Translated from the Original on Eldefe.com by Isaac Vazquez. Photos are by the author. Click any photo to enlarge. This is the second post in the series. The first appears here.

In the first post we went through some of the main roads coming from the west to the Lomas Verdes exit and, since this seems to be where the middle-class suburban world ends, I figured we would pick it up again here.  Suburbia gives way to a wooded area, another wooded area stuck amongst more neighborhoods and ultimately the posh residential mountaintops of some of “the best places to live in Mexico City.” Moving on.

The First View

There’s no question that proximity to the city was important to this rural corner. Just a few miles south of Lomas Verdes absolutely everything turns to eucalyptus, villages and farmlands. The highway passes through more and more hills on its way to the Huixquilucan exit and the  Otomi Ceremonial Center.

The Second View on the Same Highway

Without warning an warning at all, BLAM! you are back in the cinematography of the city. Naucalpan’s gray neighborhoods rise up in waves from the Periferico, and one can not pass either the highway or the green expanses of the golf courses. The expensive apartment buildings look like little houses from above but from here they are grand. I’ve even heard that the developers had some of the little houses painted grayish-white so as not to ruin the view from the newer taller buildings. I don’t know if it’s true, but as I said, it is something I heard.

Vista 2.2

The passes through the gray mountains give way to the greenest of golf courses at Bosques Real where the avenues are lined with palm trees and the grass is always watered (with Evian water, I presume). And on a clear day you can see as far as the snow capped volcanoes to the east, the smog of the city barely interfere with the purity of the air because of the height of the area. Perhaps residents’ contempt for the rest of the city is more visible than the smog.

The Third Vision of the City

Bosque Real is among the newest of residential developments and it still looks a bit empty, with several towers still under construction. The avenues here have roundabouts with sculptures by Sebastián (so beloved by the elites). And around the riding club, everything is ordered to give the impression that old money didn’t just end up here, but was achieved here. Disconnected from its surroundings and from the highway on which it depends, Bosque Real declares that its own alienation is its exclusivity.

Bosque Real on Periferico, photographed from the Lecheria Highway

Just a little further south of Bosque Real is the exit for Interlomas, another bastion of traditional family values.  There is already an excellent article here on Interlomas, so we’ll just stop just to admire these two architectural monstrosities a few miles before Santa Fe …

Monstrous ArtNaco or a celebration of "Diversity" ?

At their best, this pair could be called “eclectic.” This mix of architectural elements is a sort of essential reference to what NOT to do if you want to appear in good taste. In several urban forums I’ ve actually seen rather heated discussions as to whether it is worth proclaiming them as masterpieces of  “ArtNaco” or celebrating the diversity of the truly ugly.

Finally, we continue south …

Continuing South on the Lecheria Highway

… and that’s it. This urban highway is in a wooded part of La Venta. The options here are to continue to La Marquesa and Toluca (we’ve made already some recommendations on that route) or you can continue on to the hostility of Santa Fe.  Hoping you will go for a ride on the highway, it’s comfortable, fast, expensive and it’s a swift tour which (to my taste) is the most interesting side of wonderful Mexico City.

Entering the highway at Bosques del Lago, possibly the worst onramp on the highway. Despite the proximity to the Tech de Monterrey and the nice homes in the Bosques, the area is rather ugly.

Translated from the Original on Eldefe.com by Isaac Vazquez. Photos are by the author. Click any photo to enlarge.

Picture this: a mountainous area dotted with trees and fields. In the distance, the gleam of a lake hidden between hills, and further afield, some houses on top of the next hill still further away.  To the east is a huge city laid out in an enormous valley. And if are lucky, far off in the distance, on a clear day you’ll catch a glimpse of a couple of gentle volcanoes. Idyllic landscape?

Now imagine that all of this passes by your window at 120 miles per hour. Beside you the lights of tractor trailers lights stream and other – even faster cars – pass you by in the high lane. This postal landscape changes dramatically to big neighborhoods – houses that appear to be gray cinderblock climbing the slopes. Against the distance, the lake is no longer the only thing flashing. Now you see the bright shopping mall lights and the windows of skyscrapers. Suddenly, everything becomes wooded and provincial. Traffic only takes you to the edge of  Mexico City: Welcome to the Autopista Lechería-La Venta at the extreme west end of our city.

With 4 big lanes and hyper-inflated tolls, the highway runs from Cuautitlan-Izcalli up near Santa Fe, and connects the Mexico-Queretaro and Mexico-Toluca highways. Literally cutting through the mountains, this highway exemplifies some aspects of the landscape through which it charges: brutality alongside Interlomas’s opulence, poverty in some of the neighborhoods surrounding the heights and the claims of Atizapán and suburban Lomas Verdes. And one should not forget the post-card like views from the mountains that the Edomx government likes to boast about.

