MEXICO CITY: A Telenovela

And that really resonated profoundly for me. This is a topic that is rather hard to write about in our culture because there is no grey area or middle ground for patriotism. Either you love America or you’re likened to a terrorist. This isn’t fair because the more you grow to love something, the more cognizant you become of the flaws. Travel has allowed me to see my home nation with a different perspective, from afar and from the eyes of others around the world. When we let ourselves escape our comfort zone and throw ourselves into something new and out of the ordinary, we are capable of incredible realizations. 

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THINGS I LOVED/HATED THIS WEEK #234

I walked up and down the street where he allegedly lived. I lingered in the bookstore that he launched to sell books of his images. I found lists of shops he liked and visited them. I went to exhibitions that he put on. And when I was lucky enough to be in Paris during a Chanel show, you would know exactly where to find me, lurking around the Grand Palais. Let me tell you, reader, for a young fashion lover, there is nothing so intoxicating as an obstructed glimpse of the Chanel runway. I waited in the rain, longing for Karl to come out, but I never saw him.

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MEXICO CITY: Ho For A Good Churro

I’ve never been able to eat pea soup without thinking of demonic possession. Do you know anybody who has ever been possessed by an unholy spirit? It happens so often in the movies and television that you’d think we’d all know of at least somebody. I’m in a coffeeshop right now back home, watching the rain fall — like in Mexico City, it won’t stop — and this idea has quite suddenly enraged me. Every week there’s some new show on the Travel Channel about some possessed child.

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MEXICO CITY: Glorious Escape

Since I left the airport last year, my soul has been aching to return. And finally I’m back and I can’t even begin to tell you how wonderful it is. Nothing has changed, if anything, Mexico is better. But I’m jumping ahead. I need to start at the very beginning. Hopefully — and I just learned in one of my university courses that that’s not an acceptable word but I don’t give a hoot — you’ve missed my lengthy reminisces of travel. As one of my long-dead heroines, Lady Lucie Duff-Gordon, an Englishwomen who gave herself completely to Egypt and died in Luxor, once said, “I long to bore you with traveler’s tales.” Let’s get started.

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MEXICO CITY: Decadent Darkness

One life is hardly enough. I have no fear of death, but I really am irked that I only have a century here. And that is if I’m lucky. For a lot of people, more than I ever expected, a hundred years is plenty. People are tired and worn down and disinterested in life. I think there’s nothing more thrilling than being alive, seeing what’s around and learning about what has happened in the recent and distant past, so I will never understand this attitude. If I could live forever, I would pay whatever price. I’d make a deal with the Devil if that were a real thing. 

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