Diversión

Over the past couple of days I've investigated different Mexican entertainment options. This really is a wonderful but slightly bizarre country...

I was wandering down to La Roma (the Shoreditch of Mexico City) to find a light dinner, having eaten a huge lunch of five courses for less than £4 with my team. Having passed through a small park where people were jamming on guitars and drums, I found a few promising-looking places but settled on El Péndulo, a 'cafebrería' bookshop-cafe-bar-restaurant hybrid. It reminded me of Piola Libri in Brussels. I ordered a margarita and said yes when the waiter asked if I wanted it 'frapeada' (which looks worryingly like 'fraped' when written down, but is altogether different when spoken). It arrived with so much crushed ice that the ice was as tall as the glass! Alas, I don't have photo evidence but it was amazing. To balance out the tequila, I also ordered some mollárabes which are an example of fusion food at its best - toasted itta bread, stuffed with melted cheese, a touch of mayonnaise and avocado, with limes to squeeze and pico de gallo salsa to spoon on the top. I might have to reinvent this as a party snack soon.

The following night I went to the cinema to see Beautiful Creatures (which I would watch on a plane, but I wouldn't rush to watch on DVD). All quite a pleasant experience - quite roomy seats, virtually nobody in the cinema, lots of trailers for sci-fi films I probably won't watch. At the drinks-n-snacks counter, I was flummoxed by the many combo options but eventually settled on a 'combo movie meal', despite the assistant's slight disapproval when he described it as 'infantil'. It came with a vast quantity of popcorn, a reasonable size soft drink and a mini chocolate bar, and may go some way to explaining some of the plumper children you see around from time to time...

Last attraction was karaoke, but not as I have ever done it before. The scary thing was that it was public - there was a big stage with spotlights, with tables of guests looking up from smoke-machine shadows. More strange, though, was the compere, who made a massive build-up for everyone and said 'qué bonito!' after most people, even when it was very clearly not bonito at all. But even odder were the live drums and bass, which drowned out most of the singing, and the two backing singers, whose brief it was to subtly cover up the less tuneful among the karaoke-goers. Overall I think our group was among the most musically gifted - there was a table over the other side of the room which was ear-shatteringly dreadful, with one of their number, Jessica, nonchalantly checking her phone halfway through a song as she screeched through an interminable Spanish ballad. I was not among my group's leading lights, though, with a rather flat rendition of Don't Stop Believin' which improved slightly towards the end but started fairly awfully. This time I think being drowned out by the drums was a blessing... The best moment came when Kelly in our group sang Total Eclipse of the Heart, and the backing singers did a 360 turn every time they sang 'turn around'... comedy gold.