:-)

Guess what that is! Yes, my (missed) suitcase. I'm really glad that it finally arrived. This morning my a parcel service ("Good morning, Mr. Manns. I've got a parcel here. Really heavy.").

Nobody told me where something went wrong or what went wrong but I guess that it didn't stay in Madrid where I changed planes. While they could tell other passengers directly that their suitcases or bags had stayed in Madrid, they couldn't tell me anything until yesterday night. Therefore, I guess the suitcase stayed in Mexico and arrived yesterday with the next plane. Maybe it was to heavy for the worker on the airport and he said: "I've got a pain in my back anyway. The guy who will come tomorrow can do that."

And now guess the weight of my suitcase...

30kg!!!

80 maximum

On our way back from our week of vacation I had my first real encounter with Mexican police. I'm not sure what I've told you about Mexican policemen but it is definitely another thing...

Mexican policemen are corrupt. At least some of them. No matter how much some Mexicans keep telling it is not true. Let me tell you that last week, for example, one of my friends turned left with his car where it was not allowed (which in some cases you can't know because there are no signs or they are kind of "hidden"). She had to get out of the car, had to show her driving licens etc. Then the policemen told her that it was 200 pesos and because it wasn't really much she decided to pay. But when she wanted to, the policeman said: "Get into your car, get into your car." She didn't understand and said: "But I want my driving license back." "Get into your car, you'll get it back." Later he explained that it was in order to prevent that anybody would see him receiving money. Of course there are official fines which you have to pay at the police station. Although in most cases it es cheaper it is a lot of trouble. Therefore a lot of people "pay" the policemen. BTW, this is called mordida ("bite"), one of the words in the vocabulary test.

Now let me tell you how I got to know 2 Mexican police men:
When you are on your way back from your vacations and you have to travel more than 1000 km it can happen that you like to get home as fast as possible.
Therefore it can happen that, when the motorway is very good, has two lanes and your Jetta has 105 HP, you drive 150 km/h.
It also can happen that you do so despite the sign "80 maximum" (nobody respects the trafic signs in Mexico!).
Then it can happen that you overtake 5 cars.
It can happen that the first one is police... *oops*

First they didn't really care about my speed. I guess because their car was slower anyway. Unfortunately about 1 km further there was the toll station and a queue in front of it. The police passed and after the station they called me out... *f...*

Martin already hid part of our money, in case we had to pay we could tell them we didn't have that much. I stopped and got out.
- Where are you coming from?
- From Playa del Carmen.
- And where are you going?
- Back to Puebla.
- Where are you from?
- From Germany.
- Ah, from Germany. I'm not sure how it is in your country but here driving that fast is not allowed. Maximum speed on the motorway is 110 and that part only 80.
- Yes. *very guilty face*
- Can I see your driving license?
- Yes, of course. *I had him over a COPY of my driving license* (It's something you learn in Mexico: Never give them the original unless they insist on it because it can happen you didn't do anything wrong and they just want money for giving you the license back.)
- You know we can take away your car? Then you have to go back to Puebla by coach.
*Martin gets out of the car. I can see despair in his eyes.*
- So, did you rent the car in Puebla?
- Yes. Well, it's a Volkswagen car. We are interns there and they give a car to 4 interns each.
- You are interns? The girl (Ute), too?
- Yes.
- For how long are you here.
- I'm here for 4 months and a half.
- Me for 6 months and she as well.
- Aha. Your Spanish is quite good.
- Thanks.
- Well, please don't drive that fast any more. This is not your country. Like this you'll cause an accident.
- Ok.
*He gives me the copy of my driving license*
- Take care. *He shakes my hand*
- Good bye.
- Good bye.

To be honest, I have no idea how I got out of this without paying or any other punishment. It must have been a combination of the fact that we weren't just tourists, we weren't gringos and we understood and spoke quite a bit of Spanish. And definitely the two policemen must have had their best day of the year! I still can't imagine... Such a story, for so little. Just cost me some nerves.

