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Mexico
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MEXICO

Capital: Mexico City (est. pop. 19,750,000)

Population: 104,907,991

Area: 1,972,550 sq. km.

Economy: In 2002, Mexico ranked 53rd in the UN's Human Development Index survey and 13th in total GDP, with a per capita GDP of $8,897. In 2001, 26.47% of its revenues went to foreign debt service and 40% of its population lived in poverty.

Main Language: Spanish

Monkey's Name: El Monito (El Moh-nee-toh)

Fun Fact: Mexico's best known drink must be tequila, a strong liquor distilled from the spiny leaves of the blue agave plant. Much like the French regional designations for Champagne and Cognac, Mexico's strict tequila codes dictate that only five areas of the country can legally produce a drink called tequila.
The Monkey isn't sure how many times he's been to Mexico. What is certain is that he has been to far more places in this massive country than his photos attest to. Alas, despite spending time in mammoth Mexico City, colonial Puebla, beauttiful Guanajuato, and elsewhere, the only place the Monkey remembered to get his photograph taken was in Quintana Roo, a state fronting the Caribbean on the Yucatan Peninsula. It's not all a wash, because the Monkey did get some good shots at the beautiful seaside Mayan temple at Tulum.

Mexico is one of Latin America's most vibrant countries (which is saying something in this part of the world). It is blessed by having been the center of a number of indigenous cultures that built some of the world's great civilizations. Today, these indigenous cultures—both living and defunct ones—remain a vital part of the Mexican identity. Spain's conquistadors were amazed by the complexity, ingenuity, and splendor of these societies, though that didn't stop them from ransacking the various pre-Columbian nations that once ruled Mexico.

Modern Mexico is a truncated country, having lost much of its territory to the expansionism of the 19th Century United States. Nonetheless, the country is enormous, thriving, and influential. Its 1917 Revolution was only outstripped by that of Russia, and many an exiled Latin American intellectual has found safe haven in accomodating, non-interventionist Mexico. While the country is home to the buzzing megalopolis of Mexico City, often considered the world's largest city and undoubtedly one of Latin America's chief cultural centers, it also contains countless quiet villages where rural Mexican life goes on at its own pace. The country's people, cuisine, architecture, and unique cultural hybrid make it an unforgettable place to visit.

Of course, that didn't stop the Monkey from repeatedly forgetting to have his picture taken there.

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The Monkey gets himself into a prickly situation in Tulum, Mexico.

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