07 MARCH - 08 MARCH 2011
The Tukanoan people of the Amazon did not consider their fellow forest dwellers, the Macu, to be people. They would say that the Macu were not born of the anaconda but rather were breathed into being from the dust of the first human, Yeba, the child of Jaguar Woman and Father Sun. They were subhuman, mediators between the realm of the living and the spirits of the forest. I wondered in that sense if the Macu still wondered the earth and if in fact I was some sort of descendant of these people. I mean only three to four months ago I had the mouth of a puma wrapped around my knee whilst politely asking it in Spanish for it to 'chill the hell out' and now, standing atop the pyramid of the sun, acting as a mediator between Jet's post apocalyptic piñata night binge and listening to the spirits of a civilisation that disappeared so abruptly some 1200 years ago it was me that needed to breath a little life into what looked to be quite a torrid day for my cohort. Ahh, the residual effects of being tequilaNated! Still before continuing with the story of how we arrived in Teotihuacan it needs to be pointed out that the little idea actually sprouted in the backstreets of Tijuana, so let me take this story back a few steps!
Back in the days when our bank balances were flatlining and our desires for NYC crumbling under a frontierland evening sky, Frichot and I were throwing around options in what appeared to be a losing battle for the continuation of the wing and a prayer tour. Feasibility studies concluded that options for travelling further south into the heart of Mexico might just allow us the chance of surviving for a few weeks if the kindness of the friends of Frichot fan club were to come to the party - which they in actual fact did and spectacularly so! So right here, right now, big thanks to Warren (muchos gracias) and Jet's flatmate MH for saving us the trouble of having to sell Jets' talents on the streets of Mazatlan! Trust me boys, pickings were slim but some of the Mexican mamas were eyeing Frichot off like a picante morning burrito after an all night tequila bender, it would have been brutal for him but necessary in order to save us!
Near Hostal Regina - Ciudad de Mexico - Mexico
Near Hostal Regina - Ciudad de Mexico - Mexico
Love Bugs in Mexico City - They are all the rage!
Near Hostal Regina - Ciudad de Mexico - Mexico
Near Hostal Regina - Ciudad de Mexico - Mexico
Several days after our last ditch attempts to save the tour were realised we cruised into Cuidad de Mexico to commence the last few days of an escapade that had had more lives than a feisty frog (get it, a frog croaks ...constantly!!?? Ahhh, doesn't matter). With a touch of good fortune we had located the Hostal Regina via an hasty search on Hostelworld and landed in their foyer early on a Monday morning without so much as a hint of the alcohol fuelled antics that would be attacking us within the next few days. We should have known of course, there were tthe old and familiar tell tail signs. Immediately upon arrival a mohawked behemoth with what I thought was a German accent (in fact it was Dutch) made his presence known and introduced himself to us in the following manner, 'Hi, my name is Patrick and I work here. Anything you want, anything you need just ask me. My role here is to get you f**ked up every night'...and you know what, the mighty man stuck to his words and did just that. Now Patrick is kind of an odd fellow. Ten times cheerier than Sydney on it's best mardi gras evening and louder than Ken Done mashed with Maggie T, this guy had Jet colouring his hair purple within 20 mins of our arrival and me ripping out a blinding rendition of Beds are Burning by Midnight Oil in the foyer of the hostel a few mins later. He also had us signing up to a piñata making carnivale of tequila and misguided confetti bombardment that very evening, and this my friends is where our days in Mexico City took a violent but inevitably brilliant turn.
Seriously, this happened within minutes of arriving at the Hostel - Patrick on duty!
No kidding, it was really going to be a pinata night!
It sounds relatively tame doesn't it? In fact it sounded like the perfect way that I would be able to cure the nasty bout of insomnia that I had been suffering the last few days. Earlier in the day Patrick had put it to me that I was 'obligated' to partake in the piñata making antics of that evening and added nonchalantly 'Oh and by the way, tomorrow night you'll also be hosting a BBQ!' (but more of that in my next post).
....and so it begins!
Can you see where it started to go wrong??
Oh yeah, fire fight! Head for the hills hombres!
It was innocuous enough to commence with. Several randoms at a hostel being guided in the fine art of piñata making and the intricacies of its design. Sitting back in the foyer of what I must say was easily the best hostes I've stayed in, I kind of had it in my mind that this would more than likely be an early night as Teotihuacan was beckoning us into its breaches on the morrow, but something happened. The other misfits that actually turned up to the event were quite cool! Usually at events such as these you encounter one or two people that you click with but it seemed that right at this moment we had close to 10 congregated around a table wondering how the hell they got roped into doing the same thing - and then 'it' commenced. The first few rounds of tequila shots. What good can EVER come of tequila shots, right! Through Patricks' warped guidance and direction we somehow concocted a drinking game that involved the creation of random geography questions, more drinking and the wild throwing of wet rags that quickly turned putrid shades of grey with ensuing throws. I'm not sure if it was the tequila (lol, really, I'm not sure) but we all got a little boisterous with our antics until we realised that there was a huge bagful of confetti that was just waiting to be cast in to the rarefied air of a Hostal Regina evening...and then it was made so! With beers aplenty and regular visits to nearby Oxxo's (the Mexican equivalent of the 7-Eleven that thankfully also sells cheap alcohol), we were throwing confetti bombs for the rest of the evening. It was an odd way to spend a night but it ended up being a hell of a lot of fun and as I've mentioned, it was one of those rare situations where everyone just gets along, so thank you to the following people for making this night such a laugh (Rachel, Patrick, Sophie, Kyall, Tom, Koganti) and a few others whose names escape me. We closed out the evening, or rather morning, at somewhere close to 5am with Rachel and Tom somehow occupying our room until the early hours. Not that I minded too much, I kind of had a thing for Rachel by that time anyway, but hey, no news there, she already knows it (don't you Ms Englishman?).
