About a month ago, I was given the incredible opportunity to visit Mexico City, Mexico as a staff member and representing MLJ Adoptions. Having traveled to Mexico before for pleasure, I thought I would know what to expect. However, I was unaware of how biased my approach was. Having only traveled to Cozumel prior to this trip, I had no idea what Mexico City was like. If you’ve never been to Cozumel, it’s basically a tourist destination made for one reason: to reel in tourists and make a profit for businesses and locals. In my opinion, Cozumel and other tourist cities of Mexico (like Cancun or Zihuantanejo) masks the reality of their culture. There are astonishing differences between these cities.
Mexico City and Cozumel are almost entirely different. For one, most people in Cozumel were bilingual in Spanish and English. Since Mexico City is the second biggest city in the Western Hemisphere, I had also convinced myself that English would have been spoken. This was not the case, however. Most of the time, MLJ’s foreign staff in country assisted in translating our English into Spanish and vice versa in order to understand and communicate with the residents of Mexico. This went for people in restaurants, shops, our hotel staff, and even most government officials we met with.
Although I experienced somewhat of a culture shock, I still managed to enjoy the experience I had there. Geographically, the city is mountainous and sits at a high elevation (so no mosquitos!). The terrain gave us some beautiful landscapes to view and the climate was perfect during our trip.
The reason for this trip was to meet with our newly hired foreign staff and to meet with the DIF office in the state of Queretaro in hopes of receiving a better number of referrals. Overall, the orphanage was extremely clean and well maintained. Although the experience of visiting the orphanage was highly emotional, it was comforting to know that kids who lived in this orphanage were well taken care of.
Alongside business components of my trip, I was also fortunate enough to visit various parts of the culture and history through sightseeing. The staff and I had the chance to visit the Pyramid of the Sun, Castille De Chapultepec, and downtown Queretaro. (See below!)
Although I experienced somewhat of a culture shock, I still managed to enjoy the experience I had there.
Families adopting from Mexico are required to travel as part of their adoption process. Mexico offers many options for site seeing and tourism that will keep adoptive families occupied during their trip and also allows them to become familiar with their adopted child’s history and culture.
If you are interested in adopting from Mexico, please visit our website for additional information on requirements and getting started.
