Mexico VII: Puerto Escondido

(or, we get stuck in a Hostel)

12/01/06 – 12/07/06

 

Map, Puerto Escondido: http://www.tomzap.com/map-esco.html

 

(photos from this time are up...)

 

I was taken by surprise by Puerto Escondido.  I didn’t remember turning off MEX 200 and suddenly we were there.  Everyone emptying off the bus.  It was early, judging by the sun (I was getting pretty good at that) it was 7:30ish.  We load up the bikes and wave goodbye to another asshole bus driver.  Within seconds we are approached by a very friendly young woman who tells her name is Julie.  She unfolds a glossy booklet and shows us lovely pictures of a Hostel – Hotel Shalom.  Camping is dirt cheap there.  Also a kitchen, showers (hot water), bathrooms, a bar, a pool, etc.  We think it sounds like a good place to heal.  She smiles and runs off to chase down some blonde European surfer boys with her pitch. 

 

Christina doesn’t think she can walk on her ankle and her hip is hurting worse now.  We walk the bikes through the already bustling town.  But this is a softer bustle.  The bustle of a beach town.  People are friendlier, more relaxed.   We get hopelessly lost because the directions we were given, and the map we were handed, are both useless.  Big surprise there.  Christina asks some construction workers.  20 minutes later, after much gesticulation and waving in general directions, we’re on the right path.

 

Hotel Shalom’s logo was a camel that looked so much like Joe Camel that every time I saw his outline somewhere around the grounds I found myself with the incredible urge to smoke.  In fact I was having the urge a lot so far during the trip.  There something about hard traveling and smoking that go so well together.  There’s also a social aspect to smoking and traveling.  Standing outside a depot, asking for a light, is a great way to strike up a conversation.  Step into a café or bar, looking for information, best to have a smoke on ya.  But so far, I’ve resisted.  The front area is a beautiful bar and lounge area complete with pool table, foosball, stereo (playing trendy international world funk and hip-hop), and pretty Christmas lights.  The grounds are also lovely.  The pool, as one would expect, was a little grimy.  And not much chlorine.  There were private rooms, bunks, and camping/hammock area in the open spaces.  The painted colors were bright and flowers were in bloom.  A lime (here: limon) tree grew heavy with fruit.  For the first few days, it was a sort of heaven from the nasty urban centers of our past.

 

The hostel, and the tourist parts of Puerto Escondido in general, were full of international (mostly European, but with some Canadians and Australians – they’re European too really now ain’t they?) backpackers.  A good majority of them were here to surf the famous Playa Zicatela. [http://www.tomzap.com/lymphoto.html], but others were here to party and swim for a few days before continuing on the Gringo Trail routes mapped out in their Lonely Planet guides. 

 

Besides the cheap rate, the best place about the hostel was is location.  It sat just a 3 minute walk from one of the most beautiful beaches I’ve ever seen.  Playa Carrizallo.  A tight cove, a perfect crescent, jagged sides, soft warm sand, and nice waves for swimming or learning to surf.  It was never crowded, and the people there were a mix of local teens spear-fishing, local families, backpackers, and old couples.

 

Hotel Shalom also sat on a small strip with grocer, internet, and several small cafes.  There was really no reason to leave the area.  A great place to rest and heal before heading out.  But see, we have this problem of inertia.  Bodies at rest stay at rest.    Why leave such a relaxing place?  Bikes?  What bikes?  Central America?  Where’s that?   Christina’s hip and ankle were soon healed enough for us to ride again and we began to explore the non-tourist parts of town.  We really liked it!  So days and nights turned into more days and nights.  Mornings of exploring, afternoons of naps, evenings of cold beers and swimming in the ocean, nights of spicy tacos and sweet walks.

 

Christina had run out of her Romance novels two nights into Puerto Escondido.  This was not good.  They were her escape, her “down time”.  But English books were no where to be found so far in Mexico.  She was becoming distressed.  Now before you judge, be warned:  Christina puts up a spirited defense of the Romance Genre.  And I understand.  As a lover of sci-fi and fantasy, I am constantly defending the genre against small minded literary snobs as well as those who pick up a paperback from their local Borders and assume that’s what sci-fi is all about.  It’s like hearing 50cent and deciding you know what hip-hop is all about.  And for the self-important and over educated, the Romance genre is the most maligned of any.  This is probably because it’s populated almost entirely by women writers, written for women audiences.

