Gabriella

       The rest of the weekend I was pretty successful in keeping busy. Saturday morning Gabriella and I went to Starbucks and chatted while she had a cigarette. She is quiet in a sweet way, but has an excellent grasp of the English language. This is nice, especially since I still have a problem ordering coffee, and my French is just a rusty as it was marginally mediocre two years ago. I let her talk because she has a hard time understanding my accent, but mainly because she has so many interesting things to say! She's been everywhere. Sometimes she doesn't get to see her home, a small town in Russia, for months and months because she moves so constantly. Tokyo, Turkey, Hong Kong, Indonesia....There are more places she's lived in, but my memory isn't what it used to be, now that I'm an adult and all.              

        Gabriella's experienced in travel: she walks everywhere to castings, and some of those are quite a distance: DF sprawls in all directions. Every time I hop into a taxi, I feel a bit lame. I constantly have to remind myself that she's been traveling by herself for years, and though she does not look it at all, she is 24 (she seems 19/20 tops). I am still called a "little child" or "just a baby" by other models. 

        Anyways, over all, I wouldn't feel comfortable walking by myself to a place I've never walked to before, especially in DF. Some castings can be in pretty sketchy areas, and those seem to rise up around you without your notice.

The Hippodromo

       If at the moment you exited your plane at the Districte Federale Aeropuerto, you were blindfolded, and whisked away to the Amsterdam hippodromo, you would not believe you were standing in Mexico City. Amsterdam, as you can assume, given its name, is ridiculously European. The neighborhood itself circles a large park riddled with fountains, ponds, large stone paths, and bridges. Dogs of all kinds and sizes roam off leash with their owners. Amsterdam must be dog heaven. I have never seen so many dogs...so many different breeds. They run rampant in and out of the fountains; chasing the ducks. 
       The shops and restaurants are a delight to gaze at. There are quite a few Spanish restaurants in the Hippodromo, but a Californian would have a hard time recognizing the food as Mexican cuisine. It is far saucier that what I am used to, being from North Cal, where what you see a lot of is Fresh Mex or Cali Mex. But who really minds anyways? All the food here is delicious, tempting, and potentially dangerous to a susceptible digestive system.

      My favorite restaurant, by far, is a French place near Insurghentes. Even better, across from where I stay there is a Starbucks, a Yogurtland, and this marvelous tiny gourmet Italian restaurant, deli, and shop. Last fall they had so many samples of pan de morte, olive oil, breads, and dips, that I would wander around with a basket "intent" on shopping, when really I'd just be grazing their samplings. This season they don't have many samples out. That may be my fault. I don't know if they recognize me, but the barista at Starbucks certainly does. He had to tell me last time I was here that I was making things difficult for him. I kept ordering nonexistent items from the menu. He explained that he speaks fluent English, and, wouldn't it be best for me, for both of us, if I used my native language? So now I am forced to inflict my parroting on innocent taxi drivers. But when the poor guy isn't behind the counter, I stubbornly choose to wreak havoc on other innocent Starbucks employees with my Monkey Spanish.

    My mom and I call our use of the Spanish language "Monkey Spanish" because our grasp of it is so general that basically all we do is go through the motions. What comes out of my mouth is never the same, and never, ever, truly Spanish, but I am working on it as often as possible (it is so, so important to know what someone is explaining when they are instructing you on the choreography of walking down a runway). Sometimes I catch myself just speaking English with a Spanish accent, which does nothing at all except confuse the general public. Often after people get a chance to listen to me talk, they treat me like a fragile object or an explosive devise that has no idea when it will explode and hasn't decided yet what should trigger it. Suffice to say, I think I make the people and baristas of DF nervous.

          The agency is naturally closed on Sabado y Domingo so I didn't anticipate landing any jobs or castings over the weekend. My occupation the night I arrived was to keep busy enough to ward off homesickness.

          It's difficult to get out of bed when you are just tired from the trip and no one prompts you to get up. Friday evening was all bustle because I had to buy sheets and shampoo, etc. and when my shopping was done, I decided I needed to wash and flop right into bed or else I'd spend my time feeling sorry for myself. I was able to chat on Skype (what a glorious invention!) with my mom, which was very comforting. The apartment was basically empty, with all the girls out clubbing, and my soon-to-be roommate, Gabriella, was at a shoot. I chose an empty top bunk and after engaging in a brief tango with the bunk ladder that resulted in a bruised stomach, finally just slumped into the bed. It was hard not to feel a little bit triumphant: I had actually settled in, even though I hadn't yet gone through the motions of unpacking.

