Word: rinks
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Construction worker Macario Lopez has queued for four hours, along with his brothers, children, and nephews, to swap his cowboy boots for a pair of ice skates. He could never afford to take them to a commercial rink at $5 a head, he says. But the Christmas season has brought a colossal 34,400 square-foot open-air skating rink to the heart of Mexico City, in the central square known as the Zocalo. It's the largest rink in the world, its boosters claim, and more importantly, it's free...
...free mega rink is the brainchild of leftist Mayor Marcelo Ebrard, as part of his campaign to make this heaving mountain capital a more pleasant environment. Last spring, he shipped in tons of sand to build four urban beaches that were also a hit with residents, while inspiring dozens of comedy skits about plump sunbathers walking through gridlocked traffic. Ebrard has also built miles of cycle paths, on which he's posed for cameras atop his mountain bike on sunny Sundays...
...Surrounded by towering models of candles and a vast canvas of a moonlit lake, the rink is a surreal spectacle in the midst of Mexico City's grinding traffic, colonial churches, and endless protest marches. To add to the illusion of escape offered by the rink, huge speakers play sweet Spanish ballads as the skaters glide along the white surface...
...form chains," a supervisor urges over the public address system. "Don't smoke on the rink. Don't talk on your cell phones. It's for your own safety...
...rink has been an incredible success," the mayor recently told reporters. "Look how may people have come." He promised to open two more free ice rinks on the outskirts of the city, claiming that the project would also raise the level of Mexican contestants in figure skating tournaments. U.S. and Canadian skating champions whizzed round the rink at its opening, while a German team performed a choreography from Grease to applause from some 60,000 spectators...