One thing that I really don't like about many Mexican women is the amount of make up they use, especially around the eyes. I understand that the social pressure to be beautiful is rather strong, but looking like a raccoon won't improve your chances of finding the man of your dreams, really. You're more beautiful if you accept who you are and smile (there's nothing more beautiful than a woman smiling) than if you end up looking like a sunburned geisha.
Long life to those with subdued make up!
I didn't feel unsafe in my travels throughout Mexico, but it is true that you find more than enough well-armed security guards and policemen everywhere, and there is plenty of stuff in the crime section of the local newspapers.
Security (or the lack of it) has been named as one of the main reasons for the lack of growth in Foreign Direct Investment in the country, and is one of the most important areas that the government has focused on, with mixed results.
For the first time in my life I entered a Mexican cantina when I was in San Miguel de Allende. Reminded me of my local Finnish lähiöbaari.
Andrés Oppenheimer otra vez saca un libro sobre actualidad latinoamericana altamente recomendable. Aunque en algunas cosas se nota un poco que fue escrito hace ya dos años, en general se trata de un libro que nos muestra qué es lo que han hecho los países que sí se han subido al tren de la globalización y el desarrollo y por qué Latinoamérica aún no ha hecho lo propio, con resultados mediocres.
Me quedo con tres reflexiones:
-Países como México o Argentina harían bien con seguir el ejemplo de Corea del Sur, que con un consenso político ha alcanzado niveles de desarrollo que ya quisiéramos nosotros con una tamaño de población similar.
-Sabía que Brasil se trata de posicionar como el líder de la región, pero no estaba enterado que por eso han empezado a referirse a la integración de Sudamérica en lugar de Latinoamérica (que incluiría a México, el único país que tal vez le haría sombra). Obviamente, las políticas de Tlatelolco tampoco han ayudado mucho en contrarrestar esta jugada de Itamaratí.
-El crecimiento actual de las economías argentina y brasileña, dependiente de los precios elevados de las materias primas, no es sustentable al largo plazo a menos a que decidan invertir esas ganancias en otros negocios. Si no, pregúntenle a México cuando iba a “administrar la abundancia” bajo la presidencia de López Portillo.
As you may have noticed in other instances, the contact between different cultural groups will produce unexpected and sometimes some rather comical results. This is the case in Acapulco, which has been a port facing the Pacific for over 300 years and a mass tourism destination for at least 50.
Acapulqueños are renowned throughout Mexico for their usage of a word to refer to friends, acquantainces or whomever they are talking with at the moment: "Brody", deriving from the English "brother". A word that is used all the time, it is the trademark of their speech together with their lack of pronunciation of the letter s.
During the past 18 years, the Norteña music genre has expanded from its homeland in the north of Mexico to the rest of the country. Even in places in the south of the country like Acapulco where so-called “Tropical” music such as salsa and cumbia still predominates you can find radio stations devoted to norteñas.
I’ve heard that it has even become popular in some parts of Brazil (could somebody confirm if that’s true?).
As in any country, big or small, there are plenty of cultural differences between Mexicans of different areas of the country. My sister was victim of these in a wedding she recently attended in Monterrey.
She was told that it was going to be a garden wedding, whose dress code in Mexico City is purely in light, pastel colours as they are during the day and surrounded by nature. You can imagine their surprise when they arrive at the appointed place and find out that it was not a real garden, but a hall decorated as a garden and the rest of the guests were dressed in night gowns and smokings. All the people from the capital had made the same mistake, so they stood out at the event.
I suppose this shows that you have to check and double-check your assumptions every time, even in your own country.
2007 started with us climbing the top of a hill with some friends to see the fireworks over the Helsinki metropolitan area. From that point onwards, we knew it was going to be uphill the whole year. I finished my masters, got married, continued working and kept on the move during this year. It has been tough, but definitely worth it.
What will 2008 bring?
Of course I missed my family, but the food is a definite plus.
Euro-denominated banknotes share a common theme around different eras of artistic expression. Therefore, the 5 Euro note is classical, the 10 Euro romanesque and so on. I've always argued that the 100 Euro banknote, which depicts the baroque style, could just as well be Mexican, since Mexican art is baroque and exhuberant, and they like to decorate everything, so for example in Christmas you will see plenty of special ornamentation in houses, until in some cases it becomes too much.
Mexicans as well have a certain sense of humour. Take the picture below:
The current craze in Mexico City is to buy a specific kit so that your car would look like Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer. So you take a (from the Mexican perspective) American influence, twist it a little, add a little of humour and of course put it in your car, without which you cannot survive in this city (actually you very well can, but everything will take you much, much longer).