Atizapán from the highway. Mile after mile of gray cinderblock homes give way, in the south to some more middle-class color.

For Chilangos who’ve never been there or who’ve never bothered to admire the landscape, I present first a set of photos: from the entrance at Bosques de las Lomas to the Lomas Verdes offramp. As one simply cannot ride public transportation here, it is understandable that this corner is not well known in the city, and although this road is far from inexpensive, on a clear day, the view alone makes the ride worth it.

Galleries Atizapán. The Emerald Zone on the other side of the highway, with its incredibly green golf courses, like the meadows of Condado Saayavedra, home to very pretty girls (so they say).

Presa Madin from the Madina Bridge. I don't know how people can sleep living next to this dam, especially in rainy season.

The newly built Lomas Verdes exit. Before this exit was completed one had to fight the deadly curves of the avenue that runs along the Madina Dam. If one takes this exit one arrives in just a few moments to ... another shopping mall.

My next entry will cover the next leg of our journey, from Lomas Verdes to Santa Fe!

Paloma Negra, Benito Juarez, Chimulhuacan, EdoMex (Street View)

“The city is the most environmentally benign form of human settlement. Each city dweller consumes less land, less energy, less water, and produces less pollution than his counterpart in settlements of lower densities.”

-Peter Cathorpe, quoted in Prospect Magazine

In one of my past lives I was hawking supposedly environmentally friendly office-building style condos near the coast of Nayarit. Even then I thought to myself, “That thing is about as green as a Hummer with a dandelion decal on the bumper.” They sold, though I’m not sure any of them ever got built.

Not surprisingly in that line of work, there was infrequent reference to “the slums of Mexico City.” Foreign buyers are always re-assured that most of Mexico is safe, you just have to avoid the drug war and the “Slums of Mexico City.” Having lived in Mexico City now 5 years, I can assure you that “slums” are few and far between.  The article I’m looking at today defines slums thusly: “the conurbations made up of people who do not legally occupy the land they live on.”

In Mexico City, that would be a big part of Chalco, where the worst part of the flooding took place over the past several weeks. Then there are remaining strips of the poorest places in the city. These have been, over the last several decades, largely built up to the point where they are but underdeveloped, usually narrow zones, subsumed as it were into the larger urban mass. Rafael made reference the other day to pigs and chickens on the roof in Neza, but I think his whole point was that today’s Neza is not like it used to be.

Chalco is far to the south east of the city. But within the city, you can encounter the poorest of the poor neighborhoods in a very few places in Iztapalapa, Atlampa in Delegación Cuauhtemóc and a few other places. If anything they seem now like just busted streets where the houses are thrown together mostly out of refuse. They don’t go on for acre after acre. But this line from the Prospect Article really caught my eye.

Alleyways in squatter cities, for example, are a dense interplay of retail and services—one-chair barbershops and three-seat bars interspersed with the clothes racks and fruit tables.

That sounds more and more like all the places in Mexico City that I am most fond of. And here it turns out, is another reason my fondness is justified. Also from Propsect:

• Squatter cities are also unexpectedly green. They have maximum density—1m people per square mile in some areas of Mumbai—and have minimum energy and material use. People get around by foot, bicycle, rickshaw, or the universal shared taxi.

• Urban density allows half of humanity to live on 2.8 per cent of the land.

• “Cities are so much more successful in promoting new forms of income generation, and it is so much cheaper to provide services in urban areas, that some experts have actually suggested that the only realistic poverty reduction strategy is to get as many people as possible to move to the city.”- The Challenge of Slums, a 2003 UN-Habitat report quoted in the Prospect Article

• Consider just the infrastructure efficiencies. According to a 2004 UN report: “The concentration of population and enterprises in urban areas greatly reduces the unit cost of piped water, sewers, drains, roads, electricity, garbage collection, transport, health care, and schools.” In the developed world, cities are green because they cut energy use; in the developing world, their greenness lies in how they take the pressure off rural waste.

So, folks can have those office-building-looking condos on the coast. They can’t match the sustainability of living closer to other people. Score one more for the densely populated city.

On Guelatao going into Nezahualcóyotl

Rafael Zafra is studying English language writing with the ExpEnglish Blogging Program. A student in International Relations at UNAM in Mexico City, his posts in Spanish are published on eldefe.com.

Nezahualcóyotl or ‘’Neza’’ in its short form is a municipality of Estado de México in Mexico City where people are known for their ‘’unsophisticated attitudes.’’

They proudly write Nezahualcoyotl on their Taxis

This little city borders the east side of Mexico City.  Honestly, I rarely talk about myself in Nezahualcóyotl with my friends or other people because I always feel they would deduce that I have some kind of bad manners or maybe I am some kind of uncivilized person if I go there. It’s a prejudice that I’ve just learned or picked up while growing up in this city.

