I Am So Popular: Estoy Muy Popular!

Besides, bad Spanish sometimes comes in mighty handy for bad puns and other forms of amusement. For example, take the cop—the one with the ginormo belly spilling over his belt and casting a sombrero-esque shadow over his crotch— who pulled us over as we drove on the outskirts of Monterrey, Mexico on our way to the state of San Luis Potosi. Him I dubbed Po-Po de Puerco, a right I do believe I earned after I flat out bribed him, with a fistful of US $20s, to shut his pie hole and let us drive on. (I also thought I deserved a fotografia with him, but my cohorts seemed uneager to translate this request.)

Thank to Po-Po de Puerco, I now know what it feels like to be profiled and misjudged based on appearances. Considering we weren’t driving anywhere near as fast as the folks flying by us, why’d he pull us over? Easy—to his eyes, we were a carful of honky gringos with Texas tags. He had no idea that of the four of us, only one—yo soy—had been born in the US. And only one—yo soy tambien—did not speak Espanol perfecto. Or that two of us happened to have lived in Mexico for many years.

He wanted 3,000 pesos, cash on the spot—a little less than $300. My friend, the driver, told him about fifty million things inside of thirty seconds, though the only words I understood were Mira aqui senor!! (Look here, mister!) and NO! (No!) Po-po said he was willing to drop down to 2,000 pesos. Cop Haggling! Could this be the next reality show?

Finally, sick of his caca de toro, I trotted out my inimitable Americano Stupido routine—the bad Spanish that drives Juarren and Luc nuts— and started stuffing twenties into his chunky little fingers, knowing everyone speaks cash. Of course after the fact, we had many, many good ideas as to how we might’ve better handled the matter. For example, everyone should’ve followed my lead and pretended not to know a lick of Spanish. And Juarren pointed out that we didn’t get a receipt. So when we passed Po-Po just up the road—having pulled over another “speeder”—we drove up and demanded one. To which he replied, “You know that’s not how it works down here.”

And how does it work “down there” in Mexico? Well, let’s begin our journey north of the border. I know, from many trips down, that whenever one announces one is going to Mexico, one will be told repeatedly that one is going to be kidnapped and/or shot the minute one sees the Nuevo Laredo ciudad limits sign. I am not entirely poo-pooing these unsolicited warnings—things have gotten hairier for sure. But should I stay locked in my room and let intimidation deter my wanderlust? I know there are no guarantees in life, but I do think one can exercise some common sense and be somewhat safe.

Toward that end, the week before we left, I was listening to This American Life, and they happened to be doing a segment on what to do if you’re kidnapped in a foreign country. Curiously, the only two examples they gave were Mexico and the Middle East, the two spots I’ve picked for vacation this summer. In Mexico, you are supposed to ask your kidnappers for a bible, first thing. In the Middle East, you are definitely NOT supposed to ask for a bible.

I asked Juarren, the Middle Easterner, to teach me how to ask for a bible in Spanish (“Da-me una biblia”). Then, to further hedge my bets, I asked him how to say, “Jesus Christ is my lord and savior!” To which he responded with a string of words that, even though no comprendo exactly, yo knew for damn sure these words did not have anything to do with JC and, more likely, probably meant, “I will blow your German shepherd and your pet goat if you will bring me a bible, some hot sauce, and a cell phone pronto.”

But we didn’t get kidnapped, so the bible continues to remain a mystery to me. And though we took lots of small back roads through the desert, we hardly saw any federales either. The biggest fear, for me anyway, always comes at the very end of the thirteen hour drive, when we rapidly ascend a mountain on a cobblestone road in the dead of night, to an altitude of 9,000 feet, not a guardrail in sight. Then through a one-way tunnel before at last arriving in Real de Catorce, our final destination. (If you’ve ever seen that shitty movie, The Mexican, you have seen images of Real, which is a magnificent village with breathtaking views.)

We also did not suffer Montezuma’s revenge. On the other hand, after bragging how, during many prior trips, I had no trouble acclimatizing, instant karma seized me, to the tune of a thin-air headache so bad I had to lie very, very still for three days. Then, when I tried to clean my glasses, I realized that my glasses weren’t smeared-- my eyeball was. Self-diagnosis courtesy of Google suggested a High Altitude Retinal Hemorrhage. Put more romantically, the entire world, as viewed through my right eye, appears to have been painted by Monet. (Juarren, bless his corazon, said if only I’d blown out my retina last November instead, he could’ve saved the money he spent taking me to the impressionistic museums in Paris last December.)

Despite legal blindness in my right eye (which allegedly will resolve eventually) and the loss of $140 to a corrupt cop and the lectures from everyone and their mother (and my mother) about how one should never go to Mexico, you will not find me complaining one bit about my decision to go. If you are in the market for a cheap vacation to a magical place in a foreign country with wonderful food and really nice people, guess what? You can make it to the border in three hours, and somewhere lovely not long after that.

We saw sculptures in the desert, hiked up to silver mine ruins, witnessed a pilgrims’ vigil in an ancient church full of scary gray-skinned Jesus statues sporting real hair and deep bloody gashes. We hung out with Abuelita Yolanda who lives in the most wonderful, light filled, off-the-grid, tiny house up past the old cemetery. We do not share a language, but I bring her yarn—we both knit—and she gives me her signature chipotle sauce, which most of my friends can’t tolerate, but which I could drink with a straw.

Our final evening, before catching an overnight bus back to Austin, we saw a play for children. Unable to understand a word the characters were saying, I was left to my own devices to interpret this piece, which I think was called Night of A Thousand Demons. In the end, I decided it was a cross between a PSA for Burning Man and a dramatic rendering of what a bitch I am to Juarren in the mornings before I have my coffee. (In fact, I was so horrified to see a reflection of my un-placatable, pre-caffeinated self that, no shit, I quit coffee upon our return.)

With the trippy visions of that play dancing in my head, I headed through the tunnel and back down the mountain to wait for the bus near the tiny, government sponsored chapel built into the bus station. Tearing my eyes away from the saints painted on the walls, I turned in time to see another bus getting ready to pull out. To my shock and delight, the spare driver was stowed away in the luggage compartment beneath the bus.

Sometimes when I travel, I get so torn up. I want to live in the place I visit and, at the same time, I want to go home and never leave again, so much do I love my own little corner in my own little chair. But I always head back out again. Because out there, beyond the warnings, the threat of unspeakable crimes and reality of unspeakable languages, I always find a million little adventures, details unique to wherever I am. Esta porque no parar por nigngun momento!

Spike Gillespie is considering running away to Mexico permanently. She blogs for JetBlue, KnitBuzz, and her own damn self. She’s teaching a series of writing classes in the Fall. Email spikegillespie@gmail.com for details.