To Hellholes and Back Page 19

  On top of all this, Mexicans drink like off-duty cops, boozing it up without apology seven days a week starting in the early afternoon. I’ve long maintained that there’s no such thing as a good drinking town—to misquote Tip O’Neill, “all drinking is local”—but Mexico City might be an exception.

  What I mean by this is that inside the walls of a bar every city in the world shrinks to human size and how good a time you have drinking always comes down to the people you’re with. In the right company you can have as much fun in a deserted roadside bar in Cardston, Alberta, as you can at the Oak Room in New York or Skybar in LA. Your ass conforms to a barstool the same way in Paris that it does in Medford, Oregon. Once it’s in your bloodstream, alcohol behaves in New Orleans exactly the same way it does everywhere else.

  Yet Mexico City is an extraordinary guzzling arena, a place where you can depend on the beer being frosty, the music energetic, and the women, if not throw-a-frying-pan-across-the-room-at-you-with-a-passionate-rage-they’ll-bring-to-the-bedroom-an-hour-later hot-blooded hot, at least miles more animated than those you find in America’s genderless suburban drinking holes. Two weeks pickling my vital organs in a city where you can get buzzed without even trying forces me to reconsider my entire curmudgeonly “no such thing as a good drinking town” gambit. And to recall the parting words of my ex-colleague and provocateur extraordinaire John DeVore, who, as I was preparing to move away from New York City, pulled me aside and said in an avuncular vodka-soaked rattle: “Your alcoholism is going to miss this town.”

  I once wrote, “No place needs a good PR agency more than Latin America. For a region with so much going in its favor—food, scenery, the most hospitable locals on earth—it has a worse reputation than the Florida Division of Elections.” This made me some friends among our neighbors to the south, though not so much with touchy Floridians. Nothing I find in Mexico City changes my mind, particularly about the people.

  Spanish colonialism put an undeniable jinx on every indigenous civilization it came in contact with. But while the church and crown’s legacy of corruption remains—from Mazatlán to Manila, graft is the mainstay of every country conceived in the wake of the cross—it also left behind a tradition of public grace and manners. Although no longer exactly chivalrous, the hoi polloi of Latin America are still reliably friendly and cordial. Two telling examples stand out from a long list of random kindnesses shown to me in Mexico City.

  I walk into a mom and pop pharmacy near Plaza Garibaldi looking for a sewing kit. I’m told savvy travelers always carry their own, but this is the first time in more than two decades of world travel I’ve ever needed one. The owner apologizes for his limited stock, then disappears into the back. He returns a moment later with a yard of dark thread dangling from a single needle.

  “No kit,” he says in English. “Will this do?”

  I say it will and break out my wallet.

  “No charge,” he says, waving off my outstretched hand. “I’m sorry this is all I have.”

  “It’s exactly what I want; let me pay,” I say, tactfully not mentioning that all I want the needle for is to gouge a pus-filled boil from the end of my finger.

  “It’s a gift. Please, put away your money.”

  Beside him, his smiling wife wraps the needle in paper, improvising a cover for the tip with a tiny piece of Styrofoam so that I won’t lance myself when I put it in my pocket.

  Next, on my first attempt to purchase a metrobus ticket from a machine, I ask a young couple behind me for help with an automated Spanish command that I don’t recognize. With the couple’s assistance, I buy a thirty-peso card (about three dollars), good for six rides.

  When I swipe the card at the turnstile, however, a buzzer sounds and the gate locks up. A uniformed transit cop informs me that I must put additional credits on the card in order to use it.

  “I bought this card ten seconds ago,” I say. “There are thirty pesos on it.”

  I swipe the card two more times and get two more buzzers.

  “I’m sorry, señor, no pass,” the transit cop says.

  Behind me, my new Mexican pals are outraged. Correctly assuming that my rudimentary Spanish is nowhere near equal to the task of talking my way around a disagreement with metrobus police, they take up the matter on my behalf.

