Mexico City

Not just any old jalopy

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Rocket 2

Widely acknowledged as the first rock-'n'-roll song ever, the label for the record "Rocket 88" credits the number to Jackie Brenston (the vocalist) and his Delta Cats. The band was actually Ike Turner's Kings of Rhythm; "Brenston and his Delta Cats" was a figment of the imagination of producer Sam Philips. Turner, who plays the piano on the tune, was so eager to begin work with Philips' Sun Records that he allowed the producer to use Brenston's name on the song, which went to #1 on the R and B charts (there were no rock charts in 1951, when the record was released).

Rocket 1

The song is about an Oldsmobile that was introduced to the market in 1949, and whose golden age lasted through 1953 (although the automaker continued to produce them until 1999). Until the 88s came out, Oldsmobile had been a staid family carmaker. The 88s, on the other hand, were sexy and dynamic -- the kind of wheels that would impress girls, were featured in the NASCAR races of the time and deemed worthy of an Ike Turner song.

Rocket 3

A couple of years before his death, at a club in New York, I heard Ike Turner play this song. His piano opening to "Rocket 88" was "appropriated" in 1958 by Little Richard when he cut "Good Golly Miss Molly." But in the argument over originality, there are people who will say that "Rocket 88" was itself "inspired" by Jimmy Liggins' "Cadillac Boogie" in 1948 and by Pete Johnson's "Rocket 88 Boogie," recorded the same year. As King Solomon said in Ecclesiastes, "There is nothing new under the sun."

In any case I had never actually seen a classic Rocket 88 until I ran across this somewhat rusting model the other day in Colonia San Miguel de Chapultepec.

104 in the shade

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Now that the colder weather is upon us, a memory of higher temperatures. I was in east Texas last August. It was excruciating -- hotter than 100 degrees Fahrenheit (about 40 Celsius) every day I was there. It went up to 104 degrees the day that I took this photograph. One doesn't usually associate arch humor with the Baptist faith, so here's to the waggish preacher responsible for the message.

Jerk chicken

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According to one Spanish-English dictionary, the word gilipollas -- used, as far as I know, exclusively in Spain -- is defined as a "bloody fool" or a "jerk." While there is probably no literal way to translate the term let's just say that most people would use decisively harsher epithets for their interpretation. So it took a sense of humor for a Mexican to call his spit-roasted chicken restaurant Gili Pollos. This is the flagship at Calle Cinco de Mayo #46 in the centro, but there is another at the corner of Sevilla and Avenida Chapultepec on the fringes of the Zona Rosa. While their claim to make the best chicken in Mexico City is arguable, I know of no other rosticería with a funnier name. (Of course I have always thought it odd that something called "Jerk Chicken" is more or less the national dish in Jaimaica.)

The treasure of the Colonia Del Valle

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One of the great literary mysteries of the 20th century is the identity of B. Traven, the author who came to Mexico in the mid-1920s and lived here until his death in 1969. According to his biographers, he may have been a German anarchist named Ret Marut, or perhaps the illegitimate son of Kaiser Wilhelm II. At the time of his death, his widow, Rosa Elena Luján, claimed he was a Chicago native, the son of a Norweigan father and a mother from the U.S. (although Luján would change her story later on).

In any case, most of Traven's most well-known novels, including The Rebellion of the Hanged and The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, are set in the country which he made his home during most of his life.

The other day, in the Colonia del Valle, I walked by this building, constructed by an engineer named Morales and an architect named Traven in 1938. This would have been around the time that B. Traven was completing his cycle of six novels set in the jungles of Chiapas. Unless anyone can positively prove the architect was another Traven, I'd like to add to the myth and suggest that while he was busy writing his books he was also responsible for residences in Mexico City.