When I mention Neza I can easily say many words related to it that I am sure other people would immediately understand. Words like “naco,” poverty, gangs, ugliness, rudeness, over-populated, unsophisticated, uncivilized, guns, horses in the middle of the street, pigs and chickens on the roofs, overgrown houses, lots of markets and no green areas. Some of them are true, some of them are false.

The truth is that my life is closer to Neza even today than anyone could imagine. I have always felt that I would hear at least some of the adjectives I mentioned above if I said something about me and Neza and that is why I hardly talk about it. I could talk about myself and my academic background at UNAM. Or about me and my family from Puebla but I would never say Neza is where I first lived when I came to Mexico City. It’s where I started my elementary school when I was 6 years old. Then me and my family moved to Iztapalapa but I still studied there.

Since then I can remember some places that have made me happy, although Neza has changed over the years and many places have disappeared since I left it. I could still easily find places and walk through its streets. It is not the place where I have established my relationships or my life so I may not have a real description of it, but its places have formed part of me.

The Hungry Coyote at the center of Nezahualcoyotl.

When I was a child I was taught at school that Nezahualcoyotl means ‘’hungry coyote’’ which I always related to its people in that they have got some sort of energy that has made them different and even special and formidable. Most of its people are hard workers living under difficult circumstances and who have`t had time to study. So, many of them are vendors and sellers and dealers in whatever, all of whom have built their own businesses. And that is why I don`t agree with those who say it is a poor part of the city. Certainly Neza has grown fast, strong and even wealthy.

The New Ciudad Jardín Bicentenario

The interesting thing about this little city inside the city is that it was built in the 1960’s after a lake started to dry up. It was what remained of the giant lake that covered what had been Mexico City. In spite of its growth (or because of it), Neza has been built without good urban infrastructure. That may be the reason it can look like is not a really beautiful place to live, but the truth is that its beauty remains in its energy and its people.

Interior Plaza Jardín, Nezahuacóyotl, from the opening story on eldfe.com

Unfortunately the danger still there, alongside all those big markets that cover whole kilometers and that clog avenues on a specific day of the week all around Neza. A specific day is set such that those big serpents of stands visit every part of the city and there you can find whatever you want. I remember my brother looking for a gun with the people he got along with and all of whom worked right there. There are usually many young people working there especially selling good clothes for reasonable prices. In that way the market become a place to hang out. Beer is actually sold on the street so going to those markets called ‘’tianguis’’ can be really fun.

A new really interesting project has been built where there used to be a giant garbage dumb with about 10 million of tons of trash. All the garbage from Mexico city used to be poured here in this despised part of my city.

The photos above are taken in places that used to look like this!

The government and some of the richest business men like Carlos Slim have built this new complex. Actually I did not even know they knew this part of the city exists.

Anyway, in this new project, called Ciudad Jardin, people can find those expensive stores that used to be far away from Neza, along with blocks of luxurious and expensive apartments and government buildings. I find that a little bit ridiculous because people always will prefer to buy their goods in their precious and crowded ‘’ tianguis’’ and they will always find there what they will never find in those expensive and boring stores. I guess they will prefer to build themselves their really big and shapeless houses with a couple of dogs living on the roof to living in spaces that could not be adapted.

Neza has secretly made me happy. Certainly I will never be able to talk about Neza without embarrassment but I will never forget that it is where I first got drunk when I thought that an ugly and unsafe night club was the funniest thing in the world, when I thought Polanco, Roma, Fuente de Diana or Valle de Bravo were simply the names of the streets near my school and not really luxury places in Mexico City. It is where I first kissed a girl and where I happily had my first real friends.

Definitely, I will never be able to hide the Neza part of myself.

San Jerónimo Acuzulco greets the winter sky in Estado de México

This is a little beyond what Isaac wrote in his own article on the same trip. His photos are better than mine, but I’ve gone into a bit more detail for the English language audience.

Mexico City is always an adventure. But as more and more businesses have moved into the far west of the city – the sprawling Santa Fe district – travelers whether on business or pleasure – have found themselves isolated in the surreal skyscraper district far from the city’s world famous charm and hundreds of bustling neighborhoods. Getting beyond Santa Fe and the National Park to the west is a quick trip into a magical countryside. It’s a countryside for which Mexico should be famous.

Santa Fe

Santa Fe is notorious among Mexico City residents for the traffic snarls that torture and belittle drivers and for the skyscrapers – dozens of which lend a futuristic tone to the entire area. There is only one real bottlenecked traffic interchange that connects Santa Fe to the greater city of Mexico and all of its history and charm. In contrast, Santa Fe is glistening, new – and alienating.

