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So I flew back from Jordan to Boston to see a high school friend of mine for the weekend, which was nice catching up. Then spent ~10 days in NY with a weekend in the city to see some friends from both high school and college. The weekend in the city really reminded me why NYC is easily the best city in the world…it honestly felt as close to normal as you can get. One of the more interesting sights from my weekend in the city was a Trump rally just outside Bryant Park, which was a “45 for 24” theme. My sister then flew in at the end of the weekend to spend a few days with me so just hung out at home after that. I was actually fortunate enough to qualify for the vaccine so got the J&J shot, which is only one jab, so now I can travel completely guilt free which is nice I suppose. One quick highlight from my time at home was buying the Tony Hawk remake on my PS4…just such a wonderful game.
I flew from home to Savannah to go to a college friend’s bachelor party that weekend – all 12 of us were vaccinated (I was the last one), and that included 5 non-medical employees so that was a pretty cool thing. The weekend was a ton of fun and it was pretty low key, just hanging out in the backyard heated pool or the nearby beach. We also, for some reason, drunkenly watched the LOTR movies which was a nice little added touch. Overall, it was definitely a nice little break to come home for a few weeks, see my parents and sister, hang out with some friends, and then the bachelor party was a definite cherry on top, so I’m definitely glad that I came back for it. He’s probably only one of like <10 friends I have who I would have come back for a wedding (and therefore for a bachelor party) to be honest…for the rest, I don’t know if I’d spend the money to fly all the way back home and then back out again.
After that, I flew directly to Cancun to meet up with another high school friend and some of his London Business School friends…because of England’s lock down, like 20% of his cohort are vacationing in Mexico in different groups which I personally find incredible. Spent a day in Tulum which was sort of a nice lazy beach town (got serious Bali vibes here) before heading to the Dos Ojos cenote on the way to spend a couple of nights in Playa Del Carmen. Dos Ojos was surprisingly super cool…cenotes are basically these sunken limestone caverns that served as freshwater reservoirs for the Mayans. We went snorkelling there and the vision is crystal clear, you can figuratively see for miles and miles. And when you see a diver with their flashlight torch on down below, you can really get a grasp of how massive these underwater caverns truly are. While in PdC, just walked around a bit and it was a lot like Tulum in that it was just another local beach town, but definitely felt less touristy than Tulum did. In both cases, while it was a bit pricey (especially for Mexico!) the food was still fantastic. Unfortunately was unable to dive here as the few dive shops I reached out do said they only did dives across the strait on Cozumel island, but this meant that 2 dives would have cost over 150 USD. This entire stretch is supposed to have world class diving so hopefully I’ll be able to catch some later on in Honduras when I hopefully make it there.
After PdC, we took a day trip to Chichen Itza before circling back to Tulum where I spent the night with 18 (!!!) LBS students in a swanky AirBnB mansion, before my Saturday morning bus ride to Merida. Chichen Itza was honestly really cool. It was slightly dulled by the fact that we couldn’t climb or enter any ruins, but it was still impressively restored and maintained. The pyramids were the obvious highlights, and there were even a few cases of intricate Mayan carvings that you could see up close (there are actually a lot of these but many are in pillars that we cannot approach since they’re all roped off). On the way there, while I was driving at like 130 km/hr in an 80 zone, a guy sped by me to overtake and we saw him get flagged by the cop, and then saw the cop turn on the siren, enter the road, and chase him down. It was hilarious watching everyone who was going at 120+ slowing down to 80 on the right lane while the pig raced by on the left, and Martin and I were yelling “Policia!” in the Ben Stiller-from-Anchorman voice. Speaking of which, this entire week with him was just us mangling spanish and it was a blast.
After this, we went back to Tulum to meet up with Martin’s LBS friends. There were like 25 of them in Tulum in total split between two AirBnBs. There was this hilarious instance when they got in of a few classic type-A personality MBA girls trying to figure out over 30 minutes how to divy up 19 people across 8 rooms, factoring in gender and beds in each room as some were doubles and some were triples. It was honestly hilarious and really encapsulated the MBA experience for me. Went to some fancy dinner and drinks spot, where one of the guys had a bunch of us take a bite out of a jabanero pepper to see how it would go. Probably a top 5 spicy food for me and my tongue was watering for a solid 5 minutes, but after seeing the near death reactions of all the white people around me it made me feel much much better. Sort of like how you feel sober even if you’re drunk if everyone else around you is wasted. After that, we went to what is probably the most crowded area I have been in since before COVID in a nightclub (even more crowded than some of my irresponsible South Africa spots before I got COVID there). But I’ve been jabbed so it was fine, and most of the LBS guys had symptomatic COVID recently so it wasn’t an issue…they all tested negative for their flights back to the UK a week or so after this club night.
