School, or El Prepo, in Mexico City. She wanted to study medicine, but upon arriving to the vibrant intellectual center of her country, she discovered political activists, artists, communists, and other people who dared to dream and question. Chopping off her hair and switching to overalls from the drab outfits of a good Catholic girl, Frida fell in with the Cachets, a group of pranksters led by Alejandro G=mez. One of the Cachets' victims of trickery was a tall and fat muralist, Diego Rivera, who was commissioned by the school to paint its auditorium. Spunky Frida stopped at nothing to annoy Rivera, 20 years her senior. She and the Cachets soaped the stairs so Diego would slip and fall, stole his lunch, and popped water balloons over his head. Only years later would her taunting and teasing of Diego evolve into a love affair.
In 1925, Kahlo suffered the bus crash that would ultimately and irrevocably change her life. Frida and her then-boyfriend Alejandro G=mez Arias were in Mexico City waiting for a bus that would take them to her home in Coyocßn, Mexico. The bus came, and they climbed on. As Frida and Alejandro chattered about her plans for medical school, the driver approached a risky intersection and decided to take his chances. Seconds later, an electric trolley rammed into the bus, destroying it and launching bodies everywhere. 18 year-old Frida disappeared in this confusion, and Alejandro, also injured, discovered her with a metal pole protruding from her abdomen. After someone pulled the pole out, an ambulance rushed her to the hospital, where doctors treated a fractured pelvis, a dislocated shoulder, two broken ribs, and shattered bones in the right leg and foot. This accident was the beginning of an unbearably painful series of physical ailments that would persist for the rest of Kahlo's short life. During her recovery, Kahlo turned to art, and wrote many unanswered letters to Alejandro. After one frustrating year of prol...