How do you know what decision to make? When there is a tidal wave of choices and armies of advisers persuading and pushing you in one direction or another and you don't trust your instincts anymore? When your inner voice sings enthusiastically time and again at options that are so different and you have a constant tug of war between the two sides of you that are polar opposites. If you stripped away all the shoulds and the ought tos and self-imposed pressures and judgments... how do you know what is real?
It´s pretty simple really. If you don´t like the question... it´s probably because you don´t like your answer. I still grimace and squirm and cringe under the weight of the "what are you doing here?" - or worse - the cocktail party horror; "what do YOU do?", which quickly places you in to your slot in the food chain and essentially translates into the worth of your life and how valuable are you as a person. What is your contribution to society? What is the POINT of you?
Perhaps in a small way it relieves you to realize that the only person who agonizes over the answer is yourself, yet, I still detest the question..
I forget that the taxi driver who asked me did so out of a reflex, or that the cocktail party question loaded with judgment and scolding and scathing, or looks of bemusement which make you feel like a ridiculous person, is probably coming from someone who you will never meet again; who doesn´t care, or who asked in the first place out of a desperate bid to fill an awkward silence.
Enough. If I don´t like my answers then I need to change what I am doing until I do. But it´s not easy for those of us who haven´t been made exceptional at any one thing, or strongly desired the motherland; or motherhood; or a brilliant career in medicine or engineering, or the spirit and confidence of an entrepreneur. I could never focus for too long on any one thing. I have a short concentration span. This goes for jobs... places... plants... pets... and (this is hard to admit)... people.
I had the freedom to chose and was never pushed or prodded or forced in any one direction. A privilege of abundance of choice that conversely goes hand in hand with a constant fear of making the wrong one.
I used to scoff at the ignorance of my compatriots who stayed at home in their comfortable lives, and feel pity for them trapped in a mental prison of their own making. I always strived for more and had to see what was further than the backyard, then beyond the woods; the ocean and more. But am I just shifting from place to place doing a random series of unrelated things? Or can I connect all the experiences together? If I wanted to study medicine or become a writer or a masseuse or simply sell jewelry on a beach in Colombia, would that make my MBA any less valuable?
Do I stay or do I go... I know the only person I have to ask is myself. I just have to learn to trust that feeling again.
25 Nov 2009
24 Nov 2009
El Paso 2001 The journey begins
The bus trip was long. I had watched out of the window as leafy green scenery gave way to dry soils and rolling hills of parched brown grass and, eventually, to desert. For forty-eight hours we had both been dying to get here, but now that the moment had come, I wished that we could continue observing our surroundings from behind the secure vantage-point of the coach window.
For the last two days we had been as if in a time-capsule. The outside world now seemed frightening and I found El Paso, with its dusty streets and foreign people, intimidating.
There was a knot in my stomach as we descended from the bus and went over to collect our backpacks from the hold. I had the distinct feeling that we were being watched and turned to see a group of dark-skinned men sipping beers in the café opposite the bus station, nudging each other and gesturing in our direction. One of them made a kissy face at me. It was difficult to pinpoint which of his features was the least attractive; the gut that spilled out over his shabby brown pants, or the fact that his fly was unbuttoned.
I stared the other way and wrestled with my pack to secure the straps over my shoulders. After so long of being cooped up in a small seat, my limbs felt weak and I knew I wouldn’t be able to carry it far in the desert heat.
So this was El Paso. Not exactly the homey Texan city that I was expecting. The kind that I had seen on adverts for fajita kits. America seemed to have given way to Mexico even though we were still north of the border. Without warning, everyone around had turned into Mexicans, including those travelling with us on the Greyhound.
As we made our way towards the centre to find a hotel room, the heat began to penetrate. “According to this,” said Anton, pointing at the guidebook, “there’s a hotel on East Stanton Street that’s really close to the bridge. I think we should go there. It doesn’t look much further.” He took off his cap and rubbed his head, his dark blond hair already scorched by the sun, had turned several shades lighter. Although he was tall, his frame was slight and his arms slender and I wondered if he had more difficulty carrying that weight than he let on. I smiled and dragged my feet along behind him, the reality dawning on me that this would be the first of many such treks.
I caught sight of myself in a shop window. I looked rough. My uninspiring shade of hair colour, which can sometimes look almost blonde, in the right light, was mousy and stuck to my head in places. My backpack was nearly as big as me and caused me to sweat under the arms on to my sleeves. I really needed a shower. The cooped up conditions on the bus had certainly done me no favours.
Shop workers and people strolling by mostly ignored us, although I probably eyed them with suspicion. Two days on a Greyhound bus was more than long enough to encounter some of America’s finest. Like the curious girl in front of us, travelling from Seattle to North Carolina (about a five day journey) with her pet fish in a small tupperware container. Or the alcoholic with the pungent smelling feet that nearly had herself ejected from the bus for steeling beer from a Chevron station, outside of Sacramento. There were two would-be gangsters on the final leg of the journey, calling everything and everyone a ‘motherfucker’, and the argument that took place between a fiery Latina and an even fierier black lady was particularly entertaining. The whole bus party was unable to continue its journey because the black lady had decided that she wanted the Latin lady’s seat. Sheer size gave her the upper hand and, eventually, she won, actually needing two seats to accommodate her large form.
For want of anything better to do (reading made me feel queasy) I had spent most of the duration of the journey trying to decide whether there was no truer representation of American life than this, or whether the Greyhound simply attracted all the oddballs and screwballs within the States. Perhaps the rest of America was comparatively normal and it was here on the buses that Jerry Springer found his contestants. It had certainly been an eye-opener and had made us both more aware of our belongings, and of our sanity.
El Paso is a well-laid out city, like the kind you could expect to find anywhere in North America, but there is an impoverished feel to it. Dollar clothing stores and fast food outlets line the sidewalks, and grand, modern buildings overshadow the falling down mini markets and laundries.
Loud Spanish voices filled my ears as we walked passed a thrift store. Two women were involved in a heated discussion, about what I could not tell, but their husbands stood in the background exchanging amused glances.
After several wrong turnings, we reached the ‘Gateway’ hotel. Colourful beaded curtains were hanging at the entrance door and, apart from a modest sign, there was little to distinguish the place as a hotel. We walked into a room, where three men were seated – two at a sofa and one at a table – smoking cigars. They stared at us penetratingly and without warmth. Our eyes turned to the man behind the reception desk who greeted us in English, asking which type of room we were after and for how long. All I could concentrate on was the fly that had landed on his eyebrow. He made no attempt to remove it and I had an overwhelming urge to slap it off with my hand.
As we walked up the stairs with the key we heard laughter and I could feel their eyes boring into my back. As I had not used my Spanish for some months, it was rusty and Anton had no knowledge of the language and was armed only with a small phrase book, we knew the next few months were going to be interesting. Although I had not quite prepared for it to be like this on “the safe side” of the border.
It was still early, something like 8.30, but I felt as if we had been up for days already and, as soon as we put down our bags, I jumped onto one of the beds. I lay down and stretched, feeling every fibre of my body lengthen. I surveyed the room. The carpet was a faded threadbare red and the fan above oscillated slowly and squeakily, its attachment to the ceiling a little precarious.
I lit a cigarette and watched as the smoke was caught by the wind from the fan and made little serpent motions. Anton was experimenting with our water purifier at the wash basin. The water came out warm and brown. I got up and went over to the window, pulling back the barely-there net curtains and looking down on to the street below. A fine layer of desert dust hung in the air. It was more visible on the other side of the street where the sidewalk was drenched in the morning sun. The streets were busy with people going to work. A bus heaved passed under the window and two children cycled by.
I let the curtain fall and withdrew into the room, suddenly overcome with tiredness. “Voila!” Anton produced a blue plastic cup filled with water. I looked at it with moderate suspicion.
“Do you think it’s safe? I know the guy in the store said that you could filter puddle water with it, but… it’s warm.”
“I dunno, but I’m thirsty and if we get really sick we can always sue.” He took a sip and passed it to me. It had a slightly clinical taste, which must have been the iodine. I lay on the bed looking up at the ceiling, concentrating my energy on the rotations of the fan. I heard Anton saying he was going out to buy some water. I was asleep before he returned.
Strange dreams invaded my sleep. Images from the bus journey – I was still on the bus but we weren’t going anywhere until everybody ate five hamburgers. Then the lady bus driver turned into Anton and he was trying to tell me something but I couldn’t hear him. I couldn’t understand what he was saying. He seemed to be speaking another language. I woke up. It felt as if I had slept through the night and awoken to a new day, but the clock said that it was quarter after three. Anton was not in the room. There was a note on the table:
“Gone for a look around – back soon, A.”
I shrugged off the wave of sleep I still felt and took a sip of the warm water beside me. I could hear the Mexican men downstairs in the lobby and I wondered if they had been there all day. I took off the clothes that I had been wearing since we left Vancouver and jumped in the shower, which seemed to saturate everything in the bathroom apart from myself, on whom it dripped and spluttered. I washed the two-day grime out of my hair. I remember watching the Wrigley’s chewing gum commercials when I was younger – the ones that took place on the Greyhound. Then they had seemed so exciting and romantic. A wry smile came to my face as images of our travel companions sprang to mind: a psychiatrist’s dream (or nightmare, depending on your point of view).
There was a knock at the door – it was Anton with a coffee for me. I received it gratefully. “There’s free Internet access in the library. I just sent an email to Paul to let him know we’re ok.”
Paul was a mutual friend back in Canada, cynical, doubting and thoroughly expecting us to fail. “You don’t speak Spanish, you don’t have enough money, you don’t even know which direction to head in”. Paul had racked up a list of reasons why what we were doing was folly. “I know we’re heading South,” I protested, and Paul had just laughed in that patronising way of his that always made me feel totally ridiculous. Underneath it all I knew it was because he was worried. He had even forwarded me (and I swear this is true) a web link entitled “comebackalive.com”.
I could not help but wonder where all of Anton’s energy had come from, as I gladly sipped the coffee, rubbing my eyes. “So what’s it like out there?” I enquired. “It’s weird. The library was cool and there’s a square where I sat down and had a drink. But I went into a store to buy some smokes and the woman serving didn’t speak English at all.”