But nearby are some of the truly magical valleys and country places that make local and low-budget tourism in Mexico such a treasure to those in the know.

It is very possible to drive and to stop and to know exactly what to expect – and one shouldn’t be hindered by worries about approved tourist destinations and hyped up stories of violence. The truth is that some of the finest spots for an afternoon lunch or a breath taking view are just moments away – almost anywhere in the country in Mexico.

La Marquesa National Park

Long term residents of the Santa Fe area will point you toward La Marquesa for your weekend outing. La Marquesa is an enormous National Park – one that could truly take a lifetime to appreciate and it is but a few moments drive to the west of Santa Fe’s westernmost border on the Free Toluca Highway. It is truly a magnificent collection of valleys settled high among the peaks of the mountains – in winter time many of them will be snow-covered. Snow is – of course – exceptionally rare in most of Central Mexico.

National Parks in Mexico are frequently flanked by all manner of small businesses catering to visitors – and La Marquesa is no exception. Perfect for hiking and biking in the forest, most foreign guests are a bit turned off by the plenitude of horseback riding, go-kart tracks, quad and ATV rentals and all manner of “Areas Recreativos” and these few types of places simply repeat themselves throughout the roads leading into and around the park. While anyone can use a good day in the country, and many of the food vendors can not be beaten, a drive beyond La Marquesa is something to remember forever.

Both the Free Highway and the Toll Highway connect Mexico City with Toluca – a fast growing industrial giant to the West. And the mountains of La Marquesa itself form a perfect barrier between.

The remarkable collection of yet to be discovered villages and pueblos are but minutes from the park as you begin the long slope that leads down to Toluca itself in the basin of its own adjoining valley. Simply follow signs in the park for the two municipalities to the south, Ocoyoacac and Capulhuac. Both are largely rural and agricultural – and in Mexico that means the valleys are swept from side to side by immense golden plains of grain painted right up to the stands of enormous pines. Navigation is not difficult from any point here as you can always turn around and follow the well-marked roads back to La Marquesa.

The Church in San Miguel Almaya

Between La Marquesa and Toluca

Among the pueblos to visit, San Miguel Almaya clings to the knees of its own cragged mountain. Like every town laid out by the Spanish, San Miguel is centered around a tiny church, zocalo (or public square) and an administrative office building. This makes it incredibly easy to visit almost every town in Mexico – there’s always a public square in the middle – just look for the church. And San Miguel Almaya, though hardly a tourist mecca, offers the same unique feeling, coffee and a place to grab lunch right off the zocalo.

Just across the valley is tiny Coamilpa offering tremendous views not just of San Miguel Almaya but of the vast Toluca Valley, and of Toluca itself. The lakes on the city’s western edge look much bigger than they actually are – and of course – they punctuate what is already a dramatic vista.

Winter view from Coamilpa of the Valley of Toluca

Continue your drive down the slope into the valley and you’re already in the western suburbs of Toluca.

The church in Coamilpa

Capulhuac de Miramontes already starts to feel like a hard-scrabble industrial suburb – but a trip to the 17th century cathedral – San Bartolomé Capulhuac – in the middle is rewarded by the thriving public market next door where anxious sellers pile your tacos higher and higher. But the town specializes in Barbacoa – Mexican Lamb served in giant banana leaves – which should be sampled in and around the central market. The cathedral and Zocalo area is surrounded by hundred year old administrative buildings and the town boasts several other very old and attractive churches and a bull ring. And the magnificent baroque convent – Molino de San Cayetano – is simply not to be missed. Baroque architecture is complemented by nearly an overgrowth of vegetation – simply a glimpse at the town’s rich historical legacy.

The center in San Jerónimo Acazulco

Leaving  Capulhuac de Miramontes travelling north along the “Acueducto” – really but a two lane roadway – it is difficult not to feel you’re merely on another business trip to Toluca. But almost any quick right turn will plunge you right back into the country side. But stick to the Acueducto until you can right turn onto the Ocoyoacac – Chimaltecalt road that leads straight into the beautiful pueblo of Ocoyoacac. The Cathedral is easy to spot and reach from the main road and the main road continues another 3 miles to San Jerónimo Acazulco.

Both of these are striking pueblos of the best Mexican flavor. San Jerónimo in particular offers an ancient cathedral propped up amidst a tangled web of crooked stone streets. They’re so narrow you can sample – at least by scent – all the foods being prepared for sale on weekends in the high tourist season. In the off’season – and this is not a heavily touristed area – the streets offer both mystery and an enticing area to explore. The atmosphere is baroque, almost medieval, and the mountains offer a cooling, isolated backdrop something like the famous San Cristobal de las Casas in Chiapas.

