As my driver inched (millimetered?) us along the Place de Reforma and onwards to our ultimate destination, my mind wandered (as it will when it has an hour of forced inactivity to kill): what would it be like to live in this city? How much does one of those nice three-story townhouses in the Palanco cost? What? Too much! What about something cheap in the suburbs? A shack near the waste dump? Renting?
It's not like I'm planning to become an expat in Mexico. After all, the only Spanish I know is what's on the menu at El Torito. It's just I can't help wondering what it's like to live in places I visit.
And the sheer size and importance of Mexico City makes that wondering more intense. After all, what the Cuidad is today, Los Angeles might be tomorrow. Actually, chunks of LA are already like Mexico City, absent the beheaded corpses and interesting architecture.
Strike that next to last comment. There were no headless victims in MC. That carnage is further north, or further south, or somewhere other than the capital. It's hard to imagine anyone getting enough privacy to behead someone in Mexico City.
But the architecture is interesting. Mostly because I couldn't believe any of it was still standing is such an active earthquake zone. There it was, however, either putting the lie to the idea that 17th century building techniques were inefficient, or testifying to the patching power of cheap cement and a little stucco.
But I digress. My driver got me to my destination. I worked - in a tough situation - with some of the nicest people I have ever met, and then I was safely deposited back to my hotel.
And as I slept a sleep that only comes after eating not wisely but too well in Mexico City, I could only dream of a bright and hopeful future for that messy but easy-to-love metropolis.
And to it's inhabitants I wish good water pressure, safe commutes, freedom from corruption and gangs, and an endless supply of Zantac.
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