“I know, it’s like we’re there already, isn’t it? I suppose it’s a good way of easing us into crossing the border. I think I’ll go and have a look around too. Are you hungry at all? Maybe I’ll try and grab us something to eat.”
As I left the coolness of the hotel room, the heat outside hit me like a slap in the face and the desert air blew into my nostrils. The town square, as Anton had said, was where people sat and congregated. I was handed a pamphlet about Jesus as I walked passed.
I suddenly felt really hungry and decided to look for a supermarket. I made it my goal to find a grocery store, or at least somewhere to buy the ingredients to make a sandwich with. As I walked leisurely up and down the streets, taking in the sights and smells of the city, I was whistled at and catcalled, stared at and was even questioned as to where I was going. It is amazing the difference it makes walking down the street alone, or walking down the street with Anton. I knew there would be a lot worse to come, Mexican men had somewhat of a reputation to uphold.
After about an hour of wondering in the heat I decided to give up – there was no supermarket in El Paso. I bought a packet of chips, two apples and some rather hideous-looking iced cakes from a lady in a mini market, who managed to serve me without looking at me even once. She did not look at the cash register either, but managed to carry on her animated conversation with the man slouched over the counter, who looked a lot like the one who had blown me a kiss earlier.
Feeling sleepy and in need of shade, I made my way back to the hotel. The roads were strangely quiet. The sun had crossed to the other side of the street. My stomach twitched with a mixture of excitement and apprehension. The eerie whistling of a western movie theme tune rang through my head and I felt that at any moment the sheriff would come around the corner with his gun in his holster.
The sun set rapidly at around 7. We discovered a fire escape on our floor and heaved opened the door. From there we watched as the sun sank, leaving a streaky trail of reds and purples behind it. We sat at the top of the rickety staircase staring across the border, just a few blocks away. The slums of Ciudad Juarez were twinkling on the hills.
The dark shades of evening disguised the uneven sidewalks and shabby shop faces. Crumbling facades of buildings and dusty streets were air-brushed out of the picture. From this distance and in the flattering light, the sparkle of lights from the hills looked pretty, Christmas tree-like. The harsh, stark daylight was gone. Tomorrow we would be over there.
Back in the hotel room Anton fiddled with the television, which was one of the most antiquated I had seen in a while, with a dial knob where the channels had to be tuned in. In shades of green and red we watched the only channel available – the news in Mexico. In Guadalajara, there were flash floods and we saw pictures of people splashing each other in the streets, with water up to their knees; in Oxaca there was a student uprising (about what we failed to decipher); in Mexico City there was a piece about a shooting.
We turned it off and took out a deck of cards from my pack. We were both strangely subdued. “You know what?” asked Anton, “that’s a real country, with real people and real problems. It’s not like Canada the wonderland anymore. It’s for real.”
“What are we doing?” I asked half laughing, half serious, with a sudden desire to be back in Paul’s apartment, digging him in the ribs about being so worried. I had a lump in my throat. We had some dinner (chips and iced gooey things) and washed it down with some iodineised water. At least I would lose some weight on this trip.
Chapter 2
The morning dawned hot and dry, as I expected it probably did every day in Texas. We filtered some emergency water into a little bottle and tried to memorise the instructions in the guidebook. Neither of us wanted to have to pull it out and consult its pages in the streets of Juarez; we may just as well have worn a neon sign shouting “I’m a tourist! And I’m lost! Please come and rip me off!”
We had read that only tourists in Mexico wear shorts and, not wishing to further differentiate ourselves from the crowds, we covered up in T-shirts and long pants. I don’t really know why we made such an effort to not stand out. The very fact of our huge backpacks, Anton’s streaked blond hair and our confused expressions would be more than enough of a job by itself.
Unlike Anton, a coffee and a cigarette was not enough to sustain me until lunchtime, which was probably why he was so skinny and I wasn’t. People say that they don’t quit smoking because they are afraid that they will eat more. It doesn’t work that way for me. Smoking has never been an appetite suppressant. If I have a cigarette, I still need a snack, or some breakfast, or something to make my brain believe that I have had food. I finished off some cheesepuffs, which had been exposed to the air and were slightly stale-tasting. I smiled at the thought of my mother back home, and what she would have to say about how I’d been eating the last few days.
With one last look around the room and a token checking underneath the beds, we made our way down the stairs and into the lobby, where the same men were already assembled in their places, viewing some early morning Mexican soap in which the characters wore excessive amounts of mascara and no amount of over-acting was too strong. There were no clues as to what their role in the running of this hotel was. As far as I could make out, they only served to intimidate people as they walked in. Lazy cabrones who sat around all day while their woman worked in the mini-markets, clothing stores and launderettes, before returning home and cooking the dinner. The man behind the counter asked if we were heading into Mexico and wished us luck, saying that we were about to go and experience another culture and country, and that we would have the time of our lives. Perhaps he wasn’t so bad after all. Or perhaps he had hidden a packet of drugs in one of our backpacks and we would be besieged at the border.
It is a strange thing, when fuelled by just enough fear and uneasiness, what great fantasies form in the depths of our imaginations. I did not normally have a suspicious nature, yet some defence mechanism in me made me size everyone up. I suppose it is just our fear of the unknown, irrational, like that of the dark, when it is impossible to see what is lurking in the shadows and our minds fill in the blanks with alarming possibilities. Part of me blamed Paul, who had filled my head with so many horrifying scenarios that, in Canada, were easy to brush off, and here, amongst the dusty, sultry reality, suddenly played on my mind. We stepped out in to the street outside and started to make our way towards the bridge into Juarez. I had mixed impressions of El Paso. It was not a place that you felt compelled to hurry back to by any means. It was not a must-see place to visit. It was simply the stepping off point into Mexico, its very name meaning ‘the pass’ in Spanish. The inhabitants were strange and the attractions of the town few, but still I would remember it fondly, as the start of our adventure.
The border between Mexico and El Paso is separated by a bridge, which is manned by a person in a small cubicle, and blocked to cars by a light wooden barrier. Before leaving El Paso, a small fee of 25 cents maintenance charge is levied. At least, this is what you could expect to see on a typical day, according to our guidebook. But today was obviously the guard’s day off. There was no one in the cubicle. We waited for a few moments wondering what we should do next, until a few ladies with large bundles and baskets casually side-stepped the barrier and started walking over the bridge, unconcerned. We shrugged our shoulders and did the same, checking first that no one was going to run around the corner with a shotgun and arrest us. Even though we knew that the Immigration office was on the other side, this lack of policing of the border seemed strange. Probably all the more so because we were subjected to such fierce interrogation by meaty officials with army haircuts at the USA border into Seattle.
Summoning up their most threatening and sullen faces, they asked us why we wanted to come to America, what we would be doing, when we would be leaving, and how we were going to pay for it. American customs officers always make me feel as if I have something to hide, spluttering through my answers and stumbling over simple questions, such as birth date or profession. Although, my birth date usually raises a smile from even the most sombre of them, falling as it does on the 4th July. Rarely has a customs official failed to inform me of what a good party I would have on my birthday should I spend it in the States.
My thoughts returned again to our surroundings, which were hot, dry and dusty. As we shuffled along the bridge over the Rio Grande, the straps of my bag began to gnaw into my shoulder blades. The noise and hub of our first Mexican city grew louder. We walked right over and into a busy street. The ladies in front of us had already been swallowed up into the scene of the city. Had we not known that the Immigration office was to the right of the bridge, it would have been easy to keep on walking and disappear into northern Mexico without anyone so much as batting an eyelid or raising a sombrero.
There were a few people milling outside a small office a few yards away. We walked in and put our packs down, which brought instant relief. I felt as if I had shed several pounds just from walking over the bridge. There were several officials behind glass panels inside. An overweight, cheerless woman, with a suggestion of a moustache at the corners of her upper lip, grunted at me to approach. “¿Hablas Ingles?” I attempted, smiling, expecting a warm smile in return as acknowledgement of my efforts. She stared at me with a look of repulsion and, not until she had made me feel as if I was physically shrinking in front of her did she answer “no” in a loud, aggressive tone. I turned round to Anton, who was looking worried. This did not happen in rehearsals last night. I took a deep breath and dug into the back of my brain for my Spanish.
I handed over our passports and asked the woman for a ninety day tourist visa and she did her best to not understand a word that came out of my mouth, visibly relishing my embarrassment, and letting me squirm for a few moments longer before, obviously aware of what we wanted, she eventually threw two visa slips under the counter and blurted at me in very fast Spanish. Evidently we were to go to the first bank we could find to pay for and have our visas validated there. At least I was ninety per cent sure that was what she had said. I did not dare to ask her to repeat herself.
Anton gave me a pat on the back as we stepped out of the building. I lit a cigarette and took a drag, leaning against the wall for support. “That was hard work”, I muttered, flicking a coil of ash onto the ground and smoothing it away with my boot. They probably see thousands of stupid gringos trying to cross into their country each year and resent them for their arrogance. I knew that I just needed a few weeks to refamiliarise myself with their language but hated not being able to speak fluently or with confidence. It was always so much easier to speak a foreign language in a bar, after several drinks, when your inhibitions have been dispersed. Anton let out a yelp of anguish, as he searched and researched his small day pack. His phrase book was not inside and he had evidently left it on the counter in the hotel as we paid our bill. Although not hugely useful for me, it was at least of some aid and I knew Anton really wanted to try and help with the hotel bookings and try learning Spanish. Now all he had to come to his aid were the three short pages in the back of the ‘Let’s Go’ guidebook, which were packed with useful expressions, such as, “marrying me will not make you a US citizen” and “you killed my father, prepare to die”. These expressions would definitely come in handy when making idle conversation in a bar or finding out train times. I inwardly cringed.
Once we had reloaded ourselves with our backpacks, we walked away from the office and crossed the busy road, where the sidewalk was heaving with people waiting for a bus. We were not planning on spending any longer in this town than necessary, as we had heard bad reports of it. Bob Dylan wrote ‘Just like Tom Thumb’s blues’ ** get this **, arguably one of his most depressing songs, about Ciudad Juarez.
