Cats and sunsets

I know... I like to complain about air contamination, pollution, consumption, wastefulness... but Mexico City has its beauty, and here´s an example:



I took this Monday from my office. My desk is in the corner that´s cold in the morning and hot in the afternoon, but there are almost always spectacular sunsets and I can see them from right here. Maybe the best thing about photochemical smog.


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Gatita (kitten) and Baxter. Still haven´t named her. For the first day, Baxter was irritated, but didn´t attack, and now he´s warmed up. A bit jealous and standoffish still, but another week and they´ll be soulmates. (Baxter hasn´t forgotten you, Milo).

Trash turn-around

Mexico City's waste disposal system is a mess, but the city government has an ambitious plan to recycle, compost and burn for energy 85 percent of its trash. Today, it only reuses about 6 percent of its waste, according to an Associated Press article. Experts say if the city can pull through on its plan, it would rival waste management systems of the U.S. and Europe, and would be a much faster turn-around than elsewhere.

That would call for significant efforts on all fronts. With 12,500 tons of trash produced daily in the megalopolis, or 700 dump trucks per day, that's a lot of rubbish (Mexicans make 3.1 lbs. / 1.4 kilos of trash per day, while North Americans 4.4 lbs / 2.1 kilos).

The plan to build four state-of-the-art processing centers in the next four years is ambitious, but only one has been approved so far. The federal government ordered the city to shut down one of its landfills at overcapacity, and after several delays it is posed to stop operation this month.

The city required residents to begin sorting organic and inorganic waste some 6 years ago, but the infrastructure can't meet the laws. Most garbage trucks lack separate containments, and a lack of recycling facilities makes it hard to avoid mixing banana peels and toothbrushes. The city is also going to start imposing harsher fines for dumping trash on the streets.

In Mexico City, there simply isn't a system for dumping trash. Anyone can toss their rubbish on the street at night and it will be collected the next morning with no consequence. There's really no way to charge for trash disposal, and collectors get tips for picking up trash from wasteful businesses. Perhaps one way to pay for it would be to add "trash taxes" to electricity, water and gas bills and charge extra for packaged stuff. Or just stop collecting and let it pile up in front of people's houses.

People need to develop a recycling culture as well. Mexico City’s streets have separate containers for organic and inorganic trash – but you'd be lucky to even find one (lately I’ve noticed more, however). If not, most just toss their waste on the street and the people with the big brooms will clean it up before sunrise.

My mom has always been very conscious about recycling. We’ve been doing it since I can remember, and it just becomes a habit. She also started composting a few years ago, and I started doing that in earnest when I moved to my new apartment in December. In just a few weeks, my roommates and I have built up a surprising amount of orange peels, egg shells, broccoli stems and papaya skin. (Gotta get dirt and worms).

I also give credit to my workplace. You can’t find disposable plastic cups next to the water cooler anymore and they’ve invested in a bunch of fancy new mugs.

This all reminds me of the opening scenes in Wall-E, one of my favorite movies. Mountains of garbage, some of it stacked in neat cubes, others a heaping mountain, are as high as skyscrapers, and not a living thing remains.

What`s her name?

Baxter was bored and lonely, but not anymore. He has a new playmate. She has no name, but if you can come up with a good one, free drinks!

She`s a siamese-mix, playful, enjoys licking things and people and gives painful massages. The name must sound good along with Baxter. Like Dexter or Jaxter.

I wear Mexico on my hand

The other day I was crossing the street and tripped over a hole in the road. Asphalt, my hands and right elbow briefly kissed, and a few days later I noticed that the scrape on my right hand resembled the outline of Mexico City. Uncanny.

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All of last week was rainy, cold and overcast. This week it’s been the opposite, and on Wednesday, you could see the snow atop Iztaccihuatl (iz-tah-see-watt-ull; sleeping woman), a rare site from here. Regrettably, I didn’t take any photos of Mexico City from my office – every day except today has been exceptionally clear, no smog. Today is disgusting, but maybe it will be better in the afternoon.

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Preview: Bloggery topics for next week:

• We haven’t had any picture posts for a long, long time. I have a pile of Mexico City snaps I’ll post.
• They’re cutting water next week for 3-4 days…I’ll detail the despair and dehydration.
  
• A recipe for delicious chocolate shakes.
• My sporadic attempts at vegetarianism.
• A review of the new Metrobus line.
• Obama.
• And maybe a post from a special guest!

Welcome Mr. President

Barack Obama´s becoming the first African-American president didn’t fully sink in until yesterday. Watching the inauguration with my co-workers, including one other American, it was surreal and fantastic.

Just when the world was losing hope in the U.S. after eight years of recklessness and arrogance, we made a great leap forward by showing everybody how much we had advanced since the Civil Rights era.

Barely one year ago, I was in Mexico for the holidays, and I was staying at a hostel in Oaxaca when Iowa held its first primary – the official kick-off of election season. I woke up the next day and heard excited ruckus from other gringos –

“Did you hear Barack Obama won the Iowa primary?”