Sophie getting ConfettiNated!
This vendor loved our business! Drunk idiots = muchos pesos!
Waking up just a few hours after our ordeal however proved to be the real litmus test. Sensitivity to bright lights, a dull throbbing headache, an arm that had lost all sensation hours ago and a bed full of confetti? In those first few mins of a new morning I had myself questioning the ongoings of the mind bending piñata event and how exactly the outcome had led to the situation that I now found myself in. I know there are informants out there that can answer those questions for me and if they were ever to arrive in Sydney, well...anyway...I digress.
Teotihuacan had been my big selling point to Frichot back in Tijuana several days earlier. With funds dwindling I put it to him that seeing this archaelogical site just outside of Mexico City might just be our ticket to getting this tour back on track (aside from the fact that it was a place that I'd always wanted to visit). As we sat in silence at the breakfast table that morning however and mentally patched together some of the shenanigans and sometimes vile concoctions that had made their way into our systems, I looked at the dull, listless shell that was Frichot and wondered how in the world I'd manage to get him standing let alone riding in a mini-van for several hours just so he could walk in the blistering sun for another few hours and then climb the highest legally climable pyramid in the world. As Frichot 'dry wrenched' a few times whilst at the table he looked up at me sullenly as just said this, 'Go hard or go home mate'. We were definitely back on!
Frichot - the aftermath
Google it - seriously, just Google it!
So a couple things that I didn't know about Teotihuacan or Mexico City for that matter. I had assumed that Teotihuacan was actually an Aztec site, wrong! The site was in actual fact quite a large cultural and commercial centre that existed some 1000 years prior to that of the Aztecs. At its zenith in the first half of the first millennium AD there were something like 200,000 people that inhabited the complex, although the specificity of the ethnic groups who lay claim to the site vary (Nahua, Otomi or Totonac). This therefore had me asking the obvious question, 'then who the hell were the Aztecs and where was their hideout?' - good question, am glad I asked it.
First glimpse of the Pyramid of the Moon from the Avenue of the Dead - Teotihuacan - Mexico
Frichot loved the stairs!
Teotihuacan - Mexico
The Aztecs were a people of central Mexico who from approximately the 13th century adopted the city of Tenochtitlan, located on an island in Lake Texcoco as the capital of their empire. Whilst this in itself doesn't sound that impressive there are a coupld of 'add-ons' to this snippet of information that may make it so, 1) The city of Tenochtitlan was built in a manner very similar to Venice, small cities and villages all tied together by a series of canals. Indeed when Hernan Cortes and his crew turned up to Tenochtitlan in 1521 they termed it the 'Venice of the Americas', just before they set about destroying it, and 2) The entirety of Mexico City is actually built on top of what was once Lake Texcoco! That to me was quite a headspin. Where the hell did all that water go and how did they manage such a feet of ingenuity and engineering (all questions that I haven't had the chance of Googling as yet).
Pyramid of the Moon - Teotihuacan - Mexico
Pyramid of the Sun - Teotihuacan - Mexico
Frichot with the Pyramid of the Sun in the background
Our Aztec buddies aside, arriving at Teotihuacan that afternoon had me sinking back into some of the golden memories that I have of my first arrival to Angkor Wat in Cambodia. The size and scale of the site is daunting even by modern day standards, let alone for a pre-Columbian people of two milennia ago, and just the same as Angkor, it's that initial realisation of enormity that just has you mesmerised from the start.
Pyramid of the Moon taken from the top of the Pyramid of the Sun
On top of the sun
Trying out my Indiana Jones look - yeah, I kind of like it
Looking toward the Pyramid of the Sun and Avenue of the Dead
Walking around the complex for something like three hours, with Frichot losing half his weight somewhere along the Avenue of the Dead (aptly named I'd say), we managed to climb up to the top of the Pyramid of the Sun and take in both the view of the complex and the entirety of the surrounding area. Sometimes when you take a seat and try to absorb places such as these attempting to use adjectives to adequately describe them or provide a sense of perspective just doesn't seem to cut it. What I will say is this. Once again, on the wild ride that I've had for the last year I feel more than fortunate to have been provided with the chance of seeing a place that I've always wanted to see. To have done that with a great mate of mine, no matter how ill he was (even though he managed to tough it out quite successfully) is something that I'll always remember and cherish.