The disorderly queue of people at the bus stop pushed and shoved each other as a bus pulled around the corner. We managed to pile ourselves onto it and found a seat near the centre of the bus. If we were on the right bus, we should be at the Rio Grande mall, where we were could catch a bus to Juarez’s main coach station, in a matter of minutes. There was no air conditioning on the bus and the open windows provided little ventilation. Sporadic palm trees grew in the middle of the road, ripping through the broken pavements. The chaotic streets heaved with traffic. Children on bicycles loaded with provisions passed dangerously close to the sides of the bus. The driver had a rosary hanging from the sun visor. The plastic brown seats made my skin sweat and feel sticky. I picked at the hole in the cover of the seat in front, rolling the foam I pulled out into little balls. Out of the window a collection of large shops loomed up. Anton jumped up and signalled to the driver. The bus stopped and we got out, trying not to knock people flying with our heavy luggage as we squeezed passed.
It was good to step out into the outside air again, even if it was close and seemed to coat the back of the throat. A busy, wide road lay between us and the mall, and we took several attempts to cross, eventually deep breathing and running over as fast as we could. There was no sign to say that this was the ‘Rio Grande’ mall. In fact, most of the shops seemed to be closed. We crossed over the car park, and into the mall, where the cool air soothed around us.
I asked a young lady with large golden hoops in her ears and a high ponytail if this was the Rio Grande mall. She looked at me blankly. That is what I thought I had asked her anyway, but I had probably just told her that she was a big river. We looked at the mall planner. No where on it did it state ‘Rio Grande’. I looked up and saw the unmistakable glimmer of a golden arch. To my dismay, there was a McDonalds here. Like an octopus, its tentacles had stretched into most countries in the world. Dishing up its own brand of tasteless, generic burgers and cardboard fries. Fast food that contained some kind of McNicotine, enticing the poor addicted masses back through its doors, clogging their arteries raising their blood pressure, and impacting on the local competition. I turned away in disgust.
After attempting to ask a few different people where we were, we got the distinct impression that this was not the Rio Grande mall. We went outside again and decided to go into the Holiday Inn, as there would be counter staff there that spoke English. Sweaty, dirty and not looking in the least bit like hotel guests, we traipsed up to the reception desk and explained our predicament. The lady behind the counter spoke perfect English and was very helpful, although she did not know how to direct us to the central depot, or to the Rio Grande mall. We did learn, however, that we were still a long way off and, in fact, had come totally out of our way.
She placed a map which had the bus routes listed on it on the counter and the three of us managed to work out which combination would get us there. We wondered out at least now having some perspective of where we were and which direction we were heading in.
We found a bus stop and leaned against it. Knowing from experience that the best way to make a bus arrive is to light up a cigarette, I did so and a few seconds later a bus rumbled around the corner. Routa 8A. it seemed to be the one that we needed. I crushed my cigarette out on the floor and we jumped on to the bus. This time we had managed to board the right bus and we only had to change once before we arrived at the main depot.
We stepped inside and saw a counter marked ‘Omnibus Mexico’. I recognised that name from the guidebook and felt slightly relieved that we seemed to be in the right place at last. By a combination of sign language, fumbled Spanish and pointing at the guidebook and the departure board, we eventually managed to get two first class one way tickets to Chihuahua. She told us the bus trip was about five hours, which was nothing compared to the last trip we had taken, and would pass by very swiftly.
We had half an hour to wait and we bought two coffees, sat down and surveyed our surroundings. It was much the same as any bus station you could expect to find anywhere in the world. A point of transit filled with people sitting, waiting to catch their next bus to a different city, and people reunited with family hugging and gabbling fast and cheerful greetings. Most people had large bags and bored expressions. No one eyed us with suspicion, as though we didn’t belong in this picture. In fact, they didn’t look at us at all. Just normal people going about their everyday lives. I started to feel more relaxed at last. People are people wherever you go. There is nothing more dangerous or scary about Mexican people than your congregation at church or fellow publicans, even though I had had visions of them all wielding guns and being somehow intimidating. I don’t know why I felt so frightened in the hotel room that morning. I started to feel more at ease and able to observe people without the same level of suspicion as before.
We handed our backpacks to the driver and he placed them in the luggage hold underneath. We stepped onto the coach, which was very plush, air conditioned and had enough leg room to stretch out. It was twice as lavish as the American Greyhound and 48 hours in this baby would have been a relative pleasure.
As we pulled out of the bay and drove along, I again looked at the outside world through a pain of glass. I felt secure and comfortable and knew that we would not have to move for at least another few hours. Every so often I caught the driver’s eye in his mirror and he smiled at me. It wasn’t a sleezy smile at all, more a kind of comforting, fatherly type of smile. I felt ashamed for ever worrying about coming here.
We passed through the outskirts of the city and watched as shackle-style houses gave way to barren and open landscape. Soon we were driving through desert where there was nothing to be seen apart from open spaces and dry desert ground, dotted with the odd brush or desert fern.
A violent crash of rolling thunder filled the sky, invading the rhythmic vibrations of the bus in my ears. This was followed up by a giant flash of fork lightning. The rain fell out of the sky like a dam released on a river. The sky darkened and the water beat against the windows of the coach. I felt very snug inside, and stared out of the window with a childlike excitement. Watching, anticipating, gasping as the rain let up none of its ferocity and the booming thunder echoed across the wild desert ‘scape.
Two minutes later, the sun came out and shone across the land as if nothing had happened. The windows of the coach dried off and almost no evidence remained of the rain. I was reminded of my childhood, growing up in Saudi Arabia and the freak weather that could occur there too. Flash storms of great intensity that would disappear as quickly as they had come. And the evening sun that set with no twilight, going from light to dark, as if someone were turning a dimmer switch down.
I turned to Anton in the seat next to me. His eyes were closed and he looked relaxed. I looked again out of the window at the beautiful, barren scenery and let out a smile. At that moment I could think of no where else I would rather have been and I closed my eyes and leaned back in the seat.
For the last two days we had been as if in a time-capsule. The outside world now seemed frightening and I found El Paso, with its dusty streets and foreign people, intimidating.
There was a knot in my stomach as we descended from the bus and went over to collect our backpacks from the hold. I had the distinct feeling that we were being watched and turned to see a group of dark-skinned men sipping beers in the café opposite the bus station, nudging each other and gesturing in our direction. One of them made a kissy face at me. It was difficult to pinpoint which of his features was the least attractive; the gut that spilled out over his shabby brown pants, or the fact that his fly was unbuttoned.
I stared the other way and wrestled with my pack to secure the straps over my shoulders. After so long of being cooped up in a small seat, my limbs felt weak and I knew I wouldn’t be able to carry it far in the desert heat.
So this was El Paso. Not exactly the homey Texan city that I was expecting. The kind that I had seen on adverts for fajita kits. America seemed to have given way to Mexico even though we were still north of the border. Without warning, everyone around had turned into Mexicans, including those travelling with us on the Greyhound.
As we made our way towards the centre to find a hotel room, the heat began to penetrate. “According to this,” said Anton, pointing at the guidebook, “there’s a hotel on East Stanton Street that’s really close to the bridge. I think we should go there. It doesn’t look much further.” He took off his cap and rubbed his head, his dark blond hair already scorched by the sun, had turned several shades lighter. Although he was tall, his frame was slight and his arms slender and I wondered if he had more difficulty carrying that weight than he let on. I smiled and dragged my feet along behind him, the reality dawning on me that this would be the first of many such treks.
I caught sight of myself in a shop window. I looked rough. My uninspiring shade of hair colour, which can sometimes look almost blonde, in the right light, was mousy and stuck to my head in places. My backpack was nearly as big as me and caused me to sweat under the arms on to my sleeves. I really needed a shower. The cooped up conditions on the bus had certainly done me no favours.
Shop workers and people strolling by mostly ignored us, although I probably eyed them with suspicion. Two days on a Greyhound bus was more than long enough to encounter some of America’s finest. Like the curious girl in front of us, travelling from Seattle to North Carolina (about a five day journey) with her pet fish in a small tupperware container. Or the alcoholic with the pungent smelling feet that nearly had herself ejected from the bus for steeling beer from a Chevron station, outside of Sacramento. There were two would-be gangsters on the final leg of the journey, calling everything and everyone a ‘motherfucker’, and the argument that took place between a fiery Latina and an even fierier black lady was particularly entertaining. The whole bus party was unable to continue its journey because the black lady had decided that she wanted the Latin lady’s seat. Sheer size gave her the upper hand and, eventually, she won, actually needing two seats to accommodate her large form.
For want of anything better to do (reading made me feel queasy) I had spent most of the duration of the journey trying to decide whether there was no truer representation of American life than this, or whether the Greyhound simply attracted all the oddballs and screwballs within the States. Perhaps the rest of America was comparatively normal and it was here on the buses that Jerry Springer found his contestants. It had certainly been an eye-opener and had made us both more aware of our belongings, and of our sanity.
El Paso is a well-laid out city, like the kind you could expect to find anywhere in North America, but there is an impoverished feel to it. Dollar clothing stores and fast food outlets line the sidewalks, and grand, modern buildings overshadow the falling down mini markets and laundries.
Loud Spanish voices filled my ears as we walked passed a thrift store. Two women were involved in a heated discussion, about what I could not tell, but their husbands stood in the background exchanging amused glances.
After several wrong turnings, we reached the ‘Gateway’ hotel. Colourful beaded curtains were hanging at the entrance door and, apart from a modest sign, there was little to distinguish the place as a hotel. We walked into a room, where three men were seated – two at a sofa and one at a table – smoking cigars. They stared at us penetratingly and without warmth. Our eyes turned to the man behind the reception desk who greeted us in English, asking which type of room we were after and for how long. All I could concentrate on was the fly that had landed on his eyebrow. He made no attempt to remove it and I had an overwhelming urge to slap it off with my hand.
As we walked up the stairs with the key we heard laughter and I could feel their eyes boring into my back. As I had not used my Spanish for some months, it was rusty and Anton had no knowledge of the language and was armed only with a small phrase book, we knew the next few months were going to be interesting. Although I had not quite prepared for it to be like this on “the safe side” of the border.