Someone asked me, “Who is Barack Obama?”

“He’s a black presidential candidate.”

I thought, how amazing it would be to elect the country’s first non-white president, but he probably won’t make it past Super Tuesday...

Now, a year later, our country and the rest of the world face huge problems, and Obama has Superman-like expectations. By electing him we’ve already regained some of the credibility we’ve lost, but let’s see what happens when our new president flexes his muscles and gets his hands dirty. I hope you can pull us through, Mr. Obama. I have a lot of confidence in you.

Monday market madness

One of the reasons I love Mexico:



What less than $15 buys you: top, left to right: cabbage, squash, papaya, pumpkin flowers, baby potatoes, beetroot, garlic, mushrooms. Bottom, left to right, 7 kilos of oranges, carrots, grapefruit. Cat not included.

The tianguis (tee-ON-geez -- open-air, temporary market) sets up a few blocks from my work Mondays and Tuesdays, and usually has lower prices than closed-air markets and supermarkets. My way of bargaining prices (bargaining is accepted at these types of markets) is to look hesitant and say, "pues...a ver..." (well...let´s see...) followed by a reluctant silence. It worked a few times yesterday, but nothing significant. I have to be more aggressive. Most fruits and veggies, however, seem to be not-in-peak-season. Right now you can get a kilo of Mandarin oranges for about 7 pesos (25 cents a pound!) but avocado and mango season -- my favorites -- aren´t until spring time.

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It rained yesterday, probably the first precipation in Mexico City since October. Although we´re entering prime pool season (hot and dry), the cracked lips, dry skin, clogged nasalways and stagnant air are here to stay for a while. Rain sort of cleans the air and gives it a creamy feeling. Today is shaping out to be the same -- refreshing!

Obama and Calderon: an urgent meeting

At this moment, U.S. President-elect Barack Obama and Mexican President Felipe Calderon are meeting in Mexico City. While this is the first time a president-elect has met with a Mexican president pre-inauguration day, I hope this meeting is more than just symbolic.

Mexico is quickly on its way to becoming a severely injured state – and a civil war breaking out isn’t difficult to imagine. Since Calderon took office in December 2006, more than 8,000 Mexicans have died as a result of drug violence, many innocents, most of those taking place in the north (in Ciudad Juarez, more than 1,600 were killed in 2008 alone), but the whole country seems to be infected, as drug traffickers, under pressure from increased military presence, fight for increasingly constricted trafficking routes to the U.S.

Just last week, a TV station in Monterrey was attacked with grenades, and Mexico’s interior secretary and head of the drug war (No. 2 man after the president) died in a plane crash (it may or may not have been an accident). Mexico is among the worst countries to be a journalist, after Iraq and Russia.

A report from the United States Joint Forces Command, which monitors other countries for possible, unexpected and sudden problems, recently released considers Mexico and Pakistan as states that are in risk of collapse if they don’t take immediate action.

“Such states, it says, usually pose chronic, long-term problems that can be managed over time,” the article says.

“But the little-studied phenomenon of "rapid collapse," according to the study, "usually comes as a surprise, has a rapid onset, and poses acute problems."

”Kidnappings have become a routine part of Mexican daily life. Common crime is widespread. Pervasive corruption has hollowed out the state,” the article says.

While Pakistan is more of a risk, the U.S. has a deeply vested interest in Mexico. It’s its third-largest trading partner after Canada and China and third-largest oil importer.

It’s a complex problem that spans across many levels – from corrupt top government officials to police officers to drug dealers, but the U.S. needs to take action, and not through military force.

One of the things that both sides of the border need to do is legalize marijuana, sell it, regulate it and tax it. That would remove pressure on the military, drug enforcement officials and police, reduce the number of innocent people killed, and allow officials to focus on more serious problems, saving millions of dollars.

Hopefully, Obama and Calderon’s meeting today is fruitful and launches what needs to be quick, efficient action. Mexico’s – and the US´ -- future depends on their cooperation.

The department of redundancy department

In Mexico, bureacracy prevails.

“On Thursday, the federal government awarded a prize for the "Trámite más inútil," or least useful bureaucratic procedure,” says The News.

With more than 20,000 submissions, the award went to a woman who said going to IMSS (public health care) is a pain in the neck.

“She makes countless trips to different IMSS representatives and regularly endures long delays just to get her son the special medication he requires,” the article says.Fittingly, the event began at 8:30 sharp and was over in an hour, as promised by officials, according to the story.

There are more than 4,200 trámites in Mexico, and President Felipe Calderon has promised to shave off about 1,200 by the time his term ends in 2012.

The contest was held in order for officials at federal, state and local levels to evaluate bureaucracy and cut red tape.

I’ve experienced my own share of run-around.