 

So, anyhow, on the strip where the hostel was located, there was a bright storefront with a sign: Library.  It wasn’t open many hours during the week, but finally one morning it was and so we stopped by.  It was a lending library operated by the International Friends of Puerto Escondido.  Outside sat a handful of older, wealthy white folks reading magazines.  The membership costs were too high for our short stay there, but there were some shelves out front of books for sale.  And there were some Romance books!  Granted they were falling apart (some even missing covers), yellowed, and musty, but they were what she was after.  Christina spent a good hour looking through the entire selection and found several she wanted.  She had brought along several finished books that she hoped to trade in and approached the guy working the makeshift desk.  “No trades!” he barked.  Christina asked him how much.  40pesos a book he said.  That’s about 4dollars in US money.  Christina looked at him in amazement.  He was cold and sharp.  “And we’re closing in 5 minutes.  You want them?  We don’t take trades because we don’t want to trade crud for our good books.”  The books Christina had to trade were all almost new.  This guy was just being an ass because his back hurt and he wanted to get back to his poker game or whatever the hell this retired ex-pat did all day.  Christina looked at me.  What to do.  She really wanted the books.  He then barked at us again: “I’ll give you the member discount.  30pesos per book.  We’re not a business you know.”  “In the States these books would be worth maybe a quarter” Christina told him.  I was thinking that in the States, our library couldn’t even give away books in that condition.  “Well, missy, you’re NOT in the States.”  He spat condescendingly.  I wanted to jump him.  “Well?”  He stood waiting.  Christina put the books down and walked away.  Good for her.  The whole night though she fretted over it.  Over his attitude, over the loss of the books.  Did she do the right thing?  Lose her chance just to spite a jerk?  Yes, yes, yes, I kept saying.  Bunch of jerks running some sort of charitable front organization for who knows what purpose.  Even at best, just to band together against the foreigners whose country they lived in.  Christina wanted to break in at night and steal the books.  She wanted to know if I’d go with her.  No, I said, it’s not worth it to me, but I’d sure as hell lie to cover your ass if the authorities come asking questions.

 

The next day though, the universe provided for her.  We were walking towards the centro when we noticed that the circular building in the center of one of the plazas was not a gazebo, but a two floored building that read University Bookstore on the side.  We decided to go check it out.  Inside the tower were two floors of books for the University, arranged by class.  As I browed the political theory section, drooling over all the books, and wishing I could read Spanish (and they say US colleges are leftist!), my eyes suddenly came to rest upon the unmistakable spine of a Romance novel.  I rubbed my lids.  No mistake.  And even crazier, here in a bookstore for students, with no other books in English, were about 12 Romance novels, all in our native tongue.  I thought I was hallucinating.    I called Christina over.  She nearly fainted.   The only thing we could figure was some upper level literature class was doing a semester on the American Romance Genre.  It was so strange.  And to top it all off, they were a third of the cost of the nasty library’s –  and brand new, still in plastic wrap!

 

The days in Puerto Escondido passed like honey.  I had my first fish tacos of the journey.  Damn good.  Discovered the refreshing joy of a Michelada.  Watched the super cool Mexican surfer chicks, all curves and wide toothy grins.  Giggled at the Italian surfer dudes, all peroxide blonde, frigid, mirrored-sunglassed, and stoned. 

 

And then of course we began to meet people:

 

A kid from Holland who had been all over the world and didn’t really like Mexicans.  Go to Asia he told us. 

 

Daniel, the Italian guy who ran the place (though not the owner, whom we never met), who was most certainly a vampire.  He would walk by and just stare like he wanted to slip over and suck you dry.  Christina and I would have to draw straws every morning to decide who would ask him for our vegetables from the locked communal fridge.

 

A French couple almost finished with their vacation.  She was like a French version of Christina, kinda eerie.  He came out with the best phrases in English (like when returning from a day of no waves for surfing he exclaimed to us: “Big Shit!”). 

 

A lawyer from Oaxaca City who wanted to have drinks with us and explain the “situation”. 

