How can I access each element of a pair in a pair list?

Use tuple unpacking:

>>> pairs = [("a", 1), ("b", 2), ("c", 3)]
>>> for a, b in pairs:
...    print a, b
... 
a 1
b 2
c 3

See also: Tuple unpacking in for loops.

A 2-tuple is a pair. You can access the first and second elements like this:

x = ('a', 1) # make a pair
x[0] # access 'a'
x[1] # access 1

If you want to use names, try a namedtuple:

from collections import namedtuple

Pair = namedtuple("Pair", ["first", "second"])

pairs = [Pair("a", 1), Pair("b", 2), Pair("c", 3)]

for pair in pairs:
    print("First = {}, second = {}".format(pair.first, pair.second))

When you say pair[0], that gives you ("a", 1). The thing in parentheses is a tuple, which, like a list, is a type of collection. So you can access the first element of that thing by specifying [0] or [1] after its name. So all you have to do to get the first element of the first element of pair is say pair[0][0]. Or if you want the second element of the third element, it's pair[2][1].