Yucatan - V

As I already said, our next stop was in Cancún. I guess Cancún is for US Americans what Mallorca is for Germans. The difference is that Cancún was built around 30 years ago from scratch! There is the zona hotelera (area where all the big and expensive hotels are) next to the sea and... let's say the rest of the city. At least, there the hotels aren't that expensive. But there are tourists (gringos) all over the place and they try to fool you everywhere;-) For example we ordered a beer each of us in a pub and got tow each. My friend asked if at that day there were dos por una (two for one; sometimes they have those offers here) and they told us that yes. When we had to pay we had to find out that it wasn't true and there was nothing we could do about it. The next day we were looking for a relatively cheap restaurant. After asking some people in the street we found one. That is to say: the food was cheap. The drinks were not listed on the menu and we didn't think about asking how much they were. At the end, the two cokes I had were much more expensive than the meal *annoyed*.

As Cancún is a place crowded with tourists we went to Isla Mujeres (Women Island) which got it's name because the Spanish conquistadores found a temple with many statues of goddesses there. There is a more romantic explanation for the name but it is not true;-)

It is true that Isla Mujeres isn't that crowded with tourists but by no means it is a quiet place. Martin and I went snorkeling there which was very nice. The funny thing was that after we had paid and everything was almost ready on the boat they asked us if we could swim... And you will be surprised to hear that the majority of people there couldn't or couldn't swim very well in deed. They got their lifejacket and the promise that they would get extra attention...

You already know the less good news. Some of our things were stolen on that island.

Besides of that the beach is nice there...

Another "Wake up!"

Last weekend I went to Zacatlan. It's a nice small city about 3 hours by car from Puebla. On the pic you can see the nice view you have there. When we were at that place (where I took the picture), we asked ourselves if it wasn't possible to go down this valley. So we asked a woman in a shop who told us that it was possible and also told us the direction where we had to go. Because of our experience with Mexicans telling you where you have to go (see one of the previous posts), we also asked a policeman for the way. He told us that it was forbitten to go down there because it was so slippery.

Nonetheless, he went with us to the place where the path starts downwards. Additionally he went away and came back with to boys (about the age of 8) to guide us downwards for a coke each.

I guess that describes some more things in Mexico.

Wake up!

The other day, when I looked out of my window in the morning, I saw this:
You think that's the Mexican style of changing tyres? - No!
That's the Mexican style of stealing tyres over night.

To be honest I don't feel that save any more although they told us that we live in a quite save area. I guess "quite save" means "relatively save considering I'm in Mexico".

The "funny" thing is that usually it's not a problem to find your tyres or other parts of your car again. In most cases you can find them on a market in town (called Falluca) the other day. That means if you are quick enough before somebody else buys them. So what you can do is buying them back at that market. Proving someone that they stole them is almost impossible.

So I should say: Wake up! You are in Mexico!

Teotihuacan, City of Gods*

Last weekend I was in Teotihuacan, which is a place east of Mexico City.


You can find the most ancient pyramids of Mexico there and the whole place is very impressing. There are three main pyramids which are:

1. La Pirámide del Sol (Pyramid of the Sun)
2. La Pirámide de la Luna (Pyramid of the Moon)
3. La Pirámide de la Ciudadela (Pyramid of the Citadel)

The first has a hight of 63 metres. The second is about 40 metres high.

There are a number of smaller pyramids which all represent the planets. I found it very impressing that they know about our solar system already 300 BC (or a little later, around that year the constructions began).

The name Teotihuacan is of Aztec origin. The Teotihuacanas (name of the people that orignially lived in the city) lived already before the Aztecs but for a reason unknows they abandoned the city. Later the Aztecs found the city and believed it was the city of their gods. They also named the main street of the town "Avenue of the Dead" because they believed the small buildings along the street were the tombs of their former kings.

As you can see on the pictures the weather was very good and although I protected myself quite well from the sun, I ended with a little sunburn on a very strange place. The next day I had to wear my safety shoes which was painfull.