Two wonderful and related stories I heard from the LBS crew – a couple of them wanted to go to Antigua a month or so ago, and in order to enter you need a business or family reason. So they created this fake seaweed retrieval research/business and had the slides and emails to back it up, and got into the country. They wound up repurposing this for a class project and got top marks on that as well. Second story is similar – a group wanted to enter the Maldives and needed a business or family reason, so they had a month’s worth of fake emails that ended with the “Maldivan businessman” saying that they needed to meet in person to “close the deal”. The things you learn in business school. Honestly one of the most impressive things I have ever heard, and I think the only story I’ve heard since retirement that’s more impressive are the guys I met in South Africa who spent 14 months in Antarctica on a research expedition.
Anyways, we ended that night with a 4am cab back to the AirBnB by this gem of a driver named William. He blasted shitty electronic music and had strobe lights in his car so 4 of us had a massive 25 minute rager while driving back. It was honestly more enjoyable than the club itself since I’m not really a club guy. Overall, Tulum was sort of like Goa for me where it was really only enjoyable because I was with a friend…otherwise I would have been a bit bored as it’s only beaches out there. After I left, I found out that there was also a large contingent of UChicago Booth kids also remote learning in Tulum…combined with the fact that one of my college buddies who is in Stanford business school is remote learning with a bunch of kids in Costa Rica, it’s definitely good to know that we are in good hands with the future business leaders of the globe.
The next morning, I woke up at 9am to catch my 5 hour bus ride to the colonial city of Merida. Merida is a really nice city that weirdly reminded me a bit of Odessa in Ukraine, in terms of the grand, colorful facades that lined up all of the streets. And yet it was obviously distinctly Mexican. It was just a very colorful city, and sort of what I would stereotypically expect in Latin America. Lot of impressive church facades and bright walls. There was also a really cool tree lined avenue that had a bunch of restored villas that gave it a very European feel. My second day here, I wanted to go to the Uxmal ruins but unfortunately found out that it was closed on Mondays. I had already booked my 40 USD, 9 hour bus ride to the Palenque ruins the next day, so sadly had to miss out on that. Instead just spent that 2nd day just wandering around Merida even more as it’s quite a pleasant city.
The one good thing about all of my long bus rides in Mexico was that they were genuinely comfortable. Especially compared to the slogs I had in sub-Saharan Africa…the busses here were AC, reclined seats, and just plain comfortable to sit/sleep in and offered plenty of leg space. And there weren’t annoying stops every 30 minutes for touts to jump on and sell their street food.
To be honest, I think I enjoyed the Palenque ruins more than the more famous Chichen Itza. This was since Palenque was in a much more ruined state (though nowhere near to the extent of Cambodia), so had a little bit more of that Indiana Jones/Uncharted vibe going for it. However, for some reason, due to COVID they now don’t allow any climbing/entrance into the numerous ruins in this site, which definitely sapped my enjoyment a bit as this place is ripe for some good old fashioned exploration. Because of this, I’d say Palenque was merely “good” instead of being fantastic. One big takeaway from here is that you can really see how many Mesoamerican pyramids can be lost to time as general mounds, as the pyramids here were in a semi-restored state where the grass was clearly growing all over them but you could still see the stonework and shape of the pyramids. But give it a few hundred years of unregulated growth and all of these pyramids would just be grassy hills.
After Palenque, I took another 9 hour bus ride to the mountain town of San Cristobal de las Casas. This was pretty much exactly what I pictured a stereotypical “Mexican” town to look like. Colorful and flat, narrow streets, colonial architecture that is more simple than grand, tiled roofs, tons of locals about wearing traditional Mayan clothing. I really liked this town, though I will say, the hostel I was staying at, with like 70+ people, was literally all the worst hippie tourists you typically see in SE Asia who all seemingly migrated to Mexico as it’s open. Very similar vibe to the worst people you meet in Burning Man as well – white dudes (everyone is white of course) with dreads, very pro astrology (and thus anti COVID vax…I will die on the hill that there is a 100% correlation between these two), pseudo-spiritual types. This rant by Will in the second Inbetweeners movie is basically spot on. Definitely fun to hang out with for a few days, but similar to my view on the I-Banking/Consultant/Lawyer bro, not someone I could really tolerate for more than few days at a time.
