Fan mailI’ve spent a bit of time recently obsessing over the US Democrat primaries. There’s a big US expat community in Mexico City and I’ve watched some of the candidate debates with a group called Democrats Abroad in the American Legion bar in Condesa. In the process I have unexpectedly become a Bernie Sanders fan and wrote a piece for a Liberal Democrats blog explaining why he’s the best person to beat Trump, published last week. I’ve reproduced it below, or you can just read it at Lib Dem Voice here. It received a mixed reception! To see all the comments, go to the linked version. Why B ..read more

Donald Trump launched his election campaign by calling Mexicans rapists and murderers, promised to build a wall to keep them out, and is still at it, apparently considering shutting down the southern border (this is illegal but never mind) to keep coronavirus out. But I’ve recently found out that Trump is actually Mexican. Not literally, of course, but in his style of governing. Octavio Paz, poet and authority on the Mexican identity, wrote a famous essay showing how much Mexico’s rulers still owed to the Aztec model of centralised arbitrary rule. In the 19th century, Benito Juarez and ot ..read more

It’s easy (and fun) to go to another country and start judging, especially when certain things aren’t run quite how you expect them to be. I have to check myself sometimes. In my head, by comparison with the daily frustrations of Mexico City, the London Underground has become a perfect transport system I know deep down that this is not the case. So I thought I’d give a couple of examples of organisational dysfunction that can’t be blamed on Mexicans. Firstly, this week I went to watch the Democratic party debate at American Legion bar. The last one of these was not a success but mainly be ..read more

As the ball floated over my head for the eighth time in the game I remembered why I hate playing left-back. I turned, off-balance, and gave chase to the Mexican winger ten years younger than me. Half falling, I followed him into the penalty area, and as he reached the six-yard box I decided enough was enough. With a desperate lunge the younger man hit the floor – but somehow I got a toe on it and corner was given. Our American goalkeeper applauded what looked like a skilful tackle but what was actually just me giving up. I voluntarily substituted myself and lay down on the sidelines. This ..read more

I’ve been reading Susan Cain’s Quiet which is both a defence and celebration of introversion. I especially liked how it catalogues the ways introverts like me learn get by in an extrovert’s world. It made me think about why it’s so good to have an introverted personality when you’re a foreigner living in Mexico. So lonelyLearning to speak Spanish is a challenge for an introvert. On the first day of my CELTA English teaching course our tutor made the obvious but slightly crushing point that extroverts learn languages more quickly, being more disposed to dive in to achieve immersion in the ne ..read more

I spent 3 weeks travelling through the south of Mexico into the nearest parts of Central America. Here’s what I ate: Tapado soup from Livingston, GuatemalaNot just this! Oaxaca in the south is known for its rich cuisine. Mole negro is a chocolatey-nutty sauce that takes days to make and is considered a delicacy. It is often served with meat. I first tried this at the Teotihuacan ruins just outside Mexico City and gave up after two mouthfuls. Tepid, bitter, borderline nauseating. The version I tried in Oaxaca was as part of a gourment tamale (more on those later), this was more palatable. An ..read more

Most people go abroad to experience something different, so we´re disconcerted to find the distance of oceans changing very little. Teaching corporate English in Mexico particularly highlights this. I´ve been surprised to find that corporate culture has given certain workplace practices and ideas a global freedom of movement most workers can only dream of. In a pharmaceutical company lesson I instigated a discussion on what to do when you don’t know the answer to the something. Students generally agreed that it’s never a good idea to admit total ignorance and that one should smooth over th ..read more

So many peopleAs a teenager on a French volunteer camp one summer I befriended an American named Andrew. He impressed me with a story of how as a member of the Arizona state college cross-country team he would rise daily before 5am to jog across the desert. This inspired me to do the same after a summer of inactivity and self-abuse in which tennis with friends used to mean a beer at the bar even before the allotted hour had run out. The sweaty choking fiasco which inevitably followed my attempt to recreate Andrew’s heroics will be familiar to most people who’ve tried to get back in shape. Than ..read more

In a feature I definitely didn’t steal from a popular Channel 4 sitcom here are my reflections on what the Aztec civilisation has to teach the modern businessperson. The 1512 AGM of Aztec PLC , as depicted by Diego Rivera1. There’s no I in team (but there are two in sacrifice) The Aztecs recognised that sometimes individual sacrifice is essential for the healthy functioning of the unit. In their case this was of course literally, in the many people whose hearts were ripped out by high priests in honour of the sun god Tonatiuh. In your case this might be to make a few staff redundant at the ..read more

If you don’t know the story of the Spanish Conquest of Mexico you should look it up now, as it’s one of the most exciting, significant and tragic events in human history. This month was the 500th anniversary of the first meeting between lead conquistador Hernan Cortes and Moctezuma, emperor of the Aztec empire. It led to a violent conflict in which a small Spanish invading force, helped by its exploitation of local rivalries and the inadvertent introduction of smallpox, dominated the indigenous millions and created New Spain. As I say, look it up. Aztec room at the National Anthropology Mus ..read more