This is a
continuation of the my brief sojourn to Mexico in April 2011. I'm
currently on a flight between Charlotte and Chicago and got got hooked
up with an exit row seat, so it seemed like a good time to finish this
up. The first part covered my time in a Mayan Riviera resort with Mikey
and Shannon. This part will cover my solo trip through the Yucatan to
Campeche and Merida. Both were brutally hot, but interesting in their
own way.
First thing's first - Mexican buses rule. You're not doing the whole greyhound thing when you're cruising between towns in Mexico if you have any sort of money whatsoever. The primera class and ejecutivo buses have big, lazyboy-like seats with your own personal video system and tons of leg room. After heading down to Playa del Carmen, I boarded one of these bad boys to head about six hours away to Campeche, the capital of a state called...Campeche. Go figure.
I was all sorts of confused at the bus station, but eventually got it sorted out despite my shitty Spanish. The ride there was entirely devoid of entertainment - it was just bush on either side of the road for the entire time, other than than going by a huge prison right outside of the city that didn't exactly inspire feelings of safety.
My first night there was game seven of the Canucks/Hawks series. The Canucks had been up 3-0, but pissed away the series and were down to the wire. I wasn't about to miss that game, so I headed over to the Oxxo (best store ever) to grab some beer. But...Oxxo's in Campeche don't sell beer. What the hell? They do everywhere else. I went back to my hotel and asked where to grab beer, and they pointed at the restaurant across the street.
"Uh, no...I want to buy some to drink in my room?"
*blank stares*
Well fuck. I guess I was doing this sober, because the game started in 15 minutes. It's fucking Mexico though - you can usually get beer from just about anywhere. What the hell? I was surprised the concierge wasn't selling them out of a cooler in the fucking lobby along with t-shirts and sunglasses. But nope. Sober hockey it is.
The Canucks were up 1-0 for most of the game, but gave up a goal late to go to OT. When Burrows scored in overtime, I completely lost my shit, knocked my netbook onto the floor (almost breaking it) and ran around my hotel room screaming like a retard. Sober. About a minute later, there was a loud knock on my door that killed my euphoria. I answered it, and there was a big (well, Mexican big - so like 5'6) security guard standing there, asking me questions in Spanish that I didn't understand. I guess I was a little louder than I thought.
"I'm sorry...uh, lo siento? That's right isn't it? Uh, I'm sorry. Hockey, me very happy."
*blank stare*
He came into the room and looked around, like there was gonna be 12 other people in there. I just pointed at my netbook on the floor. He didn't get it. So I pointed at myself and made the universal shhh sign with my finger to my lips. He said "SI SENOR!" and rattled off some other shit I couldn't understand. Then left, shaking his head. I didn't give a shit though, the Canucks finally put away the Hawks!
I went out exploring after that, waving at the security guard as I passed through the lobby. He just gave me the "I have cramps" look that most women give me when I try to talk to them. It was still really hot, but Campeche is really nice, especially at night. It's an old walled city on the water (the walls were built to defend against pirates) with narrow, picturesque streets and a pretty laid back pace. The malecon (beach walk) was amazingly nice, and devoid of people. No beaches, but still cool. There were also a lot of funky buildings along with the old walls themselves to check out.
After cooking in the heat for a while, I retired to the restaurant across from the hotel (where they spoke English! Huzzah!) and grabbed some killer food and a few pacificos. The next day was exactly the same, minus the hockey. Just chilled, wandered around, went to the Oxxo for snacks and the restaurant for dinner, and enjoyed the ambiance of a non-touristy Mexican city on the water.
The next day, I headed north to Merida. It's only about 2 hours away, but I still took the fancy bus because it was about four dollars more than the regular one. This is when I came across something known as the first-class waiting room. Apparently all bigger Mexican bus stations have one, but I didn't see it in PDC. And folks, they fucking rule.
Instead of dealing with the oppressive heat out in the station with everyone else, you can go chill in an air-conditioned room with TV, free drinks, newspapers, the whole deal. It was 39 celsius in Campeche that day, so I'm sure you can imagine how happy this fat kid was when I figured that out. The best part is that it was only separated by a glass window, so all the people dying in the heat sit there and stare at you, basking in AC and drinking a Corona, and seethe with anger. Sorry homie, I guess I got Juan up on you this time. Aaaand that's my shitty joke out of the way for this blog.
Merida turned out to be even hotter than Campeche. Like, unbearable can't-go-outside-or-you'll-die hot. I think it was 42 one day and 43 the next. I explored as much as I could, but only in short spurts. None of the bars or restaurants had AC and even Mexicans were all "why did you come here in April? Are you retarded?" when they'd talk to me. In English. Tons of people in Merida spoke English, which surprised me. It was a bigger tourist destination than I thought, apparently.