 

Maurizio, a Mexican, who came down to Puerto E. from Acapulco to spear-fish and chase the “mermaids”.  Every night we’d see him around the town with a different woman, sometimes with two.  His Red Snapper, cooked with limon and garlic, an hour after he caught it, was the best fish we’ve ever had. 

 

A shy and timid young couple, Mathilde and Jorge.  She was from France, studying abroad in Mexico and had met Jorge in a Cuban jazz club.  He was from Mexico City.  In a few days she would return to France.  Their sadness at this eventuality ran beneath everything they did or said.

 

The mother and daughter who ran our favorite café.  The mother was from the Czech Republic.  Back in her student days she had met her Mexican husband while he was studying mining in her country.  He eventually convinced her (after having their daughter) to move back to Mexico with him.  She never regretted it.

 

Jerome, Claire, and Cat rolled in from Oaxaca City one night.  He was French and spoke very little English and Spanish.  Cat was from Australia, traveling the world.  She spoke a little Spanish (often confusing the word for chef and ashtray and sometimes asking for two beers and the Chef) and Japanese.  Claire was from Malta, exploring Mexico.  She spoke some French.  Somehow these three had met and were traveling together, speaking in an odd combination of several languages to one another.  We spent many hours talking to Jerome.  Conversations were slow but meaningful.  He would insist Christina speak to him in Spanish, then say, NO, speak English!  Then he would get frustrated, speak in French and we’d play an elaborate game of charades until each sentence was parsed.  But somehow we talked about everything from movies to food to traveling to the role of governments and multinational institutions (“big money, big bosses” he would say) on keeping the poor of the world in rags and hungry while claiming to be helping them.

 

And then of course there were Felice and Norma.  Two twin Mexican sisters who cleaned the hostel.  They didn’t get much money they informed us, but got to live there for free.  They were hilarious!  All day, from the various corners of the grounds you could hear them giggling.  They insisted on speaking to me in rapid giggling Spanish day after day.  Sometimes I would get lucky and Christina would be there for translation. Often I would just giggle along and shrug.  One morning as I swatted mosquitoes in the damp, dark communal kitchen (the only really awful aspect of the place was this nasty kitchen – although it did have a great sign that read: “Be Careful with Your Head”), the sisters told me through giggles that it was their 17^th birthday.  They were really sad that they couldn’t be with their family, but maybe there would be a fiesta at the hostel that night?  Later that night I found them alone in the hostel’s lounge, all dressed up in their birthday best.  We cursed their boss the vampire for not even getting them a cake.  It seemed what they really wanted was to have their hair cut.  They went around asking all the internationals if they knew how to cut hair.  I made the mistake of mentioning that Christina didn’t know how, but that she cut my hair.  Blame it on translation, but they jumped up and down and demanded that I find her.  I went looking and couldn’t find where she was.  When I returned to the lounge they were giggling and pointing down the block: “Internet!  Internet!”  So I found her at the internet place and she laughed and said No Way!  She wrote them out a note that explained that she was NOT a professional and that she was worried that she would ruin their beautiful hair.  I brought the note back.  They were upset, but the giggling returned.  Halfway through my next cerveza grande (940ml), I heard giggling again and in the corner saw Mathilde (Jorge watching) with scissors in hand, going at it.  We all sang Happy Birthday and that was that.

 

One night, returning to the hostel we were hailed by Maurizio.  He was sitting in front of the café next to Hotel Shalom (a small pizza type joint for local hipsters, the ubiquitous poster of Che tacked to the sea-washed boards of the back wall).  Maurizio had just returned from fishing and had his cooked catch spread out before him on the table.  He invited us to sit and share.  I was carrying a cerveza grande and poured some around to Maurizio and another bohemian cat sitting there.  We ate the amazing fish and talked and drank.  The young local bohemian invited us to a party at a bar that was having its grand opening on playa Marinero (just over from Zicatela).  He drew us a crude map.  When we went to leave I offered the empty beer bottle to the owner of the place in case he wanted to return it for its deposit.  He misunderstood and said in shaky English: “You can’t return that here.  You didn’t buy it here.  You didn’t buy anything here.  You just sat there.  What I wish is to sell you one of my beers.”  “Como?” I asked “I said I want to sell you a beer.”  Ah, yeah, I’d stepped in it here.  Sat at his restaurant, ate food that wasn’t his and poured beer for his customers that wasn’t his.  “Yes, I would love a beer.”  I told him as way of penance.  We slunk off in embarrassment. 

