Ciudad de Mexico, Mexico
I’m on a birthday trip to Mexico City, and presumed to be Spanish-speaking from JFK onward. My rusty skills are coming back to life, and I’m pleasantly surprised by how few people speak English. My sister speaks more than me, and I’m able to safely bow out when I’m unsure how to phrase something or, more likely, too embarrassed to attempt it. I look around at the storefronts, the lettering on the signs, and express how strange it is to be in a Spanish speaking country that isn’t Spain. Usually if I’m surrounded by the language I am visiting my Grandparents house in Madrid, or with cousins who remark that my accent is Mexican Spanish, not Spain Spanish. I don’t know how to tell them nobody in America speaks ‘Spain Spanish’, and make a quick joke about the absurdity of saying Barthelona.
Being in Mexico makes me think about the fact that I’ve never been to Colombia. I wonder if it would feel like a homecoming or even more of a stark separation. A portion of my blood is from Colombia, but is it enough to feel like home? All of the labels available to me look like ill-fitting hand-me-downs that will never fit quite right. I have a Grandfather from Colombia, a dad who grew up in Uruguay, and a family culture that formed around years spent in Spain. I feel like there should be one location that gives me a sense of belonging, but instead, I seek shelter under the umbrella of the three.
I can’t get over the beauty of Mexico City. The streets are so quiet and green. I think we have eaten every type of pastry imaginable, with double servings of anything guayaba and mandatory rounds of conchas. I look into the beautiful cafes and imagine myself living here for some time, free to wander and waltz, and speaking excellent Spanish. I love passing families on the street and imagining what they’re up to today. I love hearing someone lecture their dog in a foreign language. I point a terrier out to my friend and say you can tell he’s not American.
We’re at the Frida Kahlo house and reading about the iron handrail that shot through her pelvis. Every room in her home is a different branch of a flowering tree, and her medical devices decorate it like ornaments. I walk through the halls as if I were living there, closing my eyes and imagining that the museum does not exist. Above the clamor of visitors, I can hear birds in the garden, and I think about how morning calls are different all over the world. These are the sounds she heard growing up here, the way I heard the mourning dove. I think about all the secret gardens behind the gates of houses like the Casa Azul, and I wish I could be someone’s daughter in every one of them. I think about being eight years old and lying on the cool tile floors.
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