It was still early, something like 8.30, but I felt as if we had been up for days already and, as soon as we put down our bags, I jumped onto one of the beds. I lay down and stretched, feeling every fibre of my body lengthen. I surveyed the room. The carpet was a faded threadbare red and the fan above oscillated slowly and squeakily, its attachment to the ceiling a little precarious.
I lit a cigarette and watched as the smoke was caught by the wind from the fan and made little serpent motions. Anton was experimenting with our water purifier at the wash basin. The water came out warm and brown. I got up and went over to the window, pulling back the barely-there net curtains and looking down on to the street below. A fine layer of desert dust hung in the air. It was more visible on the other side of the street where the sidewalk was drenched in the morning sun. The streets were busy with people going to work. A bus heaved passed under the window and two children cycled by.
I let the curtain fall and withdrew into the room, suddenly overcome with tiredness. “Voila!” Anton produced a blue plastic cup filled with water. I looked at it with moderate suspicion.
“Do you think it’s safe? I know the guy in the store said that you could filter puddle water with it, but… it’s warm.”
“I dunno, but I’m thirsty and if we get really sick we can always sue.” He took a sip and passed it to me. It had a slightly clinical taste, which must have been the iodine. I lay on the bed looking up at the ceiling, concentrating my energy on the rotations of the fan. I heard Anton saying he was going out to buy some water. I was asleep before he returned.
Strange dreams invaded my sleep. Images from the bus journey – I was still on the bus but we weren’t going anywhere until everybody ate five hamburgers. Then the lady bus driver turned into Anton and he was trying to tell me something but I couldn’t hear him. I couldn’t understand what he was saying. He seemed to be speaking another language. I woke up. It felt as if I had slept through the night and awoken to a new day, but the clock said that it was quarter after three. Anton was not in the room. There was a note on the table:
“Gone for a look around – back soon, A.”
I shrugged off the wave of sleep I still felt and took a sip of the warm water beside me. I could hear the Mexican men downstairs in the lobby and I wondered if they had been there all day. I took off the clothes that I had been wearing since we left Vancouver and jumped in the shower, which seemed to saturate everything in the bathroom apart from myself, on whom it dripped and spluttered. I washed the two-day grime out of my hair. I remember watching the Wrigley’s chewing gum commercials when I was younger – the ones that took place on the Greyhound. Then they had seemed so exciting and romantic. A wry smile came to my face as images of our travel companions sprang to mind: a psychiatrist’s dream (or nightmare, depending on your point of view).
There was a knock at the door – it was Anton with a coffee for me. I received it gratefully. “There’s free Internet access in the library. I just sent an email to Paul to let him know we’re ok.”
Paul was a mutual friend back in Canada, cynical, doubting and thoroughly expecting us to fail. “You don’t speak Spanish, you don’t have enough money, you don’t even know which direction to head in”. Paul had racked up a list of reasons why what we were doing was folly. “I know we’re heading South,” I protested, and Paul had just laughed in that patronising way of his that always made me feel totally ridiculous. Underneath it all I knew it was because he was worried. He had even forwarded me (and I swear this is true) a web link entitled “comebackalive.com”.
I could not help but wonder where all of Anton’s energy had come from, as I gladly sipped the coffee, rubbing my eyes. “So what’s it like out there?” I enquired. “It’s weird. The library was cool and there’s a square where I sat down and had a drink. But I went into a store to buy some smokes and the woman serving didn’t speak English at all.”
“I know, it’s like we’re there already, isn’t it? I suppose it’s a good way of easing us into crossing the border. I think I’ll go and have a look around too. Are you hungry at all? Maybe I’ll try and grab us something to eat.”
As I left the coolness of the hotel room, the heat outside hit me like a slap in the face and the desert air blew into my nostrils. The town square, as Anton had said, was where people sat and congregated. I was handed a pamphlet about Jesus as I walked passed.
I suddenly felt really hungry and decided to look for a supermarket. I made it my goal to find a grocery store, or at least somewhere to buy the ingredients to make a sandwich with. As I walked leisurely up and down the streets, taking in the sights and smells of the city, I was whistled at and catcalled, stared at and was even questioned as to where I was going. It is amazing the difference it makes walking down the street alone, or walking down the street with Anton. I knew there would be a lot worse to come, Mexican men had somewhat of a reputation to uphold.
After about an hour of wondering in the heat I decided to give up – there was no supermarket in El Paso. I bought a packet of chips, two apples and some rather hideous-looking iced cakes from a lady in a mini market, who managed to serve me without looking at me even once. She did not look at the cash register either, but managed to carry on her animated conversation with the man slouched over the counter, who looked a lot like the one who had blown me a kiss earlier.
Feeling sleepy and in need of shade, I made my way back to the hotel. The roads were strangely quiet. The sun had crossed to the other side of the street. My stomach twitched with a mixture of excitement and apprehension. The eerie whistling of a western movie theme tune rang through my head and I felt that at any moment the sheriff would come around the corner with his gun in his holster.
The sun set rapidly at around 7. We discovered a fire escape on our floor and heaved opened the door. From there we watched as the sun sank, leaving a streaky trail of reds and purples behind it. We sat at the top of the rickety staircase staring across the border, just a few blocks away. The slums of Ciudad Juarez were twinkling on the hills.
The dark shades of evening disguised the uneven sidewalks and shabby shop faces. Crumbling facades of buildings and dusty streets were air-brushed out of the picture. From this distance and in the flattering light, the sparkle of lights from the hills looked pretty, Christmas tree-like. The harsh, stark daylight was gone. Tomorrow we would be over there.
Back in the hotel room Anton fiddled with the television, which was one of the most antiquated I had seen in a while, with a dial knob where the channels had to be tuned in. In shades of green and red we watched the only channel available – the news in Mexico. In Guadalajara, there were flash floods and we saw pictures of people splashing each other in the streets, with water up to their knees; in Oxaca there was a student uprising (about what we failed to decipher); in Mexico City there was a piece about a shooting.
We turned it off and took out a deck of cards from my pack. We were both strangely subdued. “You know what?” asked Anton, “that’s a real country, with real people and real problems. It’s not like Canada the wonderland anymore. It’s for real.”
“What are we doing?” I asked half laughing, half serious, with a sudden desire to be back in Paul’s apartment, digging him in the ribs about being so worried. I had a lump in my throat. We had some dinner (chips and iced gooey things) and washed it down with some iodineised water. At least I would lose some weight on this trip.
Chapter 2
The morning dawned hot and dry, as I expected it probably did every day in Texas. We filtered some emergency water into a little bottle and tried to memorise the instructions in the guidebook. Neither of us wanted to have to pull it out and consult its pages in the streets of Juarez; we may just as well have worn a neon sign shouting “I’m a tourist! And I’m lost! Please come and rip me off!”
We had read that only tourists in Mexico wear shorts and, not wishing to further differentiate ourselves from the crowds, we covered up in T-shirts and long pants. I don’t really know why we made such an effort to not stand out. The very fact of our huge backpacks, Anton’s streaked blond hair and our confused expressions would be more than enough of a job by itself.
Unlike Anton, a coffee and a cigarette was not enough to sustain me until lunchtime, which was probably why he was so skinny and I wasn’t. People say that they don’t quit smoking because they are afraid that they will eat more. It doesn’t work that way for me. Smoking has never been an appetite suppressant. If I have a cigarette, I still need a snack, or some breakfast, or something to make my brain believe that I have had food. I finished off some cheesepuffs, which had been exposed to the air and were slightly stale-tasting. I smiled at the thought of my mother back home, and what she would have to say about how I’d been eating the last few days.
With one last look around the room and a token checking underneath the beds, we made our way down the stairs and into the lobby, where the same men were already assembled in their places, viewing some early morning Mexican soap in which the characters wore excessive amounts of mascara and no amount of over-acting was too strong. There were no clues as to what their role in the running of this hotel was. As far as I could make out, they only served to intimidate people as they walked in. Lazy cabrones who sat around all day while their woman worked in the mini-markets, clothing stores and launderettes, before returning home and cooking the dinner. The man behind the counter asked if we were heading into Mexico and wished us luck, saying that we were about to go and experience another culture and country, and that we would have the time of our lives. Perhaps he wasn’t so bad after all. Or perhaps he had hidden a packet of drugs in one of our backpacks and we would be besieged at the border.
It is a strange thing, when fuelled by just enough fear and uneasiness, what great fantasies form in the depths of our imaginations. I did not normally have a suspicious nature, yet some defence mechanism in me made me size everyone up. I suppose it is just our fear of the unknown, irrational, like that of the dark, when it is impossible to see what is lurking in the shadows and our minds fill in the blanks with alarming possibilities. Part of me blamed Paul, who had filled my head with so many horrifying scenarios that, in Canada, were easy to brush off, and here, amongst the dusty, sultry reality, suddenly played on my mind. We stepped out in to the street outside and started to make our way towards the bridge into Juarez. I had mixed impressions of El Paso. It was not a place that you felt compelled to hurry back to by any means. It was not a must-see place to visit. It was simply the stepping off point into Mexico, its very name meaning ‘the pass’ in Spanish. The inhabitants were strange and the attractions of the town few, but still I would remember it fondly, as the start of our adventure.
The border between Mexico and El Paso is separated by a bridge, which is manned by a person in a small cubicle, and blocked to cars by a light wooden barrier. Before leaving El Paso, a small fee of 25 cents maintenance charge is levied. At least, this is what you could expect to see on a typical day, according to our guidebook. But today was obviously the guard’s day off. There was no one in the cubicle. We waited for a few moments wondering what we should do next, until a few ladies with large bundles and baskets casually side-stepped the barrier and started walking over the bridge, unconcerned. We shrugged our shoulders and did the same, checking first that no one was going to run around the corner with a shotgun and arrest us. Even though we knew that the Immigration office was on the other side, this lack of policing of the border seemed strange. Probably all the more so because we were subjected to such fierce interrogation by meaty officials with army haircuts at the USA border into Seattle.
Summoning up their most threatening and sullen faces, they asked us why we wanted to come to America, what we would be doing, when we would be leaving, and how we were going to pay for it. American customs officers always make me feel as if I have something to hide, spluttering through my answers and stumbling over simple questions, such as birth date or profession. Although, my birth date usually raises a smile from even the most sombre of them, falling as it does on the 4th July. Rarely has a customs official failed to inform me of what a good party I would have on my birthday should I spend it in the States.
