Midwesterner in Mexico

To celebrate my end-of-job + John’s 3-day weekend, we decided to make the 6-hour drive down to Oaxaca City in the state of Oaxaca for the weekend. We will definitely have more insightful comments to add, but for the moment wanted to share this gem of a poster found in the baño of the seemingly oft-gringo-frequented Café Brújula coffee shop.

Among the questions this poster raised for me were:

• Have you considered purchasing a new toilet?
• Is this an image readily available on the internet or in restaurant supply stores, or did someone design this Pooh-themed poo-restriction sign specifically for your establishment?
• Given that the poster is only in English, is this evidently a non-issue with local Mexican patrons?

Taking the term "polite analogy" to a whole to level... If only E.E. Milne knew what Pooh's likeness was being used for these days...

Many thanks to any regular readers out there who have been patient with my month-long absence!! I assure you postings should return to some modicum of regularity moving forward. This month has been a hectic one, diving back into my 3rd semester of my MBA program (virtually HALFWAY DONE!!!) as well as surviving 2 major events that I coordinated at work– Días de Tecnología, day-long technical training events for ~380 Texas Instruments fans in Mexico City and Guadalajara. We were also honored with a visit from friend Emily who thus far wins the “longest distance traveled” award from John & Julie’s B&B, as she currently resides in Germany.

My pal Paul Westbrook at the TI booth during my first Mexico tradeshow, MexEEdev.

Anyway, the biggest news in my life right now is that this week marks the end of my employment with Texas Instruments, the company I have worked for since the summer of 1998. I started as an intern for 3 summers in Houston, joined their sales training program in Dallas after college, spent 4 years in technical sales in Boston, and another 2 in the Washington DC area. I thought that would be the end of it when we headed down to Mexico City last year, but conveniently someone had just left the Marketing/University Programs position for TI Mexico. 

Yes, I am a dork, but yes, this is my favorite TI demo: an LCD powered off of grapes.

And so it came about that last fall I joined a great team of 7 guys located in 4 cities across Mexico, with a patient boss who was willing to take a risk that I might be able to learn Spanish faster than someone new could learn the 8 zillion acronyms & intricacies of TI! Though I certainly still have room to grow on the Spanish, I will say that I have progressed from feeling a flash terror whenever the phone in my office would ring, to being able to have a 3-hour long meeting in Spanish at a university discussing how they might use TI products in their engineering curriculum. (I will admit to getting a bit lost during a biomedical lab tour though…)

A workshop I coordinated in Mexico City, taught by our star trainer extraordinaire, Ken Schachter.

The experience working for TI in another country and another language has been both fun & challenging, enlightening & frustrating, all mixed together. At this point, however, John & I have about one more year left in Mexico. After much debate, I decided that this is my best (and probably only!) chance to take a break, enjoy Mexico, and figure out what it is that I want to do when I grow up.  The fact that this MBA is coming out of my own pocket is inspiring me to actually take some time & try to get something out of it, vs. the panicked reading/homework-doing/paper-writing the night before class every other week to date.

Here's lunchtime at our Día de Tecnología 2 weeks ago in DF... Let's play Where's Waldo... Can you spot me???

I’m really interested in starting my own business, and while I don’t know yet what that might be, I DO know that I need some time to really investigate it. TI has been a fantastic place to work & I truly hope to stay in contact with the many amazing people I’ve met there. After 11 years there, however, I am ready for a change! I feel amazingly lucky to have this opportunity to hit the reset button, not to mention a husband who’s totally supportive (as long as he sees an uptick in tasty dinners prepared by yours truly, which I suppose is only fair).

Me with Clementina, one of the good friends I met in this role, and her esteemed colleagues from CINVESTAV!

So anyway, expect the occasional brainstorming / introspection / call-for-ideas as I begin this year-long odyssey here in Mexico City. Please feel free to offer any proactive hot tips & insights!! I have so many things I want to do/work on, I am certain that next summer will be here way before I expect it… For those of you who know me, it is time to make a new Excel spreadsheet!!!

In the trendy bright-green shirts, you'll find the proud TI Mexico sales team, accompanied by some other TIers who visited for the Tech Day events 2 wks ago.

