Mexico City

Mexico City. Wow. Living in the largest city in the world - 15 million people, my Mexican friends laugh hard when I tell them the capital of my country has 500 000. The colonial part of it is absolutely beautiful, the museums, the mighty architecture, the Basilicas and cathedrals. It is placed 2000 meters above sea level, which makes me yawn a lot (Galdhøpiggen gå og legg deg, liksom) and it creates a special atmosphere that I like a lot. A little bit disturbing, though, to admire a beautiful cathedral in the Zuccalo knowing that the Spanish conquistadors coldly demolished ancient, mighty Aztec Pyramids to build their "House of God".

I have a strange love-hate relationship to this city" says David Lecona, a melancholic writer and poet living in the City. We meet through CS and make friends. He is writing poetry and also working on a book about The Shining Path, a latin American socialist terrorist group. We talk politics a lot, both with leftist sympathies. David has the saddest eyes, big, innocent and still expressing the knowledge of a lifetime. We go out for Sol, Corona and tequila with sangrita, lime and salt. Why did we leave out the Sangrita back home? Anyway, tequila is dangerous stuff for a gringa who hasn't been drinking much for two months, and I almost dance on the table.

On of the other nights I go out with David and his good looking cousins Rodrigo and Suri, also CS people. We go to a small, local outdoors coffee bar where Mexicans of all ages eat donuts and have coffee. We laugh and laugh trying to teach each other uglyeties in Spanish and Norwegian - I love couch surfing! The night is lovely, but then I have a Bad Burrito Experience reinforced by severe caffeine poisoning from those killer Mexican double espressos. This results in high fever, vomiting, a racing heart and lots of other unpleasant symptoms, but before it gets that bad David takes me home, covers my shivering body in five Indian wool blankets and helps me out big time. An awful experience, but I have luck in my bad luck; David and his cousin Rodrigo stays awake to take care of me the whole night, being the sweetest friends a traveler can ever have. Thank you so much guys, that meant the world to me. Please come to Oslo and vomit in my trashbin any time.

Mamma and I mainly stay with a beautiful Italian/Mexican couple, Alma and Gian Mauro. They are the sweetest hosts. Alma is doing a doctor's degree in Mexican literature and is in her holidays at the moment, so she spends a day with us, guiding us through the mucho complicado transport system of metros and buses. Sitting and being stared at by curious Mexicans not used to blonde girls on the Metro, I ask Alma how she and Gian Mauro met. They are one of those couples to get future inspiration from. She smiles like she has a secret and says "No, that story is for dessert". We see the city and do two extensive museums, the first one is the Anthropology Museum with proud Astec and Maya culture, the second is the Bellas Artes Museum. To my joy there is a Frida Kahlo exhibition at the moment. Very inspiring! What a woman, what a life story.

In the night Alma and Mauro take us to the wonderful area called Coyoacan with stunning colonial architecture, bright colours, art galleries and cafés. We are conveniently guided out of the worst tourist jam and go to an all Mexican place with lots of big families and great atmosphere. Here we are introduced to a broad variety of tacos, salsas and drinks like horchata, jamaica and atole, my favourite, a thick warm milk drink with maize meal and vanilla or chocolate. Alma does a great job explaining us about the Mexican culture - from the very small things like how to hold the tortilla to the bigger picture, like the mass fleeing to the United States. In some villages, 80% of people's incomes is dollars from their hard working, low wage family members in the Estados Unidos. Several times I hear people say "We hate the United States". Can you imagine what a different story we would have if the U.S hadn't stolen the oil rich land of Texas?

After some days we decide to go to the small village of Huasca. We take the bus fo two hours and it is lovely. Every long distance bus we've experienced in this country has live music - bands and single musicians jumping on and blessing us with a couple of songs before they collect money from the passengers and hop on another bus. A band with three male virtouoso guitar players, a lonely woman with her guitar and her intense, heartfelt voice. Sad, but very very beautiful.

Huasca meens the city of joy and happiness, and indeed it is. In the small hotel we meet Elizbeth, an out-of-this world beautiful girl and her mother, we spend the day with them to see vulcanic grounds, castles and spectacular montain views. We buy some of the district's liqour of many flavours, rompope.

Next morning, the woman who owns the hotel wakes me up at five thirty in the morning. We have a sunrise date. We walk up to the hills talking in a broken way; she speaks only Spanish and I only English. We improvise. We have blankets. We get along. I even make a joke that makes her laugh. The sunrise is priceless.

Returning to the City Monster and Alma & Mauro's place, we drink Manzanilla tea and listen to great music the whole night. We get our long awaited dessert in the form of their captivating love story, but I'm sorry - you'll have to go to Mexico City to hear it.