Give a grito if you don't hate freedom

This past weekend (September 16th) was Mexico's Independence Day and on Saturday night we went to the Zocalo to hear El Grito de La Independencia. Mexico's freedom as a nation began in 1810 when Father Miguel Hidalgo rang the bell of his church in Guanajuato and implored his compatriots to rise up against the Spanish. Ever since 1910, his call to arms is reenacted by the current president from the balcony of the Presidential palace on the eve of Independence day (Why not on the 16th itself? Good question).

Since it's hard to imagine the U.S. President standing on the balcony of the White House every 4th of July and shouting "Long Live America!" we had to see this for ourselves. Getting there was a bit of a chore, as the streets surrounding the Zocalo were too clogged for taxis, and walking there subjected our group to the night's other venerable tradition: dousing people with spray foam as they walked by...

It's like snow, except gross.

It was all in good fun though, and we took it in stride.

Note: not a real moustache.

The kid on the left here had actually blasted me in the face with the very can in his hand just seconds before I took this picture. Charming little bastard, isn't he?





Finally, we got throught the gauntlet to the Zocalo for the thing itself. As you can see from my Zapruder-like videowork, it's pretty much exactly as advertised: the President shouts off a list of heroes before ending in multiple refrains of "Viva Mexico!" as the crowd goes wild.

Extra points to those of you who pick up the woman's voice at the end shouting "Viva tu madre..." Let's just say she was not a fan of the current administration.

Immediately afterwards, there was an amazing fireworks show. Since this is Mexico, it had to be very loud and much less safe. The explosions went off pretty much directly above our heads -- we literally could feel debris falling on our faces. It was awesome.
As for the day itself, we decided to run around town a bit but a lot of places were closed, naturally, since it's such a big holiday. Still, it was a gorgeous day to be out and the most memorable thing was this photo which was literally the view from our table in a coffee shop on the roof of a Sear's department store downtown:
Man this town is weird.