Also unique and worth a visit are the pueblos of:

• Xalatlaco and Santiago Tilapa to the south
• Santiago Tianguistenco – famous for its boxers – just south of Capulhuac and with a marvelous municipal palace and cathedral
• Between Capulhuac de Miramontes and Ocoyocac is tiny San Nicolas Tlazala with a wonderful chapel, Capilla de San Nicolas Tolentino
• San Pedro Atlapulco, just outside of La Marquesa, and at the highest elevation of any of the pueblos in the Valley of Toluca – it also has the best documented pre-hispanic history.
• Much further to the south – about one hours drive, a pueblo truly famous for its pyramid, Malinalco is almost the only other true tourist destination in the region.

Between La Marquesa and Malinalco to the south and Toluca to the west there are at least a dozen other pueblos that the true die-hard pueblo visitor will enjoy. You can follow a complete map of the places in the Toluca Valley covered for this article here.

Each one boasts a zocalo and a church – but each is unique in terms of atmosphere, landscape and personality. Estado de Mexico – which surrounds Mexico City on 3 sides – is usually considered a vast suburban wasteland. In Mexico that means over-development, no public spaces much less any zocalo, and no walkable streets. But Estado de Mexico is an immense place – and the striking landscape that seems to cut the city off in the west also zig-zags westward to the state capital, Toluca, and the valleys that surround it. An afternoon driving from town to town rewards more than just the senses – though the senses will very much appreciate it. Mexico’s countryside, and tiny country pueblos and villages – reaffirms the spirit too.

Stunning San Jerónimo Acazulco, Estado de México

San Miguel Almaya

Translated from Isaac Vasquez‘s original at eldefe.com.

January 11 of 2010 was marked on my calendar with a red pen: the return to classes, the end of the idle and disorderly life that I’ve been maintaining since mid-December. In order to sing Las Golondrinas “The Wanderers” – appropriately in this vacation season  (and to take a stand against the cold, which is lately the subject of the national conversation) I decided that it was a good moment to go to La Marquesa and to breathe the frozen rustic air.

My original plan was to return to my favorite valley in  the park (el Valle del Conejo – the Valley of the Rabbit), a deficiency at driving directions caused your servant and another collaborator from Eldefe.com an enormous error in turns ended up paying off in a little-known zone of Estado de México. Crossing mountains into the Valley of Toluca – through colorful forests, wagon towns and not at all well travelled valleys of La Marquesa, the highway towards San Pedro Atlapulco crossed ample yellow fields under an almost-summery sun, everything idyllic in tone.

Toluca in the distance from the tiny hamlet of Coamilpa

By mere whim, and the skillful management of a few bends in the road, we arrived at San Miguel Almaya, a small town in the skirts of what we suppose was a volcanic cone – today but a small mountain covered with pines. And although the villagers seemed a bit suspicious we continued towards Coamilpa, a small village with more or less seven streets and in which two friendly children with a red ball approached to see us while we enjoyed an enviable view towards Toluca from the village basketball court.

Returning to the highway, we arrived to Capulhuac de Mirafuentes, a town rather greater than it seems at first and bearing a remarkable similarity with Cuautitlán, perhaps the reason I felt rather at home. After a fast visit to the zocalo and the Oxxo and the central market  we continued on towards Ocoyoacac, passing on the way through San Nicholas Tlazala.

Capulhuac de Mirafuentes

We didn’t pause in either town but we made up for it in wonderful San Jerónimo Acazulco. It could be described as Pueblo Magico waiting to be discovered – very small, nailed to the top of its little mountain, with narrow crooked street, adorned with hanging colored papers. A church at the very top of the town and the highest tree mangled… in short, bringing together the finest qualities for the towns tiny size. The cold bit in deeper from the mountains and so we asked how to return to La Marquesa and defied a curvaceous mountain route with breathtaking views until we were again in the park. Only a few minutes later the shining Towers of Santa Fe disregarded us: such is the greeting for those who arrive in Mexico City from Toluca.

San Jerónimo Acazulco

It is curious to thing that between these two enormous cities there exists this constellation of pueblos and villages, each with its own particular enchantments whether it be a church or a view of the lake or the forest. Passing into Mexico City, each vibrates totally differently. This region of Estado de México feels like it’s left its problems hanging in the toll booth back on the highway and that it’s given in completely to the pleasures of the countryside.

Alas – it was cold as hell and the holidays have passed and the routine of normal life rebounds. But if you find the stress and anxiety of city living oppressive – a little weekend trip can do wonders. Don’t hesitate to explore – this one of the least well known place  in going into in the strangers place in Estado de México – exactly between Toluca and our fair city: a trip that can be made in a single day, nothing far but highly rewarding.

