Being a tourist in the city I call home.....and a very scary man

Yesterday was one of those magical days where my love where my love of this city got completely re ignited. My friend Jill and I decided to hop on the train and enjoy the city. I can walk to the train from my apartment so the fact that I don't really ever use the train is a little silly.

The first leg of our trip was....interesting. We are sitting there for a few minutes when we hear them announce over the loud speaker that we are at the South West Museum. I perk up because I LOVE museums. We are bantering back and forth about what sort of museum we imagine this being when the man sitting directly across from us says its an "Indian" museum. Firstly, I don't use the word Indian unless I am talking about people from India. The man corrects himself and calls it the Native American Museum and we spend the next 10 minutes or so marveling and what the Native Americans were able to do without all the technology we have today, like building pyramids. This led to talking about the Great Wall of China. Did you know that at any given time there were 10 million people working on the wall and that it only took 10 years to construct? Pretty amazing. All the while a very umm, intriguing looking man sat and very clearly listened to everything we were saying without giving any input. Imagine a guy, about 6'4 with long white hair and not all of his teethe. Union Station quickly came and Jill and I exited the train and said goodbye to our new friend. I am not 5 ft off the train when the aforementioned traveler approaches me and with anger in his eyes says "Do you really think Indians have any value?" Okay...disclaimer. I am 5'0 and 110 Ibs soaking wet. I am also fearless and know full well that when it comes to arguing about things related to social justice or basic human rights I am pretty equipped to win. I am never what people expect and mostly people don't expect this little fashion girl to have any education or opinion about anything outside of what Louboutin's would look better. I can only imagine that my face got all sorts of twisted up and I said very adamantly "of course I do, they are people and people have VALUE". Reality then kicked in and I realized that this was a very large and potentially crazy man and potentially not someone I could have an educated conversation with. I found a hole in the crowd and quickly scattered away. Half frustrated that I wasn't able to "educate" this man and half relieved to have made it away.

We then made it over to Olvera Street. I had never been before but have always been struck by it from the street. I have been missing out because it is very much alive and a gem in this city that I call home. There were Mariachi's and people dancing. There were Churro's and other mexican pastries and every shop window was filled with vibrant traditional outfits. It was the sort of place that I knew I could spend day at if you let me.


to be continued....