I’ve been here now a little over two months. Two more months to go.

In some ways not a lot has happened since my last post. I’ve been doing the same things: strolling around the city, loafing in the cafés and museums, eating, reading, doing laundry. But in other ways I feel as though I’ve done a lot. I’ve continued to spend time in even more new neighborhoods and districts, wearing out shoe leather and using up the credit on my Metro card as the days dribble gloriously by.

Enjoying the fountains at the Monument to the Revolution

I made a long day trip out to Ecatepec, a rough and tumble city suburb just across the line from Mexico City. Confusingly for visitors the country here is called Mexico, there’s a city called Mexico, and there’s also a state called Mexico. Ecatapec is in Mexico state, though there’s no real gap between Mexico City and Mexico state, you’d never really know you’d crossed borders. Metro line B runs from the Centro all the way up into the guts of Ecatepec, but it’s a world away.

With a population of around 1.7 million, Ecatepec forms the most populous suburb of Mexico City, and is (according to Wikipedia at least) the fifteenth largest suburb in the world. The bits just over the border are quite pleasant, but as you delve deeper into the bowels of the place – around metro stops Plaza Aragón and Ciudad Azteca – it quickly gets rougher and grittier. According to the newspaper El País Ecatepec is the worst place to live in the entire country, considering safety, quality of life and job opportunities. It looks it. There’s more garbage on the streets (much of Mexico City is actually quite clean considering the population), the architecture is drab and ramshackle, and if you had a factory that sold concrete cinder blocks to the city of Ecatepec you’d be a millionaire many times over. More women are killed and attacked there than anywhere else in Mexico.

I actually had an interesting (and completely safe) afternoon walking around the streets, and an excellent lunch at a tidy little restaurant near one of the metro stations. No one bothered me though I did get looked at quite a lot. I got the idea Ecatepec is not on any sort of tourist itinerary. I doubt I’ll return either.

Buddies enjoying a chat and a drink in a cantina in Ecatepec

To contrast Ecatepec as robustly as possible I also spent an afternoon in Polanco, one of the wealthiest and poshest parts of the city. Here is where the fabulously wealthy live and play. The malls are full of top-end retailers. The high-end restaurants serve more or less the same sorts of things you can find in Roma or in Centro, but for inflated prices and with a more of a concocted ambiance. It’s the most American looking place in Mexico City, from what I can tell.

There are some good museums there though, like the Soumaya. Brainchild of Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim, the Soumaya occupies prime real estate right in the thick of the action. The building from the outside is striking, though I found the inside rather drab and uninteresting. There’s a shockingly good collection of paintings though, ranging from Italian masters to Rodin to Monet, Renoir, Van Gogh and Picasso. There’s also an excellent collection of Mexican painters, young and old. The museum is beautifully clean and cool – and it’s free.

Soumaya Museum, Polanco

A week ago I’d decided I’d had enough of Mexican food and wanted something else, something Asian. The recent edition of Chilango magazine ran a feature on a few dozen standout places to eat in and around the city, many of them specializing in Chinese, Indian, Japanese and other cuisines. One place, Café King, apparently has the best ramen in town, so I headed over there to slurp up a bowl (and a nice surprise, the restaurant is in Santa Maria la Ribera, one of my favorite neighborhoods in the city). An Asian guy greeted me when I walked in. I asked him – in Japanese – if he was from Japan, (he was) so we proceeded to have a conversation about ramen. He told me (in Japanese so as not to alarm any of the other diners who, presumably, couldn’t speak Japanese) that if I was a fan of ramen and had lived in Japan then I was sure to be extremely disappointed in the ramen Café King offered. “It’s ramen for Mexicans,” he confessed, and proceeded to talk me out of it! I wondered why Mexicans couldn’t know good ramen from bad, but the waiter seemed fairly determined not to leave me disappointed. Very Japanese…

A friend here has told me about an area near Viaducto where a lot of Chinese merchants live, and where there are a lot of “authentic” Chinese places to eat. It’s on my To-Do list. Luckily I don’t speak Chinese, so I probably won’t be dissuaded from eating there.

Farmacia Coliseo, República de Perú, Centro

Sweethearts on the rooftop café of the Museo del Estanquillo

The Palacio de Bellas Artes – one of the best examples of Art Nouveau in Mexico 

I also made a quick trip down to Oaxaca state to visit my niece who lives in a small town near the Pacific coast. The air was thick with humidity but the food was excellent. Oaxaca has a large indigenous population, vibrant craft scene and unique cuisine and is noticeably different from Mexico City, much more compact and traditional. The towns and cities are all much smaller too, of course. It felt good to get out of Mexico City and breathe in some moist ocean air.

The Pacific coast of Oaxaca, near Huatulco

Colorful street in old Oaxaca City

I’ve found a few more places for walking. The large Bosque de San Juan de Aragón (just a few stops on the metro shy of Ecatepec, as it happens) is an excellent place to walk laps. I also spent an interesting afternoon in Section II of the Bosque de Chapultepec, walking the long jogging path that runs around the entire outer edge of the park.

Mannequin maker on Perú – much of Centro is still dominated by small workshops

I still love the city and am now definitely worried that four months isn’t going to be long enough to see all the things I’d planned. There’s always next time, I suppose…

Dancing in the Alameda, Santa Maria de la Ribera

Stay tuned!