This blog used to be about living in Mexico City and travelling throughout Mexico, but I have now moved to the French Riviera, living in Nice and working in Monaco.....Can the simple life be found here?? I will try and find out....
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Shadow Shot Sunday 12 - The only place to be in Mexico right now...
More from masked-up Mexico City - Update
When they start driving they have to don the surgical gloves as well...
Here is my masked taxi driver taking me to my apartment this afternoon, looking somewhat sinister, but with his rosary swinging beneath the driver's mirror...
WHO has reported tonight that the spread of the disease seems to have now stabilised... let us hope so... but even if this is the case the economic ramifications and consequences of this, as tourists are cutting short their holidays and fleeing the country, will be felt for a long time to come here in Mexico...
In the meantime, Mexico City feels and looks like it has morphed into some weird Science Fiction movie or even worse a perverted porno film. In light of this, do you think this guy, spotted at the Maco Art Fair last weekend, had any awareness of how he was presenting himself???
Is he offering us DF residents some brand new form of sexual service that promises to be out-of this-world to entertain us during this crisis?? Or is he merely worried about his own health and contracting the deadly disease?? Whichever - the irony of his statement seemed totally lost on him!!
Will keep you posted on whatever happens next here in Mexico City.....
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Masked Mexico City morphs into Ghost Town...
The Mexican Government took swift action on Friday to impose severe precautionary measures to hopefully contain the further spread of the virus. All Public events have been cancelled, Government buildings and Offices closed, plus all schools shut down for the next ten days. Football games have been played behind closed doors in empty stadiums, Theatres and cinemas have stayed dark, and even Mass has been suspended after heated debate concerning the safety of taking the wafer during Communion.
The city's population, of some twenty million, has been advised to stay at home, avoid congregating in large crowds, refrain from greeting or touching people.... Mexico City is notoriously a place where people find it very difficult to follow rules, and are not usually law-abiding citizens! So how have we been faring faced with such draconian restrictions and shutdowns??
Well I have been out and about today, and the city truly has morphed eerily into a Ghost Town. I have never seen the streets so quiet, the traffic so absent, the hustle and bustle so strangely subdued...
Only a few lone shoppers braved the malls contributing to the feeling that Mexico City had indeed morphed into one of those weird Science Fiction movies...
Or trying their best to refrain from the "No kissing" rule on the benches along Reforma, a notorious location for cuddling and canoodling...
To find out what is happening today in other parts of the world, click here... for My World Tuesday posts... I hope they contain much better news...
Friday, April 24, 2009
Shadow Shot Sunday 11 : Antigua
Purple Robes at Play - The Lighter Side of Easter in Antigua...
You can still display your own extrovert personality and look cool and trendy in sunglasses and a purple robe...
And indeed, after the processions it is perfectly acceptable to get on with the ordinary things in life, which may involve making those all important phone calls on your mobile...
Reconnecting with your girlfriend.....
Even indulge in some canoodling in the public plaza....
In the plaza after the Processions, a more festive atmosphere reigns with everyone eating, drinking and chatting with family and friends...
Families are on the move, walking back along the cobbled streets after their duties have been performed in the Processions...
Many are on the move by motorbike, an increasingly popular form of transport in Antigua.....
Or by scooter...
But I think my favourite shot of all that best exemplifies this theme of the wonderfully human side to celebrating Easter in Antigua, Guatemala, is this shot of the clear devotion and love a parent has for his child - shown in this image of father and son....
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
A life in the day of an Antiguan alfombra...
Made of pine needles and fresh flowers, or coloured sawdust in intricate stencilled designs, they start to appear at 2 or 3am along the major route of an Easter Procession. Whole families are up and out beginning the process under spotlights, laying the foundations, crawling precariously on crawl boards so that the complex design is not compromised...
Complete concentration is focused on creating the most beautiful of flower carpets..
And the most stunning of sawdust carpets along the narrow cobbled streets....
Everyone gets involved - young and old, family and friends, tourists and locals....
Then, before the Processions arrive, the main task is to keep the flowers as fresh as possible with a constant spray of water from the family hosepipes.....
The odd dog or too has to be shooed away from spoiling the holy effort and pristine finished product...
As the monumental Processions draw near, the carpets are first blessed by numerous incense bearers who create an atmospheric haze of smoke swirling along the streets...
Local people following the Procession rush to gather what remains of the trampled flowers as they are now holy and blessed, and then it is time for the final stage...
And with astonishing and somewhat ruthless,clinical efficiency, rushes in a team of sweepers, who without further ado, brush up the remnants of pine needles and sawdust unceremoniously dumping them into the convenient dumpster - the final float in the Procession....
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Amazing Easter Processions in Antigua
It takes 100 men " Los cucuruchos" to carry a float this size, and they proceed along the Processional route with a coordinated hypnotic swaying movement - to literally keep it all afloat. Places are assigned by strict height measurement from ground to shoulder, and each bearer is given a "turn" and "shoulder" position on the platform issued on a postcard pinned to their purple robe.
Next come the women in black lace mantillas and stilettos stoically wielding the Virgin Mary aloft. The haze of the incense and passionate fervour is palpable in the strong, harsh sunlight...
The giant carved wooden figures of Christ carried on high in Guatemala are world renowned for the intensity of their Passion...
An intensity and religious fervour which is mirrored in the faces of the Procession leaders...
And of course the float bearers themselves...