 

We spent the next afternoon swimming at Zicatela (a big no-no the guide books told us afterwards) in the crazy waves and strong riptides.  Then, after sunset, with pants full of sand and my beard of salt, we made our way over the grand-opening party at the Mono Loco (Crazy Monkey).  The bar was nothing but a shack with a roof that extended over a small sitting area.  The dance floor was sand.  The band, a rag tag crew of Mexican hipsters, old men, and a Rastafarian, was passionately playing Cumbias while locals and internationals danced and drank.  The ocean softly kissed the sand just feet behind us, while the stars in their multitudes burned light years away.  For every beer I bought, our bohemian friend from the night before (who was working as waiter here) would buy Christina a free cocktail.  He was flying high on Mescal and who knows what - bopping from table to table, laughing, slapping backs - the alternative mayor of Puerto Escondido. 

 

We found Mathilde and Jorge sitting at a table with Maurizio and we joined them.  Maurizio, in a juvenile game of making his newest mermaid jealous, decided to pour his attention all over Christina.  He told her all about his past and his problems with staying with just one girl.  He told her about his time in the States and his issues with homosexuals.  He told her about Jesus.  All of this I caught in little pieces because they were speaking Spanish and I was occupied with Mathilde and Jorge, and even more so, with the music.  Damn to hell with Nortenos, I was now in love with Cumbias!  In the final move of his jealousy gambit, Maurizio asked me if it was okay if he danced with Christina.  “I don’t know, you should ask her.” I told him, just like I tell anyone who asks that.  Christina, having seen through his game from the start, didn’t care.  She just wanted to dance.  If anyone knows Christina at all, they know she loves to dance.  And dance she did.  Right on the owner of the bar’s foot.  He yelled out: “Zapatos!  Zapatos!”  Ah, the silly gringa, wearing her shoes on the sand dance floor.  What was worse, when we looked up, we realized the owner was the same guy who owned the pizza joint we’d been in the night before.  Whoops.  But he didn’t seem to care too much.  It was a party after all.  In the end, all was okay because Maurizio, a man with nothing to gain from the comment, told Christina she was a really good dancer.  She’s still glowing from that.

 

Sometime soon after, our money almost gone, Jorge produced a six pack of Sol from under the table.  I swear it hadn’t been there before.  It wasn’t too cold, but it was late, and it was beer.  What did I care, my toes were in the cool sand.  All of the sudden Christina is elbowing me.  I look up, the owner is looking at us and pointing.  Our bohemian buddy approaches: “No, you cannot drink that beer here.  This is the wrong beer.  We try and have money.  Try and have party for money.  I will take your beer and hold it.  In a cooler.”  Jorge has hidden his under the table.  I couldn’t look at the owner.  Man, twice in a row, drinking outside beer in his place.  For days after Christina would tease me when I asked her what some passerby would say: “He said: there’s that gringo who drinks the wrong beers.”

 

Soon though the loveliness began to fade.  The Chiles Rellenos were not hot, the beer flat, the vampire at the hostel was budding wings.  Julie, the friendly woman who found us at the bus-station, was morose and haughty.  The stoned surfers were starting to grate on my nerves.  And the international backpackers were making me sick.  They were loud all night, cold and grumpy all day.  Sometimes a group of 4 would pass and none would return a “hola”.  I thought maybe they were just hung-over every morning.  I can be cranky too the next day for sure, but hell, I don’t take my shit out on others.  Maybe it was the language barriers?  But smiles and nods know no language barriers.  These people were just cold.  And not only that, they were slobs.  Cigarette butts in the swimming pool, bathroom tissue on the floor (not a healthy thing in a country where you don’t ever flush the paper down the toilet), soda cans left on tables, and wrappers everywhere.  And dirty dishes.  Oh my god, these folks knew no respect whatsoever!  Every day a sink full of dirty dishes would pile up.  This despite some large signs in several languages on the kitchen wall exclaiming: “The staff are not your slaves!  Clean your plates and the kitchen”.  And so Felice and Norma would be in there day after day, cleaning a bunch of spoiled backpackers’ filth.  It so enraged me!  I tried to explain to Felice in sign language that if I ever caught someone leaving their dishes I would kick their ass.  “Kick their ass” is pretty easy to explain with gestures.  She giggled.  I don’t know.  It was the first time in maybe 10 years I’d set foot in a hostel.  That one was in Austin, Texas and I remember it fondly.  But if this was the way they were, I wanted nothing to do with them.  Even if I had to spend a few dollars more somewhere.  Hell, I’d much rather just camp on the side of the road.  It was time to move on.