*There is no relation to the film "City of God" (Cidade de Deus) which I can recommend, however. People say it's similar in some parts of Mexico City.

Nicki, king of Momoxpan

Some explanations first:

• Momoxpan is the part of Cholula (city next to Puebla) where I live here.
• Nicki is a dog.

People here say that I belonged to a family but since this family bought a new dog, he is living in the street. I don't know if that's true but fact is that Nicki is everybody's dog in Momoxpan. Therefore he is also called "king of Momoxpan". It's quite a wonder he is still alive because, for example he drinks from puddles and that water isn't clean at all. My housemates once gave him a piece of really hot meat and Nicki didn't appear for some days so they thought he was dead but no... still alive. Now we bought some dog's food for him and also give him water but Nicki just can't get enough. The other day he stole a whole bag of sugar from our house. And some weeks ago he stole a bag of toast. This dog is incredible!

Besides of that he is very calm and I've never heard him barking. Strange dog! But he's cool!

You have to know that here in Mexico don't have to register a dog and nobody would think about paying taxes for a dog like in Germany. Therefore there are a lot of dogs just living in the street. And some even live on the motorway on our way to the Volkswagen plant. You can imagine some of them don't live very long. Almost every second day you can see a dead dog there. The road we use is called periferico but some also say "perroferico" (perro = dog). How good Nicki is living in Momoxpan...

How to say... (without words)?

Today let me introduce the "strange" world of Mexican gestures to you. In many situations gestures are used. Sometimes it's because you can't understand each other like in the disco or between two drivers. And sometimes I guess Mexicans are just to lazy to open their mouth.

To say "yes", you open and close your index finger while the rest of the hand is closed. I don't know how to describe this in a better way therefore I add some pictures.



If you want to say "no", you show the back of your index finger and move your hand from one side to the other while the rest of the fingers is closed.




To say "thank you", you make this gesture. It took me some time to get used to that. Before, I had known this gesture only from German drivers where it definitly doesn't mean "thanks";-)


You make this gesture in order to say "sorry". I guess it represents a person falling to their knees.





And this means "gay". It is used by Mexicans, for example, when they talk about Ronaldinho (this really happened in a bar in Papantla).




Special note to Mr. Ronaldinho's lawyer: I didn't say Ronaldinho is gay.

Transportation

When you drive on Mexican roads, you can see a lot of interesting and strange things...














People don't seem to care about safety too much. It's not only watermelons that are loaded on the back of a pick-up and hardly fixed. Often there are kids or women instead of the watermelons...

Note: I wrote "kids or women" on purpose. The roles of men and women is another interesting topic. Maybe I'll write about that next time.

Views

Have you ever heared about Popocatépetl? It is quite famous, I guess. It's the second highest mountain in Mexico (5452m), the second highest volcano in North America and what I see when I look out of my window (más o menos;-). It looks nice, doesn't it? But it's not that nice all the time. This volcano is still active and we sometimes can see smoke coming out of it. The last breakout was in 1996. Well, ten years ago... time for another one. I don't hope so!

Popocatépetl has a "twin" called Iztaccíhuatl (never mind the pronunciation, it's of Aztec origin, I have my problems with that, too) which you can see on the next picture on the right. Some of my colleagues have climbed it and I'd like to do that, too. I just have to do a bit of training! And even if you are well-trained, people say that you have a strong headache and hardly can breathe. By the way, it's not possible to climb Popocatépetl any more; except for those how have a special permission (journalists, scientists etc.).

Some people say that Iztaccíhuatl looks like a lying woman (make up your mind yourself). There also is an Aztec legend which says that Iztaccíhuatl was a princess once and Popocatépetl a soldier who were in love with each other. When Popo had to go to war, Izta killed herself. When Popo returned he found her dead but ever since then he watches over her. And when he is really sad and cries, smoke comes out of the volcano.

And that's me in front of them...