One interesting thing about San Cristobal was the incredible amount of leftist graffiti that was sprawled everywhere. Beyond the usual ACAB ones, there were a lot about the Zapatista Uprising from ~25-30 years ago, general anti-capitalist ones, and a bunch about how there can be no revolution without women and general women’s rights ones, as it was recently International Woman’s Day.
After a few days here, I took an overnight bus to the city of Oaxaca. Oaxaca was a really really nice city. Tons of local tourists there, and it was crazy colorful (even moreso than Merida!), almost like a giant city version of the Bo-Kaap district in Cape Town. Also for some reason got vibes similar to the French Concession in Shanghai, at least in terms of similar squat flat buildings with tree lined streets. But the food here was excellent (even by already stellar Mexican standard), and it was just a ton of fun to wander around the city, seeing some impressive church facades and checking out all the instagram-worthy colorful buildings.
While in Oaxaca, I stumbled into the only Church I could find that was open (really the only impact of COVID in Mexico from a tourism standpoint is that almost all churches and museums are closed), where I saw a live rehearsal by some orchestra. I spent a few hours there as they worked their way through 3 symphonies, all of which I knew! Honestly so glad I took Intro to the Symphony in College…Beethoven is legit like one of my top 5 to 10 favorite musicians. But the three they played were Mozart’s 25th symphony (the movie Amadeus starts with the intro to this symphony), and Beethoven’s 3rd and 5th symphonies. Listening to any type of music in a church is just awesome as the acoustics are incredible. Reminded me of one of my favorite church memories, which was listening to a choir in the Berliner Dom 8.5(!!!!) years ago when I was studying abroad, or even when we caught a choir in St.Basil’s Cathedral in Moscow my first time there with my family in the summer of 2016. And listening to Beethoven live is always great…the only other time was when I dragged my family to see him in Munich – the Munich concert hall was actually built over the beer hall where Hitler staged his Beer Hall Putsch.
Also in Oaxaca, there was this massive market area called the Mercado de Abestos. I had wanted to go to a stall that was featured in the Netflix show Street Food but unfortunately she’s temporarily closed due to COVID. But this giant maze (that definitely wasn’t COVID friendly!) reminded me so much of the hawker stall courts in Singapore. It was a really nice throwback to Asia to be honest, and just a ton of fun to follow my nose until I settled on a random stall to eat at. Another cool thing I did in Oaxaca was go to probably the most “authentic” Mexican bar I’ve ever been to with a few people from my hostel (which was definitely the best hostel I stayed in while in Mexico. Just a top notch place, Hostal Central in Oaxaca). It was literally like those seedy Mexican bars you see in Hollywood, where you swing open the saloon doors and its filled with locals – we were the only gringos there. Just a really cool experience in general.
In my final day in Oaxaca, I took a half day trip to see the nearby Zapotec ruins of Monte Alban. It was a pretty cool site though comfortably behind Palenque and Chichen Itza in terms of the Mexican ruins I have seen so far. It was basically a massive plaza that was littered with these ~20 meter tall raised platforms (pyramid might be too strong of a word here). But the coolest thing for sure was that this was my first time seeing some Mesoamerican carvings up close, since these were actually visible from the walkable areas unlike Chichen Itza and Palenque where they were way behind the roped off areas. After Monte Alban, I got lunch at this place called El Pocito which was also featured on the Netflix Street Food show in their Oaxaca episode. The dish they served here is called a Piedrazo, which is apparently a Oaxacan speciality. It’s a chunk of stale bread that is soaked in vinegar, and then mixed with onions and carrots and some spices before being topped with a handful of strands of cheese. It honestly reminded me a ton of the Jewish food that I ate in Lviv, Ukraine. Was pretty good but definitely not something that I would expect to be a “Mexican” dish. I also had what was easily the best horchada of my time in Mexico here. In Oaxaca they serve horchadas with “tuna”, which is a cactus fruit. It looks almost like the rosewater drinks you get in India but this was incredible, and I wound up having two here.
After Oaxaca, which was probably my favorite place I visited in Mexico, I went to the city of Puebla. Puebla was certainly a nice spot to spend a few days in – the architecture here was very baroque, so it had the most European feel of any Mexican place I had been to. The main cathedral in the square (which was miraculously open!) was quite grand, and it was a nice throwback to go into an extravagant cathedral – again, a very European throwback. One of the highlights here was a weekend antique market that they have. There was all sorts of cool shit out there – it weirdly reminded me of Montmatre in Paris in particular due to all the eclectic stuff on sale. Anything from turn of the century prints to early Hollywood era movie posters to Super Nintendos and Gameboy Colors and original Xboxes to medieval weaponry to vintage cigarette cases and alcoholic bottles to classic rock vinyls…just a total hodgepodge of things. Was easy to spend a couple of hours getting lost here, though I did feel a tad bit guilty for examining so many things while having zero intention on actually buying them. The highlight of Puebla was probably these bomb chalupas (which are absolutely nothing like Taco Bell’s chalupas) that I had at a hole in the wall diner.
