Have you ever sat at a small table in a quaint, bustling cafe in Mexico on a rainy day? Have you ever ordered a breakfast that never arrived? Have you ever had a robust piece of frijole art in a heavy glass frame come crashing down on your small table, land directly on an artisanal glass cup full of purple sand and shatter? Have you ever listened to what happens in a bustling cafe when glass shatters and everyone instantly becomes quiet and stares in your direction? Well Yelp fam, this is precisely a small sampling of the experiences Randall and I encountered at Cafe Michelena's haunted frijoleria and biblioteca. I mean, I hella have to hand it to this establishment. The foyer is lined floor to ceiling with expensive art books (none of which you're actually allowed to touch or even look at), and the menu is robust and various in its offerings (even if they never intend on actually giving you your food). Randall and I found this cozy confines of this cafe after a week of traveling through the Mexican country side. Needless to say, I was hungry for a fucking crepe. Upon entering Michelena, we were greeted by a young girl with pan stuck in the multi-colored braces adoring her shape dientes. They asked us to wait and we did. We tried to read the art books and we were admonished. We tried sitting at a vacant table and we were scolded. We tried ordering food and we were ignored. Randall ordered from the Caucasian section of the menu: Fruit juice and a goddamn blueberry muffin. It was embarrassing to say the least. I have to hand it to him though. He tried ordering in Spanish. It sounded like this: "Ho-la, me jamo Randall. Yo ke-ero una blueberry muffina y una hu-gu de neringha". Yeah. This is the man I love. I was honestly so embarrassed that I just pointed at something random. It never came. What did come, was a massive piece of framed art, off its small, precarious hook and onto our table. The glass shards landed in our laps. Randall screamed. We refused to move and forced them to pick the glass pieces off our laps with their bleeding fingers. 3.5 hours later, Randall's muffin was rock hard, my food was still missing and we decided to leave. Randall stood up and with a flourish of disdain usually reserved for soccer Mom's, walked over to a tray of day old pastries, selected the apple injected croissant, slammed it on our table and declared it compensation for our troubles. We split it. 45 minutes later I had a cup of corn and mayonnaise and 2 churros. Viva Mexico. read more