The other day Ahmed and I went to Cablevisión to upgrade cable service, add internet and cancel the credit card that I had lost and was on my cable account. Logic would say you could do it all at one window, but arriving, I first had to take a number, wait, then go to one window to cancel my credit card, go to a manager to contract the services, go to a different window to make the payment and give the receipt back to the manager.

By Mexican bureaucratic standards, that’s not that bad. After all, there were few people there so I didn’t wait long.

Last week, I went to a pharmacy to buy hydrogen peroxide. I ordered it from a woman behind the counter. She gave me a ticket with the price, which I took and then got in line. Ten minutes later, I gave the ticket to the cashier, paid for the peroxide and got a receipt. I then stood in another line for five minutes, handed the receipt to another woman and she finally gave me the peroxide. All of that for a tiny, 60-cent bottle of oxygenated water!Even more irritating are the banks. One friend told me that every time he deposits money at the bank to pay his light bill, he gets a “Pago por derecho de depósito” – a fee for the right to deposit money in the bank. Good grief!

Bread fit for kings

Mexico continued its holiday celebration Tuesday with Three Kings Day (Tres Reyes Magos). Think Santa Claus, times three, with gold, frankincense and myrrh. On January 5th, kids write a letter to the three kings asking for gifts and claiming their well good behavior throughout the year. If they’ve been good, they wake up to gifts on the 6th, and if not, a lump of coal.

Coming back from work Monday night I was baffled at the traffic and the amount of people on the streets. It took forty minutes to get home, twenty minutes more than normal. Later, though, walking past a toy store, with about fifty ambulante stands directly outside of it selling the same (pirated) things, I knew why.

On the 6th, Mexicans eat Rosca de Reyes – King´s Bread – a large, circular piece of sweet bread topped with pieces of dried fruit. Some have cream or cheese inside, and each person takes his or her turn cutting off a piece. Tiny plastic baby Jesus dolls are baked inside, and the person who finds one has to make or buy tamales and atole (a highly concentrated drink made of sugar and corn) for friends, family or co-workers on February 2, the day of the Candelería.

My office had rosca and hot chocolate and on my second piece I nearly bit a baby Jesus. I taped him on my computer monitor where he hungrily awaits tamales.

The bread is delicious, but extremely environmentally unfriendly. Each rosca is about two feet by one foot, and sold in large plastic or cardboard containers. I don’t know if there’s a way to avoid that unless you stop the tradition, since people and bakeries lack the willpower to save and re-use the containers, and making your own seems quite difficult.

But I shouldn’t criticize…I may just buy a rosca tonight since they’re half off.

H2-no

The National Water Commission (Conagua) announced today it would cut water supply to more than 5.5 million people in Mexico City and the state of Mexico three days each month from now until May, according to El Universal.

Conagua says the suspension is due to water reserve shortages, which are at 62 percent capacity when they should be at 85 percent capacity at this time of the year. Even though it’s dry season now, it hasn’t rained in an unusually long time …. I can’t remember the last time it did – maybe in October?

The only way reserves will get back to normal levels is if it rains.

Hmm…rings a bell. Maybe human sacrifice will solve the problem? Let’s summon Tlaloc, the Aztec rain god. I’m reading “Aztec” by Garry Jennings right now, and coincidentally just passed the part which details how there was famine and drought for the longest time, but the indigenous nations waged a peaceful war in order to capture enemies and sacrifice them to the gods, hoping for rain. It worked.

Seriously though, lacking water – even for a day – is one of the most frustrating things you can imagine, right behind long lines and banking bureaucracy. Three days doesn’t sound like much, but it becomes exaggeratedly long when you think about all the things you use water for – bathing, shaving, brushing your teeth, washing dishes, cooking. It’s time to start hoarding water, and perhaps sacrificing a few ambulantes, taxistas and delinquents.

These purposeful water suspensions reflect poor governing. Mexico City has grown exponentially in the past 60 years, with unprepared urban planning. I wouldn’t be opposed to paying more for water, but at the same time, people waste too much.

Mexico City alone wastes enough water to fill 20 Aztec Olympic Stadiums, and that’s only taking into account leaks and run-offs…imagine what people waste when they wash dishes, brush their teeth or “water” the sidewalks – a futile and common site here.

We’re in big trouble if we can’t manage and conserve our fresh water. Many experts say the next war won’t be for oil, but for water…and it’s looking more likely with shortages like this.

Good sites

This site warns you to keep an eye on your cat, who may be plotting to kill you.

For Radiohead and/or Jay-Z fans, here are remixes of both.

Credit card crisis

Happy new year!

Coming back from vacation in Veracruz and between bus, taxi and plane transfers, I lost my credit card yesterday, causing a few moments of panic and desperation. After revising my backpacks a few dozen times and searching for a possible magic pocket my card may have slipped into, I gave up hope and called the bank. Luckily, nobody had used the card, but I blocked it anyway. I have another day yet until it is unsuspended, but I’m going to cancel it. The good news: no more never-ending holes of debt. The bad news: no more plastic conveniences.