I’m posting some memories from the summer. I could let FaceBook and Instagram turn my memories into filler content between ads, or I could add my memories to my website and keep them meaningful. It still feels weird publishing something that isn’t an intellectual essay, but there’s more to life than writing essays and I want my website to reflect that.

I visited Mexico in June! I was visiting my prima (cousin) Odette as she moved out of Mexico City and back to her hometown of Cancún. By the way, Odette is an amazing photographer and you can see her work HERE and HERE. The pictures in this post were taken by me, though.

My room was in the Colonia Nápoles neighborhood of Mexico City. There aren’t any zoning laws in Mexico City, so across the street from me was a convenience store and a Pre-K daycare. Besides the kids being loud in the mornings, it was really nice. I was only a few blocks from the (Mexican) World Trade Center, a local landmark.

On my first night we walked a few blocks to get street tacos al pastor. I sat beside this nice dog:

The next day, we visited Bosque de Chapultepec (Chapultepec Forest), the city park. There’s a castle within the park that everyone wants to visit - the line stretches out of the castle. We skipped that and instead saw a photo exhibit on Mexico’s native bats, and walked through some of the park’s monuments, like the Altar a la Patria (Altar to the Homeland).

Walking along one of the lakes, we stopped by a bookstore bistro. We intended to only do some window shopping, but then I found their philosophy/theology/Great Books section, which took up the entirety of a giant shelf that stretched up to the lofted ceiling. I spotted the Greek philosophers 7 feet above me. Then I got to thinking:

I teach at a Catholic school, so philosophy/theology is a required course. Hispanic students are our largest demographic served. A lot of my students back home need to read philosophy, but speak primarily Spanish, in the Mexican dialect. My school has Spanish Bibles that our students seem to understand, but it’s difficult to find Spanish translations of philosophy. My school has found a few translations, but these were written by Spaniards. Students keep telling us that Spain’s Spanish might as well be another language from the Mexican Spanish they know, so the “Spanish” philosophy books we’ve used weren’t helping anyone.

With all the above in mind, I asked an employee to grab the ladder and pull down a copy of Dialogos de Platon (Plato’s Dialogues). This edition has every dialogue Plato wrote, even the apocryphal ones. It’s a huge tome, and it became the bulkiest item in my luggage. Plato is the primary philosopher in my school’s theology curriculum, so for only $15 I made school much easier for my Spanish-speaking students.

With Plato acquired, we walked another half mile to the Museo Nacional de Antropología (Mexico’s National Anthropology Museum). My cousin loves this place, and, if I had to guess, I’d say that’s due to the 3 following reasons:

1) It’s really more like 8 museums in 1

2) It’s an epicenter of national pride

3) There are a lot of snake artifacts

Here’s a cool summer travel challenge: go to the Museo Nacional de Antropología (a museum about humans) but only take pictures of the snakes:

Side mission 1: there’s an opossum somewhere in the museum. Take a picture of her too (if you can find her):

Side mission 2: Find the googly eyed knives. Take a picture to verify:

If you 100% this challenge, including completion of the side missions, the merchant will sell you his secret item: a locally made axolotl plushie. Keeping this in your inventory give you +10 physical defense and +25 morale, making the end game grind to the final boss much easier:

Here’s one fun fact about Mexican history: the Aztecs associated alcohol with rabbits, as seen by the alcohol pitcher below, sculpted into a fat rabbit. They called drunken ragers “the rage of 400 white rabbits”. I don’t know how you’re supposed to pour from this:

We spent a day hiking through the ruins at Teotihuacán. The complex has 4 parts: the Sun Temple, the Moon Temple, the Serpent Temple, and the Avenue of the Dead. I went straight for the Serpent Temple.

We walked to the other temples but those aren’t open to the public, because the steps are too hazardous. The Serpent Temple was the only one with permitted stairs and those were still precarious (see below). If you trip and fall, you're gonna die.

While walking up and back down the Avenue of the Dead, we found an exhausted bee crawling in the middle of the walking path. I rescued it, walked it over to a daisy well off the path, found a nice bloom and poured her some water. Don't worry, I have experience rescuing small critters.

Finally, on our way to the airport for our flight to Cancun, we found the Golden Beetle. It was in the house’s garden all along. He almost got stepped on by accident, but don’t worry, he’s not dead in this photo, we saved him.

Cancún was originally a Mayan word, kàan kun, which means “nest of snakes”.

Cancún has been a snake haven since ancient times, but I didn’t see any snakes on that leg of the journey.

We did still see critters on our journey through Quintana Roo (the state that Cancún is in).

We went to Holbox and rented a beach hut for the afternoon. It came with a complimentary companion dog, named Morgan.

I had to leave Mexico early, since Hurricane Beryl was hitting landfall in a few days and was going to pass directly over Cancún. After I arrived back home, a friend of Odette’s sent me this photo for identification.

They saved this baby Central American Boa (Boa imperator AKA Boa constrictor) that had washed up from Beryl’s wind and rain. In my experience, Mexicans are much less afraid of reptiles than Americans are, so the friend was happy to shelter this baby from the storm and set her free once it passed.

I’ve actually pet-sat a couple of Central American Boas (AKA Boa Constrictors) named Java and Harlow. They are some of the sweetest creatures. Snakes have their own kind of virtue.

Now that I've met some Boa Constrictors in-person, I'm shocked at the popular perception of these creatures. We're taught to believe they're prehistoric killing machines. But the Boa Constrictors I've met have been friendlier towards me than a lot of cats and dogs.

Java, the younger male Boa, loved me. Whenever I changed out his water bowl, he'd scoot out of his cage, gently wrap around my wrist, and hang out with me for a while like a living bracelet.

Here's our travel summary of Mexico:

Pros:

Cons: