Yes, a ridiculous concept. Unless you were born and raised in Mexico City or have a strong preference for smog, altitude, overcrowding and poverty.

Then, most any city pales in comparison to Paris.

But this is the rare occasion when I wish I were in the distrito federale with Los Tricolores waving above me. Rather than the red, white and blue of France.

Why? Because the U.S. national soccer team is going to play Mexico in World Cup qualifying in Mexico City at 1 p.m. (PDT) tomorrow. (I wrote about this in a different vein and at greater length on my Countdown to South Africa blog.) And I haven’t missed a U.S.-vs.-Mexico Cup qualifier in Azteca Stadium … well, in two decades.

Some of my most interesting international soccer memories are tied up with Mexico City and Estadio Azteca.

(Including a harrowing trip to a Gold Cup finale, in 1993. During a rough, spiralling landing, during which keeper Tony Meola, sitting across the aisle from me, almost lost his lunch … my passport fell out of my pocket. I didn’t realize it was gone until I had left the airplane, and they wouldn’t let me back on to find it, and I just assumed I would have trouble escaping the country, but it was ended up at the lost-and-found at a United Airlines office, in the Mexico City airport, and I got it back on the way out of the country, against all odds. Turns out, to be honest, that back in 1993, a birth certificate would have been enough to get me on the plane, and I had a copy faxed down to me.)

So, yes, Azteca.

The place is located 7,200 feet above sea level, in a city choked by air pollution, and it is an enormous venue, startlingly vertical, that will be packed with 100,000-plus Mexico fans. There is a sense, at all times, of things about to spiral out of control. Now, that has not actually happened in my three visits for World Cup qualifiers (nor for my Gold Cup finale there). Imagine a Los Angeles Raiders home game, and that slight worry that Something Is About to Happen in the Stands, and multiply it by three, and that’s the feeling in Azteca.

There is a hint of recklessness in the air, of “authorities unable to control things” that makes it a bit intoxicating.

My memories of the last three qualifying matches:

1997: Jeff Agoos is sent off in the 32nd minute, and the 10-man U.S. team puts in a heroic effort, running itself into the ground and hanging on for a 0-0 tie. By the end, Mexico fans were jeering their own team for not scoring. That tie remains the only “result” the U.S. has taken out of Azteca in 23 tries. The Yanks are 0-22-1 down there.

2001: Mexico 1, U.S. 0, on a Jared Borgetti goal, and it wasn’t all that close. Mexico dominated the match, as I recall. I have a distinct memory of Landon Donovan, in his first visit to Azteca, running himself nearly to death, and getting fluids intravenously after the match. He looked like hell.

2005: Mexico 2, U.S. 1, and again, it wasn’t that close. Mexico led 2-0 at the half on goals by Borghetti and Antonio Naelson, and it was done done done. Coach Bruce Arena later suggested his team was adversely impacted by the altitude and ran out of gas a half-hour into the match. Well, maybe. Eddie Lewis scored on a nice shot from 19 yards, from a pass by Donovan, in the 59th minute, and it was a bit of history — the first U.S. goal in Mexico since 1984. But there were no quality chances after that, and after it was over, Donovan said, “I would like to play them anywhere but here. I would fancy our chances.”

That match, the 2005 match, was also the one that I drove to,  from Tijuana to Mexico City, in a rental car, with Damian Secore. We went through the Sonoran Desert to Hermosillo, skirted Los Mochis to get to Culiacan, took a detour to Fernando Valenzuela’s hometown of Navojoa, went past Mazatlan and on to a fishing village named San Blas, then to Guadalajara and the capital. I filed back to the paper all the way down, six consecutive nights, which isn’t easy when you’ve been on the road for eight or 10 or 12 hours, going 30 miles per hour behind a truck loaded with pigs.

We got to the team hotel the night before the game, and Landon Donovan saw us and said, “You look destroyed.”

But it was great fun.

What is sad is that I can find no trace of that series on the Web, and I know a batch of it was linked by this or that blogger and should have appeared on various L.A. News Group sites … but now it’s gone. I have hard copies in storage, but I’d like to link some or all of it here … sigh. Now I feel destroyed.

So, tomorrow’s match. Wish I were there. Even if it meant living Paris. Though the match likely will end badly, as it nearly always has, down there.

It would be fun to drive Mexico deeper down the qualifying table. But I expect the side that scores the first goal will win, and I assume it will be Mexico. Probably Giovani dos Santos, the half-Brazilian forward who has been snapped up by Tottenham.

I’ll see if I can find the match on TV somewhere here in Paris. I am not optimistic, however. Not when a couple of Euro sides also are playing qualifiers tomorrow night.