  “This man has paid his fare!” the woman exclaims. “We helped buy the card ourselves. You are a [presumed expletive, not understood] to treat a foreign visitor like swine!”

  “He cannot pass through the gate with an invalid ticket. That is the rule.”

  “Don’t be an imbecile,” the husband barks. “Look at him. Is this a man who cheats a few pesos for bus fare?”

  As usual, I’m dressed to suggest that I’m carrying just enough money to buy a head of cabbage and not much else, so this is an unnecessarily charitable assessment.

  “Please don’t worry about me,” I say to the couple. “It’s a bad card. I’ll buy another one.” I’m no Thurston Howell, but to me it makes more sense to write off three bucks than prolong a standoff with foreign authorities on a bus platform.

  “No,” says the husband. “We will not leave you to face this incompetence alone.”

  He says this in Spanish and I can’t be completely sure of my translation, but his courtly diction and polite pronouns suggest the sort of exactitude you want in your bus station lawyer. The argument ends when the wife swipes her card, passes through the gate, then reaches over the turnstile and swipes her card a second time. The light turns green, and she grabs my arm and pulls me through. As I pass into the Promised Land I glance behind me at the transit cop.

  “Bien,” he says, and shrugs.

  On the bus, the couple not only refuses to allow me to repay them for the fare; they actually try to give me thirty pesos out of their own pockets as a refund for the faulty ticket for which they feel personal disgrace and responsibility.

  I realize that the more time I spend in the city, the more likely I am to run afoul of local ne’er-do-wells and maybe even become the victim of a petty crime. Possibly worse. If I do, I hope I come out of it with the perspective of a David Lida and don’t allow the exceptional to define my perception of the usual, which, so far, has been overwhelmingly positive.

  Almost a week into Mexico City and the most apparent danger being the possibility of jumping a pant size—I die a little inside each time I go up a belt notch, and the taco snarfing here is nonstop—the trip clearly needs shaking up. What better place to boost my exposure to the worst a society has to offer, I think, than a professional soccer match?

  Fortunately, I’ve recently met a Canadian gringo named Marty McLennan who has married into a local family. By the rules of Hispanic culture, this automatically makes me nearly as tight as tamales with an affable branch of Lopezes who happen to hold the beloved Mexico City Pumas in the psychotic regard typical of foreign soccer fans. When Marty’s wife, Ruth, informs me of a Sunday game at Olympic Stadium against the loathsome barbarians of Cruz Azul, the Pumas’ Mexico City–based rivals, I jump at the opportunity to join the family outing.

  The day gets off to a promising start. On the bus to the stadium I find myself standing next to a middle-aged Australian. Even though he’s wearing a scarf bearing the emblem of the reviled Cruz Azul dirt balls, he seems like a friendly enough guy. Diplomatically subduing my day-old but nonetheless burning Puma loyalty—when it comes to sports fandom, beachfront rentals, and personals ads I’m a big believer in the “come big or stay home” philosophy—I strike up a conversation. A nice thing about Aussies, living in their own country has gotten them used to being accosted by talkative strangers, so they don’t mind when random dudes start interviewing them on public buses.

  “Bill” has lived in Mexico City for about a year and because he’s got a sensitive government job I won’t say much about him other than that his Spanish is impeccable and he has a curious amount of knowledge concerning the Mexican and American militaries and the developing political situation i
n just about every country in Central America. Since I still haven’t seen any, I ask him about danger in Mexico City.

  “I’ve only had one instance and it was at the stadium where we’re going today,” he tells me. “I was pickpocketed there about six months ago.”

  Finally, something nefarious to report about Mexico City. I knew adding soccer to the mix was a good idea.

  “We were coming out of a match, thousands of people all pressed together, herding toward the exit as you do. That’s when he got it.”

  Pickpocket stories always intrigue me, not simply because it’s never happened to me, but because I honestly don’t think it ever could. Since I usually carry my wallet in my front pocket, I feel immune to this kind of theft. I know the big front bulge makes you look like a wiener, but you get to keep your money.

