I’ve been looking forward to Mexico and Mexican food for a
good while. Mexico is absolutely obsessed with tacos and violence. I chose to
focus more on the tacos and challenged Fok to a Taco Tally to make 100 hundred
tacos in our three weeks here. And so the Taco Tour begins!
This place is street food heaven! There are street vendors and
little cantinas everywhere selling hand sized tacos which vary from beef streak
through marinate pork, to diced chorizo sausage – almost always served with
cilantro and onion, and with a lime to squeeze, some green salsa and a red hot
sauce ready by the side of your plastic bag covered plate (saves on washing up).
The Mexicans eat tacos for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and so did we.
But back to the start, we crossed into Mexico through an
intense military compound border crossing. There were several Km’s of high
fencing and razor wire - a totally different sight to US/ MEX border crossing
at Tijuana that Mum and Dad took us through back in 2006. Mexico is where all the drugs and immigrants
of Latin America are trafficked up through to the USA.
Our first destination is Mexico was Playa del Carmen. The whole
coastline around this area seems to be a big amusement park for dumb, hateable
tourists. I feel sorry for the local communities who have been nudged off this
beautiful coastline to make way for the resorts. If not for the food, this
place would be nothing but offensive to me. It’s the worst place I’ve been
since I left home. Tacky, touristy, superficial, overpriced, full of drunk
tourists and devoid of any cultural value
- I entered Mexico through its asshole.
We used our time in Playa to get out of Playa.
First to Tulum to visit the Mayan ruins right on a
spectacular beach. Sadly, the sheer hordes of tourists smothered the place, and
it felt no more special than the Indiana Jones Ride at Disneyland.
Our next forays were more fruitful. We visited the town of
Valladolid, where we got our first glimpse of a more authentic Mexican town.
Here we saw lots of street vendors, and were lucky enough to see the Palm Sunday
celebrations in the town Cathedral. Mexico is an extremely religious country,
90% of the population is Catholic. (I remember a year ago I was in Russia on
Palm Sunday and they used birch branches because they have no palms.)
In this region of Mexico there is an extensive system of underground
rivers and lakes. A Cenote is where the roof collapses in and leaves a big hole
in the lands surface, exposing the subterranean water system below. The one we
visited was touristy as all hell because it’s the top rated one, but I had
enough room to swim myself so I enjoyed myself. The water was beautiful, black
fish were swimming around us, and roots hang down from the tree’s that lined
the rim above. A strange little landscape to be in.
Chichen Itza is the name for the most celebrated Mayan ruins
in Central America. An ancient city that was not destroyed by the Spanish conquistadors
because the forest grew over it and hid it, the most impressive structure in
the extensive complex is a big squared pyramid. This is considered one of the
modern wonders of the world.
Next we had a couple of nights at Cancun. I wanted no part
of it but Fok though we should check it out, so I was perfectly ready to hate
the place as much as Playa. But I didn’t. Yes, it was grotesque, a long line of
extravagant hotels on the water, like the Las Vegas strip wedged on a sand
strip between the Caribbean and a big lagoon. It was a spectacle though, quite
amazing really. And the beach really was beautiful it’s the reason why the
Mexican Government selected this location in the 70’s to develop and draw in
American tourists.
Maybe the reason I didn’t hate it so much is because we were
tucked away in the local part of town -
a ten minute drive from ‘the strip’. This suited us much better and we
ate some of the best Mexican food we’d have in all of Mexico, surrounded by
locals who were just as happy as us to ignore the rich tourist in their high
hotels by the water and focus on the great tacos and quesadillas the vendors
were serving up.
On a side note, they put chilli or hot salsa on everything
here. I even ordered a mango sorbet and the vendor put chilli on top. A weird
taste.
On another side note, in the streets of Cancun we were
offered drugs and children for sex.
Next we went to Merida, which is a small colonial city and
capital of the Yucatan State. It is considered the safest city in Mexico, and
is growing rapidly as people from up north of the country temporarily or permanently
leave their hometowns to escape the escalating violence. Our trip in Mexico
takes us only about half way up. Above that it’s too dangerous because of the
drug cartels fighting for power and opportunity to get drugs across the border
up to the hungry, high paying US of A. Mexico now has 9 out of the top 20 most
dangerous cities in the world by murder rate, and is only getting worse thanks
to politician and police corruption (the military are apparently the only ones
who haven’t been deeply corrupted). Mexico is on a steep descent.
But down in the safer, southern region, Merida is a cool
town were the Taco Tour steam rolled ahead. It was a great town to just wander,
checking out the big markets and exploring any street that intrigued me from
the corner – not something I was game to do in the previous countries we
visited or that I’d be game to do in most other parts of Mexico.
Then to Campeche, a perfectly restored colonial town, which
almost has the feel of a movie set. The streets are picturesque but somewhat
lifeless. We walked along the old defence walls, sat in the park next to the
cathedral that looked spectacular when lit up at night, and spent our three
afternoons in town at the waterfront watching the sun set over the Gulf of
Mexico.
Here I had a few good tacos, but also one of the worst meals
of my life. I ordered a dish called Mondongo from a market cantina, which I knew
was made from the guts and gizzards of the chicken but I wanted to try because it’s
a region specialty. I’ve had gizzards before and they were quite nice, fried
crispy and spiced. Mondongo is a soup of rubbery, wet and chewy gizzards in a
bitter broth. I thought after all the things I’ve eaten I would be able to at
least get the soup down to a polite level in which it could be left. But no,
the gizzards got me, and I walked from the cantina shamed.
Easter came and passed without a single chocolate egg – we
had tacos instead.
From Campeche we got an overnight bus up into the mountains.
I dread sleeping on buses. It’s usually me sitting awake and listening to moody
night music and watching the darkness outside pass as the rest of the bus
sleeps, but after a few hours of that I finally drifted.
San Cristobel del las Casas was where we got off the bus. Up
higher it was much cooler, and wandering through the town to find our accommodation
immediately woke me up and put me in high spirits. This town is what I expected
from Mexico. Apart from having a great feel, some picturesque streets and
interesting local characters (a strong Mayan presence here as we are back down
towards the Guatemala border), San Cristobal had the cheapest tacos we would
find at 2 peso a pop. That converts to 16 cents Aussie. Sure, they weren’t filling,
but they were descent enough to keep going back for more.
Our taco tally was rising on its way to 100, and we got on
another night bus to head northwards.
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