Mexico City Continued

So as I was saying from my previous post, the flight attendant comes up to us and saids, "Hey if anyone comes to your door and knocks, DO NOT OPEN!"

So we're like what? what happened?  She said that she told her friend she was coming to Mexico City.  Her friend told her that the last time she stayed there, someone came and knocked on her door.  She looked through the peephole and saw a guy with a gift basket.  The guy said the gift basket was from receptions downstairs.  Now she was smart, instead of just opening up, she said hold on.  She then went and called downstairs and asked the reception area.  They told her there was no such gift basket, and they didn't know who was at her door.  She hung up, went back to the door, and the man was now gone.

After hearing this, I was already a little spooked...Then the other other flight attendant goes, "omg...I am glad you told me this...my friend said something happened to her too!"  I was like, are you serious? more stories?  I don't know how many more of these I can take!

She said her friend stayed there and was sleeping...It must have been late, like 1 or 2am or something like that...she was half asleep so wasn't in her right mindset.  There was a knock on the door and the man outside calls out "maintainence".  She was groggy and only half awake so didn't think twice about opening the door.  The man comes in and saids I have to fix something in the bathroom.  She said ok...and then went back to sleep!  After a few minutes, she realized a little that it was a kinda weird, got up, went to the bathroom to check on him.  He was in there fidgeting with something so she just thought ok he's really fixing something.

She, again, went back to lay down on the bed.  At this point, I am thinking damn she is brave!  After a few minutes she opens her eyes, getting ready to go check on the man again, and there he was right beside her, with a gun pointing to her head.  He told her to be quiet.  Instead, she screamed with all her might, kicked, punched, struggled to get out of his grip.  Somehow he got scared and ran out of the room.  She told the operators downstairs and they finally found the guy, and he was just a random guy that roamed in from off the streets!

I was standing there thinking about how lucky she was...before I could even digest everything, the pilot goes, "Yeah my co-pilot got robbed the last time he was here!  And from the short 10 minutes that it took him to walk back to the hotel, they had already charged all of his credit cards!!!"

I didn't have a story to share, and didn't want to have any stories that I might have to share.  So I told them I wasn't gonna lay one foot outside of my room!!!  Sigh....I lied though...I went out with the other flight attendant because she didn't have anything to eat.  We walked around just looking for the grocery store and was going to go back, but then couldn't find the store and ended up eating at a local cafe/restaurant.

It was pretty good, and very very cheap...It was a daily special that comes with soup, rice or macaroni, the entree, dessert, and a drink.  I ordered an omelet and mine came out to be around $6.

Then we saw a pastry shop across the street and decided to check it out as well.  The pastries all looked sooooo good so I couldn't resist!  We bought some...but then when I ate it in the hotel later on, it was not good at all.  The cake was so hard, it didn't even tasted like a cake!

Luckily nothing happened to us, and we got back to the rooms safely.  But I don't know if there is a next time I go there, if I would be so brave as to venture out again...It is definitely... not for the faint of heart!

Looks so good right? These were definitely misleading!!

First Impressions and stories of Mexico City

I was actually pretty excited at first for my long layover in Mexico City.  That is, until the stories came.  After a really really long day, we arrived in Mexico City and all of us just couldn't wait till we get to the hotel and pass out.

We got into our transportation that would take us to the hotel.  Barely leaving the airport, we hear police sirens...we started joking with the Spanish speaker that the cops were coming for him to search his bags...next thing we knew...the police was behind us and pulling us over.

He came up to the van and opened the doors, then started having a conversation with the Spanish speaker in Spanish...we had no clue, of course, to what was going on or what he was saying.  After waiting patiently in what seems like an eternity, the speaker tries to explain to us what the popo was saying.  He said basically there is going to be a new law (so its not even a law YET) that crewmembers are not allowed in this kind of van...so we're asking then whats the deal now? are we going to be able to go now? or what?

He said the popo was saying that we might get fined and blah blah blah...the pilot was like ok just go fine the airline...just let us go right now...besides it is NOT a law yet so what is the deal?  He (police) just kept talking and saying stuff in spanish for like another ten minutes and finally closes the van door and starts talking to the van driver.

Now that we had the doors closed, the speaker starts telling us that basically the popo was trying to get money out of us and how it was really corrupted over there.  He was saying all that talk about the "new law" was all bullshit and it was ALL about the money.

The van driver came back in the car and we drove off.  We asked him what happened and he said the police asked him to pay him some money and he'll let us go...we were shocked and asked him if he paid him.  He said no, he just told the stoopid ass that he don't have any money...

We couldn't believe that the police (the people that we would go to if we needed help in a foreign country) were like that over there...so we were like well I'm not sure I want to be out and about walking around...what if we run into another popo and get send to jail unless we pay them???

We get to the hotel, and I am admiring the decors because it was a really beautiful hotel.  I'm thinking ok...I can deal with hanging out here at the hotel and not going anywhere...this looks really nice!  You can see from some of the pictures here that I took...the room was huge and very very comfy...

And then...While we were checking in, the other flight attendant comes up to us and tells us another story to warn us...and totally scared me half to death!

Story...to be continued...