And for those of you who are like “what happened to the ‘Mexico’ part of your Mexico blog?”, here is a smattering of the posts I am delinquent on:

• John’s trip to a luxury house in Ixtapa (while I had MBA class, boo)
• DF activities for when the parents visit!
• More Lucha Libre trips!!
• Views from the top of the Torre Mayor in downtown DF
• BFF Kim visits from Boston!
• San Miguel de Allende
• Guanajuato (go now!)
• Anniversary trip to Huatulco, on the Oaxacan coast
• Karaoke night out at Escaparate in Polanco
• Julie finally goes to the pyramids (Teotihuacan)
• How to become a luchador: an interview with El Matador
• Navigating the Mexico City airport

So yes, more to come, honest! Thanks for sticking with me during my month of near-radio silence, and cheers to John for filling in with his Yaxchilan posts. Off to get some sleep in preparation for my waning hours as a TIer….

And here is the metaphorical mountain I am ready to climb to figure out my new career path!! Please be ready with bottles of water along the way... ;)

If you read the previous post, you know that we’ve finally arrived at the Maya archeological site of Yaxchilan on the banks of the Usamacinta river.  There are more than 120 structures in the central area, distributed in three complexes at different elevations.  Yaxchilan shares similar characteristics with other regional sites, including roof combs, stelae, carved lintels, alters and murals, among others.  As I noted in the previous Palenque post, much of the ornamention was done by painting the layer of stucco covered the exterior of many buildings.  Very little remains, but what does is breath-taking; it must have been simply amazing.  Make sure to bring your flashlight!  We were the only group there for the majority of our three-hour visit and I was by myself much of the time.  It was pretty awe-inspiring to wander around alone and imagine what life must have been like over a thousand years ago.  Let’s start the photo essay, shall we?

We entered the site at the rear of a temple which had a bunch of underground tunnels. You can see the base of the roof comb above my head.

Descent into creepy darkness, anyone?

Checking out the tunnels. Note the classic Maya arch.

In addition to bats, the tunnels had some awesome spiders. Check out those jaws!

The main courtyard is about 50 yards wide, 400 yards long, and is flanked with buildings.

One of the lintel carvings

This Maya writing is on the underside of one of the lintels. A good reason for tall people to duck and look up!

A close-up of one of the stelae carvings.

Another fantastically detailed stelae close-up!

Check out the staircase leading up from the main plaza to the Great Temple.

The Great Temple, which still has a fair amount of the roof comb intact.

The Maya in Yaxchilan supposedly believed their world would end if the head of this warrior, in the Great Temple, were replaced.

Three temples sit perched a few hundred feet above the river and the main site.

A cross-section of a building shows just how big a fan the Maya were of this arch (sorry, I'm obsessed).

Since Julie’s been slacking off a bit of late, I decided to revisit my promise made in my original post on our trip to Chiapas to check out Palenque with a rundown of our visit to the Mayan archeological sites of Yaxchilan and Bonampak southeast of Palenque.

Yaxchilan, on the west bank of the Usumacinta River which forms the border between Mexico and Guatemala, was a large regional center and a rival of Palenque (fought in 654), among others.  It seems war wasn’t its forte as I believe they were dominated pretty badly on at least a couple of occasions.  Yaxchilan was at its zenith during the long reigh of King Shield Jaguar II, who lived into his 90s (unthinkable at that time) and died in 742; the city was abandoned around 810 AD.  Yaxchilan is known for excellent sculpture including carved stela and narrative stone reliefs on lintels (the top of the door frame which spans temple doorways).  If you visit, make sure to crouch down in the doorways and look up - some of the coolest and best-preserved carvings are on the lintels.

The crew - Ashley, Bertie, Nicole, Alla, Emily, Ben and John!

Getting to Yaxchilan is half the fun.  First, one makes the ~2.5 hour drive (we had our own car) from Palenque to the town of Frontera Corozal, largely by way of the Carretera Fronteriza before taking a really cool 30-45 minute boat ride to the site.  The road is very nice compared to others we’ve driven, though be sure to start from Palenque with a full tank or make sure you hit the one gas station we saw on they way…it’s in a small town 30-45 minutes from Palenque; I believe it’s also the location of the first military checkpoint we hit - and where I took the below photo.

