Travel and arrival

This morning, Scott graciously took me to Eppley at about 4:30. I checked in and he walked me to security. I know all the rules for the TSA so that was easy.
I got to the gate about 20 minutes early, no problem. Flight was scheduled to leave at 6. My flight to Mexico from Dallas was scheduled to leave at 8:50, with the doors closing at 8:40 and no one in entering after that. (Pay attention to the timing, it's important.) They say it's 2 hours from gate to gate between Omaha and Dallas.
Due to lightning yesterday (5/10/2017) morning in Omaha,  I didn't leave Omaha until about 6:25. Now our flight got to Dallas a little bit early, but I didn't get off the plane until 8 20--And this was after saying "excuse me, excuse me, my flight is boarding, excuse me" and pushing past a whole bunch of people and being super rude. Then I saw I only had to go from gate C28 to gate C11, this seemed so reasonable. The thing about DFW is that it's kind of round so the distance between them was actually a lot. When I was at C20 I heard them make the last call for all passengers leaving to Mexico City. This is when I began to run. Yes, I was one of those people running through the airport. I got to the gate with my lungs burning and a little embarrassed but how hard it was for me. My bag was pretty heavy though, so I'm not too hard on myself about it.

The flight from DFW to Mexico City was less than 3 hours. I watched the movie "Joy" with Jennifer Lawrence and Rober De Niro, and I've been on 5 and 10 hour flights before so it was fine. It was pretty cloudy and I was sitting on the wing, but here are a few shots I got out the plane window, arguably one of the worst ways to take photos.

 

 

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Once I got of the plane, I had to walk like half a mile through this hallway to get to immigration/customs. First is customs where declare if you have anything with you. I didn't have to get my bag checked because there was this sort of randomizer button that everyone pushed at the front of the line. I got green, so I walked right past the luggage x-ray. Then, more hallway an immigration, where a lady asked if I was staying with friends or family or a hotel, and If I planned on traveling inside Mexico. I said "friends"and "yes", then I got my passport stamp and went on through. It was all very orderly and short, but there weren't many people since I picked an early flight. 

I stepped into the airport and had to compose myself for a moment. "Don't be a tourist!" A trip to the bathroom reminded me of some rules--don't flush toilet paper! I went in the stall just after a janitor had left, so I saw the cleanest bathroom ever. Actually, the whole airport was super clean! The floors gleamed like glass. There were janitors everywhere, and they were very polite. There seemed to be a union disagreement between airport workers and some airlines. There were big vinyl signs about how the airlines stole and spent their pensions. Some workers had "I support the union" on their vests. I wonder how that would go over in the U.S.? 

Next I had to buy a ticket for the bus to take me to Xalapa (also spelled Jalapa, pronounced Halapa). I just followed the signs for "Ground Transportation" for a while. The hall was lined with kiosks for every car/taxi/bus company in Mexico I think, very crowded. I found ADO and got my bus ticket. About $33.00 for 4 hour and 40 minutes. Now, I saw bus, but it was really a 12 passenger van. I went where I thought I was supposed to be and walked around a whole bunch being lost, and I finally asked a guy. He said I had to go across the street to the bus terminal...this was a terrifying prospect since it was like 6 lanes of airport traffic to cross...which is why there was a skywalk. Duh. The only scary thing about the skywalk is that the ADA doesn't exist here (obviously) so the slopes of some ramps were insane. Startling lack of handrails as well. Anyway, I made it. A guy put my bags in and I gave in a dollar, that's what the internet said to do. 

There were 6 of us on the van. 
 
The bit of Mexico city I saw was pretty consistent with other big Latin American cities I've been too. Houses with peeling paint or bright colors, sedans and small pickup trucks everywhere. People, bikes, motorcycles and scooters, and dogs all on the streets, very busy. There's great variety in the vegetation. Flowering trees, cactus, aloe, evergreen shrubs. Once we got out a bit farther, it honestly looked like a hillier version of Western Nebraska. Brown grass, short shrubby things, there were a few cactus but not like you might imagine. Some parts looked like the places in Oklahoma where the highway was cut through a hill, leaving red and striated cliffs on each side. I kept falling asleep in startling awake, with pressure in my ears telling me we had changed elevation. Bad afternoon for my neck. 

There were two movies shown on a screen attached to the ceiling at the front of the van. I had to look up the first one: The Might Macs. It was in English with Spanish subtitles. Then we stopped for a bathroom break. I had asked earlier if anyone had some Dramamine, and a nice lady bought some for me at the stop! The, we watched Garfield's Pet Force which was in Spanish and really bad...from what I could hear and understand.

When we got the bus terminal I felt like, "What, here already?" I hopped out and grabbed my bags and found my way to the official taxi ticket stand. He only took pesos at the window, so I had to go out to an ATM to take out pesos. The ATM was after a turnstile, so then I couldn't get back in! I had to go back around an though a metal detector to get back to the taxi ticket window. Finally with my taxi ticket, I went back out the turnstile and out to the taxi line, where a guy took my ticket and told me to get in taxi  940. I rode for about 25 minutes. There were no seatbelts in the back of the taxi, only the front seat. I looked for one, I prefer to wear it! Anyway, we pulled up and I knocked on the door and had to wait 30 seconds or so--I got nervous that I didn't have the right place, or she wasn't home. She did answer though, and I did this weird handshake/hug/air kiss that I really must practice.



When I got here, Maria Theresa was about to leave for mass, May 10 is Mother's Day in Mexico. I got here about 6. She offered to let me stay home and rest and unpack and so I went with that, although I am interested to attend a Mexican Mass sometime while I'm here. After she left, I did a classic "Emily move." I planned on going out to photograph the garden, and the door closed behind me and locked. So much for my rest and unpacking time. She said she would be home a bit after 9. I had over 2 hours to wait. Luckily she had shown me where the switches to the outside lights were. 

Her neighbor Panchito comes over a lot to pick up Tere's food scraps to feed to her chickens. Luckily, she came over around 8:30. Double luckily, Tere had told her about me. She didn't know how to unlock the door and I certainly couldn't explain it to her in Spanish, so she tried a few different doors. I got in! I did have some time to unpack, and here are the fruits of my locked-out labors:

 Polilla grande

 There are these birds all over, it seems that 2 of these guys live here and a dove also, plus some others types that I can hear but not see.

 Giant aloe plant!

 
Tere said she would bring ham and bread and milk home for me to have for dinner. It was nice. The man on the milk box is guapo

She gave me some towels, we talked about what we would do the next day, and I talked to Scott for a few. Around 10:30 I went to sleep and I slept the hardest I ever have in my life!