Brotherly love

Sergio's brother Luis came through town last weekend, along with his old friends Bill and Mike, so it was a carnival of 40-something dudes at Casa Moreno. As such, this post will be largely (and unfortunately) Sasha-free.

The fellas showed an amazing tourism drive-- arriving on Thursday night at close to 2 am, they nevertheless hopped in a taxi in a city none of them were familiar with to go get something to eat. Apparently they just said "Condesa" and that was that until almost dawn. Impressively, they were out the door by 10 am the next morning and climbing the Pyramid of the Sun shortly after that. A random Scotsman expressed approval of their celebratory beverage of choice.

Blue label, eh? Nice.

That night, Sergio introduced the boys to the joys of Mexico City's many Argentinian steakhouses. After converting from kilos we realized we had ordered four pounds of steak, which was brought to our table on a standing grill.

The next day we ran around the Centro, and did a considerable amount of shopping for four grown men on a quasi-bachelor weekend. The fellas were shocked to learn we had actually covered only a few square blocks, and really only about 5 miles from our house -- El Distrito is mad-dense, as we saw for ourselves from the top of the Seguros LatinoAmerica tower:

Note: those aren't clouds.

The markets were lively and the day was beautiful. Also, chickens were sleeping in the street.

Tragic.

There was another fantastic dinner on Saturday night, this time with Sasha there to keep things respectable. The boys ventured into the realm of true Mexican mole, and seemed to be sold on it.

Sunday afternoon was the most ambitious of all: a soccer game, followed by a bullfight. Sergio privately feared it couldn't be done. But it was.

The game completed the trifecta for Sergio of all 3 DF professional soccer teams. We went to see the Club Universidad Nacional, more commonly known as the Pumas of UNAM. Interestingly, they are essentially a college team, and play on a college campus, but are professional players playing in the First Division soccer league. Their fans are therefore particulary lively, as they are primarily 19-year-old kids. When they play the other Mexico City teams like Club America, it's as if the UT Longhorns were playing the Dallas Cowboys -- and it's competitive. The game we saw was against a clearly inferior team but the fans were no less rabid after all 4 goals:

GOOOOOOLL............................

.........LLLLLLLLLLLL!

The Pumas also play in a historic place: the stadium of the 1968 Olympic Games, known for the Rivera mural on its facade, and for this classic moment:

Oh wait I meant this one.

From there it was on to the Plaza de Toros for a Sunday afternoon bullfight and it was, well, it was a bullfight. Whatever your opinion of bullfighting (and it certainly is controversial), there is no doubt that unless you grew up in Mexico or Spain you've probably never seen anything remotely like it.

I mean, the image below is an actual photo. That is to say, the matador really wore that outfit.

It actually sparked a very long conversation about its meaning. If anyone has any ideas, feel free to share them. We ended up with more questions than anything else.

Overall it was a great weekend because our guests seemed truly enthralled by all they saw. And there's nothing like seeing family from afar.

Facial hair is a Moreno thing.

One last note: if you haven't heard, there's been some real terrible things happening at the US Embassy in Belgrade -- that is to say, people broke in to the Consular building and set it on fire. Fortunately, no Embassy staff were hurt, but speaking as people who work in the Consular building of an Embassy we can assure you that mob-fueled arson would be really not cool. Please take a moment to remember the many dedicated people that work overseas for our beloved country.