Scroll down for a map of the route and the locations of the places mentioned in this entry.

The Zocalo in San Jerónimo Acazulco

Please give us a sec while the valle de toluca map is loading up.

Random street in Gustavo A Madero; One of the things Street View was made for.

I am just polishing up the last touches on the Mapa de Colonias of Mexico City’s northernmost delegation, Gustavo A.  Madero, here.

And making the map ended up being just one of the pleasures of getting to know your city that much better!

Gustavo A. Madero is our first new neighborhood map since the launch of Mexico City Street View early last month and it totally enriched the experience as the photo at left will attest.

The image below shows how the image first appeared right on the edge of colonias Residencial la Escalera and San José Ticomán. Of course, we asked, “What exactly is a plane doing in the middle of urban hell?”

WTF ? San José Ticomán

Click here to see the actual Street View image and then try “driving” or even flying on the map to the airport, just south, though bordering in Venustiano Carranza. The distance is a good 11 kilometers flying straight – which is impossible as this is some dense urban jungle.

The mystery was solved by a user-photo. Of course, it’s the Politicnico’s Aerospace and Engineering school, ESIME Ticomán.

I covered, already, the far northen mountainous reaches of Gustavo A Madero in a post about Cuautepec, a few weeks ago. And thank goodness I did. Those were the truly difficult neighborhoods – as difficult to map as they are to walk!

And that partly explains why Madereños ( a word I think I made up) will generally tell you they live in either Cuautepec, Lindavista, or Aragón – nobody knows the other places.

Until now.

Of the 176 colonias in the Mapa de Colonias de Gustavo A. Madero,

• 

  Reaching for the Future! Monumento Solidaridad Nacional in the Neighborhood of the same name.

  6 are Barrios.

• 2 are Pueblos.
• 14 have Aragón in their names: Pueblo San Juan de Aragón, col. San Juan de Aragon, plus secciones 1-5, 7 & 8, Villa de Aragón, Ex-Ejido de San Juan de Aragón Sectors 32 & 33, CTM Aragón, and Campestre Aragón.
  
• The 6th Section of San Juan de Aragón is the Zoo which brings the total to 15 if we are going to include animal neighborhoods! If any of the human residents care to protest we can certainly add it.
• There are 20 postal codes for the delegation, with the word Aragon in their names.
• Alamos Aragon, Aldeas de Aragon, Aragon de las Fuentes, Arboledas de Aragon, Campiña de Aragon, Castillos de Aragon, Croc Aragon, El Renacimiento de Aragon, Hacienda de Aragon, Jardines de Aragon, Nueva Aragon, Nuevo Valle de Aragon,  Ampliacion Parques de Aragon, Paseos de Aragon, Rinconada de Aragon, Valle de Aragon, Valle de Aragon 2, Valle de Aragon 2a Secc, Valle de Aragon 3a Secc, Valle de Aragon Ctm Xiv, and Valle de Aragon Norte are all in neighboring Ecatepec de Morelos
• While Bosques de Aragon, Exhacienda Santa Ana Aragon, Joyas de Aragon, Plazas de Aragon, Prados de Aragon, and another Valle de Aragon are all in nearby Nezahualcoyotl.
• 7 neighborhoods have Lindavista as part of their name and none is simply known as Lindavista.
• There is no record of any “view” from Lindavista – pretty or otherwise. (ha ha)
• Only 2 neighborhoods share the name Cuautepec though the entire northern 3rd is sometimes referred to generically this way – see the previous post for more on Cuautepec.

Solidaridad Nacional

Below are a few more highlights of our journey through Gustavo A Madero:

The ultra-scary Monumento to Solidaridad Nacional (pictured Street View above right) – might not be so scary if it wasn’t practically unknown and hidden away in this forlorn corner of the neighborhood of the same name (yellow) that borders on Tlalnepantla and the Zona Escolar (blue). I covered a little bit more in this post last week, but since it is such a thrill – here it is again (click either image to enlarge).

Next, how else can you make an industrial park look this good ?

Parque Industrial Petan never looked so good.

It’s positively shimmering in the sunlight that falls down upon Nueva Industrial Vallejo!

The Street View is here. Obviously I could spend a lot of time on these big industrial areas.

But I have to move onto the other stuff that I always obsess over.

Namely – enormous transit hubs:

It's not the spot of glowing extraterresestrial pre-Columbian messengers.

To many Chilangos, Gustavo A Madero is synomous with Indios Verdes. It’s a big beautiful transit hub and traffic snarl.

It’s also a good argument for why I sometimes need to cool down on my glowing admiration for all things Chilango.

