One of the things that I missed on my first visit to Mexico City is viewing the city from the hotel’s rooftop! And I’m very glad to have been sent here the second time. Of course, I made sure to take photos. I couldn’t forgive myself if I fail to do so this time.
The Zócalo is the main plaza of the historic center (Centro Histórico) of Mexico City. My colleagues have been telling me to visit this place and on my third weekend in the city, I finally managed to see it.
I was pretty sure that taking a cab would cost me a lot because it is quite far from my hotel, so I decided to just take the Turibus. It cost me MX$165 and I got to see the whole city. I didn’t hop off the bus, though. I wanted to, but the bus interval is quite long and on the stops, there were always long queues. I didn’t want to lose my good seat so I just stayed on the bus for 3 hours to complete the whole route.
The Turibus’ Circuito Centro passes by many interesting places that I can’t squeeze everything in here. For now, I’ll just show some photos of the Zocalo.
A photo as we approached the Zocalo:
The building on the left is the Metropolitan Cathedral of the Assumption of Mary of Mexico City (Catedral Metropolitana de la Asunción de María).
The huge Mexico flag tells you that you are indeed, at the Zocalo:
True to its name, this part of the city has many buildings of historical importance. Most of these historic buildings were constructed between the 16th and 20th centuries.
If my memory serves me right, the buildings on the photo on the left house some restaurants and shops. The building on the photo on the right is the National Palace.
Below are some photos taken a few blocks away from the zocalo. The traffic was bad but I didn’t get bored because the area was bustling with activity. It was a good opportunity to observe the Mexicans. ^^
I actually got to visit this area again to view some ruins but I’ll save it for another post. 
This is the last of the series of posts on Mexico’s Anthropological Museum. Most of the photos below were taken in the second level of the museum. My feet were killing me so I was only able to look at half of the exhibits. I spent half an hour resting my legs while I watched the Mexicans enjoying their time at the museum. I wish I had a roll-about. It would have helped minimize the pain in my legs and would have served as a temporary seat!
The second floor exhibits were mostly mannequins with costumes, miniatures and houses replicas.
I found it interesting that they had something like Philippine’s nipa huts. It brought back my childhood memories when I used to visit my grandmother.
My grandmother used to have something like these kitchen utensils, too.
So have you noticed how the mannequins look real? I definitely wouldn’t want to explore this museum at night!
This display was at the first floor. It’s quite creepy but nonetheless interesting…
Museo Nacional de Antropología – Part 1
Museo Nacional de Antropología – Part 2
Museo Nacional de Antropología – Part 3
The Museo Nacional de Antropología of Mexico showcases a lot of archaelogical and anthropological artificacts from the pre-Columbian era. Too bad I couldn’t identify from which collections my photos are from. The only exhibit categories that I can recall are: Maya and Teotihuacan. You may want to take a look at this page for the museum layout. It has a beautiful architecture and the impressive “el paraguas” at the entrance convinced me all the more that I was going to enjoy my time there:
The museum is so huge that I had to take breaks before going to another collection. You may want to take advantage of the eat-all-you-can buffet at the restaurant there. The food was OK but trust me, you need to fill up before going around.
The entrance fee was MX$57.00 but free admission for citizens and foreign residents. If I do have a chance to live in Mexico City, I’ll definitely visit the museum as often as I can!
Now let’s start with the ones outside.
Most of the signs/descriptions are in Spanish so I couldn’t get the details.
The building on the left, I assume, has some sort of bedrooms and the ceiling was adorned with the following:
Too colorful for me, yet undeniably amazing.
Now, the potteries and stone slabs with carvings. These were really beautiful when I saw them with my naked eye. I wish I had a great camera~
I’m not sure if the items below were just used as ornaments. But how about the figurines? Maybe these were the “dolls” at that time?
I normally don’t like taking photos of skeletons but this post would be incomplete without it. Plus, this tomb was so intriguing:
House replicas and footwear are also in my favorites list:
Aren’t the small sandals cute? ^^
I already took out a lot of photos from this post yet I still have to write the 4th part to cover the exhibits on the second floor!
Museo Nacional de Antropología – Part 1
Museo Nacional de Antropología – Part 2
Museo Nacional de Antropología – Part 4
I’m still not done editing the photos that I took inside the museum so I’ll just include a few photos in this article. My point and shoot camera is not that good so I need to at least apply “auto level” to most of the photos taken inside the museum.
To continue from Part 1, I found these really interesting miniatures. These reminded me of the movie 10,000 BC, although I’ve only watched the trailer:
These reminded me of my history lessons when I was still in highschool:
And I don’t think I still need to explain what this is:
I was actually looking up at a huge wall painting of mammoths and I almost stepped on this display! But they would have made sure that the glass could hold up to more than 50 kilograms, right?
When you visit an anthropological museum, what do you think about?
As I look at the exhibit, I always wonder what will be on display for this era. I think computers and cellphones won’t be as interesting as potteries and other sculptures. *_*
Museo Nacional de Antropología – Part 1
Museo Nacional de Antropología – Part 3
Museo Nacional de Antropología – Part 4
If you enjoy visiting museums, then you must at all cost, go to the Museo Nacional de Antropología or the National Museum of Anthropology when in Mexico City. The museum is located along Paseo de la Reforma and is one of the Turibus stops.
I loved the place. I’ve enjoyed the two hours that I’ve spent there, yet it was not enough.
I’ll be writing two or three posts about this museum. I still need to look for the rest of the photos so for now, I will just show you what you can find before going in.
The simple facade of the building does not fully represent the anthropological treasures you can find inside:
Now, what do you think of these two gigantic sculptures placed outside the building. They are undeniably great works of art but every time I see these photos, it creeps me out.
Museo Nacional de Antropología – Part 2
Museo Nacional de Antropología – Part 3
Museo Nacional de Antropología – Part 4
As a Japanese food lover, I want to find out how different are the Japanese dishes in every country that I get to visit. (Now that I mentioned it, I realize I’ve never tried Japanese food when I went to Paris).
One of the Turibus stops was a shopping mall in Mexico City called Reforma 222. When I saw the Japanese restaurant Sunka, I knew I had to try it. Getting inside was a bit intimidating at first because I’d be eating alone again. At the same time, I was worried nobody among the restaurant staff could speak English nor Japanese (and no one could).
One of the reasons why I loved my stay in Mexico is because of the delicious dishes it offers! In this post, I am listing down the dishes that I love, something that I can eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner for days!
There are many delicious dishes in Mexico City that I wanted to try. Most are in huge servings that in most cases scare me, just like this breaded chicken that I’ve tried to finish but failed many times…