You may recognize this woman's striking Maya features on subsequent photos!

Like most of Mexico, it’s inadvisable to drive at night to avoid hitting animals, people, topes (speedbumps), and lastly (and likely the smallest threat) because a handful of signs along the road proclaim that this is EZLN territory (the Zapatista Army of National Liberation, a revolutionary group comprised largely of indigenous Maya folks whose 1994 uprising was quickly put down by the Mexican Army).  To be clear, we felt completely safe and no one we talked to in Palenque or elsewhere offered warning, but as we joked, it’s all good until dudes with guns jump out of the jungle. 

The countryside is lush with rolling mountains everywhere; standards of living are very basic.

Escudo Jaguar  may be the only gig in town for lodging; it offers cute, if basic bungalow-style rooms at very reasonable rates which start around $20 and go to $60 for a triple w/ 3 double beds.  The grounds are very well maintained and folks are friendly.  We only ate there given our one night stay; the food was fine but runs no danger of being labeled gourmet.

The digs at Escudo Jaguar

The river and embarcadero (boat launch) is just a couple hundred meters away, and you can arrange a boat to depart at your leisure.  I HIGHLY recommend leaving at or just before sunrise; we left around 6:30 am and Escudo made us box-breakfasts for dining on-board.  Watching the sun rise and fog lift from the river was magical, and there’s no gate at the site, per say, so if you get there before the caretaker you can just pay when you leave, after all, it’s one way in, one way out and a looong walk back to Escudo!

Your chariot awaits!

Gorgeous sunrise

Bertie and Nicole are happy campers!

I'm unsure if this look is "Blue Steel" or "Imminent Death"

Sorry to keep you all in suspense, but this is already getting long and it’s well past my bedtime, so you’ll have to sit ON THE EDGE OF YOUR SEAT until I can do part 2 “Yaxchilan, this time for real”.  Saludos!

Let us cut back once more to a little over one year ago, to the big day in Glasgow when Julie & John officially became “The Talls”. (Official wedding day blogging delayed by higher priority anniversary vaca + subsequent MBA class prep…)

The day before the wedding, we suggested a day trip to Edinburgh to our guests, sending them on their way with one of my favorite Popout Maps of both Edinburgh & Glasgow. John & I remained in Glasgow to relax & finish final wedding-day prep activities, i.e. a hasty table plan + a last minute decision to get my dress steamed. That evening, I arranged to meet the bridal party at my favorite Glasgow pub (Ben Nevis) for a quick prep discussion & perhaps one cheeky pint. Famous last words.

For those of you not familiar with Tanya's patented game of Dance Ball, one person does a dance move then "throws" it to another person, who then has to repeat that dance move & introduce a new one. Note: this does not go over well at pubs where "dancing" is not socially acceptable... but it is freaking hilarious. As you can see, I am not a good dancer.

You always hear stories about the brides who go on crazy diets for the month before their wedding and/or wouldn’t dream of ingesting any fatty foods or alcohol in the days before the event, lest they puff up like a tick for the big day. Well, my “last meal” as a singleton was a fried fish supper from the chippy down the road, followed by an impromptu near-bachelorette party drinking numerous pints of lager until midnight and playing an intense game of Dance Ball (not appreciated by our fellow middle-aged Glaswegian pub-goers). And it was fantastic. Some additional Carmanns even made an appearnance.

The girls drinking healthy, nutritious Kronenbourg 1664's to cleanse our systems before the wedding day.

The Carmann brothers joined in the festivities as well!

Our festivities were accompanied by a fantastic live session in the corner.

The boys + a few of the ladies had a similar pre-wedding get-together at my 2nd favorite pub, The Goat. However, I do not believe it entailed any Dance Ball, which I can only assume made it inferior to ours.

The crew gathers for a group pic as the night winds down outside of The Goat. Who's ready to get married tomorrow???

