Mexico City, previously known as Distrito Federal, one of the biggest cities in the world, the capital of Mexico, land of smells, noises, culture, music, history, amusement, and chaos. If you’re actually moving in: welcome! You’ve chosen one of the best cities in our country to live, trust me. I’m not a defeña, I’m a chilanga (an urban term for people who weren’t born here but live in Mexico City) and I don’t regret moving to Mexico City. Here is everything you need to know before moving to Mexico City.
If you’re planning to visit this city, you’ll probably stay safe, go to the most touristic places like monuments and museums, pyramids or take the hop on hop off bus, but you may want to know some local survival tips.
First of all, you must choose wisely where you’re gonna live. If you come here for work and it’s an office or a static location, you definitely want to be near. Most offices concentrate in Polanco and Santa Fe. Those are expensive places to live, there are almost no residences but apartments, and luxury apartments at that. If you can afford one, that’s fine, but if it overpasses your budget, don’t worry, there are plenty other options and at a very acceptable distance.
For Polanco there are these neighborhoods:
Granada, Ampliación Granada, Irrigación, Lomas de Sotelo. If none of this convinces you, just make sure you’re as close as possible from one of Line 7 subway stations, because Metro Auditorio, Metro San Joaquin and Metro Polanco are the closest stations to the economic conglomerates.
If you are planning to rent or buy a car, you want to get to know the city first. This is a concrete jungle, literally. People in Mexico City are very friendly, but when it comes to the road, most of them forget modals; this is not a matter of rudeness, people are mostly in a hurry and distances here can be a pain in the ass, which supports point N°1. Driving in Mexico City could be easily considered an extreme sport. The worst times to be behind the wheel are: at 8 am in the morning because most people have to be at work at 9; and after 6 pm, because those same people leave work, so chaos and crowds meet.
Public transportation is an option as long as you don’t have to take too many, if you live in the metropolitan area, like Estado de México, there won’t be a subway station near, so you’d probably have to take a bus and it’s not very safe, not to mention that they are slow and drivers are not careful at all. Subway is under surveillance 24/7, so inside you couldn’t be safer.
One of Mexico’s cultural contributions is traditional food. There’s a huge variety of typical food that you can find in several spots of the city, but my advice is to avoid ambulant food near the subway or bus stops because those places are not very clean and you can end up with an infection. There are several gourmet and non-gourmet markets where you can eat delicious, at a reasonable price and very clean food, one of those is Coyoacán, there’s a market in there that most of the offer is seafood, typical dishes and in the streets of Coyoacán you can find elotes (corn), churros, crisps or traditional candies. Some other very popular spots for street food is Condesa and Roma, those two have a ton of restaurants for all kinds of preferences, vegetarian, carnivore, vegan or gourmet.
If you’re heading somewhere either walking or driving or in public transportation, you need confidence. Wherever you’re going, you need to show confidence, otherwise, you’ll make people notice that and they’ll think you’re wasting their time or they can take advantage of your lack of confidence. Pickpockets, muggers and scammers will smell that. You have to be patient when it comes to driving, if you change lanes as soon as one flows, you’ll find yourself trapped; most people are in a hurry, so stay polite and calm but confident, don’t let stress take over your emotions.
This is a huge city, streets are not straight and names can be tricky; you can find two streets named the same and with a difference of 10 miles between them. Your best friend to find someplace here will be google maps. I used to get lost here when I moved in, but with a lot of effort, unlucky situations where I ended up lost and accepting I needed a lot of help, I managed to memorize the most common routes in my routine.
If there’s a place in Mexico that has everything, that’s got to be Mexico City, so enjoy your stay, have fun and explore it as you want, but keep in mind this advice to make your experience safe and more practical. Moving to Mexico City will be the adventure of a lifetime.
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