After checking out the zocalo (second-nicest I had seen in Mexico so far behind Puebla) and having a few beers here and there, I went for a walk though the area where all the colonial houses were. It wasn't the type of architecture I expected to see in the Yucatan, but the buildings were really cool. And the city was quite affluent by Mexican standards. I was impressed, except for the heat.
Shit got weird back at my hotel though. As I was walking through the main corridor that separated the lobby from the back of the hotel, I had to step in between some dudes that were on both sides of the hallway. I didn't touch any of them, or do anything in particular that could have pissed them off, but one of them yelled out "Fuck gringo! Fuck you!" after I passed by. I just ignored him and continued walking, thinking he was just drunk or something. It turns out he wasn't drunk, just fucking crazy. I wouldn't find that out until the next day though.
After getting up early and going for another long walk before it got really hot out, I headed to the lobby of the hotel to grab some lunch. It was basically a a big square, probably 100 feet on each side with tables scattered throughout and a covered roof with a bunch of birds chillin on the inside, swooping down to steal any food they could. I'd never really seen anything like it in a hotel, but it was cool nonetheless. At 34 bucks a night, it's tough to argue with oddities like this place.
Anyway, I sat off to the side where I could plug in my laptop and was busy writing about some UFC event and mainlining coronas. I was pretty oblivious to everything going on around me, until I got splashed with a shitload of water and saw a cone cup land on the table beside me. The fuck? I look up, and see the angry vato from the night before walking by. Not stopping, not looking at me, but yelling "Fuck you gringo! Fuck you!" while heading for the exit. There was a dude walking beside him, presumably a friend of his, looking at him but pointing at me with the universal WTF look on his face. He then looked at me and gave me the universal "I'm sorry!" face, but fuck that. I wanted to know what this kid's fucking problem was.
"Hey!" I yelled as I stood up, with everyone looking at me. "What is your fucking problem?"
I guess he had been waiting for me to respond, because he immediately stopped at the sound of my voice and turned around. "Fuck you, you fucking gringo! Get out of of here or you gonna get fucked up!"
Now I'm a big dude, but I'm hardly the kind of guy that goes looking for confrontations. I have a big mouth that frequently gets me into trouble, but I can usually either talk my way right back out of it or just stand up and look scary. That works 99% of the time. This time though, I was fucking pissed off because I didn't do a god damned thing to make this guy mad. That, and I had about 10 coronas before 2pm. I lost my temper, which almost never happens, but I never even got out of the angry starting gate. His friend took care of that quite nicely for me.
By slapping his buddy in the back of the head, as hard as he could.
The bitchslap echoed through the square, and everyone went from looking at me to looking at them. Like, in unison. It was like a tennis match where the ball got hit across the court and the entire crowd's eyes followed. That snapped me out of seeing red as fast as I had seen it in the first place, and I started to laugh. It was quite similar to a kid that says something stupid and his mom swats him for embarrassing her. But it was two adult males. It was too ridiculous not to laugh at. And if defused everything.
The slapper pushed the idiot through the lobby door and came right back to me, giving me the prayer signal that signified apology the whole way. Once he got over to me, he was extremely apologetic and explained that his buddy was, in his own words, "angry a lot". He said that I had pissed him off by walking by the night before without excusing myself, as he had been in the middle of a conversation. I apologized for that and said I had no idea. He brushed that off and said his buddy was just constantly looking for a fight, and anything set him off.
"Especially white people. He usually picks smaller ones though," he said with a laugh.
I laughed my ass off at that. Before I could say anything else, he flagged down the waitress, ordered me two coronas and paid for them, then apologized once again. He introduced himself as Javier, shook my hand, told me there wouldn't be any more trouble, and left. Nice dude. Every crazy dude should have a handler like that. It totally reminded me of when the crazy Latvian guy wanted to kill me in the Stockholm airport just for wearing an Alex Ovechkin jersey, but his buddy came to the rescue.
Not much happened after that. I headed back to Cancun for a night before I flew home. Staying in town is 100 times better than out in the hotel zone. I had a kickass huge room for 40 bucks a night, right in the middle of the more authentic action. I took a pass on that and watched UFC 129 on my netbook in my room though. I got all pissed off when the wifi cut out right before the main event, then started watching TV out of frustration...and the show was on a Mexican channel! For free! I could have been watching the whole time on a 46 inch TV but noooo. At least I got to see GSP beat Shields.
The day after this event, I wrote something for BE that people liked and by the time I got back to Vancouver, I had been tentatively hired as a staff writer. And I've been there ever since. Most people would remember a trip to Mexico for drunken antics. I remember it for most getting a writing job. Strange how that works.
First thing's first - Mexican buses rule. You're not doing the whole greyhound thing when you're cruising between towns in Mexico if you have any sort of money whatsoever. The primera class and ejecutivo buses have big, lazyboy-like seats with your own personal video system and tons of leg room. After heading down to Playa del Carmen, I boarded one of these bad boys to head about six hours away to Campeche, the capital of a state called...Campeche. Go figure.
I was all sorts of confused at the bus station, but eventually got it sorted out despite my shitty Spanish. The ride there was entirely devoid of entertainment - it was just bush on either side of the road for the entire time, other than than going by a huge prison right outside of the city that didn't exactly inspire feelings of safety.
My first night there was game seven of the Canucks/Hawks series. The Canucks had been up 3-0, but pissed away the series and were down to the wire. I wasn't about to miss that game, so I headed over to the Oxxo (best store ever) to grab some beer. But...Oxxo's in Campeche don't sell beer. What the hell? They do everywhere else. I went back to my hotel and asked where to grab beer, and they pointed at the restaurant across the street.
"Uh, no...I want to buy some to drink in my room?"
*blank stares*
Well fuck. I guess I was doing this sober, because the game started in 15 minutes. It's fucking Mexico though - you can usually get beer from just about anywhere. What the hell? I was surprised the concierge wasn't selling them out of a cooler in the fucking lobby along with t-shirts and sunglasses. But nope. Sober hockey it is.
The Canucks were up 1-0 for most of the game, but gave up a goal late to go to OT. When Burrows scored in overtime, I completely lost my shit, knocked my netbook onto the floor (almost breaking it) and ran around my hotel room screaming like a retard. Sober. About a minute later, there was a loud knock on my door that killed my euphoria. I answered it, and there was a big (well, Mexican big - so like 5'6) security guard standing there, asking me questions in Spanish that I didn't understand. I guess I was a little louder than I thought.
"I'm sorry...uh, lo siento? That's right isn't it? Uh, I'm sorry. Hockey, me very happy."
*blank stare*
He came into the room and looked around, like there was gonna be 12 other people in there. I just pointed at my netbook on the floor. He didn't get it. So I pointed at myself and made the universal shhh sign with my finger to my lips. He said "SI SENOR!" and rattled off some other shit I couldn't understand. Then left, shaking his head. I didn't give a shit though, the Canucks finally put away the Hawks!
I went out exploring after that, waving at the security guard as I passed through the lobby. He just gave me the "I have cramps" look that most women give me when I try to talk to them. It was still really hot, but Campeche is really nice, especially at night. It's an old walled city on the water (the walls were built to defend against pirates) with narrow, picturesque streets and a pretty laid back pace. The malecon (beach walk) was amazingly nice, and devoid of people. No beaches, but still cool. There were also a lot of funky buildings along with the old walls themselves to check out.
After cooking in the heat for a while, I retired to the restaurant across from the hotel (where they spoke English! Huzzah!) and grabbed some killer food and a few pacificos. The next day was exactly the same, minus the hockey. Just chilled, wandered around, went to the Oxxo for snacks and the restaurant for dinner, and enjoyed the ambiance of a non-touristy Mexican city on the water.
The next day, I headed north to Merida. It's only about 2 hours away, but I still took the fancy bus because it was about four dollars more than the regular one. This is when I came across something known as the first-class waiting room. Apparently all bigger Mexican bus stations have one, but I didn't see it in PDC. And folks, they fucking rule.
Instead of dealing with the oppressive heat out in the station with everyone else, you can go chill in an air-conditioned room with TV, free drinks, newspapers, the whole deal. It was 39 celsius in Campeche that day, so I'm sure you can imagine how happy this fat kid was when I figured that out. The best part is that it was only separated by a glass window, so all the people dying in the heat sit there and stare at you, basking in AC and drinking a Corona, and seethe with anger. Sorry homie, I guess I got Juan up on you this time. Aaaand that's my shitty joke out of the way for this blog.
Merida turned out to be even hotter than Campeche. Like, unbearable can't-go-outside-or-you'll-die hot. I think it was 42 one day and 43 the next. I explored as much as I could, but only in short spurts. None of the bars or restaurants had AC and even Mexicans were all "why did you come here in April? Are you retarded?" when they'd talk to me. In English. Tons of people in Merida spoke English, which surprised me. It was a bigger tourist destination than I thought, apparently.