My thoughts returned again to our surroundings, which were hot, dry and dusty. As we shuffled along the bridge over the Rio Grande, the straps of my bag began to gnaw into my shoulder blades. The noise and hub of our first Mexican city grew louder. We walked right over and into a busy street. The ladies in front of us had already been swallowed up into the scene of the city. Had we not known that the Immigration office was to the right of the bridge, it would have been easy to keep on walking and disappear into northern Mexico without anyone so much as batting an eyelid or raising a sombrero.
There were a few people milling outside a small office a few yards away. We walked in and put our packs down, which brought instant relief. I felt as if I had shed several pounds just from walking over the bridge. There were several officials behind glass panels inside. An overweight, cheerless woman, with a suggestion of a moustache at the corners of her upper lip, grunted at me to approach. “¿Hablas Ingles?” I attempted, smiling, expecting a warm smile in return as acknowledgement of my efforts. She stared at me with a look of repulsion and, not until she had made me feel as if I was physically shrinking in front of her did she answer “no” in a loud, aggressive tone. I turned round to Anton, who was looking worried. This did not happen in rehearsals last night. I took a deep breath and dug into the back of my brain for my Spanish.
I handed over our passports and asked the woman for a ninety day tourist visa and she did her best to not understand a word that came out of my mouth, visibly relishing my embarrassment, and letting me squirm for a few moments longer before, obviously aware of what we wanted, she eventually threw two visa slips under the counter and blurted at me in very fast Spanish. Evidently we were to go to the first bank we could find to pay for and have our visas validated there. At least I was ninety per cent sure that was what she had said. I did not dare to ask her to repeat herself.
Anton gave me a pat on the back as we stepped out of the building. I lit a cigarette and took a drag, leaning against the wall for support. “That was hard work”, I muttered, flicking a coil of ash onto the ground and smoothing it away with my boot. They probably see thousands of stupid gringos trying to cross into their country each year and resent them for their arrogance. I knew that I just needed a few weeks to refamiliarise myself with their language but hated not being able to speak fluently or with confidence. It was always so much easier to speak a foreign language in a bar, after several drinks, when your inhibitions have been dispersed. Anton let out a yelp of anguish, as he searched and researched his small day pack. His phrase book was not inside and he had evidently left it on the counter in the hotel as we paid our bill. Although not hugely useful for me, it was at least of some aid and I knew Anton really wanted to try and help with the hotel bookings and try learning Spanish. Now all he had to come to his aid were the three short pages in the back of the ‘Let’s Go’ guidebook, which were packed with useful expressions, such as, “marrying me will not make you a US citizen” and “you killed my father, prepare to die”. These expressions would definitely come in handy when making idle conversation in a bar or finding out train times. I inwardly cringed.
Once we had reloaded ourselves with our backpacks, we walked away from the office and crossed the busy road, where the sidewalk was heaving with people waiting for a bus. We were not planning on spending any longer in this town than necessary, as we had heard bad reports of it. Bob Dylan wrote ‘Just like Tom Thumb’s blues’ ** get this **, arguably one of his most depressing songs, about Ciudad Juarez.
The disorderly queue of people at the bus stop pushed and shoved each other as a bus pulled around the corner. We managed to pile ourselves onto it and found a seat near the centre of the bus. If we were on the right bus, we should be at the Rio Grande mall, where we were could catch a bus to Juarez’s main coach station, in a matter of minutes. There was no air conditioning on the bus and the open windows provided little ventilation. Sporadic palm trees grew in the middle of the road, ripping through the broken pavements. The chaotic streets heaved with traffic. Children on bicycles loaded with provisions passed dangerously close to the sides of the bus. The driver had a rosary hanging from the sun visor. The plastic brown seats made my skin sweat and feel sticky. I picked at the hole in the cover of the seat in front, rolling the foam I pulled out into little balls. Out of the window a collection of large shops loomed up. Anton jumped up and signalled to the driver. The bus stopped and we got out, trying not to knock people flying with our heavy luggage as we squeezed passed.
It was good to step out into the outside air again, even if it was close and seemed to coat the back of the throat. A busy, wide road lay between us and the mall, and we took several attempts to cross, eventually deep breathing and running over as fast as we could. There was no sign to say that this was the ‘Rio Grande’ mall. In fact, most of the shops seemed to be closed. We crossed over the car park, and into the mall, where the cool air soothed around us.
I asked a young lady with large golden hoops in her ears and a high ponytail if this was the Rio Grande mall. She looked at me blankly. That is what I thought I had asked her anyway, but I had probably just told her that she was a big river. We looked at the mall planner. No where on it did it state ‘Rio Grande’. I looked up and saw the unmistakable glimmer of a golden arch. To my dismay, there was a McDonalds here. Like an octopus, its tentacles had stretched into most countries in the world. Dishing up its own brand of tasteless, generic burgers and cardboard fries. Fast food that contained some kind of McNicotine, enticing the poor addicted masses back through its doors, clogging their arteries raising their blood pressure, and impacting on the local competition. I turned away in disgust.
After attempting to ask a few different people where we were, we got the distinct impression that this was not the Rio Grande mall. We went outside again and decided to go into the Holiday Inn, as there would be counter staff there that spoke English. Sweaty, dirty and not looking in the least bit like hotel guests, we traipsed up to the reception desk and explained our predicament. The lady behind the counter spoke perfect English and was very helpful, although she did not know how to direct us to the central depot, or to the Rio Grande mall. We did learn, however, that we were still a long way off and, in fact, had come totally out of our way.
She placed a map which had the bus routes listed on it on the counter and the three of us managed to work out which combination would get us there. We wondered out at least now having some perspective of where we were and which direction we were heading in.
We found a bus stop and leaned against it. Knowing from experience that the best way to make a bus arrive is to light up a cigarette, I did so and a few seconds later a bus rumbled around the corner. Routa 8A. it seemed to be the one that we needed. I crushed my cigarette out on the floor and we jumped on to the bus. This time we had managed to board the right bus and we only had to change once before we arrived at the main depot.
We stepped inside and saw a counter marked ‘Omnibus Mexico’. I recognised that name from the guidebook and felt slightly relieved that we seemed to be in the right place at last. By a combination of sign language, fumbled Spanish and pointing at the guidebook and the departure board, we eventually managed to get two first class one way tickets to Chihuahua. She told us the bus trip was about five hours, which was nothing compared to the last trip we had taken, and would pass by very swiftly.
We had half an hour to wait and we bought two coffees, sat down and surveyed our surroundings. It was much the same as any bus station you could expect to find anywhere in the world. A point of transit filled with people sitting, waiting to catch their next bus to a different city, and people reunited with family hugging and gabbling fast and cheerful greetings. Most people had large bags and bored expressions. No one eyed us with suspicion, as though we didn’t belong in this picture. In fact, they didn’t look at us at all. Just normal people going about their everyday lives. I started to feel more relaxed at last. People are people wherever you go. There is nothing more dangerous or scary about Mexican people than your congregation at church or fellow publicans, even though I had had visions of them all wielding guns and being somehow intimidating. I don’t know why I felt so frightened in the hotel room that morning. I started to feel more at ease and able to observe people without the same level of suspicion as before.
We handed our backpacks to the driver and he placed them in the luggage hold underneath. We stepped onto the coach, which was very plush, air conditioned and had enough leg room to stretch out. It was twice as lavish as the American Greyhound and 48 hours in this baby would have been a relative pleasure.
As we pulled out of the bay and drove along, I again looked at the outside world through a pain of glass. I felt secure and comfortable and knew that we would not have to move for at least another few hours. Every so often I caught the driver’s eye in his mirror and he smiled at me. It wasn’t a sleezy smile at all, more a kind of comforting, fatherly type of smile. I felt ashamed for ever worrying about coming here.
We passed through the outskirts of the city and watched as shackle-style houses gave way to barren and open landscape. Soon we were driving through desert where there was nothing to be seen apart from open spaces and dry desert ground, dotted with the odd brush or desert fern.
A violent crash of rolling thunder filled the sky, invading the rhythmic vibrations of the bus in my ears. This was followed up by a giant flash of fork lightning. The rain fell out of the sky like a dam released on a river. The sky darkened and the water beat against the windows of the coach. I felt very snug inside, and stared out of the window with a childlike excitement. Watching, anticipating, gasping as the rain let up none of its ferocity and the booming thunder echoed across the wild desert ‘scape.
Two minutes later, the sun came out and shone across the land as if nothing had happened. The windows of the coach dried off and almost no evidence remained of the rain. I was reminded of my childhood, growing up in Saudi Arabia and the freak weather that could occur there too. Flash storms of great intensity that would disappear as quickly as they had come. And the evening sun that set with no twilight, going from light to dark, as if someone were turning a dimmer switch down.
I turned to Anton in the seat next to me. His eyes were closed and he looked relaxed. I looked again out of the window at the beautiful, barren scenery and let out a smile. At that moment I could think of no where else I would rather have been and I closed my eyes and leaned back in the seat.
Border Crossing Honduras / Nicaragua 2001
Although by now we should have been seasoned professionals at crossing boarders, they still filled me with apprehension. It wasn’t the thought of the unknown that made me hate boarder crossings. That was the most exciting thing about entering a new country. It was the fact that wherever there was a boarder, indeed, wherever there was a tourist, there was also a rip-off merchant lurking in the shadows. It was inevitable that these two things went together. They seemed to always come out and try to hit you when you’re at your most vulnerable- i.e. when you didn’t know where you were going or what the currency was worth. Running so dangerously low on money at this stage, in one sense, we had less to lose, but because of that, every time we did lose anything, or over-pay for something, it’s loss was felt more sorely. And with our back packs appreciating in value every day from all the souveniers we had picked up, I became less and less willing to hand them over to the bus workers and watch them disappear from sight onto the roof above.
