Days 50 - 62: Ciudad de México; costa norte de Veracruz

Hans and I spent our first few days together doing close to nothing in the third biggest city in the world. We managed to leave our beautifully-groomed and cozy crashpad (one of two homey and quiet private rooms in the back courtyard of a french family's home) long enough to give Hans a sampling of great street food and markets, catch stares playing capoeira in a plaza, and oggle some Pre-Hispanic art in the fantastically overwhelming Museo Antropología. To ensure Hans a true Defeño experience, we added our bodies to the sardine pack of the evening metro and the carbonated pedestrian currents of Alameda central, on errands for organic vegetables and camping fuel...and experienced the lingering tremors of an earthquake when surfacing from the tube. (I thought I was just dizzy, but the lack of lights for a few hours that evening and apologies from our host soon informed me otherwise.)

I've loved reexperiencing Mexico city in these days before and after Hans' arrival. I returned on the 1st and by instinct took a hostel in the artsy Roma neighborhood, where I spent a few days relaxing and marveling in how different my perception of this city is this time around. Equipped with better Spanish and more experience with this country's pulse in general, D.F. no longer seems as overwhelming or threatening, especially outside of the centro's confusing and commercial, touristed hubbub. I took myself to a museum or two; spent a few nights staying with a Mexican friend of a friend, experiencing “real life” in the big city and putting my Spanish to the test; and confirmed it's possible to escape to greenery for a day, with a trip to the serene pine forest and monestary of Desierto Leones National Park. Staying in Roma, and with Hans in Santa Maria de la Ribiera (which is so far north of the centro and so little touristed Hans and I were the only güeros we saw), I saw much more of the calm and warmth I experienced in smaller towns bob to the surface of D.F.'s churning.

Now Hans and I are in Veracruz! Aie, it is so different here! It's lush, and the dinosoar hands I cultivated in D.F.'s harsh air and water are now being healed by sea-salty humidity - in which my damp clothes also never dry. Hans and I arrived by night bus to the tranquilo, tiny town of Tecolutla, dogearred by Lonely Planet for it's turtle-saving ecology center and incredible, cheap seafood. It reminds me a little of Hawaii here: the thick air, the extra bugs, the strange and raucous bird noise at the beginning and end of the day. The beach is lined with thatched pavilions for lunching in the shade and vendors pushing carts of mariscos cocktails or juices and whole coconuts you can get macheted open and plugged with a straw for 25 pesos.

Time with the ocean is healing.

On the way back through town at dusk, hundreds of long-tailed black songbirds fill the gnarled sillouettes of tropical trees, and collect like shards of dark glass on the roofs of buildings. We walk in the warm and early dark; the people in town move like the air does. Some very silly and friendly folks at a liquor shop sell us what we mistook for regular playing cards (“Cartas Españolas” instead), and attempt to teach us how to play with a deck that has no 8s or 9s.

Today we saluted the ocean and headed north to Papantla, another saucy little friendly town a bit inland, near the jungle ruins of El Tajín. Tonight we had incredible seafood (shrimp in garlic sauce....aaaahmmmmm) on a restaurant balcony overlooking an usually lively Zócalo. At the end of our meal, a brass band started up at the far end, and a parade of young people in white or bright bible costumes wound their way by, colorful paper latterns and stars bobbing above them: Posadas have begun!

Tonight I feel positively flooded with affection for this country.