Needless to say, the evening offered just the calm, relaxing experience traditionally hoped for before a wedding. The big event was held at House for an Art Lover in Glasgow, an amazing facility designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh (excellent Scottish architect who is somewhat Frank Lloyd Wright-esque). Located in beautiful Bellahouston Park, we chose it because of its unique design, gorgeous setting, and super-tasty food. We held the ceremony as well as reception there, thanks to the support of the fantastic Pastor McNally that my mom found at St. Columba’s Lutheran Church. All went smoothly, thanks to great support from Gillian & James @ HAL, Ken Thompson of Team Thomson Photography, and wittily-named ceilidh band Ceilidh Minogue, who talked all of us novices through some very fun Scottish highland dancing. Anyway, enough chit-chat; here’s a few favorite pics courtesy Ken!! (click on individual photos to enlarge a bit)

Thanks for letting me take a quick trip back to our fun times in Scotland last May! We will now return to your regularly scheduled programming of Mexico, so expect a post on our recent anniversary trip to Huatulco this week… honest…

A new interruption from my wedding-reminiscing… I came across this pressing news article from Mexico City’s esteemed (??) free daily newspaper, Publimetro, on Friday. It was excellent fodder for a wee chat with my taxi driver as we sat in standstill traffic due to the stupid route he chose. He simply could not believe that they were making bras just for men in Japan, because there are so many bras already out there and so many pretty women to wear them.

Hey people, a free 32-page daily newspaper is not going to fill ITSELF with relevant articles...

The other best part about this screen shot from Publimetro’s online version of the paper is the article in the upper left-hand corner entitled “Girl with Three Legs Born in Peru”. This is followed by the lower left-hand corner scoop of “Cambodian bids with fake money in protest” about a man who tried to buy Pol Pot’s sandals with $790k in counterfeit bills in protest against the Khmer Rouge regime.

Packing for exciting trip to Huatulco tomorrow has taken precendence over a lengthy, super-riveting post about the day before our wedding last year in Glasgow. So as an interim step, please see below some pics of my favorite animal in Scotland, the furry coo. (perhaps more officially known as “Highland Cattle“) FYI, it is only the cutest cow ever. All these pics were taken at Pollock County Park, an amazing park south of the river that holds the esteemed Burrell Collection (one man’s collection of 9000+ pieces of art from all over the world), Pollock House (a gorgeous 18th century mansion), and some of the most amazing gardens I’ve seen in a while. But they can’t hold a candle to wet, matted cattle!

The majestic furry coo surveys his surroundings...

My brother Tim took a pic of the sign describing their names & pedigrees.

Here's one of the black puffballs + a few babies...

...and an overhead closeup of one taking a nap. :)

I tried to bond with one of the furry coos, in hopes that he would send his furry luck our way for the wedding.

Let us continue on our Mexico detour begun yesterday with our ambitious bus trip into the Scottish countryside! As part of of dragging our family & friends over to Glasgow for our wedding, we wanted to make sure they saw a sufficient smattering of the things that make Scotland so amazing. Obviously that list could get pretty long, but we pared it down to lochs, whiskey, and castles. In a truly fingers-crossed moment that Tuesday morning one year ago, John & I both heaved a sigh of relief as the bus we’d hired blindly from the US rolled up in front of our hotel right on time. We had a tight agenda planned & no time to waste!!

The Carmann crew pre-boat cruise and pre-Herickhoff addition. ;)

First it was off to lovely Loch Lomond for an hour-long boat cruise on the Astina. We were there early enough to secure basically the whole front of the boat’s open upper deck for ourselves, and we proceeded to bask in the sunlight while circling around the loch. (Check out the song immortalizing this Bonnie Loch here on YouTube.)

All our schoolkids eating their cold lunches on the grounds of Glengoyne distillery!

Next stop: Glengoyne, Scotland’s “Most Beautiful Distillery”! Clearly no trip to Scotland would be complete without a whisky tour!! We took advantage of the beautiful scenery and ate our bagged lunch on the grounds around the distillery buildings. Cheers to Seb’s Cafe in Glasgow for packing us AMAZING mediterranean lunches to go, with freshly-baked bread & tasty spinach/feta pastries. Sooo tasty.

Several happy whisky-tasters assessing Glengoyne's finest!

After our lunch break, we headed in to meet the Glengoyne folks & kick things off with a whisky tasting! (Well, at least everyone who had fully recovered from the night before…) This was followed by a brief tour of the whisky-making process, where we were amused several times at the lack of overly-anal safety precautions that one might expect in the US (i.e. go ahead & touch the 500-degree copper cauldron if you’re stupid; be our guest!). Eventually we dragged everyone out of the overly-alluring gift shop…

Tanya tried to hang back to sneak a taste straight from the copper stills...

