In my neighborhood I have found several eating places that have never been mentioned in books or reviewed and this evening, I went to one of those not mentioned before: A Japanese café called Café King: Anime, Manga, Musica, juguetes y MAS!
Far away from México City’s China town in El Centro Historico and Korea town near La Zona Rosa sits a lone Japanese café called Café King in Col. Santa Maria al Ribera.
I know I had passed Café King several times but always thought of it as a store like the ones that in Mexico City’s China Town. I had never stopped to seriously inspect what was inside: until tonight. Tonight as I passed the place I saw people eating – a young mother and two of her very young children.
As I stepped into what I thought was a store, I asked the Asian looking fellow if they had food and he says, yea sushi and “onigiri.” I knew what sushi was but what was onigiri? He pointed to the boy eating what looked like rice ball wrapped with seaweed. Let me try one of those and so I did.
my tasty onigiri pictured below
Wow a not an Asian store but a Japanese Café here in my hood: As I waited for my onigiri with tuna, I looked at the television that was not too far from my table. On the TV was a Japanese game show – it was not live Japanese show but a DVD, one of 100’s that he sells in the shop.
As I was watched the game show, I couldn’t help but love that there big as life, on the screen, was a Japanese drag queen, dressed sort of like a geisha girl, but obviously a man. What I thought was cute was the mother eating in the café didn’t seem to mind that her children a boy of maybe seven, and girl of maybe five were watching a Japanese drag queen on television: or did she know?
My onigiri arrived and I bit into it. The rice ball didn’t fall apart, but held together because it was a made with sticky rice. It was good. As I ate I couldn’t help but enjoy and appreciate the small sumo wrestler providing me protection; see below.
As I ate, the owner talked to me. I could tell he found a curiosity about me for he had picked up on my Texas twang, observing that I was not from México. I loved his his Japanese Spanish accent too: Where are you from? Told him I was from Dallas Texas, had moved to México a little over two years ago. He said he was from Japan, being in México City for 16 years and being in his current location for two years; how could I have missed this café for the last year I that I have been living in this hood?
He asked where I lived. I told him: Said I lived was across the park and that I had a big terrace that overlooked the park. He said, above a café, I said yes, and he said, the one with the Chinese lantern AND I said that’s the one. I he said every time he passed that apartment, he always wondered who lived there. He thought it was a Chinese person or family. LOL. My friends often joked that my place looked like a Chinese buffet place with that lantern, they were almost right.
He said lots of young people come into his place to sit on the sofa and play the guitar; guitar and sofa is something I had already noted. He said the teenagers also like his anime and manga books too.
I picked up a sketchbook that was sitting on one end of my small table; he only has two tables in the whole place. I asked you like to sketch? Are you artist too? He giggled and said no, he doesn’t sketch. He said I was holding volume two. The volume one is already full. People like to draw and write in the notebooks he said.
I found the sketchbooks, school binder note books fascinating: Full of Japanese anime and manga sketches, poems and some scribbles of people just writing their names sort of like a guest book. Great documentation of visiting customers. Lovely.
The owner said he had good coffee and that I should come back and I said I would. Why not the food was OK and seemed like a delightful person – good heart and soul.
If you happen to be in Col. Santa Maria la Ribera stop by: Read and browse the books, eat sushi or onigiri and sketch in the book.
click photo above to see more pictures of my visit to Cafe King
Café King – Comida Japonesa, Anime, Manga, Musica, Juguetes y MAS
Jaime Torres Bodet 138 (1/2 block from the park – Alameda Santa Maria la Ribera)
Col. Santa Maria la Ribera
México City, MÉXICO
Monday – Saturday: 12 Noon – 8:00 PM
Yesterday I woke up and walked outside on to the balcony, something I normally do every morning: Greeting the morning and trying to get a feel for the day.
Well this morning I looked out and saw a pair of pants right in the middle of the street, having been pressed by the morning traffic.
Just how does one lose a pair of pants? Was he drunk and got hit by a car and all that was left were the pants? Was he running away from someone and gave him or her the slip?
Yep, Nothing surprises me anymore in Mexico City.
This is what I saw on the street the other morning.
That is my door entrance showing.
If they had been my size, I might have picked them up!
Life in my neighbor, Col. Santa Maria la Ribera, never seizes to amaze me; well really life in México: The real and surreal often side by side and inside one another.
Everyone knows that this county is just obsessed with soccer. I sit on my balcony and watch the park across the street, full of people walking their dogs, riding their bikes, jogging and kicking a soccer ball around. Almost everyday I see this one kid running home from high school, not to watch TV but to get his soccer ball so he can kick it around!
Kids don’t play catch here with a football like I see in Dallas but they do kick the soccer ball to each other or use their heads to bounce the soccer ball back and fourth.
Though my park across the street, Alameda Santa Maria, is lovely, there are no large empty spaces to use as a playing field. The park has too many trees, bushes, fountains, a BIG Moorish Kiosk in the middle of the park and too lots of walkways: really my park is a park to leisurely walk or sit and watch people.
I have often wondered, what a shame that my hood does not have a soccer field for the kids. BOY was I wrong.
Almost weekly I pass by these two houses on Salvador Diaz Miron #’s 80 and 84. They look like normal old houses but they are not, they are merely facades. The houses that were once homes is now a soccer field, no kidding. Today I passed by the houses and the door and windows were open and I could see inside: No rooms or furniture, but a SOCCER FIELD!
The facades of the homes liked nice and I could only wonder about the homes in my area: How many other homes in my neighborhood are not homes at all? Oh well, Welcome to Mexico.
Picture of the houses I pass weekly – doors and windows were open today.
AND this is WHAT I saw – a soccer field! LOL