For years I assumed I just didn’t know the legendary tale of the two glowing Indians who emerged from the northern shores of Lake Texcoco and taught the Aztecs some divine and possibly otherworldly secrets about corn and floating island farming or something. One more thing I simply made up. When I asked people, “What is the story with the Green Indians?” most of them just looked at me like I was crazy.

No one ever explained to me that it’s just called Indios Verdes cause the bronze statues turned green from oxidation. Admittedly they have been around since 1889, so I guess that is respectable. You can see the Indios Verdes here in their original location at Paseo de la Reforma at the turn of the previous century,  or below in their present location at the corner of the Insurgentes lateral and Prolongación Misterios in Parque Gustavo A. Madero (since 2005) -  from the Street View shot which is here. That puts the Indios in Santa Isabela Tola while the Metro is across (a lot of) Insurgentes to the north in Residencial Ticomán.

Sometimes Green is just Green; Indios Verdes

Finally, what to do with invading Mexiquenses?

Lomas de San Juan Ixhuatepec 2nd Section

The snap above was produced after poring over the official sources. See any problem? That’s right, Lomas de San Juan Ixhuatepec in Tlalnepantla is literally spilling over the border – too fast for the sources I am checking to keep up. They’re still calling the place Area de Geoestadistica Básica # 161-062.

So unofficially, our map of colonias of delegation Gustavo A. Madero includes Lomas de San Juan Ixhuatepec, 2nd Section. The green section on our map may just be among the newest little neighborhoods in Mexico City!

It’s like watching the miracle of childbirth – except it’s a neighborhood.

The San Augustino Ex-Convento from the Tulancingo Expressway, (Click image for the original)

If you’ve browsed through the Mexico City Museum Guide that we’re still in the process of assembling – one thing that becomes occasionally obvious is that I’m driven crazy by too much Flash in museum (any) websites.

The point to a museum website is to show you some really basic info – like location, hours, maybe some highlights from the collection – and beyond that – it’s probably superfluous.

So when a museum announces a new virtual tour I am usually the first one rolling my eyes.

But I have to admit – one of the points to any Vice-Royalty collection in Mexico is usually the place where it is held – stunning 16th and 17th century architecture – ambience – and terrific spaces that you never expect to find on this side of the Atlantic Ocean -  and the Templo and Ex-Convento of San Augustín Acolman is one I have wondered about for years. And the recently unveiled “virtual tour” of the museum is not half-bad at all.

The photo at top is what you see on a return to the north of Mexic0 City from Teotihuacan or Tulancingo – and it really is one of those visions on the Mexican landscape that always make you want to stop. (See Map Below) I never have but I guess I should have – and now maybe I don’t need to. The Virtual tour gives you a really good idea what to expect and it’s super close to the city and has exactly what you hope for in one of these under-funded old ex-Convento places. Don’t know what I mean? Here’s an idea anyway. All the screen-grabs below are from what is really an admirably-done Virtual Tour. Though it is all in Spanish, I hope you’ll check it out and visit soon.
[ad#june-post-ad]

All Mexican Ex-Convento Museums seem to be hurting for a paint job - it gives you a good feel for the centuries old collection inside.

Just about all of these museums contain these sort of to-die-for art collections - not the sort of stuff you want to look at on the internet at all - but it does give you an idea.

Of course, if you're lucky, your ex-convento may contain a priceless church. The Virtual Tour gives you a pretty good look around this one.

Among the charms of the ex-convento museum is the creative way that passages need to be blocked off - I've seen 30 fire extinguishers lined up down a hallway. The Acolman people rely here on the opposite facing signage, you get the message, and on the Virtual Tour you only get one way to go anyway.

Please wait a moment while the map of San Augustin Acolman is loading.

Interlomas in Mexico City (click to enlarge)

Thus continues our series on the all but unknowable Estado de México, that nearly surrounds Mexico City. The translation below is based on the original which appeared yesterday on edefe.com, by Adolfo Mendoza Avilés.

Any city in the world has deep and profound scars. By means of these scars  we can see reflected some part of its history, its wealth and its daily comings and goings. And if they are capital cities like ours, we can clearly see part of the history that conforms to that country.

Normally, inhabitants want that their cultural, economic or organizational wealth be seen and felt by visitors. Even if a city is humble and modest, such as in Bombay, Taiwan or Sao Paulo, there is a departure from the reality of the overcrowding.

Mexicans are not famous for innovation, but quite the opposite… we’ve concerned ourselves with adapting to our own idiosyncrasy. From all of the ideas of Renaissance urbanism, the industrial city, the modern city and the corporate foreign city.

… and thus arose Interlomas, “Interlejos” or the “Tlaltelolco of the rich.”