Posing with a few sacrificial barrels outside the distillery.

Our first view of Stirling Castle towering over the countryside!

And the final stop on our bus tour: the imposing Stirling Castle, located about an hour north of Glasgow in Stirling. As per the website, “It towers over some of the most important battlefields of Scotland’s past including Stirling Bridge, the site of William Wallace’s victory over the English in 1297, and Bannockburn where Robert the Bruce defeated the same foe in the summer of 1314.” Quite a storied past!! I think good times were had by all wandering around the amazing stone buildings & taking photos of each other looking quite majestic.

The happy couple inside the Castle

One of the many amazing views from atop the Castle

We even briefly got to be King & Queen inside the Great Hall...

The Scottish appeared to have chosen a sufficiently-rugged spot to build a castle on...

EVERYTHING in Scotland is sooo green, with purple heather scattered about.

Here's me trying not to fall down as bus driver Andy whipped around the curvy roads of Scotland, while sharing riveting comments with the first 4 rows that could hear me

The bus tour turned out to be a wild success, with all our visits running smoothly & offering much more relaxation than driving a rented car on the wrong side of the road! We returned to Glasgow for dinner in Merchant Square, a fun pseudo-courtyard that once held Glasgow’s Fruit Market and now is home to a number of bars & restaurants. A few ambitious folks finished up the night at Blackfriars, an excellent pub offering numerous beers on tap + cask ales as well as live music. More to follow soon! (And thanks to Marcia/Larry/Heidi/Scott for some of the above pics!)

…to bring you a flashback to one year ago today in Scotland! I realized that I never really shared many of the pics from our wedding in Glasgow or the pre-wedding-week activities, so I thought we’d take a quick departure from Mexico across the pond over to Scotland!

Note to self: if you ever want to get a big group of guys into a dance club, have them wear the coolest Scottish hats ever.

First, the precursors: John’s Bachelor Party in Washington DC, where the boys all donned the famous “See You Jimmy” Scottish hats.

Yay for candy necklaces and tiaras!!!

And Julie’s Bachelorette Party in Boston where we dined like queens and drank with all the tacky bachelorette accoutrements a girl could ask for.

80% of the bridal party has arrived! And yes-- my cousin is even taller than me!!

But the official festivities began on May 18 with a welcome dinner at The Firebird gastropub in Glasgow’s West End. We had a fantastic welcome dinner of pizza, pasta, salad and hearty Scottish beers. I had the opportunity to wear the girl-kilt that John’s grandmother passed on to me, made of the family’s Farquharson tartan! Very exciting.

Here's the crew trotting through Kelvingrove Park to the university.

Monday morning we were up bright and early (most of us at the bargain-priced Sandyford Hotel) for a tour of the University of Glasgow, kindly arranged by our lovely friend Emily. GU is where I studied abroad my sophomore year of college, after which I was hard pressed to return to life in possibly-less-exciting Ames, Iowa. The university itself dates back to 1451, and the campus is a stunning mix of green spaces and gothic architecture.

The entrance to the university tower staircase gives you a feel that this was not meant for Carmann/Herickhoff-sized people...

We were lucky enough to score tours of both the University Tower/Main Building and the Charles Rennie Mackintosh House, one of my personal favorites. The Tower offers great views of the whole West End of Glasgow– if you are able to survive the 236 steps of the winding stone staircase to get to the top! Check out some of the city views from the Tower below & other shots of the university. (You will note the amazingly clear skies we were blessed with the entire week–not a drop of rain until the day AFTER our wedding. Needless to say, do not count on this if you take a trip to Scotland!!)

A view of the Kelvingrove Musem & park in Glasgow

The Carmann & Herickhoff crew enjoying the breeze after a sweaty climb up...

Birdseye view of the cloister courtyard of the university's main building

More of the lush green parklands around the University...with the convention center in the background, affectionately known as the Armadillo

What is a trip to the UK without a photo with the red phone booths?? :)

Here's the stunning University Chapel, where we briefly considered tying the knot

Off to squeeze ourselves onto the miniature subway of Glasgow at the Hillhead stop!

