i spent the past week in mexico, visiting my parents, who officially moved there this year. it was my first time visiting guanajuato, the city where they now live. it is a very interesting place; it's an old city nestled between mountains in the high desert (at 7000 feet / 2300 meters in altitude). there are many mazelike alleys that are only accessible by foot, as they are narrow, steep, and riddled with cobbled stairs. i was glad my parents came to meet me when i arrived, because it would have been very difficult for me to find the unmarked door of their building on my own.

from the roof of their apartment, and in many other high points in the city, you can see the dense arrangement of centuries-old buildings, stacked practically on top one another as they ascend the slopes of the surrounding mountains. to supplement the few streets which had been built wide enough to accomodate carriages, a dense, equally complex network of tunnes was excavated beneath the city at the beginning of the period where cars became prevalent.

i'm not sure if it's lucky (for structural integrity) or unlucky (for the tunnel builders who bored though it), but most of the ground there is solid rock. my understanding is that the town was originally built around mining, and that it once was the world's capital of silver (citation needed). there is also a long tradition of stone carving, which you can see in carved architectural details everywhere.

one of the most interesting visual things i noticed was the contrast between the grandness of the older architecture and the chaos of later modifications, often equally represented in the same structure. in accordance with mexican tradition, the solution to every building problem is: more cement. need a new bench or shelf? need to prevent ATVs from squishing a soft plastic hose that serves as the water line to an entire building? need to re-attach an errant tile or stone? more cement!

i spent a lot of time walking around, and we had a small party with my parents' friends, and saw some live music performances. i also explored the area around the reservoirs with a new friend, and went to a figure drawing club and made some other new friends (it was a club where everyone takes turns modeling), and saw the editor of a newspaper i used to write for when i was a kid (who now lives there too).

i didn't bring my laptop with me, and though i did do a little bit of internet research for an upcoming project, it was a rare time where i stepped away from almost all of my usual business. now i'm back home, and getting back into it all...