My second love, after my husband
The chocolates at Que Bo!, a shop in my neighborhood, are almost too pretty to eat. They look like marbles, almost.
One bite and it’s over. You want to eat all of them at one sitting, preferably with a big glass of wine.
Que Bo had a booth at the Chocolate Experience, and I happened to see the store on my way home from the supermarket today. I bought a slice of chocolate-dipped, chilied mango (how could I not?), and horchata, jamaica, mole, green tea and goat cheese chocolates. (I saved the saffron and red-wine flavors for next time.) They also sell gigantic brownies and chocolate cakes.
Since, you know, my glass of vino was already out, I went ahead and ate the horchata one while I was typing this. Creamy, sweet… mmmmm.
She is officially blissful.
How much do things cost in Mexico City?
This was my biggest question before I moved here. So far, it’s been cheaper than Dallas, but not “we can live like kings!” cheap. (Because, um, only one of us has a steady income.) A quick run-down of stuff I’ve bought recently, using about 14 pesos to $1 USD:
Groceries: Box of cereal $2 to $3; 1 lb. chicken breasts, less than $3; gruyere cheese, $6… that was a moment of weakness, I’m sticking to Mexican varieties in the future.
Coffee: At a nice cafe, less than $2 for a cappuccino. Same place charged $3 for a veggie sandwich.
Beer: Around $2.50 at a trendy cafe in our neighborhood.
A giant torta spilling with grilled meat: About $1.50 in Condesa.
Gym: Double what you’d pay in the U.S.
Taxis: My fetish-taxista ride cost less than $8 and it took about 30 minutes. (Not including the foot massage.)
Big bottle of water at the convenience store: Less than $1
Rent: Can’t really gauge this yet, but the neighborhood we’re looking at, Condesa, seems at least $200 and $300 cheaper than what you’d pay in Dallas. (Which is also pretty reasonable, as far as big American cities go.) Other places in Condesa are way out of our price range. In Polanco, where we’re staying now, I think we’re pretty much priced out for what we want.
On that note, our apartment search continues. Today we’ve officially been in Mexico City one week.
If there’s such a thing as bakery porn, it resides at El Globo
Lola, the woman who does our housekeeping, told me last week that if I ever wanted a “trocito de pan,” they’re delicious at El Globo. It’s a French bakery chain that originally opened in el D.F. in 1884. There’s one in my neighborhood, a few blocks away.
Since we really don’t eat much bread — “Hmmm,” you say, “what about the bisquets?” — okay, since we, I mean I, TRY not to eat much bread, I thought I’d pop in and check it out from a cultural perspective. Also, I kind of adore bakeries, and the smell of baking bread turns me into one of those cartoon characters levitating with her nose in the air.
I’ve been inside Mexican panaderias before, but El Globo took things to a whole new level.
…
A bisquet, a basket
My current favorite morning/afternoon/whenever snack in Mexico City: Hot bisquets with butter and jam. They’re pronounced like “bis-KET” and they don’t really taste like biscuits at all. They’re dense and sweet, slightly crisp on the outside, and made with either white or wheat flour. They pretty much blow bland English muffins out of the water.
Here are the ones I got at The Break, a coffee shop near my house. (If anyone’s wondering, “wireless Internet” is the same in English and Spanish.)
The mystic fetish taxista
I took a cab home a few days ago from the World Trade Center, after my day at the Chocolate Experience. The cab came from a sitio, which is an authorized taxi stand in Mexico City. (This is supposed to be much safer than hailing one off the street, since sitio stands have a record of your destination and the taxi license number.)
The driver was a friendly 40s-ish man with graying hair. We started chatting and I mentioned that it was my third day in Mexico. “Felicidades!” he said, clasping his hands and giving me the universal “victory” gesture. He asked how I was, and I said I was tired from walking around all day.
“You know,” he said, “if you massage your feet in three spots around the ball of your foot, you’ll feel much better. I promise.”
A few minutes later, he asked: “Do you know what podomancia is?”
Podo-what?
“Podomancia. It’s the science of reading feet. You know, like you read palms. You can tell a lot about a person by looking at their feet.”
“Interesante,” I murmured.
He asked if I wore high-heeled shoes and I said sometimes. He asked if I had a high arch, and I said yes. He recommended one- or two-inch heels as easiest on my spine, and added some technical stuff about my vertebrae that I didn’t quite understand.
Then he continued, “I can tell about you already that you have a great positive energy, and people around you like to be near you. You’re also busy all the time, which is why your feet hurt. It’s hard for you to sit still. Is that true or not?”
It was true — or at least the latter part. I thought, he knows all this and he hasn’t even looked at my feet yet?
“If you want I can take a look at your feet,” he added.
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Strawberries do have more fun
Went with my friend Joy yesterday to The Chocolate Experience, a trade show extolling the magic of chocolate. We got free candy bars (Cadbury Fruit & Nut!) and free chocolate milk from Hershey’s. We gazed at clothes fashioned out of chocolate by Mexican fashion students, and chocolate paintings. A giant chocolate-covered strawberry walked around, and so did his cousin, a chocolate bar. I also bought some kick-ass chocolate marzipan from Oaxaca, made with peanuts instead of almonds.
On our way out, walking to the restroom, we spied the strawberry in a far corner, his back turned. A girl kneeled in front of him.
What the…? Tawdry behavior at the chocolate show? No me digas!
Just when I was about yell at Joy, “Avert your eyes!”, I realized the girl was only fixing his COSTUME. We laughed about it and got pictures with the strawberry on our way out.
Learning to relax amid chaos
One of my goals is to find a new yoga studio here. I made my first attempt yesterday, taking a 5:30 hatha class at Anjali, a modern boutique-style studio about a 15 minute walk from my house. I wasn’t sure I’d know what the yoga teacher was saying — how do you say “downward dog” in Spanish? — but it ended up being fine. I just watched everyone else.
During our final meditation, the teacher, who had a soothing, deep voice, urged everyone to repeat this mantra in their heads: “Todo esta bien… todo esta bien.” I thought: “It’s all good? Really?” Bad yoga girl. I should have been clearing my mind.
After his third or fourth “todo esta bien,” two cars stuck in traffic outside decided to join in. The studio overlooks a busy intersection, and it was already rush hour.
“Todo esta bien…”
[Loud, screechy car horn] WAAAAA!
“Todo esta bien…”
WAAA WAAA WAAAAAAA!
The teacher ignored it.
Downward dog, by the way, is “perro cabeza hacia abajo.”
Our new place
My first trip to the Mexican supermarket
Lime-flavored mayonnaise!
Pre-cut jicama! Perfect for salads. Or snacking. Or whatever.
They also had huge, tube-shaped purple radishes; bags of pre-cut, shredded beets; dried papaya cubes dusted in chili powder (and dried apricots prepared the same way). I wanted to get all that but didn’t. Our fridge is only so big.
Surprisingly, a lot of the products were in English. The cereal aisle was pure General Mills.