Mondays with Mike: Viva México!

That was the view from my hotel room.

Two weeks ago I was exploring Mexico City, acting the tourist after three days of work meetings. My phone tells me that on Monday, Sept. 12, I took more than 25,000 steps, covering 10+ miles. Every bit of it was worth it.

I work for a non-profit—and like other non-profits, our board of directors meets regularly to do things that boards do. But to shake things loose — to do some blue-sky thinking — the board invites some staff members to join them for the annual board retreat. The agenda is all about everything that isn’t business-as-usual – more of a “what if?” exercise.

This year, we held the retreat in Mexico City largely because one of our esteemed board members, Lourdes Melgar, lives there and served as a sort of unofficial host. It was an inspired choice of locations, because being in a grand, richly historic setting that was unfamiliar to most of us seemed to energize and set free our discussions.

About Lourdes — she’s got some energy chops. From her bio:

Lourdes Melgar, Ph.D., is a nonresident fellow at the Baker Institute Center for Energy. She is also a research affiliate at the Center for Collective Intelligence at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where she was the 2016-17 Robert E. Wilhelm Fellow.

From February 2014 to July 2016, Melgar served as Mexico’s deputy secretary of energy for hydrocarbons and was a member of Pemex’s board of directors. She was Mexico’s under-secretary for electricity from December 2012 to February 2014, during which she also served on the board of the Federal Electricity Commission. 

Paddleboats on the lagoon in Chapultepec Park.

Anyway, I’ll spare you more work details and say that Mexico City is as grand a city as any I’ve visited in the United States or Europe. I knew little about it save for childhood recollections from the 1968 summer Olympicgames that included what was then an unbelievable long jump record set by Bob Beamon and two African American medalists–John Carlos and Tommie Smith–flashing the Black Power symbol from the awards podium. It caused quite the stir.

Beyond that, I had the usual kind of chauvinistic American view of it and all things Mexico. I think to many Americans Mexico means either all-inclusive stays at beach resorts or drug cartels and crime and corruption. Or the place people flee to come to the United States.

Welp, not exactly.

I saw just a sliver of this giant metropolis, but it was enough to be awed by what a sophisticated city it is, and by the incredible history of Mexico that I learned about during my visit.

Mind you, it’s a big city, and like lots of big cities—including here in the United States—neighborhoods run from the opulent to the ragged and poverty-ridden.

But oh my. Here are a few touristy highlights:

The entrance to the museum.

• You’ll hear this from anyone who’s been to Mexico City but you must visit the national museum of anthropology and archaeology. It’s about the grandest of grand museums I’ve ever visited. The richness and complexity of the history of Mexico is mind-boggling. And the way cultures/societies supplanted and subsumed others, again and again, provides a nice sense of how on one hand, what we do is important, and on the other, it’s but a tiny data point.
• The museum is one of several set in Chapultepec Park, a lushly green and sprawling expanse that is twice the size of New York’s Central Park.
• Another park near our hotel was Lincoln Park. As in Abraham. There’s a statue of him — and he faces directly across from a statue of Martin Luther King.
• Speaking of lush, we stayed in the Polanco neighborhood, which is affluent and not necessarily typical. Flying in and then walking around on the ground, Mexico City is strikingly green. As in oodles of mature trees and vegetation and parks.
• Food. If you go, have lots of it. My highlights were street tacos al pastor, shaved off the spit in front of my eyes. Also barbacoa to die for. And…we had dinner at a great French restaurant.
• Drink lots of water. Mexico City sits at over 7,000 feet above sea level. The air is dry and thin, so take it easy for a couple days.
• The elevation makes for an extremely mild and pleasant climate. I experienced low 70s every single day for a week.

Adios!

In Lincoln Park, you can rent radio control boats.