Mexico City

The single most important piece at Antropología is the so-called Aztec Calendar, actually The Sun's Stone, which depicts all cycles of mankind (according to the Aztecs, they were living under the "fifth sun", mankind having been destroyed four times before):



You'll may notice two things about this rock: one is a 4 X 13 pattern, and the other, that it seems to show the cardinal points: North, West, East, South.
Aztecs believed that time and space are intertwined. This room today is different from this room yesterday... oddly enough, it will be the same room, but reborn, 52 (13 x 4) years from now.

By the way, the Aztec Calendar was discovered today 222 years ago.

This is Coatlicue, the Aztec goddess of fertility, known as the "The one with a serpents' skirt". You can easily imagine the Spaniards believing that the Aztecs were devouts of the Devil:



An Olmec warrior:



Tláloc and Quetzalcóatl (Toltec culture):



Chac Mool (Mayan and Toltec):



The Stone of Sacrifices (Aztec):

A cool Mayan death mask:



An Estela from Oaxaca:



A Mayan stone relief:



The Museum is huge. I am not sure if I have visited it all.

Part of the Museum is for temporary exhibits of other cultures: China, Persia, Russia, etc.

Loved all your museum photos - that's one of my favorite museums ever.
For some reason, I'm especially fond of Tlaloc. I kept a postcard of the sculpture for years.

Also, that was one of the most interesting water features I'd seen (up until then, which would have been '66). I remember being amazed.

Tláloc was quite bloodthirsty, osso.
He was specially fond of children.
Quetzalcóatl was the cool one.

Yet another feature of old Chapultepec, the National Auditorium. All kinds of concerts are held there:

Finally, on a corner of old Chapultepec (actually behind the Fountain of Nezahualcóyotl), we find Los Pinos, the President's residence.

This is the outside:



Inside entrance:

We keep on moving west and now to the second section of Chapultepec, or "New Chapultepec" as it was known in my childhood.
It was more of a forest and started to work as a park in the early sixties:



Here we can see one of the artificial lakes, and the classy restaurant osso dined in.
You can also see the National Auditorium behind, but distances are deceiving.

As a park, I like the old section better. The second section of Chapultepec has a few attractions and a hidden wonder.

These are the well-known attractions:

The "Fair":



"Papalote", the interactive museum for children:



The Technology museum:

Oh, well.

(I probably read that but forgot)

It was all very different than anything I'd seen before.



On the classy restaurant, yes, we were guests. The female pal I went with was blond.

The hidden wonder is called El Cárcamo.

The idea was to integrate public art to a functional building.
It is built over a chamber of the early XX Century that distributes water from the rivers Cutzamala and Lerma to Mexico City.
The ensamble, made in 1951, reunites hidraulic and civil engineering, public architecture and mural art by Diego Rivera. Art and science get together in the benefit of society.

In the front, a statue of Tláloc in the water, made by Rivera



In the inside, a mural by Rivera (creationists, beware!): "Water and the origin of life". On the lower levels, microscopic creatures; in the middle levels, sea and river life; on the higher levels, humans, and people receiving water in the pipes. On the balcony, the engineers and scientists that designed the water system:

As we go back to the city center, we notice Chapultepec has many statues of foreign leaders:

Churchill:



Marshall Tito:



Gandhi:



Roosevelt:



... and Azerbaiyani dictator Aliyev:



The outrage about Aliyev's statue has led to a commission being formed to see if they can take it (or hide it) elsewhere.

We are now at my neigborhood, Colonia Anzures, a middle and upper-middle class zone. It's close to many things: 1/2 a mile to the Museum of Modern Art, about 1 mile to the Museum of Anthropology or the Angel of Independence; 2 1/2 miles to Bellas Artes; a bit more than 3 miles to Zócalo. And, most important, less than 2 miles to my workplace.
Half of Colonia Anzures -the one I live in- does not allow buildings over 3 stories high; which makes it more livable than supposedly more "posh" neighborhoods.
And they say Anzures has an everlasting autumn; fallen leaves all year round.

Now, the only "attraction" of my neighborhood is Hotel Camino Real, which used to be the top hotel in the city from 1968 to the early 90s. I love its architecture; a special place:





And it has some very interesting murals inside.

This one by Tamayo:



And this one by pop artist Pedro Friedeberg:

Anzures barely touches Chapultepec.

South of the park we find Colonia San Miguel Chapultepec, a middle-class neighborhood



And Tacubaya, which used to be the town nearest Mexico City until it got swallowed in the turn of the XXth Century:





Some parts of Tacubaya are nice, but it's mostly downtrodden:

South of the 2nd section of Chapultepec we find several working class neighborhoods: Colonias Cove, Observatorio and Daniel Garza



Also the Civil Cemetery, the biggest in the city.
Inside it, the Rotonda of Illustrious Persons:

I particularly like the Roosevelt and the Churchill.

The statue on Gandhi; his ribs are showing prominently. I've seen statues of Gandhi in India, but none that shows his ribs as that one.

I have personally seen this one in Pondicherry.

I agree with you. But I'm also fond of the Gandhi, since I run in the park right behind his statue, the famous "Circuito Gandhi" for joggers and runners.
The Roosevelt is only a few yards away, next to the circuit that allows dogs.

Your photo says: "the requested URL /reply/http://www.google.com/imgres was not found on this server."

Still? I changed it to tinypic.