After checking out the zocalo (second-nicest I had seen in Mexico so far behind Puebla) and having a few beers here and there, I went for a walk though the area where all the colonial houses were. It wasn't the type of architecture I expected to see in the Yucatan, but the buildings were really cool. And the city was quite affluent by Mexican standards. I was impressed, except for the heat.
Shit got weird back at my hotel though. As I was walking through the main corridor that separated the lobby from the back of the hotel, I had to step in between some dudes that were on both sides of the hallway. I didn't touch any of them, or do anything in particular that could have pissed them off, but one of them yelled out "Fuck gringo! Fuck you!" after I passed by. I just ignored him and continued walking, thinking he was just drunk or something. It turns out he wasn't drunk, just fucking crazy. I wouldn't find that out until the next day though.
After getting up early and going for another long walk before it got really hot out, I headed to the lobby of the hotel to grab some lunch. It was basically a a big square, probably 100 feet on each side with tables scattered throughout and a covered roof with a bunch of birds chillin on the inside, swooping down to steal any food they could. I'd never really seen anything like it in a hotel, but it was cool nonetheless. At 34 bucks a night, it's tough to argue with oddities like this place.
Anyway, I sat off to the side where I could plug in my laptop and was busy writing about some UFC event and mainlining coronas. I was pretty oblivious to everything going on around me, until I got splashed with a shitload of water and saw a cone cup land on the table beside me. The fuck? I look up, and see the angry vato from the night before walking by. Not stopping, not looking at me, but yelling "Fuck you gringo! Fuck you!" while heading for the exit. There was a dude walking beside him, presumably a friend of his, looking at him but pointing at me with the universal WTF look on his face. He then looked at me and gave me the universal "I'm sorry!" face, but fuck that. I wanted to know what this kid's fucking problem was.
"Hey!" I yelled as I stood up, with everyone looking at me. "What is your fucking problem?"
I guess he had been waiting for me to respond, because he immediately stopped at the sound of my voice and turned around. "Fuck you, you fucking gringo! Get out of of here or you gonna get fucked up!"
Now I'm a big dude, but I'm hardly the kind of guy that goes looking for confrontations. I have a big mouth that frequently gets me into trouble, but I can usually either talk my way right back out of it or just stand up and look scary. That works 99% of the time. This time though, I was fucking pissed off because I didn't do a god damned thing to make this guy mad. That, and I had about 10 coronas before 2pm. I lost my temper, which almost never happens, but I never even got out of the angry starting gate. His friend took care of that quite nicely for me.
By slapping his buddy in the back of the head, as hard as he could.
The bitchslap echoed through the square, and everyone went from looking at me to looking at them. Like, in unison. It was like a tennis match where the ball got hit across the court and the entire crowd's eyes followed. That snapped me out of seeing red as fast as I had seen it in the first place, and I started to laugh. It was quite similar to a kid that says something stupid and his mom swats him for embarrassing her. But it was two adult males. It was too ridiculous not to laugh at. And if defused everything.
The slapper pushed the idiot through the lobby door and came right back to me, giving me the prayer signal that signified apology the whole way. Once he got over to me, he was extremely apologetic and explained that his buddy was, in his own words, "angry a lot". He said that I had pissed him off by walking by the night before without excusing myself, as he had been in the middle of a conversation. I apologized for that and said I had no idea. He brushed that off and said his buddy was just constantly looking for a fight, and anything set him off.
"Especially white people. He usually picks smaller ones though," he said with a laugh.
I laughed my ass off at that. Before I could say anything else, he flagged down the waitress, ordered me two coronas and paid for them, then apologized once again. He introduced himself as Javier, shook my hand, told me there wouldn't be any more trouble, and left. Nice dude. Every crazy dude should have a handler like that. It totally reminded me of when the crazy Latvian guy wanted to kill me in the Stockholm airport just for wearing an Alex Ovechkin jersey, but his buddy came to the rescue.
Not much happened after that. I headed back to Cancun for a night before I flew home. Staying in town is 100 times better than out in the hotel zone. I had a kickass huge room for 40 bucks a night, right in the middle of the more authentic action. I took a pass on that and watched UFC 129 on my netbook in my room though. I got all pissed off when the wifi cut out right before the main event, then started watching TV out of frustration...and the show was on a Mexican channel! For free! I could have been watching the whole time on a 46 inch TV but noooo. At least I got to see GSP beat Shields.
The day after this event, I wrote something for BE that people liked and by the time I got back to Vancouver, I had been tentatively hired as a staff writer. And I've been there ever since. Most people would remember a trip to Mexico for drunken antics. I remember it for most getting a writing job. Strange how that works.
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