desfile de alebrijes

mexico is just one big parade after another. last night there was another little protest parade through the main square, el zocalo, i don´t know what they were protesting about but i think i saw a flag that said no allianza, so i guess it´s something political again, obviously. today there was a parade of huge, weird, papier mache animals, followed by men on stilts, and the obligatory brass band. at one point it all had to disband as some fire engines had to get through. there is lots of dancing and drumming, and traditional costume wearing. i don´t know if it is always like this, or whether it is all to do with the run up to the day of the dead on 1st and 2nd november. either way, it´s lots of fun to watch.

today and last night i read lots of my tefl book and it was very interesting, all about language structure, and the ways in which people learn, and how there are now more non-native english language speakers, than native, around 2:1 ratio. it is therefore a big question exactly what type of english and to what level you should teach people, and it is getting to be more about teaching english as a lingua franca rather than up to native english speaking; nobody really owns english as such, and there are so many different varieties of it (australian, irish, american, singaporean, internet language, business english etc etc) that why should we expect that every english learner wants to learn the queen´s english. but there are counter arguments to all of this. i personally think if you are going to learn english (or any language) you would want to learn it to as high and in depth a level as possible otherwise you miss all the nuances and idiosyncracies that make a language what it is - it becomes just a referential communication tool. which is fine if that is all you want it to be, i suppose everyone will have a different requirement of it.

this morning i went for breakfast (not at the hostel where the coffee tastes like mud), and the man that made my coffee said i was beautiful (perhaps he had spilt coffee in his eyes). and then 4 policemen with guns and all stern looking, asked me how i was in english when i walked past, and said welcome to mexico so i said hola and waved at them (this is my standard response to things now). so that was a nice start to the day. and it was my favourite weather, a little bit cold and really blue sky and clear. i went to the palacio nacional, which has amazing murals by diego riviera, one of mexico´s most famous artists (another being frida kahlo). there were also lots of cute cats lying around sleeping. gatos dormiendo. from there i went to the square and watched the alebrijes (toy animal) parade, then tried to find a post office but couldn´t, so headed out on el metro to the museo nacional de antropologia. this is an incredible building, and has loads of very interesting artefacts and displays from way back in the past all about the history and culture of mexico and the aztecs and mayans etc. unfortunately i wasn´t in a museum mood so i didn´t learn too much, my feet were hurting and i was tired. but i stayed there for a respectable amount of time, then went for a pizza in the park nearby. i saw lots of mexican wrestling masks on stalls which made me laugh - jim i´ll send some over for your collection.

and now my night bus awaits me, what joy. i got up early so i would be tired for it, so hopefully it´ll be ok, plus it´s only around 10 hours this time, not 30.

adios x