July 21 - Mexico City

We awoke to find a general dearth of clean clothes, so we went to a nearby 'lavandoria' that our host told us about. We were not prepared for the craziness that would follow, instead expecting a familiar coin-op laundromat. Every event in the washery was mired in misunderstand and awkwardness. We managed at first to get our clothes washed. Returning after an hour, we somehow got them to put our wet clothes into a 'secadora,' which was powered by a huge open flame, for 15 minutes. During this time, we enjoyed more of our favorite empanadas, sat by the fountain in the Rio de Janeiro park, and got some pastries and coffe at the Globo bakery. Back at the 'lavandoria,' we found our still soaked clothes in a basket. We could not understand what the one woman was saying; she just kept repeating the number two and holding up two fingers. Thankfully, a nice man explained to us simply that we had to wait an hour until the dryer was free and that she would give our clothers another 30 minutes of heat. Realizing then that the woman was trying to say "at 2 o'clock," we thanked the man and left, ashamed at our poor comprehension of the woman. Back at the hostel, we used the internet and related our laundry fiasco to our host and his friend from Brazil. One last time at the laundry place, we easily payed 70 pesos and walked away with dried and folded laundry.

Food was the next thing on the menu. We walked through colonia Condesa and into col. Hippodromo, passing a bunch of restaurants and shops, stopping at one to order pasta and pizza, which was a little odd. Next we left for Zona Rosa (as usual) for a coffee. Passing our hostel, we decided to wait for Zona Rosa to use a bathroom. Unfortunately, this proved difficult, as we ended up returning to a dirty restroom at the Insurgentes metro station (with a 3 peso entrance charge). Resolving to quickly forget this turn of events, we went to Genova street and ordered coffees and ice cream at Cafe Illy.