Suds

My friend Cynthia has a family business, fashioning soaps with spring water, natural oils, herbs, flowers and fragrances. They come in all sorts of colors and aromas: almond milk; honey, wheat and yogurt; mixed berries; chocolate; kiwi; melon and cucumber. I've been using them for years. They look good enough to eat, but I wouldn't recommend that you do. They make great Christmas gifts.

She usually sells them on the streets of the Colonia Condesa in the morning and in Coyoacán in the afternoon. If you cannot find her, send her an email at cynthiayapur@suenosdeagua.com.

Innards

Many years ago, a New York literary agent who I can only describe as hostile to my work said that my willingness to eat even the most uncommon foods in Mexico was "just short of posturing." If you are out there, dear one, it will be better for both of us if you don't read the following post.

In many cantinas in Mexico City, in the late afternoon or early evening, guys come around with baskets of snacks with which drinkers can accompany their beverages. The most popular items are hard-boiled eggs, peanuts sprinkled with chile powder, and sunflower seeds, but they also sell a kind of dried jerky that some of my friends swear is fashioned from human flesh. On a recent afternoon at Tio Pepe on Calle Independencia, a man came through wielding such a basket, and among the offerings were boiled chicken gizzards. Sprinkled with salt, lime juice and hot sauce, they were irresistible.

Say cheese

In 1922, President Álvaro Obregón invited twenty thousand Mennonites to settle in the unforgiving desert between Ciudad Juárez and Chihuahua City in the border state of Chihuahua. They'd been having trouble in Saskatchewan and Manitoba, because the government felt that their children should be obliged to study in the English language beyond the sixth grade, and to be available for military conscription. (Mennonites tend to be loyal to God rather than whatever state they are living in, and believe that a  little education, in High German, goes a long way. Pacifists, they will not let their children join any army.)

Mexico sold them 247,000 acres of land at $8.25 U.S. per acre. Today, about fifty thousand Mennonites live in or near Ciudad Cuauhtémoc in Chihuahua, and thanks to them, the entire area is farmed and to some extent industrialized.

However, Chihuahua is one of the epicenters of the current drug violence in Mexico. According to this report from the BBC, Mennonites have been sadly caught in the crossfire, principally as victims of kidnapping.

Among the activities of the Mennonites is the fabrication of cheese. Sometimes they will send a representative, clad in straw hat and overalls, to Mexico City to sell it to drivers stalled in traffic. Here one of their minions haggles with a motorist near the corner of Insurgentes and -- perhaps fittingly, given his role in their destiny -- Avenida Álvaro Obregón.

Earth to Major Tom

It was one of those instances where a street changes in what seems like the blink of an eye. I have walked by the corner of Avenida Juárez and Calle Balderas a thousand times, but a recent stop at that corner revealed the sparkling new headquarters of the Church of Scientology in Mexico. According to Wikipedia, Scientology teaches that people are immortal spiritual beings who have forgotten their true nature. German authorities have considered outlawing the religion in the motherland, although Mexico, where about 90 percent of the population declares itself Catholic, is much more tolerant. The afternoon I took this photo, Scientology's most well known adept, Tom Cruise, was nowhere to be found.

Under the hood

Much has been made over the fact that Mexico City is one of the few places in the world to allow same-sex marriages. There is some suspicion over the motives of Mayor Marcelo Ebrard, under whose aegis the law was passed. For one thing, Ebrard has aspirations for the next presidential elections in 2012. His progressive actions --Mexico City is also one of the few places in the world where a woman can get a legal first-trimester abortion -- have raised his profile around the world, although they may not gather him many votes among the conservative Mexicans in the heartland. Further, Mexico City has a notable contingent of gay tourists from the United States and Europe, who by now may have heard of bars, clubs and other venues far more permissive than in their own home towns (even if those towns are Paris or New York). The passage of the law is sure to make even more homosexuals take notice. In any case, history is rife with good legislation passed for questionable reasons. In honor of Ebrard, this photo of a car parked on the streets of the definitely gay-friendly Colonia Condesa.