MEXICO CITY — Michelle Obama , in her first solo foray abroad as first lady, said Wednesday that it’s time to break down barriers for disadvantaged youth and abandon “wrong and outdated ideas” about who’s worthy of becoming a leader.

She described herself and President Barack Obama as examples of leaders emerging from “unlikely places.”

On the second day of a three-day trip that took her to earthquake-devastated Haiti and on to Mexico , the first lady admired a huge Aztec stone wheel in a museum, played with underprivileged school children and practiced her Spanish.

“From the moment I arrived, I felt like I was entre amigos” — among friends, Obama told hundreds of students gathered at one of Mexico’s most elite universities, the Iberoamericana.

In a talk that focused on the burgeoning global youth population, she exhorted the students to examine their privileged status.

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MEXICO CITY — Making her first solo international foray, first lady Michelle Obama Wednesday met her Mexican counterpart and touched on the sensitive topic of drug treatment in a nation reeling from a war against narcotics cartels.

Mexican first lady Margarita Zavala received Obama at Los Pinos , the Mexican presidential compound near the Chapultepec Park in the heart of the capital. The two spoke for 45 minutes about “drug addiction treatment and early prevention programs” and care for migrant children, a White House statement said.

A battle between rival drug gangs in Mexico has left some 22,700 people dead since late 2006, and drug-related violence increasingly is hitting U.S. targets.

Gunmen killed three people linked to the U.S. consulate in Ciudad Juarez last month, and tossed a hand grenade into the U.S. consulate in Nuevo Laredo April 9 that shattered windows.

After their meeting, the two first ladies sped in a convoy to the Museum of Anthropology to view its Mayan and Aztec artifacts, then were to visit a primary school, Siete de Enero, serving underprivileged children. Later, Obama is to speak to university students.

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