In any case, this is an Italian-themed restaurant that serves only fresh pasta with the best meat. The chefs are artists and the cooking area is right in front of me. The gas stove has flames that rise up over pans 10 inches in the air and the chef moves the pan contents up in the air to touch the flames directly so as to provide color and flavor.
Everything on this gas range seems under control. But truly, if I saw that scene in my kitchen, I would be reaching for the fire extinguisher or calling 911! But in dish after dish, with beautiful precision, these chefs are serving up glorious concoctions at perhaps one-third the price of what you would pay in New York City.
Meanwhile, the dessert chef is now building the third tiramisu of the evening. Each layer of freshly baked cake is carefully placed between artfully applied fresh whipped cream along with berries that she pulls from small bowls and applies with small tongs. Just before serving, something magical happens with a rose. It is crumbled atop the entire work of art and served.
The focus of this chef on this one dish is a marvel. Her eyes and attention are solely on the prize, and nothing can distract her. It’s science and art combined, right on the spot, and solely for human consumption. I’m just sitting here with a glass of iced mescal and in awe of everything taking place before my eyes.
The customers here are not rich, not fancy, but they are enormously happy. The lighting is perfect. The décor is old world. The smells inside are glorious and just outside—the large glass front doors are open—smells of fruits and wood, with a gentle breeze.
I’m fully aware that when Americans like me travel the world, we can get a case of dopey romanticism about another country. We are guests and treated well. And we very easily overlook the downsides by staying away from the poverty and sadness. We stay in places others cannot afford and so on.
And U.S. income levels make it possible to live very well in poorer countries. We dare not impart our experiences to imagine that others native to the country experience the same.
With those provisos: Mexico City is a wonder. It feels like heaven. I’m seeing things that seem to have been eviscerated in American culture. Things like: pride in work, expertise, and hospitality. Also affordability! My meal at this restaurant is again one-third of what I would pay anywhere in the United States.
How dare Americans presume to look down on this country! After being here just a few days, I’m really rethinking this idea of what is rich. The United States has the highest GDP of any country in the world but where are the manners, the work ethic, the hospitality, the normal human concern for others?
The last three years in the United States seems to have wrecked the culture in many ways. It’s not just lockdowns and masking but also woke ideology that has everyone questioning everything about religion, country, tradition, and even basic gender distinctions. It has nearly criminalized the recent past.
There is no presence of any of this in Mexico. As for technology, yes, Mexico is “behind” so that cell reception comes with 3G, but somehow even that charmed me. The internet in my $50 a night huge hotel room—with a living room and a bedroom balcony with glass and iron doors that overlooks the city—is faster than what I get in the United States.
It’s true that I can look outside my window and see clotheslines and rooftop chicken coops but I will just be frank: this stuff looks refreshingly honest to me. True blue. Air-dried clothes are whiter and fresh than any dryer can make them regardless. And I don’t know what’s going on with those chickens but the one I ate last night had actual flavor, as incredible as that sounds.
The World Bank and all fancy economists imagine that they know what it means to be rich. They count up the beans and rank the countries. The IMF is always on hand to give advice to countries on how to get richer so that they can ascend up the ranks. The idea is that everyone should be like the United States.
But is that even true? What does it mean to be rich? U.S. culture is being taken over by surveillance, hectoring, a government-controlled media, and badgering, overeducated, and under-talented managers who do nothing but tell other people what to do, plus huge class divisions that feel more medieval than modern.
And this is what we want to call rich? In many ways it is miserable.
The cultural revolution in America has caused generations to lose touch with basic manners and civic norms, to feel embarrassed about who we are and our own history. Not so in Mexico. It seems blessedly free of all that. Last night I went into a store with a hat on and the doorman asked me to take it off. He was exactly right! No gentlemen should ever wear a hat indoors. Try telling that to a man in the United States and see what happens.
One of the features of lockdowns has been extreme travel restrictions. I got a new passport two years ago and only just the other day did it get stamped for the first time. It felt like a ceremony. I’m finally getting out. I too acquiesced to the fear, the temptation to become narrow and lazy, to stay put and comply. And even now, the United States won’t allow the unvaccinated from any country even to enter the country.
They tried to make us all parochial, isolated, and ignorant. They tried to demoralize us and take away our rights even to travel or invite guests from other places. Indeed I had forgotten what it was like to see the world even though my last passport was stamped several times on every page. I found myself with inordinate anxiety about even coming to Mexico.
I’m so glad I did. I might have been on the verge of forgetting what truly matters and how big and wonderful the world really is. Freedom imparts that to us while despotism takes it away. This trip is beginning to make me rethink many things such as what prosperity really is. Are we really prosperous if we are not free and if we are spied on, locked down, mandatorily medicated, and our churches and businesses shut on a whim?
All COVID nonsense aside, my experience here has reminded me of something very important. You can say what you want to about GDP and all economic data but there is no way to truly separate what it means to be rich from what it means to live a good life. You cannot take away the good life and point to data and tell people to be happy. The font of human happiness comes not from the World Bank and the World Health Organization. It is an affair of the heart that desires freedom. Take that away and you lose everything.
