Adios, Mexico

Today I fly out of Mexico. It´s a sad last day. It´s raining and a bit cold. It was snowing when I left NY. It seems like, for as long as I can remember, whenever I am leaving a place there is some sort of precipitation. Maybe it´s some cosmic sign of something. I´ll miss Mexico but I´m ready to move on. I got an email from my hostel in Sao Paulo asking what time I was arriving, and I realized that I booked it for tonight... but I fly out tonight so I don´t get there til tomorrow, duh. Whatever.

Yesterday I woke up somewhat late and went with Juana to the market where her husband, Juan, and son, Miguel, work. It is like a garage sale for 20 square blocks. Holy shit it was the biggest market I´ve ever seen or could imagine. It´s all recovered stuff from the trash at the front, then there´s new stuff as you get further in. The people selling new stuff set up closer to the center because the police are constantly walking through looking for pirated and stolen stuff. So I ate tamales and drank atole with Juana, then bought some hair gel.... I felt like a true Mexican. Everyone uses so much gel here. I knew that before I came, but it´s still a noticeable thing... EVERYONE uses so much gel.

Yesterday also happened to be one of the biggest festival days during the year in Mexico, it´s the festival of the nino dios. It´s a very holy thing and despite all the explanations I still don´t really understand it. Much like the Catholic Church. So anyway, as a result of this festival, I was bracing to face two of my greatest fears last night. I like to consider myself a rational person and I´m really not afraid of much of anything... not in a tough-guy way, just in the way that I can reason through things. But if there´s one thing in this world that scares the absolute shit outta me, it´s a carnival or fair. The type with games and dangerous rides and clowns... oh my god. Make that carnival a facet of a celebration in the Catholic Church and forget it. I mean, I went to mass as a kid and I can stumble my way through the Catholic things, thanks to my grandparents, but it´s just one of those huge entities that I feel lost in. So in the afternoon I went with the kids and their mom to the church, which was actually absolutely beautiful - every surface was covered with flowers, from the floor to the roof. It wasn´t just church, it was a cathedral. Amazing. But on the way back, we wound through the streets where the carnival was being set up and my stomach starting twisting. No way in hell I wanted to go back there. It´s like a county fair but in the streets of Mexico City. Terrifying. But I couldn´t bring myself to explain that I have this totally irrational phobia of carnivals to a 4 and 6 year old who were just dying to return. So I sucked it up. I know there´s a God because it started to rain. It was a freaking monsoon, so I knew that I was reaping the benefits of having gone to church earlier.

Juana and I went later on in the night, even though the kids had cried for not being able to go. We went to see the band and the party and it was great. Micheladas as big as movie-theater sodas, and all kinds of Mexican food was out, and we just passed through the part with rides and games pretty quickly. I was wishing I was with someone my age because the party was great... everyone was drinking and dancing and it was just one of those big, crowded things that you can´t not enjoy. I´m trying to think what I´m missing, but I´ve covered the highlights so far I think. I have to be rushed here because Im´at the internet cafe and am keeping the others waiting. But I just had a great last lunch - ox tongue stewed with guajillo chiles and some black beans. They made it last night and it smelled so good. I managed to stay healthy the entire time here, and I´m soo so happy for that.

The family is so worried about me leaving. Juana thinks I´m insane. Mostly because of my jacket. Whenever I put it on, she just snears at me and rolls her eyes. She wouldn´t let me wear it anywhere, but I´m a little bit insane so I fought her enough throughout the week. She kept trying to give me this huge hoody so that way the raterros wouldn´t look at me or touch me. I hated it, haha.

Alright so this is the end of Mexico. I´m ready to let my Spanish marinate for the few weeks while I´m in Brazil. Hopefully the Portuguese will help to nail home some of what I´ve learned, because I feel like I know less Spanish now than when I started. That can´t be true, but it´s how I feel.

Good bye, Mexico, hello Sunshine!!