After yet another morning of me having to play “alarm clock Nazi” and Tony doing his usual “shifting-into-reverse-gear-mode”, I eventually managed to husstle us out of the hotel. A little late, but in time to make the wlak to Mi Espiranza bus depot (or so we thought). After last night’s torrential downpour, which caused a power-out (and some of the most voilent thunder I had ever heard) the morning was far from cool, even at 8.30: infact it was swealtering hot. The walk to the station was not ‘quatro cuadros’ as we had been told, but more like fifteen.
We hurried along the dusty, busy streets, descending further and further into the worst district of town in the Capital of one of Central America’s most dangerous countries. With the weight on our backs, we sweated and were told “si, recto, recto, recto!” every time we asked for directions, assuring us that we were on the right track, even though we appeared to be getting nowhere. After at least 20 minutes of walking (and several near-death experiences attempting to cross the hectic streets), we eventually saw a bus swinging around the corner, bound for Choulteca.
“That’s the bus!!” I closed my eyes and let out a howl “it must have already left.” Fearing an hour of waiting on the pot-holled sidewalk by a taco stand, being stared at by passing alcoholics and loco Hondorans, I started to whimper. Tony took the initaitive and started frantically waving his arms in the air. The bus pulled over on the other side and we (rather recklessly) managed to navigate our way across the street, darting in and out of cars.
“Es para Choulteca?” I panted at the bus driver. “si, si, si” he yelled back, and we bundled ourselves on to the bus. It is hard to describe the sense of relief that washes over you every time you succeed in securing yourself a seat on the bus or finding a place to stay after hours of travelling in a foreign country. It’s something like the few seconds after awaking from a nightmare, where you realize that it was just a dream, and that you don’t actually have 2 heads after all. When that backpack is lifted from your shoulders and plonked down on the seat infront of you, a mental weight as well as the physical one is lifted from your shoulders. I sat back in my seat and panted. Tony winked at me “alright babe, we made it.”
The bus began to make it’s way painfully slowly along the same road we had just struggled down, it stopped every few minutes to let people off. I din’t notice any thing out of the ordinary abou this, until Tony asked “why are people getting off?”
“what do you mean, why are people getting off? It’s a bus. It stops”
“no, but it’s going to Choulteca, so people wouldn’t be getting out here in Tegus, would they?”
it was then that we realized that the bus was actually coming from Choulteca, and we had to endure a tedious loop through Comayaguela’s frantic back streets and markets, before changing buses at Mi Espiranza’s other depot, about 4 blocks away from our hotel. Beyond the initial irritation about having to walk unecessrily along the bad streets with our luggage, as long as we were safe, the only real nuisance about this unprecedented scenic tour, was the hour that we lost in time. It was to be the blue print for the rest of the day.
We prepared ourselves for the three hour journey to Choulteca which (although closer to three and a half), passed without any major incident, and invloved the usual vendors leaping on every time we stopped, selling anything from flash lights to clothes to Coca Cola and full blown comidas.
I noted with interest the subtle changes in culture from country to country, down to the very simple things, such as the way they speak, or the food they eat. A taco in Mexico is soft and small, an enchilada, similar to a taco, but a bit longer and a quesadilla usually just plain cheese sandwiched in between 2 tortillas (although, if they were feeling creative, it could involve an assortment of ingrediants, such as onions, peppars, and meat).
In Honduras it’s not the same. An enchilada is what a tostada is in Mexico (a crispy shell topped with meat and cheese). A taco is larger and backed, giving it a crunchy texture, the quesidillas they were selling on this particular bus were another thing entirely. Strange cookie-like objects that cause the jaw to ache after several bites, laced with a sweet, syrupy gel. I think they’re the kind of thing you would get used to and eventually even like if you spent any length of time in Hondoras. I couldn’t quite claimed to have reache dthat point yet. But seeing as these appered to be the only snack thing on offer, and with both of our stomachs rumbling, we decided to part with a couple of limpiras, and put up with an aching jaw.
We arrived at Choulteca, and boarded a microbus for Guasale, the boarder town to Nicaragua. Although our luggage was on the roof, and the spitting rain drops and black clouds threatened to drown our packs, we luckily made it to the boarder with dry luggage. As the bus pulled into Guasale and I climbed out, I was encircled by at least six men with bicycle taxis and dollars and cordobas, all pulling and harassing me into changing money with them and chosing their vehicle to take us to the frontiera.
Afetr about five hours of travelling, it was utterly over-whelming and I had to grab my back pack from the clutches of more than one over-eager bicycle men. I changed some money and waited for Tony to get out of the bus. Five minutes of chaos ensued, as they yelled their prices at us and tried to explain why their’s was the best way to get to the boarder. I had to keep pleading “uno momento, uno momento” and stepping back while I caught my breath. After the ripping off incident at the Mexico/Guatemala boarder, I was determined not to be had again. Eventually, we chose one guy to take us there for 10 cordobas, and I foolishly tipped him one US dollar (which more than doubled his original price). But with four countries and four currencies inside of a week, I was perhaps understandably a little confused- in fact, my brain was fried.
Anyway, we were at immigration. Feeling pleased and surprised that we were not charged on exiting Honduras, our spirits fell when we discovered we had to pay UD$7 to get into Nicaragua. And they only accept US dollars, which, considering how many miles away we were from the United States, seemed quite bizarre to me. Anyhow, that’s the way it was and we were forced to change seven dollars worth of cordobas back into dollars (having just changed them moments before) and Tony lined up in the bank while I chatted to the security guard in my best broken Spanish.
If I thought Honduran Spanish was a little hard on the ear, then Nicaraguan Spanish is even more so. They miow when they speak and miss the ends off of words, which is terribly confusing with prices and numbers (something we had tried so painstakingly to learn).
A few stamps later, a few dollars poorer and another sweaty walk to the bus station, we were bundled on to another bus. This was a “Leon express” bus which only cost 15 cordobas and would omit having to cambio autobuses and Chinandega. All these boarder town seem to begin with “Ch” I wondered if there was any significance in that.
With our back packs safely behind us on the bus (infinitely more comforting than strapped onto the roof and out of sight) and both seated, we awaited the departure of the bus. We sat and waited. And waited. And waited. As the sun streaked through the windows and the bus became more crowded, I had the sensation of being a fly trapped in a jam jar. I also needed the toilet. But it would only be another 2 hours to Leon when we eventually got going. I could wait. I looked out of the window at the dusty, dirty area where buses congregated and under-fed horses and over-fed pigs mingled about with the people. Our sixth new country.
During the wait (of not far short of an hour) we were at least kept entertained by the chaos around us. I was awe-struck by the number of fat people (most notably women) with huge behinds, in this poor country where much of the population could scarcely afford to feed themselves.
As they attempted to squash past each other up and down the bus, on more than one occasion did two huge arses become tightly wedged in between two seats in the narrow corridor of the bus. And then a very large lady, with an even larger basket on her head hauled herself into the bus with all the effort of a man attempting to pull an over-size truck up a hill.
Her purpose, and therefore the purpose of her basket was explained a few moments later when she produced a pile of tortillas and began to slaver them with sour crème and onions, rolling them up into plastic bags and handing them around the bus. I have to say, they would have been slightly better had they been a little warm, but, not having much in my stomach, it was not an unwelcomed snack. And still the damn bus stood stationary.
Being left with a plastic bag of sour crème and onions on my lap, I was faced with a predicament. Of having it soak through onto my lap, or following the example of our fellow passengers and tossing it out of the window. Being, at some times, almost anal in my disposal of litter, it was a hard choice to make. I took a deep breath, closed my eyes and let it drop down the side of the bus into the seething pile of pig shit below. “I’m really sorry” I thought. I wasn’t sure exactly to whom.
The engine spluttered into life at last and within a few moments, we were finally on our way. We had scarcely covered two or three kilometres when we encountered a policia road block and the bus was forced to come to a grinding hault. Pandemonium reigned, as armed policia jumped onto the bus, checking for goods and forcing people off. Apparently, the bus was laden to the gills with good brought in from Honduras. Goods for which the owners had evaded paying the duty on. We wondered what they could be checking for at first- drugs? Weapons? Counterfeit money? I stared up at the “PELIGROSO” skull and cross bones pesticides around us and at the bag of the lady with the sweaty, hairy, fat armpits beside which was choked full of tablets, and decided this must be what they were after.
But after they ushered more passengers off of the bus and found more of what they were looking for, I realized it was more cans of pop and boxes of chips. The pesticides and dubious-looking tablets were not even afforded a second glance. These are such strange countries.
After nearly an hour, a slightly lighter bus and most of the passengers reboarded, we again attempted to set off for Leon (the police apparently satisfied) I breathed a sigh of relief until we were flagged over again after scarcely pulling away. The policia waved at the driver to stop and the whole of the bus started yelling at the driver to carry on and ignore the police. The bus nearly did until, the police statrted to shout at the bus and raise their guns. Bigger police with bigger guns (AK47s) boarded the bus. Confiscationg more boxes, ordering more passengers off. We sat and watched as the people started playing games with the police. Waiting until they were on the bus, to throw themselves over our seat and fling bags and boxes out of the window at their friends. The woman with the sweaty arm pits kicked her bin liner of prescription drugs under our seat. Surrupticiously, Tony pushed them under the seat of the fat arsed lady in front.
After a couple of hours of delay (the time was now a quarter to five) the bus was ordered to return to the boarder. With admirable speed and strength, we managed to haul our backpacks out of the seat and squish past the obstacles in the path of the exit (one of which included and armed policeman) and jump out of the moving bus.
“FUCK!!!!!!!!!” we both resounded. Our skin was sticky and wet and I could feel sweat beads coursing down my stomach. There was now no way we would make it to Leon before dark and I had lost count of the amount of times we had promised each other not to arrive in a strange city after dark again.
Standing on the side of the Nicaraguan highway, with our packs at our feel and rain clouds beginning to form, I felt suddenly a long, long way from home. And still I needed the toilet.
We hadn’t been waiting too long however, when a bus for Chinandega rumbled along the dirt road and we were able to squeeze ourselves onto it, with our packs hauled on to the roof. As I melted into the seat, whacked out from heat exhaustion and frustration,, I made a little mental deal with God. He was allowed to let the rain saturate our baggage, as long as it was still there when we reached our destination. The rain drops fell. He atleast was keeping his part of the bargain.