  “That’s no guarantee,” Bill says. “My wallet was in my front pocket at the time.”

  “Don’t you feel that sort of thing as it’s happening? There’s no way someone is going to slip their hand in my front pocket without me knowing it.”

  “I felt it as soon as it happened, but I was surrounded by a crush of people. I looked around and there were five or six likely suspects. It could have been the guy behind me. Or the woman to my left. Or someone in front reaching behind.

  “Anyway, there was nothing I could do. I had my nine-year-old son with me and I was holding his hand. It was either let my wallet go or leave my son alone in a football crowd to chase after a ghost who was already moving in any one of ten directions.”

  Bill lost two hundred pesos (about twenty dollars) and his credit cards but like any good Aussie he’s prepared to up the ante on outrageous tales, even his own.

  “I’ve had transvestites in Bangkok and Rio pickpocket me as well, but they were much less subtle, grabbing at my balls first as a diversionary tactic. I caught out both of them right away.”

  “So what happened then?”

  “The one in Rio made a joke about mistaking the smaller package for the larger one. They laugh and you let them walk away. What else can you do in a situation like that? Beat up a transvestite? Call a cop? Not likely.”

  The Lopez clan has warned me not to wear a belt to the game. “They’ll take it away from you at the entrance,” Ruth says, and sure enough, in front of the stadium I pass through two pat downs that check for belts and anything else that might theoretically be turned into a weapon or projectile. The searches are comprehensive and involve lots of touching in the pleats region. If I’ve got any stowaway leeches left on me from India, these guys will find them.

  Security is even heavier inside Olympic Stadium—this is the place where American sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos raised their gloved Black Power salutes during “The Star-Spangled Banner” at the 1968 Games, so the history of subversive behavior is thick here. Although supporters of the Cruz Azul child molesters are partitioned from the home crowd by a chain-link fence and a line of police in riot gear, a pair of fans rigged out in Cruz Azul jerseys and caps have found their way into our section. They’re with two Puma friends, and I note with relief that rather than causing a riot, the stream of insults hurled among the foursome as well as at the players on the field is regarded by the crowd more as comic relief than fightin’ words.

  In the cheap seats of the upper deck I’m swiftly introduced to the two most vital words in the Mexican soccer lexicon. The first is puto, which means “fag” and is used at one point or another to describe every player on the field, including those on the home team. The second is puta, which means “prostitute” or, more loosely, “slut” and is commonly used to abuse the reputations of mothers of opposing players, though also sometimes to challenge the lineage of fellow fans. Five minutes into the glorious Pumas v. scumbag Cruz Azul match, this key terminology is already embedded in my brain by thousands of obnoxicated fans whose voices could cut through sheetrock.

  The ongoing vulgarity is a welcome distraction since the game itself is a typical soccer yawner, producing a predictable 0–0 halftime score after a grand total of one shot on goal. As the second half begins, the intensity of the drunken catcalls picks up, providing me an opportunity to add colorful embellishments to my baseline vocabulary.

  “Puuuuuuto!

  “Puuuuuuta madre!

  “Pinche puuuuuuto!

  “Pinche culero!”

  I turn to Marty and his nephews. Roberto is fourteen; Eduardo is thirteen. Both have been taking steady hits off their auntie’s beers all afternoon. One of the great things about foreign countries is that you can have straight-faced conversations with buzzed teenagers that might get you put on a watch list back home.

  “So, I know puto means ‘fag,’” I say.

  “Or ‘faggot,’ yes,” Marty confirms after consulting the boys.

  “So what does pinche puto mean?”

  “Pinche has many uses, but it’s like ‘fuck’ or ‘fucking.’”

  “So, pinche puto is ‘fucking faggot’?”

  “Yes, that’s exactly right. ‘Fucking faggot’ is what you hear the crowd keep chanting at the players.”

  “What about pinche culero?”

  “That’s ‘fucking asshole.’ Culero is asshole.’ It’s a highly offensive term.”

