Arrival - Mexico City, the Distrito Federal

Well, here I am! For those of you who have been wondering why it's taken so long for me to let everyone know how I'm doing, my apologies! Mexico City is certainly a force to be reckoned with and it's taken me several days to get my bearings. For those of you who didn't know I was gone, I'm in Mexico City and will be here until July 24. I hope that I can share some interesting information with y'all about the city and my adventures.

I arrived last Tuesday, a day later than planned because the Volcano Popocatépetl was letting off a little steam, canceling all flights to the city on Monday night. The exciting thing about arriving on Tuesday was that a weekly market that takes place right outside my apartment building! It was a bit of an obstacle course to get all my luggage past the various vendors and their stalls, but after I had settled in, I went down to check it out.

Unfortunately, photos will never do it justice because to me the most striking thing about this market are the smells of fruits, vegetables, and spices: plátanos, apples, guanábana, papaya, cherries, cantaloupe, tomatoes, avocados, broccoli, cilantro, lettuce, tortillas, and all sorts of spices... I could go on and on. There is also a lot of stuff that I don't even know what it is. I don't have pictures of the market yet, but will post when I do. For now, you can see that the google satellite view of my street was taken on market day! All the red tents are vendor stalls. My apartment is in the middle of the block on the right-hand side.  

One of the fun things to me about walking through the market is the way they market their goods to you. Every vendor that you walk past will shout out ¡güera incredible green beans for sale! or ¡güerita have some fresh, amazing potatoes! I am never sure if I should politely acknowledge each one and say "no, thank you," or if I should just ignore them given the impracticalities of saying no to everyone. They also walk around with samples for you to try and I have to say that I have never tasted a better banana or cantaloupe than I did at the market downstairs. Their marketing worked, because I bought some right away.

The cool thing about these markets is that they are called tianguis and they are the traditional markets that have been held in Mexico for centuries, since the time of the Aztecs when Mexico City was Tenochtitlán and constructed in the center of a lake.