The False Start

        To all you seasoned travelers: you Frequent Flier Milers, you jump-skippers of time zones: if you are out there, I realize that I will look a little foolish. I have traveled out of the country before, but this will be the first time that I've done so by myself. To tell you candidly, I am ridiculously nervous.
      It's not living in Mexico that scares me. It's Customs, Baggage Check. Hopping the wrong plane. Losing my ticket. Losing my passport. Urgh.
      The plan was that I leave Wednesday. Brilliant. My ticket would be paid for by the agency and would be extracted from the money I made the last time I was there.
       I haven't got paid yet. That sounds disturbing, but waiting six or seven months to be paid for a job (even the smallest of them) isn't that out of the ordinary for a model, especially not for international work. Though it is disconcerting. The money has to go through so many different hands before it gets to you, and most time the method that it travels is confusing and backwards. The agency can not pay you until the company pays you, and the company may wait until the campaign or event or commercial has been run and become profitable or they need to be reminded etc. There's got to be some way we can streamline the process, because right now, it only just seems to work.
       We had been pretty sure that I'd be leaving Wednesday, but having not heard from anyone about it becoming concrete, I kind of assumed that wednesday wouldn't happen. I really should know by now that nine times out of ten the ball will start rolling at the last minute and if someones says something will happen, even if you don't hear from them again, it will. I get a call on Tuesday at 6:00pm that my flight will be leaving from the SMF airport on Wednesday, 6:00am. I was packed, ish.
       Advice to any traveler: Never assume anything. We spent the night packing like fiends, downloading useful apps, setting up a home-share, loading a coffee card, and reviewing currency exchange rates. To top it off, no matter what I did I could not check into my flight.                 
      That should have told us something. We were told not to worry, but to leave for the airport at the scheduled time.
      Neither my mother or I got any sleep.
We left at 3:00. I was probably in a right state. Totally panicked. I had left everything up in the air! I had no idea what to do. I was horribly unprepared.
      Even though we had flailed throughout the night, somehow we were on time.
In the end it really didn't matter. The flight wasn't paid for. The seat was reserved, but not bought. It came down to a mistake in authorization through the agency, but by the time someone had realized it, it was too late.
      I was so tired that I had a hard time explaining myself to the lady behind the desk at the airport. It was even harder with my parents prompting me: '"Speak up, she can't hear you"', '"Girl, c'mon. Be more assertive, act angrier: people react when you're angry"'.
      Really though, in these pressing circumstances, after driving me about an hour to the airport at 3:00 in the morning to find out we might as well drive back home, my parents were extraordinary. Both of them, especially my dad. He is someone who very, very much likes things to play out as planned. He likes perfection, which is beneficial to a graphic designer and makes him a pretty organized and sane guy, but in this case, perfection wasn't possible. My mom is pretty used to the last minute changes and confusion that my job entails, having traveled with me to most of the castings and jobs last time I was in DF.
      I tend to internalize things. So while my stomach was in the middle of a roiling tempest, I probably seemed serene, even just a bit sullen. The rest of the day I felt jilted. Like I had been standing on the edge of a cliff with nothing but cold air buffeting me on all sides, only to be jerked back off my feet, picked up, dusted off, and turned back around. I couldn't tell whether or not to be relieved or disappointed. I had been so scared to go, so panicked. Now I felt unstable. And I had a notion that I had thrown my parents under the same bus. This felt worse than an 18 hour delayed flight to New York that my mom and I once had to deal with.

      In the end, this false start turned out to beneficial, for me at least. Don't go asking my parents, because I'm sure they'll say different, as they had to drive me to SMF at 3:00am a second time. But in my case, I came to the airport prepared, wide awake with a full night's sleep, pre-packed all my loose ends tied. The worst had happened already, so how bad could traveling to Mexico be after that fiasco? I breezed through the baggage check, I got my coffee, and after a surge of caffeine, everything seemed possible. I'm not saying that telling my parents goodbye was easy. I think, though, that it helped that my mind was preoccupied with a destination.
      When I finally stepped into the flight entryway, that snake tunnel that gives you a sense that you're not getting into an airplane, but a spaceship on its way to the moon, I made sure to do a little victory dance when no one was looking. Though if anyone had, I don't think I would've cared. Making that first flight, solo, without a hiccup set me down on cloud nine.

This is For You

        This blog is for you, my dear Friends and Family. If I don't keep it up I will regret my slack for the rest of my life, especially because you will never let me forget it. Annnd if I don't keep you all in the loop, your imaginations will run wild. Your brains will fill with bad thoughts. You will assume that I am up to no good. Which is funny. Most people think, when I mention that I'll be leaving for Mexico, that I am going to do good: by building houses, or humanitarian work.

       This makes me feel a bit awkward to have to explain to these kind souls, who have assumed the best of me, that I am, in fact, not traveling to Mexico to build houses. I am modeling. And I guess if you are looking at it in black and white, that could be considered the opposite of community service.

       The other common reaction I get, the most frequent especially now that I am traveling alone, is the immediate flash of dismay, the concern, the need to bring awareness to the muggings and assorted kidnappings that will inevitably occur if I hop into a taxi. These thoughts are blatant on everyones' faces, even if they take care not to voice them.

       A tiny insecure bit of me that wishes you would just be happy that I am leaving and exult my decision instead of quashing it. (All those references from "Taken" have really begun to freak me out.)

       Every other fibre of my being really appreciates your concern and warnings. I take it to mean that you care: that you all would rather I not get abducted, mugged, etc. And that makes me feel, instead of worried about traveling, oddly happy.

      Thank you for that.

      So, for all your rampant imaginations and for my own tumultuous reputation's sake, voila! Here you go.

Once Again

         This will be my second trip to Mexico City. There's a long story for that experience, one I was not experienced enough to keep up. (As you'll have noticed there is only one entry posted before this one describing my previous trip in 2011. And that's a post about the flight there. So, colossal failure, that blog.)
         AND, I left rather abruptly. There's a whole story there, but most everyone who is reading this blog knows it, because it is a rather dramatic one. If anyone who is not familiar with the whole extravaganza would like to be filled in, all they have to do is ask and I will gladly jot it down for them.
OK. Here goes. My second stab at explaining myself and communicating with people. Two skills that I am notoriously lacking, but perhaps I have matured since my last attempt. Let's hope I am consistent.