  “Worse than ‘fucking faggot’?”

  “Probably not.”

  Roberto and Eduardo nod in solemn agreement.

  “OK, I see. Thank you.”

  Another common refrain roughly translates as “Your mother fucks like a dog.” This phrase is shouted in the same door-knocking cadence we often associate with the old “shave and a haircut, two bits” lyric. I’m told the insult is so well known across Mexico that simply knocking on someone’s door with the familiar syncopated rhythm can potentially land you in a fistfight.

  Another interesting thing that happens in foreign countries is that you can sit in a stadium for three hours listening to everyone around you bellowing puto and puta madre as a sort of shout therapy and accept it in a way that you never would at home. Inside U.S. stadiums, shouting “faggot” or “Your mother fucks like a dog” every fifteen seconds would get you escorted out by security, or at least into a nasty altercation with a protective father or self-appointed censor. Though it should be noted that I attend most of my sporting events on the well-behaved West Coast and have never been to an Eagles or Jets game.

  Unapologetically mannish Mexican society is as fine with gay slurs as it is with defaming mothers, the most sacred pillar of Mexican culture. As a result, you sit there and grin along with, or at least silently tolerate, fifty thousand loudmouths every time someone’s sexuality is slandered. I’m not saying it’s right, just that it happens. You go with the flow and tell yourself, “It’s OK. I’m having an authentic cultural experience in which it’s proper to scream ‘faggot’ in a public place. How fascinating.”

  Is there an element of homophobia at work here? Probably. David Lida tells a classic joke: “What’s the difference between a straight Mexican and a gay Mexican? Three tequilas.”

  Brazen soccer vulgarity and a few economic matters aside, however, the merger of the United States and Mexico that some futurists predict will probably be a lot less difficult than most of us imagine. Working-class people here operate very much as they do in the United States. They meets for drinks in bars after work. They catch a show or movie or party on Friday night. They sleep in on Saturday, then clean the house and run errands before dinner. They hang out with the family on Sunday, watch fútbol or baseball on TV, maybe even go to a game. They begin the period of existential dread preceding another workweek at approximately 3:47 on Sunday afternoon.

  Mexico requires very little in the way of cultural adjustment for an American. I already like Canada and Mexico almost as much as I do the States—moving March Madness and my favorite craft root beers across either border might tip the balance—so if the grand North American alliance ever comes, I’m not going to sweat it, provided nobody tries to stop me from using my Bible c
ollection for target practice with my .45 Colt Peacemaker. I’m all for progress so long as it doesn’t interfere with our most precious schizophrenic rights.

  The good humor of the Puma fans lasts only until the pinche culeros of Cruz Azul unexpectedly score a goal (all soccer goals are scored unexpectedly) to go ahead 1–0 midway into the second half. The two Cruz Azul boosters in our section celebrate this miracle by whipping off their shirts and performing a tubby, topless salsa around the concrete bleachers, a move that gets them pelted with half a dozen cups of beer thrown by fans in the rows above. Less than a minute later, with the Puma faithful still reeling from the goal and the shirtless guys still mocking them, the Cruz Azul blood farts deliver a deathblow by scoring again with a providential shot that glances off the right post and into the net.

  The trauma of an insurmountable 2–0 lead is so devastating that the entire stadium simultaneously swears off the evils of drink forever, flinging their full beer cups into the air like 1920s Prohibitionists at a temperance tent revival. Golden Corona suds fill the skies over the stadium. Hundreds of empty cups are picked up, flattened into little Frisbees, and sailed into the lower decks. A few of these make it all the way onto the field, but most end up clipping the heads and shoulders of inattentive fans. During the literal outpouring of grief, I snap a photo of an adorable five-year-old girl—throughout the game she’s been clutching a little stuffed security puma—just seconds before she hucks her dad’s half-full beer cup over the rail onto some unseen fellow booster below. While proudly reviewing this award-winning shot in my camera’s LCD monitor, I’m struck in the back of the head by an empty Domino’s personal-size pizza box.