The remainder of our Monday afternoon in Glasgow was at our guests discretion. Some did the open-top bus tour, some visited the Glasgow Cathedral, some experienced the Glasgow Underground system (better known as “Clockwork Orange” for its bright hue & its circular layout).

John took advantage of the night out to get a few final kisses in before the big day.

After a brief rest, many of us ventured off to Ashton Lane, a fantastic wee strip of bars & restaurants just west of the University. We started off at favorite Irish pub Jinty McGinty’s, and then moved on to Bar Brel for tasty Belgian beer offerings.

Stone-cold sober, this crowd, folks. Stone cold.

Here is The Maggie's finest: a Scoobie Snack, hiding in its lair.

Although there was initial talk of moving onto a club due the early closing time of pubs in Scotland, John & I wisely managed to steer interest away from more drinking and instead towards the best drunk food you may ever find. We slowly herded cats towards a vending truck known as “The Maggie” parked at a nearby busy intersection (Byres Road & Great Western Road).

Warning: Eating a Scoobie Snack may cause tears of joy or horror, depending on how cognizant you are of what you are ingesting.

The Maggie is famous for its Scoobie Snacks, a creation that consists of 6 items: a hambuger pattie, a sausage pattie, bacon, a fried egg, cheese, and a potato scone, all stuffed into a bap (aka bun). Needless to say, this is the epitome of the “Seemed like a good idea at the time” food genre. :) But regardless, all diners were pleased and clearly agreed with us that this is a “must do” on any visit to Glasgow.

Nothing says "classy wedding trip" like gathering around the back end of a food truck for a photo of you & several wedding party members eating your weight in grease.

Tune back in tomorrow for further reenactments of John & Julie’s Wedding Trip to Scotland, one year ago this very week!

Last week my boss tipped me off to TWO new Mexico City markets with which I was previously unfamiliar:

1. Tianguis Cultural del Chopo, a Saturday-only market dedicated towards all things rock/alternative/punk/ska/goth/weed/hippie
2. Centro Artesanal Buenavista, “La Tienda Mas Grande del Pais con 100,000 articulos finos en 24,000 mts2″ (The largest store in the country with 100,000 fine items in 258,000 square feet)

These two mercados are located right next to each other, both fascinating in their own way & definitely worth a couple hours spent on a Saturday afternoon. Also, they are easily accessible via public transit– take the Metro to the Buenavista stop on the gray line B, or the Metrobus up Insurgentes to the Buenavista stop (just a bit north of Reforma).

No words come to mind to appropriately explain this photo. Credit: massiel on the Tianguis Cultural del Chopo website

The “cool” prize definitely goes to El Chopo. Their website (may I interject– well done you, tianguis [street market] with a trendy, informative website!) has a great history in Spanish. In a nutshell, the market’s been around for nearly 29 years and you can find “CDs, DVDs, records, goth clothes, sweatshirts, punk fashion, stickers, artsy stuff, live bands ploaying, emo, metal gear, urban, jamaican style, fotographic exhibitions, band members wandering around, and all that you’ve imagined in only one place!”  Additionally, the people watching (which is good in Mexico City to begin with) may rank on the “excellent” scale here. (On that front, my photos pale in comparison to one depicted above from their website, contributed by user “massiel”.) We did not have the priviledge of observing any dachsund-licking during our visit, not even dachsund-licking by flat-haired people.

I discovered reading the website tonite that you are *supposed* to get badge to take photos in El Chopo, but we somehow managed to snap a few pictures without incident. Of course, their website also requests that drugs and alcohol not be consumed in the market, and a few sniffs of the air indicated those rules weren’t being followed tooo closely…so perhaps these are all just *suggestions*….

El Chopo pics below followed by Centro Buenavista.

Ahh ska... how you remind me of my college days, when I tried to learn how to skank (ska dancing) to impress my freshman year boyfriend, until finally I realized that everyone looks like an idiot doing it.

John does his best, government-employee "tsk tsk tsk" glare towards the marijuana-decorated backpacks.

It is basically only a matter of time before I break down and buy one (or more) of these lucha libre mascara keychains...

On the other end of the mascara spectrum, we have these slightly more severe masks... I will leave up to your imagination what is happening there on the left...