Ten minutes into the journey and we encountered our third police road block. Absolutely everything, it seemed, was conspiring to keep us from reaching Leon. At least this bus was relatively empty of goods and we only had to wait for a few minutes while objects (probably including our back packs) were hauled off of the roof and checked. We were on our way again.
Sharp pains were beginning to form in my stomach from holding my pee too long. It had been hours and it was to be at least another two before I found a bathroom. I am sure that my expression on that bus must have been one of absolute misery as we bumped and swerved our way along the pot-holed, unpaved road, every movement jiggling my bladder.
The sun set dramatically over the volcano, painting the sky with vibrant pinks, reds and oranges. I would have thought it devestatingly beautiful, had not it’s presence indicated the ensuance of darkness. Many bumps, swerves and stops later ( and at one point a dangerous over-take which saw us sandwiched in between two huge lorries) and we finally rolled into Chinandega. Our luggage was there- and it was covered too.
I left it with Tony and went off in search of a bathroom, in a nearby cantina. I took a deep breath and walked in. my entrance was greeted with silent stares of pairs of dark eyes belonging to men with too much drink inside of them. I walked up to the bar and asked for a bano. I was pointed through some beaded curtains.
I walked straight into a large room of pool tables, gambling, and horny men. A gringa in the midst of a huge, men only cantina. I pulled at the dilapidated door of the bano and was greeted by a man sitting taking a shit. Suddenly a plump and kindly old lady arose out of the hammock she had been occupying and came to my side. She was gentle and grandmotherly and spoke to me in broken English, most of which I couldn’t understand, about her family in Texas.
She banged on the cubicle door at minute intervals, yelling at the man in Spanish to come out. He grunted back momentarily in reply. She vanished. I was left with fifty pairs of eyes bouring into me.
She re-appeared with a roll of toilet paper and a smile, then turned back to the door of the toilet and proceeded banging again with great force. Eventually, the man came out and grunted something under his breath. The lady went in and before she would let me enter, she grabbed a buvket of water and poured it into the bowl. “It’s OK now”. She handed me the paper. I closed the door and relief flushed over me as the liquid flowed from my body and my stomach pains began to subside.
As I went to leave, I walked over to the lady and thanked her. She gave me a hug and wished me safe and happy travels. I felt like crying at this point. Her kindness over-whelmed me. As I emerged from the cantina, I found Tony speaking in English with some Nicaraguan guys outside. They were so friendly and so cool and pointed us in the direction of the micro bus to Leon. We thanked them and walked off towards the bus, and as we did so, one of the men ran up behind us and pointing again as to where we should go. These people were so friendly and so kind, and I couldn’t believe that we could have found such shining lights in a day such as this.
Forty-five minutes in a microbus, one taxi ride, and a short walk later, we finally reached Casa Ivana, our sanctuary in the dark streets of Leon. Twelve hours to complete a four hour journey. I lay on the bed and closed my eyes. Against all the conspiring odds, police blocks, boarder crossings and potholes, we had made it through one of the most testing days of our trip.
After yet another morning of me having to play “alarm clock Nazi” and Tony doing his usual “shifting-into-reverse-gear-mode”, I eventually managed to husstle us out of the hotel. A little late, but in time to make the wlak to Mi Espiranza bus depot (or so we thought). After last night’s torrential downpour, which caused a power-out (and some of the most voilent thunder I had ever heard) the morning was far from cool, even at 8.30: infact it was swealtering hot. The walk to the station was not ‘quatro cuadros’ as we had been told, but more like fifteen.
We hurried along the dusty, busy streets, descending further and further into the worst district of town in the Capital of one of Central America’s most dangerous countries. With the weight on our backs, we sweated and were told “si, recto, recto, recto!” every time we asked for directions, assuring us that we were on the right track, even though we appeared to be getting nowhere. After at least 20 minutes of walking (and several near-death experiences attempting to cross the hectic streets), we eventually saw a bus swinging around the corner, bound for Choulteca.
“That’s the bus!!” I closed my eyes and let out a howl “it must have already left.” Fearing an hour of waiting on the pot-holled sidewalk by a taco stand, being stared at by passing alcoholics and loco Hondorans, I started to whimper. Tony took the initaitive and started frantically waving his arms in the air. The bus pulled over on the other side and we (rather recklessly) managed to navigate our way across the street, darting in and out of cars.
“Es para Choulteca?” I panted at the bus driver. “si, si, si” he yelled back, and we bundled ourselves on to the bus. It is hard to describe the sense of relief that washes over you every time you succeed in securing yourself a seat on the bus or finding a place to stay after hours of travelling in a foreign country. It’s something like the few seconds after awaking from a nightmare, where you realize that it was just a dream, and that you don’t actually have 2 heads after all. When that backpack is lifted from your shoulders and plonked down on the seat infront of you, a mental weight as well as the physical one is lifted from your shoulders. I sat back in my seat and panted. Tony winked at me “alright babe, we made it.”
The bus began to make it’s way painfully slowly along the same road we had just struggled down, it stopped every few minutes to let people off. I din’t notice any thing out of the ordinary abou this, until Tony asked “why are people getting off?”
“what do you mean, why are people getting off? It’s a bus. It stops”
“no, but it’s going to Choulteca, so people wouldn’t be getting out here in Tegus, would they?”
it was then that we realized that the bus was actually coming from Choulteca, and we had to endure a tedious loop through Comayaguela’s frantic back streets and markets, before changing buses at Mi Espiranza’s other depot, about 4 blocks away from our hotel. Beyond the initial irritation about having to walk unecessrily along the bad streets with our luggage, as long as we were safe, the only real nuisance about this unprecedented scenic tour, was the hour that we lost in time. It was to be the blue print for the rest of the day.
We prepared ourselves for the three hour journey to Choulteca which (although closer to three and a half), passed without any major incident, and invloved the usual vendors leaping on every time we stopped, selling anything from flash lights to clothes to Coca Cola and full blown comidas.
I noted with interest the subtle changes in culture from country to country, down to the very simple things, such as the way they speak, or the food they eat. A taco in Mexico is soft and small, an enchilada, similar to a taco, but a bit longer and a quesadilla usually just plain cheese sandwiched in between 2 tortillas (although, if they were feeling creative, it could involve an assortment of ingrediants, such as onions, peppars, and meat).
In Honduras it’s not the same. An enchilada is what a tostada is in Mexico (a crispy shell topped with meat and cheese). A taco is larger and backed, giving it a crunchy texture, the quesidillas they were selling on this particular bus were another thing entirely. Strange cookie-like objects that cause the jaw to ache after several bites, laced with a sweet, syrupy gel. I think they’re the kind of thing you would get used to and eventually even like if you spent any length of time in Hondoras. I couldn’t quite claimed to have reache dthat point yet. But seeing as these appered to be the only snack thing on offer, and with both of our stomachs rumbling, we decided to part with a couple of limpiras, and put up with an aching jaw.
We arrived at Choulteca, and boarded a microbus for Guasale, the boarder town to Nicaragua. Although our luggage was on the roof, and the spitting rain drops and black clouds threatened to drown our packs, we luckily made it to the boarder with dry luggage. As the bus pulled into Guasale and I climbed out, I was encircled by at least six men with bicycle taxis and dollars and cordobas, all pulling and harassing me into changing money with them and chosing their vehicle to take us to the frontiera.
Afetr about five hours of travelling, it was utterly over-whelming and I had to grab my back pack from the clutches of more than one over-eager bicycle men. I changed some money and waited for Tony to get out of the bus. Five minutes of chaos ensued, as they yelled their prices at us and tried to explain why their’s was the best way to get to the boarder. I had to keep pleading “uno momento, uno momento” and stepping back while I caught my breath. After the ripping off incident at the Mexico/Guatemala boarder, I was determined not to be had again. Eventually, we chose one guy to take us there for 10 cordobas, and I foolishly tipped him one US dollar (which more than doubled his original price). But with four countries and four currencies inside of a week, I was perhaps understandably a little confused- in fact, my brain was fried.
Anyway, we were at immigration. Feeling pleased and surprised that we were not charged on exiting Honduras, our spirits fell when we discovered we had to pay UD$7 to get into Nicaragua. And they only accept US dollars, which, considering how many miles away we were from the United States, seemed quite bizarre to me. Anyhow, that’s the way it was and we were forced to change seven dollars worth of cordobas back into dollars (having just changed them moments before) and Tony lined up in the bank while I chatted to the security guard in my best broken Spanish.
If I thought Honduran Spanish was a little hard on the ear, then Nicaraguan Spanish is even more so. They miow when they speak and miss the ends off of words, which is terribly confusing with prices and numbers (something we had tried so painstakingly to learn).
A few stamps later, a few dollars poorer and another sweaty walk to the bus station, we were bundled on to another bus. This was a “Leon express” bus which only cost 15 cordobas and would omit having to cambio autobuses and Chinandega. All these boarder town seem to begin with “Ch” I wondered if there was any significance in that.
With our back packs safely behind us on the bus (infinitely more comforting than strapped onto the roof and out of sight) and both seated, we awaited the departure of the bus. We sat and waited. And waited. And waited. As the sun streaked through the windows and the bus became more crowded, I had the sensation of being a fly trapped in a jam jar. I also needed the toilet. But it would only be another 2 hours to Leon when we eventually got going. I could wait. I looked out of the window at the dusty, dirty area where buses congregated and under-fed horses and over-fed pigs mingled about with the people. Our sixth new country.
During the wait (of not far short of an hour) we were at least kept entertained by the chaos around us. I was awe-struck by the number of fat people (most notably women) with huge behinds, in this poor country where much of the population could scarcely afford to feed themselves.
As they attempted to squash past each other up and down the bus, on more than one occasion did two huge arses become tightly wedged in between two seats in the narrow corridor of the bus. And then a very large lady, with an even larger basket on her head hauled herself into the bus with all the effort of a man attempting to pull an over-size truck up a hill.
Her purpose, and therefore the purpose of her basket was explained a few moments later when she produced a pile of tortillas and began to slaver them with sour crème and onions, rolling them up into plastic bags and handing them around the bus. I have to say, they would have been slightly better had they been a little warm, but, not having much in my stomach, it was not an unwelcomed snack. And still the damn bus stood stationary.
