings!

200-something.


1962.


1944.

On the Street: La decadencia romana

My neighborhood is definitely on the brink of something. Walking home tonight, the grocery store was full of tall foreigners and girls in orange leggings. The unannounced opening at the new Museum of the Object of the Object brought a crowd of young men wearing denim shirts and middle-aged socialites with heavy glasses and pomaded hair, while outside the scent of marijuana smoke wafted picaresquely in the air a block away. And around the corner from my apartment, the only man in Mexico City I have ever seen wearing booty shorts in a non-professional capacity was out in his most sparkly gold pair.

On the Street: Heart on the Street

My neighborhood is fast on the way up. About every other week I see a new bar or restaurant opening. This trend has been heartily confirmed today: the telenovela Entre el Amor y el Deseo is shooting on my block.

Antiquariana: Memories of the Middle School Library

Just found this entertaining blog. As I've long suspected, ugly and possibly misinformative books have always been in vogue.

Mexico City: Scenes—Red Water

For the last three days the water in the fountains of Mexico City has been running red. At first I thought maybe there was something wrong with the water supply, but then I noticed the water coming out of my shower and sink were normal.

It turns out the fountains of red are the latest manifestation of the "No Mas Sangre" ("No More Blood") campaign, led by Mexico's famous cartoonist, Rius. The campaign has produced a lot of demonstrations, sign waving, and supportive Facebook posts. Its purpose is to protest the violence created by Mexico's drug war, and combat people's indifference to said violence.

Something like Something: Take a Stand

As we know, Hemingway enjoyed claiming: "Writing and travel broaden your ass if not your mind and I like to write standing up."

And others remembered of him (and his room): "On a shelf by the bed is the Royal portable he uses, typing standing up."

Antiquariana: Have a Sit

A friend from high school who is a science writer recently told me that a study had concluded sitting is toxic.

Everything is toxic, I said. Living is toxic.

Then today I heard this story, which says that we need to program our computers to tell us when to get up and stop looking at our computers. This will keep us from dying.

On the Street: Passover

Was back in New York for about twenty-eight hours. New York is a place where construction workers own iPhones to play Tetris on the subway, and websites deliver soap to your apartment.

On the Street: Nature is In

Hipsters on the seawall in Stratford, Connecticut.

Stranger with You: Outer Space Awaited

Sometimes I think that my roommates are annoyingly weird, but then I remember that I'm a foreigner, I own a typewriter, and I spend all day listening to recordings of Glenn Gould played at high volumes.

Spanish Lesson: Drugs or Booze?

In Spanish, "GNC" and "Hennessy" sound the same.

Everyone's a Critic: Spanish or in Spanish?

Yesterday in a small bookstore I came across the latest copy of Granta. It was a collection of stories by "The Best of Young Spanish-Language Novelists"—the next Llosas and Bolaños, as the back cover put it. Of the twenty or so writers included, eight were from Argentina, six were from Spain, and only one was from Mexico.

It occurred to me that this was the first time I had seen a copy of the literary magazine in Mexico.

Adventures in Rhythm / Something like Something: Dramatic Walls

Glenn Gould playing "Lord Salisbury's Pavan and Galliard," by Orlando Gibbons, filmed 1974.

El Camarón de la Isla singing a Seguiriyas, filmed ca. 1980 (?).

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.

Stranger with You: A Year in Mexico

Today I've been in Mexico for a year. I don't know what happened. Having lived my entire life in temperate climates, I have serious trouble noticing time pass here, because there are basically no seasons.

I had been thinking that this blog should have more entries on "life in Mexico," or something like that. But I prefer the imaginary description of my life in the D.F. that I received in an email from a friend in New York:

...Avi, who is hiding in a bunker while Mexican drug lords shoot there [sic] six shooter revolvers, one in each hand pointed sky high, wearing sombraros [sic] and ponchos.

So I guess this could also be filed in an "Antiquariana" post about ye olde Mexico, which I suppose many people imagine to have looked like this:

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.

Spanish Lesson: The Royal Lemon

 In a country where basically anything can grow, there are some curious culinary absences. One is yeast. You can't simply find it in the grocery store like you can in the U.S. They only have baking powder and when you try to ask where the yeast is they just bring you back to the baking powder because the word for both items is levadura.

Mexicans love beans but unless you are willing to go to a huge market and find a place with dried beans you only have two options: black beans or brown beans. It took me eight months to finally find a small store near my house that sells garbanzo beans on a regular basis. It was a revelation. People here live in complete ignorance of the spectacular depth and variety of the world of beans. Once, early in my stay here, I was at the grocery with a Mexican friend and was getting frustrated by the endless rows of black and brown beans, whole and re-fried.

"Why do they never have any red beans?" I asked.

"What are red beans?" she said.

That's when I gave up asking people about beans.

But most mysterious of all is the complete lack of lemons. Here it is all limes, all the time. I have not once seen a lemon at a grocery store or a market, and I would wager that I have not even tasted real lemon a single time while in Mexico. Mexicans are unfazed about this. There even seems to be some confusion in Mexico about what a lemon is. This may arise from the fact that in Spain, the word for lemon is limón and the word for lime is lima. But in Mexico the word for lime is limón (so that when you ask people about "lemons" they think you are talking about limes) and the word for lemon is up for debate. Some contend that the correct word is limonero, while others insist on citron, and an American friend who lives here offers yet another option in limón real: "real" or "royal" lime.

One Mexican guy I met at a party had a different perspective: "Of course we have lemons here. There are some lemon trees growing in my grandmother's garden. We just don't use them. Why would you? Limes are better."

"Better in what way?" I said. "They're different."

"Better in every way!" he said.

Also they have about ten kinds of beers here that all taste like Corona and they don't have any other beers.

On the Street: The Crowd's Speech

 
I have been listening to American radio broadcasts covering the uprisings in Egypt, Bahrain and Libya nearly every day. After teaching English in Mexico for nearly ten months, I am repeatedly amazed by these Arabic protesters, shouting into reporters' microphones in sophisticated and eloquent English while they are out on the street protesting.

Spanish Lesson: The Polite Plastic Bag

One way that Mexicans express friendliness or politeness in their speech is by adding diminutive suffixes to words. This makes sense with nouns, and was easy enough to get used to. In giving directions, someone on the street might tell you to pass the "parquecito," or little park, even if it isn't a small park. At the cafe, someone might ask for a "cafecito," even if he wants a large.

Sometimes this habit makes less sense. You come back from the beach and a friend tells you that you are "quemarito"—even if you are extremely burnt. When you order a juice at the corner store, the cashier asks you if you want "el chico o el grandecito"—the little one or the nice little big one. How much does that taco cost? "Diez pesitos." When should I come back? "Treinta minutitos." Of course calling them little minutes doesn't make them go by any faster.

After eleven months here, I still haven't integrated this into my speech, which makes me afraid that I am constantly being impolite because I ask for a "bag" at the 7-Eleven and not a "nice little bag."