on rooftops, identities and guayabas.

A funny thing about writing this blog: somehow, I always tend to think that there’s nothing interesting to write about and suddenly there comes a moment when a lot of happenings and thoughts just take form and I end up writing several pages (I have nothing but XXL love for those who actually manage to read them all and not fall asleep!).

Today I’ve had ‘a pink giraffe among black sheep’ moment. Depending on the day, the amount of coffee I’ve had and many other factors, sometimes I feel uncomfortable with being the tallest person around and bearing the sign ‘foreigner’ on my forehead. In those moments, I catch myself grasping for the sight of someone who looks like me to feel more ‘natural’: today I exchanged the look ‘yes, I know perfectly how you feel’ with a random tall, blond, blue-eyed girl on the traffic light. Which brings me back to the concept of identity: yes, she was tall and a foreigner, but those might as well be the only things we have in common and I might as well share more similarities with the tlacoyo lady on the corner. And this brings me back to my previous post, about comparing Europe and Mexico. The biggest error in it was thinking of Europe (as it is common around here) like a uniform mass, ignoring the fact that e.g. the South of Spain and the North of Sweden have nothing in common, I mean even a 400km long little stain on the mapamundi like Serbia has its differences. But, the last post was a bit hectic in and off itself. :)

About Mexico: it just crossed my mind that it’s almost been a month since I moved here! Last week we celebrated the country’s independence from Spain (204 years ago). This is how it looked like:

my really good friend Rosario (aka Chayo), met her 6 yrs ago on a Catalan course in Mallorca. my Mexico City friend, psychologist and the provider of pillows, blankets, rides, you name it!

Besides that, I haven’t done much, been creating and enjoying that comfy everyday routine -going to the market (mercado de Jamaica, 5 stops by subway, the closer ones are in not so cool neighborhoods): today a funny thing happened in the subway on my way there. I forgot to mention that someone selling something jumps in on every station. This guy was selling bubble-foam (like the ones kids make) and to prove the quality, he started blowing bubbles all over the train (so I was covered with bubbles, this only made my smile become even bigger). Or the guys selling CDs with music from whatever period: they give you a preview by playing a sample (~15sec) of each song on the CD (and a CD has about 20 songs).

Mercado de Jamaica, ©Google

And I’ve got a new addiction: making fresh guayaba juice (2kg=1€). This is a guayaba:

©Google

The taste would be something between a quince mashed with pineapple and a dash of lemon (hope you got the idea).

Besides making guayaba juice, I tend to spend a lot of time on our rooftop, drinking coffee, reading and getting sunburned. The rooftop sums up the essence of Mexico City, overlooking the old Cathedral, the new Manhattan-like Santa Fe zone as well as the mountains/volcanoes surrounding the city. But, paradoxically, it’s also incredibly silent, being in the center of one of the biggest cities of the world. Some pics of the view:

I just adore the clouds here (as you already know)

From time to time, a random neighbor wanders off to the rooftop and starts chatting (me living here is quite an enigma, everyone’s wondering who the gringo living on the last floor is). This week’s neighbor was Doña Inés –in 20min she managed to tell me more or less everything about her life, from her late father’s profession to problems she has at work. Like every Mexican, she’s thrilled that I decided to move here and that I like her country, especially coming from a rich European country (every country in Europe is rich and prosperous around here, even Serbia). She did mention though that I should be aware of thieves and legal flaws, after all, this is a país de indios (a country of Indians, would really not like to believe that her vision of Mexico’s problems has only one cause). So, she’s happy to have a new neighbor called Camilo (that’s me, Doña Inés is half deaf). Later this afternoon, Inés’ son asked me if I could help him and his 5 friends with his English. Interesting –in Serbia, Spain and Germany I didn’t even know who lived in the apartment next door and suddenly I’m making friends with everyone in the building.

My favorite part thing about living here is washing my clothes: the washing machine is not automatic, so you have to put in clean water manually, throw out the dirty one, and so forth. So, it’s much easier washing it by hand on the rooftop. By the way, the guy bringing the drinking water to your place I talked about in my 1^st post does not operate in this area, so you have to take the 20l gallon yourself (in my case, 3 stories up). The view on water consumption drastically changes with these two.

an option for washing your clothes, it's really nice actually, you enjoy the sun and chill. and it goes fast (more or less because i brought 2 trousers and 3 T-shirts). my number is the 6, in case someone wondered

each apartment has a 'jaula' (a cage) for drying the clothes

Another function the rooftop has, besides mingling and washing clothes, is to provide me with a mental update: as I’m getting more and more used to living here, somehow I tend to forget that I’m actually in Mexico. For those of you who don’t know, when I was 8 (and living in my little town in the North of Serbia), I could draw the country’s map by heart and name all of the 32 states and their capitals. My first CDs ever was the best of Thalía (back in 1995, blushing), in school I was telling everyone I had a Mexican great grandmother living on a rancho in Aguascalientes and I used to call the Mexican Embassy in Belgrade just to hear the secretary saying ‘Buenos días, Embajada de México’. Couldn’t imagine that a couple of years later, I’ll be working at the same Embassy and having coffee with that secretary. Life.

So, yeah, Mexico did play and continues playing an important role in my life. We’ll see where it leads, I guess.

Oh, many of you asked me about the logistic part of my life here, jobs and stuff. Have been searching around, but nothing seems to pop up (yet). Somehow, I focused on experiencing the country first and making my way around the city (while there's still some savings left) and until now, things did appear out of the blue in the right moment, regardless if I’ve been running around, chasing them, so I hope it’ll be the same this time. I do have an interview at one University in a couple of weeks, though. If everything goes well, I’ll start teaching Swedish there! (an Irish friend said: okay, so you’ll be a Serb teaching Swedish in Mexico). In a couple of days I’ll go to the National Autonomous University and check what’s the procedure for foreigners wanting to study here (thinking of starting psychology, but am going to write more on this and several other issues in my next posts). 

And next week I’ll go to the airport, although this time it won’t be to leave Mexico, but to pick up Green Eyes and continue writing that book we started :)

A song to say goodbye, México en la piel (Mexico on your skin, with subtitles)! I must confess, I started crying like a Magdalena this Saturday when I heard it at a concert. Pelando el cable, I guess.

The conclusion is: this is more or less the biggest uncertainty phase I've ever had, but, it's also one of the incredible, smiling-every-day and happy phases ever. As said, we'll see where it leads!

Love you all!

Danilo