Mexico City, from my Balcony at Hotel Catedral
March 12, 2008: Mexico City
Dear Grandma,
Tonight I went to the ballet in Mexico City. I haven’t been to a ballet in years, not since G. and I lived in Chicago. Originally, I was just going to hang out in my hotel room and relax work on my research paper, but one of the students learned that the Folklórico de México was at the Palacio de Bellas Artes every Wednesday night. Since she was willing to walk down to the box office and buy the tickets, since the tickets were only 400 pesos (about $40), and since I had packed my pretty brown sundress, I decided to join the group. After all, I hauled that dress all the way from Indiana and I was darned well going to wear it!
Of course, the dress had one small flaw. It had no pockets! I tried to cram my passport and tourist card into the pocket of my denim coat (Mexico City was a little chilly at night), but it just wouldn’t fit. And, even though I’m not a girly-girl, I wasn’t about to wear that ugly money wallet thing around my neck. Plus, I’m not stupid enough to go wandering around a foreign city without ID, so I swallowed my pride embarrassment and asked M. to carry it for me. [1]
In the end, there were only four of us were brave enough to stroll around Mexico City at night — two students, M., and me. We headed out on the subway for the Palacio de Bellas Artes (i.e., Palace of Fine Arts) where the ballet was playing. Now, for the record, the students were a bit nervous about taking the subway because someone had told them about a man ejaculating on the foot of a passenger. Then, of course, there is the whole pickpocket issue. In fact, when the students went to get the tickets, they actually walked all the way to the opera house and back! Thank goodness, M. was able to talk them into riding the subway because I’m not sure my feet could have taken another forced march through the city. {LOL}
We emerged unscathed at our stop and walked over to the Palacio. We were a bit early, so M. — ever the artist — tried his damnedest to get us upstairs to see the murals by Diego Rivera. First, he tried to talk one of the ushers into taking us upstairs to see them. When that failed, he spotted an elevator and signaled for us to climb in. We punched the button, and waited. Did a little wishful thinking. Punched the button again. Waited some more. Yeah, that elevator just wasn’t going to move. Eventually, we had to give up, so someone punched the button to open the door and we tumbled out into the lobby where a cleaning lady said something to us in Spanish. She was probably chewing us out, but I guess we looked like dumb American tourists, so she didn’t call security on us or anything. Of course, I was having a really hard time trying not to laugh (there’s that weird sense of humor again), so I guess I’m lucky I didn’t get us all in trouble!
In a way, I’m a little disappointed that I didn’t get to see the Rivera murals because apparently there’s a fairly famous one in the Palacio de Bellas Artes. It’s this mural entitled Man, Controller of the Universe and is based on a mural named Man at the Crossroads which was originally painted for New York City’s Rockefeller Center. I guess the Rockefellers didn’t care for the image of Lenin that was in the mural, so Rivera was asked to remove him. When he refused, the whole thing was destroyed. So, Rivera ended up repainting the mural (on a smaller scale) in the Palacio. [2]
Anyways, what does a good member of the Morris clan do when faced with adversity? You know the answer to this one. We go drinking. Luckily, there was a cute little bar in the Palacio, so we took a seat and ordered. Since I was still feeling like a heroine in a 1950s comedy, I ordered a gin martini. In retrospect, that may have been a mistake because I was feeling pretty darned tipsy when it came time to climb (and climb and climb) the stairs to the galería at the top of the theatre. [3]
Maybe it was the booze. Maybe it was the time or the place. Or maybe I have just been so culturally deprived for so long, but that ballet was magical. Not gorgeous (although it was), not well executed (although it was), but magical. The costumes were colorful, the dancing beautiful, the music amazing. At times, I would look up at the shiny walls and watch the reflection of the dancers because it was a bit like looking through a kaleidoscope. I could literally feel the joy bubbling up inside my mind (again, maybe it was the booze?) and I felt … well, I was utterly charmed.
And that was just about the dancing. I was already giddy before the show started because I love architecture. I’m not a fancy expert or anything like that, but of all the arts, architecture is probably my favorite (followed closely by photography). The Palacio is a marvelous building and it has this impressive Tiffany stained glass curtain that depicts the Valley of Mexico, with two snow-capped volcanoes. [4] According to this website, the curtain is made up of over one million individual pieces of crystal. It was an impressive thing to see.
Of course, I haven’t even touched upon some of the funnier moments during the evening. When we first climbed up into the cheap seats, I noticed that there really wasn’t much leg room — and I’m one of the shortest women I know. I remember M. whispering something about taking his shoes off after the lights went down, but I was so busy drooling over the Tiffany curtain that I didn’t think anything about it. So, you can imagine how amused I was when I looked to my left to see that M. not only had his shoes off, but he also had his legs hanging over the seat in front of him. {Eventually, I did the same thing. I mean, it’s not like anyone was sitting in the two rows ahead of us!}
Then, at the intermission, I felt this arm snaking around my shoulders. My first thought was, “What the hell?” Then I realized it was just one of the students putting his arm around both me and the girl to his right. As you might be able to tell, said student is a little bit of a flirt. I swear, he spent a good deal of the trip practicing his pick up lines on every woman in the group. Actually, I was entertained by the whole thing which, I suppose, makes me a very bad feminist but the kid was cute and smart and evidently needs the practice if he was hitting on a cougar like me.
So, here’s the kid, with his arms around me and the other gal who was with us, when M. looks over and says: “You apparently haven’t seen her husband, have you?” Yeah, that put an end to the end of his flirting for the rest of the night. Too bad, because it was really doing my ego some good. {Just kidding!}
Hugs and Kisses,
Your Granddaughter
Originally Posted: March 23, 2008
- Yeah, I completely forgot that he had my passport until the following day. Hey, at least I remembered before I got to the airport on Saturday morning!
- In retrospect, I remember seeing a movie that talked about the whole Rockefeller fiasco. Wasn’t it called Cradle Will Rock or something like that? Am I remembering the right movie?
- Yeah, that martini was a hell of a lot stronger than anything you get in the States. Holy crap, I thought I was going to breathe fire when I was drinking it … and I very nearly puked it up when I was climbing those damned stairs. Oh well. It’s a vacation, right?
- I’d hate to be the poor sap that has to raise and lower the curtain. Could you imagine how horrible it would be if you fucked up and crashed the thing too hard against the floor??? Ack!
Tags: 2008, Ballet, Mexico, Mexico City
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