Left Oaxaca for a quick bus ride over to CDMX, where I spent a few days before flying off to Guatemala. I had already spent a week here for Dia de los Muertos (which was awesome! the art for that is so cool) back in 2016, and stayed in the same hostel I did last time as well right by the Zocalo square area. CDMX really is one of my favorite walking cities…in terms of cities that I have visited since I retired, I would place CDMX in the same tier as Shanghai/Bombay/Istanbul, with really only Delhi head and shoulders above it. Just such an incredible city, and it was super crowded with locals doing their thing. Mask use was really good here – literally everyone had one on. Just spent a few days walking around the historic Zocalo area and then taking the crazy long but really nice walk west from there through the quaint Alameda park, then southwest down the bustling Avenue Paseo de la Reforma until hitting the giant Chapultapec Park. Weather was perfect too as it was pleasant but not too hot where I would sweat from these long walks.
One cool thing I did this time that I did not last time was see the museum inside the Palacio de Bellas Artes. It was filled with turn of the century paintings, which is really my favorite type of art, so I loved seeing all those rustic paintings of French villages and cities done in that impressionist style. There were also a bunch of really cool Diego Rivera murals in here that I spent a good amount of time poring through. I think I’ve mentioned this before but for me, the perfect song when looking at any sort of turn of the century European thing is the Beatles’ Revolution 9…for whatever reason, that song just reminds me of turn of the century Europe (even though the first time I ever got into that song was back in Varanasi when I was tripping after a bhang lassi).
One thing that I didn’t really have time for/chose not to do again was see the Teotihuacan pyramids. As impressive as they were, and even though it’s been 4.5 years since I was last in CDMX and saw them, the pyramids were closed for climbing so I figured it wasn’t worth the half day hike to see it again. Especially since the ruins I’ll be seeing in Guatemala and (hopefully!) Honduras – Tikal, El Mirador, and Copan – are all fully open unlike the Mexican ones.
While I was walking around one day, I got marked as an American by a couple of other tourists (probably due to my floral shirts, which ironically enough are from Fabindia, the only clothing company I will ever stan) and we started talking for a bit. They invited me over to their hostel (which was just down the block from mine), where every day there was a 6-7pm happy hour that was a 50 peso open bar. So for 2.5 USD, it was an hour of unlimited drinks, which was a nice little way to end each of my 3 nights in CDMX, especially since there was a 11pm curfew due to COVID.
All in all, the definite highlight of Mexico was the food. Mexican food is, to put it bluntly, incredible. Probably up there with India and China as my favorite culinary destinations. Just so much variety and flavor, and the food can be suuuuper spicy as well. And Mexico is right up there with India in terms of the variety of sweet drinks that they have, from agua frescas to horchadas to champolas to tejates to a bunch of other drinks whose names I don’t even remember. And of course, as good as the regional food in Yucatan and Oaxaca and Puebla were, the best part of the food here is just the countless street taco stalls littered all across the country, where I got my treasured tacos al pastor. So cheap and yet so so good. However, as good as the food was in Mexico, the very best Mexican food I’ve ever had is still the goat tacos at Birreria Zaragoza in Chicago (this hole in the wall is far better than the overpriced and good-yet-overrated Michelin star Topolobampo, also in Chicago). Overall, I’d say Mexico was a very similar country for me to Turkey but I’d rank Turkey slightly higher. Both have excellent food (with Mexico edging it here), both have really cool historic cities (though I prefer Ottoman architecture/history to Spanish colonial), and both have really cool ruins (I would rank the Mexican ruins I saw as on par with Roman ones, though Termessos was probably better than any site I saw in Mexico. Definitely both a step below Egypt and 2 steps below the Hindu and Buddhist stuff in India/Cambodia/SE Asia). Both Mexico and Turkey are solid 7.5/10 locations for me…everything is consistently good but there were no “WOW” standouts like Chernobyl/Giza/Sossusvlei/Vic Falls Devil’s Pool/Bwindi/Wadi Rum were in my international post-COVID travels. And Mexico was definitely far and away the most “normal” place I have been to…honestly think that tourism right now is maybe at like 95% of pre-COVID levels, it hasn’t really impacted anything at all here. Looking forward to Guatemala next!