Family

I am at my cousin's office right now; it is a firm called Rockitcargo and I am going to their Christmas outing tomorrow, which happens to be to Teotihuacan, the largest and oldest pyramid near Mexico City. Their offices are on Platon street, the same street where my hotel is. This whole neighborhood feels like a trip back to ancient Greece and Rome and European literature. When I get off at the closest subway stop (which I did yesterday for the first time because everyone says taxis should be avoided), I have to make sure to walk towards Horatio and not Temistocles. Then I pass Seneca, Edgar Allan Poe and Oscar Wilde and by the time I get to Juan Batista Moliere (sic!) I know that my cave is not far.

Jorge and I spent the last couple of hours trying to figure out our family history; I am much better versed than him, but he had all sorts of old passports and birth certificates in Hungarian, which I translated to him. His grandparents left Hungary in 1947 on a special emigration passport, which was valid for Europe (except Spain and Turkey, God only knows why) and Uruguay. They chose Uruguay and made it there via Switzerland and France, boarded a ship in Marseille and ended up in Uruguay only to move over to Argentina a couple of months later. There are still lots of blind spots on the family tree though, so I am planning on doing more research to get to the bottom of things. What especially intrigues me is this mysterious family conflilct, which I am convinced existed...if I can't find out the real story then I might just make up one. Watch this space.

As for Mexico City, I sometimes feel like a movie star. Yesterday on the tour bus I was the lone passenger sitting on the top floor of the double-decker and people kept waiving at me like I was some kind of celebrity. I enjoyed it until the cold wind turned me into an ice sculpture (I stupidly over-estimated the warmth of the weather) and a couple of tree branches hit me such that I almost lost my new sunglasses. Today, at the exceptionally well laid out Museo de Antropologia hordes of little children kept taking pictures of me instead of focusing on the story of their ancestors: the Mexicas (Aztecs), the Mayas and the rest of them. I got a little overdosed on the native culture, but one of the Oaxaca tribes made amazingly beautiful gold and jade jewelry and exquisite pottery so I take that with me. I also saw Diego Rivera's murals of the history of Mexico and the projected victory of the proletariat and walking around in my neighborhood (the equivalent of Ipanema in Rio) I got confirmation that there are a lot of filty rich Mexicans. Someone has to be shopping at Max Mara and Versace after all. At least, I don't stand out as much over here. The city center is a whole different world; it reminded me of La Paz, only in a better-kept version.

Oh, and by the way. I got word. No human rights job for me. I expected it, I guess, but it still sucks. No matter. At least I don't have to feel guilty about going for the money.