Third time's the charm: these were my favorite masks-- some enterprising merchant capitalizing on the conflicting need for healthy precautions + style with wittily-decorated flu facemasks (the sign read tapabocas de moda-- fashionable facemasks).

You can even find heavy metal vintage Playboy mags...

I was entertained by the "McMuerte" logo (McDeath) until I remembered that I don't have any clothes/bags/coats to iron decals onto...

All the clothing you could possibly need for your next rave, seduction, or re-enactment of The Matrix.

As well as all the studded bracelets and animal print belts you were hoping for...

And as per usual, we blended in seamlessly.

After buying some random purses made out of old records at El Chopo, we moved on to Centro Artesanal Buenavista. I was expecting another massive outdoor market, but this one surprised us by subtly lurking in the goddamn biggest low-ceilinged warehouse I have ever seen. The “What the Hell is Going On Here” prize definitely goes to Buenavista. 

First to clarify, this is not a traditional artisan market; rather a freaking-massive store. I still expected it to be bustling with people, the way every other artisan market tends to be around here on a sunny Saturday afternoon. NO. Not even close.

I think we were one of three other couples in the 250,000+ square foot store for almost the whole time we were in there. At least 50% of the overhead flourescent lights were off. If it hadn’t been for the occasional lurking store employee, I would have been convinced that we either had gotten locked in a 70’s department store afterhours, or we had walked into the movie Mannequin. Only the mannequins didn’t look like Kim Cattrall. They looked like this: 

Did someone install this mannequin's eyes upside down? And if this is a boy, should he really be wearing that much eyeliner?

and this:

I anticipate this mannequin being featured on the Mexican spinoff of "What Not to Wear: For Kids"

 and these two terrifying gems: a surprisingly tall hand-less male mannequin wearing what can only be described as a “doo-rag”, and a bald, handless female mannequin who appears to be in ecstacy despite that fact that her wig is lying behind her in a pile that best resembles a long-haired guinea pig.

As you can see, the well-lit clothing section was simply mobbed with people wanting to take advantage of this great assortment of ponchos

I was also struck by the liberal use of space in a country where most stores fill every available inch with saleable merchandise. It felt both wasteful and luxurious (?) to see individual plates displayed on massive, astroturfed, Teotihuacan replicas:

It almost felt like I was at Aztec ruins...if the Aztecs had degrees in Turf Grass Management...

and a whole wall allotted for merely this small a number of nightmare-inducing owls:

This Owl Wall scared the crap out of me. Though it appears that no actual owls died in the making of these Owl Replicas... Maybe this is where all that hair went that we damaged with hot crimping irons back in the 80's?

One thing I was impressed with was how the store tried to teach its customers about Mexican handicrafts, in case they are not familiar with Mexican culture. For instance, maybe there are some people who don’t know about hammocks. I know for me, this carefully, artfully-arranged display really helped to show me what a hammock might be used for:

This display certainly helped to alleviate my concerns of "Is this hammock strong enough to hold me". If it is good enough for a nude, limbless, plastic mannequin and a doll COMBINED, it should easily hold my bulk.

Also, the store used fun characters like friendly frogs to help visitors understand proper drinking habits in Mexico:

Dear God: If these frogs actually died of alcohol poisoning, please forgive me for mocking them on my website. Amen.

The last thing we learned about was who we would have to talk to if we were caught shoplifting any of these little treasures:

So, uh, is this thing really for sale? Can I rent it for a Halloween party?

And finally, we perused the housewares section, also full of surprises…

I loved this "Tequila Rack"... because who among us doesn't have 18 bottles of tequila to display in our home?

For those of you considering a bathroom remodel, perhaps you have not given fair consideration to a conch shell spout + 2 rock nubbins for handles??

This decorative rooster helps to lighten the mood of any room...or at least when someone tries to emulate his mannerisms.

I don’t know that I would include Centro Artesanal Buenavista (open daily from 9 to 6) on your wedding registry per se, but I would definitely add it onto a trip to El Chopo….particularly as the store has free bathrooms that John indicated were “adequate”.  As for me, another trip to El Chopo is definitely in my future… After all, you can never have too many fashionista facemasks in a place like Mexico City.