“Me llamo… Jack!”
Departure and Arrival
The rest of the Kiwis and I left for Sydney from Auckland on January 6th to start our Mexican journey. Little did we know our travel there would be a bit longer than expected. Our first flight was three hours. This was no problem as I have been on similar flights to Aussie before. Our second flight, Sydney to LA, was scheduled for 10.35 am, however, it was delayed by 3.5+ hours. We eventually made it onto the flight at about 3 pm. Unlike the last flight, this was significantly longer than any flight I’ve been on; it was 13 hours! I actually didn’t mind it as much as I expected and managed to get a lot of sleep. I also re-watched Fight Club, which is why I made heaps of references to the film throughout our first week in Mexico. Due to the LA flight being delayed, our flight from LA to Mexico City was also delayed. After our three-hour flight to Mexico City, we were finally there after about 35 hours of travel! In the airport, I had my first taste of authentic Mexican food as me and Angela shared some tacos for dinner. Us Kiwis all arrived at the Paragon hotel at about 1 am Mexico time.
Welcome to Mexico City
On Monday January 9th, we had our arrival ceremony to Tec de Monterey at the Santa Fe campus. By this time we had met our whole cohort of 22 people. This includes people from NZ, Auz, Germany, Denmark, Switzerland, and South Korea. Our cohort consists of only 3 lads and the rest 19 ladies. That is a ratio of 13.04 per cent, which has become a bit of a meme. On that day, we also had our first class of each course: ‘Doing Business in Mexico’ and ‘Enterprise, Culture & Business in the world.’ On Tuesday the 10th, we went to the biggest mall in Latin America, Centro mall in Santa Fe, for a class activity. The activity involved comparing to our home countries and seeing how Mexican people shop. Something very funny happened at the mall when I was buying Horchata (a milk-like cinnamon rice drink) in the food court. The old lady serving me gave me a small taster, which I enjoyed. I meant to say “Me gusta” (“I like”) but accidentally said “Me llamo” (“My name is”). I quickly followed up with “Jack!”. The lady giggled with her co-worker, and I quickly ordered a glass. The Horchata was really good, though.
On Thursday the 12 we visited PepsiCo and the Chapultepec Forest and Castle.
On Sunday 15th we visited the Teotihuacan pyramids on the way to Querétaro. This was an incredible experience. I had never seen ancient structures like this before, and I thoroughly enjoyed the traditional ritual activities we did.