Towers in Interlomas (source: skyscraper city)

It’s difficult to imagine, but there are no windshield cleaners here, no franeleros,  nothing being sold on the street corners, no children asking alms, and until recently, there weren’t even traffic lights.  (According to modern people – in modern civilized districts the use of traffic lights was not very civilized – but that idea didn’t work.) There are no tacos, no tortas sold in street puestos, there are no markets nor any type of tianguis, and what’s more there are no sidewalks nor pedestrians either.

And yes, Interlomas is a negation of the country and its reality. You don’t want to see the poor, nor the street puestos, nor to be bothered by fetid odors, to sum up: different people. There is no vice-royal architecture, old-fashioned and worn away… no places with people, no trees and no children playing. The architecture of fear.

It is peculiar, but it is a space that tried to evoke to foreign cities like Houston, Los Angeles or Dallas, where a lack of human interaction has created cities with great problems; contamination, delinquency, overcrowding and abandonment. The desire to even be in other cities, overall European cities (London, Paris, Madrid…), their stores and “lifestyles”. But it is like a person with low self-esteem who is able to survive only by negating their own reality. It is only when the quality of life of another city is considered that one can begin to understand it and thus to imitate it, and not the other way around.

It is certain that the great metropolises are centers of rapid social changes… the equality of women with man, homosexuality, the homogenization of social classes, the freedom of religious beliefs, the investigation and questioning of the active life of a country. These are all questions that can be scarey, but they are also normal changes within the really modern societies of today. To separate and to isolate oneself…  is it not the epitomy of fear of change?

Interlomas reminds us of those images of the suburbs of Tokyo, where there is only concrete and more concrete. High towers, without humans, without much life. It is clear that there is a reference to Tlatelolco, but the development that Pani promoted – equipped as it was for the active life – with green areas and a homogeneous design – sought to create community and to reaffirm the wealth that social organizations can achieve within a neighborhood. Even so it failed.

Raggedy palms, dying of cold, pot-holed streets, towers of colors, without uniformity of design and traffic worse than Periferico at rush hour. If one wants a snack, one must take their car and drive it to a cold and enormous store, line up to park, to pay, to leave and then enter one’s cell, again.

I don’t know if the tendencies of modern psychology have already exceeded your author but to the best of my recollection, the negation of reality is considered a psychological disturbance. Normally, waking up to reality is a depressing thing and the fall is often stronger and lasts longer than what you were originally trying to escape.

Lost in translation.

Graffiti in Naucalpan, photo by the author

Translated from the original at eldefe.com, by Isaac Vazquez.

Some time ago a literature professor said to me that according to the cinema, the television and books, nobody lives, dies or loves in Satelite.

The majority of love stories rely on incredibly contrasted scenes of socio-economic disparity between rich Santa Fe, and the over-exploited surroundings of poverty in neighborhoods like Tepito or the Bohemian pretensions of Condesa.

It comes as no surprise, because neither the TV nor love seems to like the sepia-print that has happened in the former Toreo area. Satellite, especially, seems a sterile desert for those seeking the wild and telenovela-esque passions. The happy mansions and the wooded traffic islands surely must have been witnesses to some drama worthy of the stellar TV schedule.

I’ve been testing this hypothesis to see if there is some story worth repeating.  Near a traffic light on the Avenue Lopez Mateos, in Naucalpan, is a work of graffitti that surprises one not only by its technique, but also because it is provides testimony that – in fact – Satellite has romantic stories in its charge.

Within the graffiti one can read:

“You never told of the wounds me of your damned heart, heart, you never risked to lose to me, to love to me, and to give love to me – we lived, we cried and we laughed with passion, with passion we conduct ourselves and we did not know, not…” “Nunca me contaste las heridas de tu maldito corazón, corazón, nunca te arriesgaste a perderme por amarme, y por amarme vivimos, lloramos y reímos con pasión, con pasión nos conducimos y no supimos, no…”

And below the larger letters is a note in parenthesis:

(and even so you gave to me the greatest in the world. Thanks!) (…y aún así me regalaste lo más grande en el mundo. Gracias!)

I imagine that the author is the sweat-shirted man that appears in the painting, and in the corners are the classic Towers of Satelite surrounded by the church and the speeding traffic on the Periferico and the Ex-convent of Santa Monica, that now is hidden behind the Mundo E. That is the data that the mural gives us. Perhaps the rest of the story we will never know, silenced by daily traffic of cars on the Lopez Mateos Highway.

What has become of the protagonists? Where is the author?

Will there be a follow-up or was this goodbye definitive? Are they alive?

Did they even exist? Difficult to know.

The perfect and wide streets of Satelite City keep the secret, but it is clear, at least, that here, like anywhere in el Defe, there is something worth recounting in the pain. I feel – chilangos – that love has not ended up passing the Periferico.
[ad#june-post-ad]