Mexico City by Day

After seeing the city at night when we arrived, we were extremely shocked to see how dramatically different it is during the day! We began our first real day in Mexico City by visiting the Cathedral, which is one of the most elegant, beautiful and massive buildings I've ever seen. It really taught me how important Catholicism is to most Mexicans, and I could feel all of their positive religious energy flowing within the building. It was captivating, and I longed to feel what they were feeling when they looked up at the statues of their santos, or paintings of Santa Maria. After the Cathedral we saw a giant market, almost similar to the Eugene Saturday Market, only ten times the size, and with so many different kinds of items for sale that it's almost impossible to focus on any one of them. A lot of what we saw everywhere was so overwhelming, and the market was definitely one of them. We went into the Palacio Postal, which is the main post office of Mexico City, and it was incredible. I've never seen such an elaborate post office. My mom, a mail carrier for the USPS would be amazed. We also saw the Museo de Diego Rivera, and received a lengthy and comical explanation of one of Deigo's most famous murals from a local man who was apparently quite knowledgable in Diego Rivera's life. It was definitely a momentous event from our short stay in the city. We witnessed our first sudden rain storm, and that rain puts Oregon rain to shame! Within minutes we went from leisurely walking through the cobblestone streets in the sunshine to a giant ominous black cloud covering every part of the sky, and huge, stinging rain drops pelting us as we ran for cover at our hostel. It was a sight to see thousands of pedestrians running through the streets, vendors yanking out plastic sheets to cover their merchandise, people selling garbage bags from under cover to the unlucky ones who didn't have jackets (us, of course). We spent the rest of the afternoon eating pan dulces in our room and waiting for the arrival of our other friends who were meeting us that night. We all spent the evening chatting on bunk beds in one of the hostel rooms, and it felt just like grade school again. Today we were lucky enough to be escorted by a friend of a friend who lives in Mexico City. He showed us a very nice, upper class restaurant to eat at for lunch, and we all had a great time. Unfortunately, shortly after we had to catch our bus to Queretaro, so we didn't get much more of a tour of the city. The bus ride was 3 hours, and it felt so long... I was just so anxious to see the city that I'll be staying in for the next 6 weeks! Finally, we made it and had a great dinner with our resident director of the program, Dawn, and some other group members who will be joining us this summer. Tomorrow I finally get to meet my host family! I've been waiting for this for so long, and I can't wait! I'm sure there's plenty more to add, but for now, buenas noches!