 

The night before we planned to leave we made the mistake of eating cheeseburgers.  The place was way down the beach on Zicatela.  The warning should have been that when I asked for Tequila and Sangrita, I was poured Sangrita from a mix.  Halfway through the burgers, Christina and I looked at one another.  Uhhg.  We didn’t feel so good.  We left them there half eaten and walked down to a surf-shop that sold English books.  They had a Central American guide book for 400 pesos!  And it was a few years old.  We couldn’t imagine paying that kind of money for it, but we planned to sit for a while and take some notes.  We were only sitting for a few minutes when we both looked at each other again.  Uhhhhhg.  We had to go.  We felt nauseous.  Gross.  But we needed to look at the book.  Not to keep us on the Gringo Trail, but to read about roads and altitudes.  Was this city on top of a mountain?   Was that lake 100k up a dirt road?  In a moment of near vomit induced insanity, I traded in my copy of B. Traven’s “Government”, for a reduction in price of the travel guide.  That surfer town did not deserve such a book.  My only hope is someone picks it up by accident and it changes their life.  It could happen.  We took our book and limped (what is the biking equivalent of limping?) home.  We never threw-up, but we tossed and turned all night.  Several times I ran to the bathroom, dodging obnoxious English women – but nothing.  The next morning Christina woke up fine, but tired.  I woke up with my whole body aching and I had a fever.  I guess we weren’t going anywhere.

 

I spent the entire next day lying on my sleeping pad.  First in the tent.  Then, during the heat of the day, by the side of the pool in the shade.  I felt so sick that I couldn’t even get pissed off at the three English blokes who jumped in the pool soaking my sweatshirt (used as pillow) and entire mattress.  Christina got mad for me.  Arrogant, insufferable, infantile pricks!  “How many of my Irish relatives did your relatives slaughter?” she asked them beneath her breath.  Jerome sat by my side for little chats during the day.  He told me horror stories about the US in Iraq to cheer me up.  He kept suggesting that I drink a Coke.  He told me about his ex-girlfriend who was a nurse and she prescribed Coca-Cola when he felt sick.  Once he went to the pharmacy in France when he was ill and they gave him some medicine and told him to eat and drink nothing but white rice, carrots, and Coca-Cola!  That night I broke down and asked Christina to buy me a Coke.  I drank about two-thirds before my stomach (completely empty previously) seized and twisted.  I thought I was going to get sick but it passed.  The next morning I woke up completely healed!  Holy Coke-Cola!  Now, it was finally time to leave. 

 

I was better, but still too weak to bicycle.  So we would get on the bus again.  Our friend Eric had heard rumors that there was a list of 100 foreigners to be arrested in Oaxaca City.  Knowing that if such a list existed he would surely be on it, he fled to Mexico City.  He suggested that we might be fine there as tourists (nobody knew us), but that if something bad happened, it would be real bad.  We had no intention of going there as tourists.  With many in the movement in hiding, and the APPO folks out of public view for a while, it didn’t make any sense for us to go.  At the best it would be useless, at the worst we could endanger folks.  Oaxaca City, and its attempts at social regeneration, wasn’t going anywhere.  The fuse had been lit.  We’d be back.  For now it was onto another city famous for rebels: San Cristobal de las Casas.  We said goodbye to Jerome and company at our favorite café.  The mother and daughter hugged us and laughed and waved as they watched us pull out on our loaded bikes.  We got on the bus at 9:30pm.  Christina turned to me and said: “I don’t feel so good.  I think I’m going to be sick.”  Well, there was no turning back now, sick or not, we were Chiapas bound.