Being left with a plastic bag of sour crème and onions on my lap, I was faced with a predicament. Of having it soak through onto my lap, or following the example of our fellow passengers and tossing it out of the window. Being, at some times, almost anal in my disposal of litter, it was a hard choice to make. I took a deep breath, closed my eyes and let it drop down the side of the bus into the seething pile of pig shit below. “I’m really sorry” I thought. I wasn’t sure exactly to whom.
The engine spluttered into life at last and within a few moments, we were finally on our way. We had scarcely covered two or three kilometres when we encountered a policia road block and the bus was forced to come to a grinding hault. Pandemonium reigned, as armed policia jumped onto the bus, checking for goods and forcing people off. Apparently, the bus was laden to the gills with good brought in from Honduras. Goods for which the owners had evaded paying the duty on. We wondered what they could be checking for at first- drugs? Weapons? Counterfeit money? I stared up at the “PELIGROSO” skull and cross bones pesticides around us and at the bag of the lady with the sweaty, hairy, fat armpits beside which was choked full of tablets, and decided this must be what they were after.
But after they ushered more passengers off of the bus and found more of what they were looking for, I realized it was more cans of pop and boxes of chips. The pesticides and dubious-looking tablets were not even afforded a second glance. These are such strange countries.
After nearly an hour, a slightly lighter bus and most of the passengers reboarded, we again attempted to set off for Leon (the police apparently satisfied) I breathed a sigh of relief until we were flagged over again after scarcely pulling away. The policia waved at the driver to stop and the whole of the bus started yelling at the driver to carry on and ignore the police. The bus nearly did until, the police statrted to shout at the bus and raise their guns. Bigger police with bigger guns (AK47s) boarded the bus. Confiscationg more boxes, ordering more passengers off. We sat and watched as the people started playing games with the police. Waiting until they were on the bus, to throw themselves over our seat and fling bags and boxes out of the window at their friends. The woman with the sweaty arm pits kicked her bin liner of prescription drugs under our seat. Surrupticiously, Tony pushed them under the seat of the fat arsed lady in front.
After a couple of hours of delay (the time was now a quarter to five) the bus was ordered to return to the boarder. With admirable speed and strength, we managed to haul our backpacks out of the seat and squish past the obstacles in the path of the exit (one of which included and armed policeman) and jump out of the moving bus.
“FUCK!!!!!!!!!” we both resounded. Our skin was sticky and wet and I could feel sweat beads coursing down my stomach. There was now no way we would make it to Leon before dark and I had lost count of the amount of times we had promised each other not to arrive in a strange city after dark again.
Standing on the side of the Nicaraguan highway, with our packs at our feel and rain clouds beginning to form, I felt suddenly a long, long way from home. And still I needed the toilet.
We hadn’t been waiting too long however, when a bus for Chinandega rumbled along the dirt road and we were able to squeeze ourselves onto it, with our packs hauled on to the roof. As I melted into the seat, whacked out from heat exhaustion and frustration,, I made a little mental deal with God. He was allowed to let the rain saturate our baggage, as long as it was still there when we reached our destination. The rain drops fell. He atleast was keeping his part of the bargain.
Ten minutes into the journey and we encountered our third police road block. Absolutely everything, it seemed, was conspiring to keep us from reaching Leon. At least this bus was relatively empty of goods and we only had to wait for a few minutes while objects (probably including our back packs) were hauled off of the roof and checked. We were on our way again.
Sharp pains were beginning to form in my stomach from holding my pee too long. It had been hours and it was to be at least another two before I found a bathroom. I am sure that my expression on that bus must have been one of absolute misery as we bumped and swerved our way along the pot-holed, unpaved road, every movement jiggling my bladder.
The sun set dramatically over the volcano, painting the sky with vibrant pinks, reds and oranges. I would have thought it devestatingly beautiful, had not it’s presence indicated the ensuance of darkness. Many bumps, swerves and stops later ( and at one point a dangerous over-take which saw us sandwiched in between two huge lorries) and we finally rolled into Chinandega. Our luggage was there- and it was covered too.
I left it with Tony and went off in search of a bathroom, in a nearby cantina. I took a deep breath and walked in. my entrance was greeted with silent stares of pairs of dark eyes belonging to men with too much drink inside of them. I walked up to the bar and asked for a bano. I was pointed through some beaded curtains.
I walked straight into a large room of pool tables, gambling, and horny men. A gringa in the midst of a huge, men only cantina. I pulled at the dilapidated door of the bano and was greeted by a man sitting taking a shit. Suddenly a plump and kindly old lady arose out of the hammock she had been occupying and came to my side. She was gentle and grandmotherly and spoke to me in broken English, most of which I couldn’t understand, about her family in Texas.
She banged on the cubicle door at minute intervals, yelling at the man in Spanish to come out. He grunted back momentarily in reply. She vanished. I was left with fifty pairs of eyes bouring into me.
She re-appeared with a roll of toilet paper and a smile, then turned back to the door of the toilet and proceeded banging again with great force. Eventually, the man came out and grunted something under his breath. The lady went in and before she would let me enter, she grabbed a buvket of water and poured it into the bowl. “It’s OK now”. She handed me the paper. I closed the door and relief flushed over me as the liquid flowed from my body and my stomach pains began to subside.
As I went to leave, I walked over to the lady and thanked her. She gave me a hug and wished me safe and happy travels. I felt like crying at this point. Her kindness over-whelmed me. As I emerged from the cantina, I found Tony speaking in English with some Nicaraguan guys outside. They were so friendly and so cool and pointed us in the direction of the micro bus to Leon. We thanked them and walked off towards the bus, and as we did so, one of the men ran up behind us and pointing again as to where we should go. These people were so friendly and so kind, and I couldn’t believe that we could have found such shining lights in a day such as this.
Forty-five minutes in a microbus, one taxi ride, and a short walk later, we finally reached Casa Ivana, our sanctuary in the dark streets of Leon. Twelve hours to complete a four hour journey. I lay on the bed and closed my eyes. Against all the conspiring odds, police blocks, boarder crossings and potholes, we had made it through one of the most testing days of our trip.
19 Nov 2009
Angels Fall, Venezuela 2005
Still fresh in our minds is the memory of the
horrifying journey to get here. For most of the
journey the speedometer nudged 160k and the driver
slowed down only once to point out a dead body on the
roadside, lying beside the mangled wreckage of a car.
So less than 24 hours later, contemplating the worlds
smallest plane (with just 5 seats) and a pilot with
alcohol on his breath, I start to wonder if we are not
being just a little irresponsible.
The engine splutters into life and we racket along the
runway, finally ascending the open sky. I have never
experienced flying in a plane with the windows open,
boxes of coke cans under my seat and the controls just
in front.
The scenery is stunning and we feel every whisper of
breeze and shudder of the planes wings. Mystic and
brooding tepuis (flat table mountains) and roaring
waterfalls fill the windows. It is exhilarating.
Canaima (the town closest to the falls) could possibly
be one of the most striking places on earth, with
waterfalls pounding into a lagoon with a reddish tinge
to the water, caused by an agent in the soil. The first
day of the trip we will not see the falls, but
progress up the river in a wooden boat and visit
lagoons and smaller falls along the way.
Our party comprises the two of us, a late-middle aged
couple from Aruba - Baba and his wife - and three
elderly Venezuelan ladies. We have not chanced upon
the party trip. The camp is basic in the extreme and
when we arrive after dark, soaked through to the skin
after a long journey upstream in driving rain, there
is no electricity.
There is also no alcohol and our cigarettes have been
sacrificed to the elements and are limp, wet and
broken. There seems little to do after we have eaten
and we crawl into our hammocks at about 8.30. The
deafening throb of crickets and other cries from the
surrounding wilderness feed my over-imagination and
the most sleep I can snatch is in periods of minutes
and marked by curious lucid dreams.
The camp´s dog decides to plant itself directly
beneath my hammock and begins to lick its bottom and
scratch its fleas into my ear. Not wishing to disturb
my fellow hammock dwellers, my feeble whispers of
"shew, shew" go unnoticed. The dog stays put. I am
forced to resort to some loud expletives and slapping
movements with my hands, which provoke a gnashing of
teeth and a hurt whimper as the mangy creature limps
off.
Ciara is now awake and we both dissolve into a shushed
giggling fit as I explain the dilema. The rest of the
night passes more or less like this. There´s nothing
like a good night´s sleep. And that was nothing like a
good night´s sleep.
Stiff and weary at about 6.30am, we cannot bring
ourselves to get under an icy cold shower and we pull
on the still-damp clothes from the day before. I
ponder what effects of sleeping in a banana shape are
having upon the elderly amongst us. They are beginning
to look a little worse for wear and bleary-eyed.
We pack ourselves onto the boat and make our way
upstream to the falls. We have to cross several
rushing rapids on the way up, which pound the boat and
scratch the motor. I´d always wanted to try white
water rafting, but I´d supposed it would be in a raft.
Not in a beaten-out, over-sized canoe. The trip up the
river is a test on our aching bottom and back muscles,
as the wooden bench offers not one once of comfort.
The life vests now double up as seat cushions and the
lesser-abled begin to look progressively more peaky
and grey.
But the thick, green vegetation and rushing red river,
peppered with frothy white rapids, keep our minds
occupied. At last we catch a glimpse of the falls,
obscured by the dense jungle, tall, proud and
imposing. It is now that our group splits into two -
those who will tackle the hike to the falls, and those
who will wait at the bottom. It is not particularly
strenuous, but littered with thick tree roots and
low-hanging branches. The path becomes increasingly
steeper as we advance to the falls and the insects
more bountiful, as we slap and shreik and swish our
way up.
Suddenly they are reveiled, staggeringly high and
pouring into the lagoon at their feet. The beauty and
impressiveness of the Angel falls is not in the volume
of water, thundering angrily, like Niagra, but more in
the sheer size and staggering steep height.
Bathing in the icy-cold pool at the bottom and staring
up at the cascading water is a phenomenal, almost
sobering experience. We sigh contentedly before hiking
back down to a hearty lunch of chicken and mashed
potatoes.
On the return to the camp, the rain sets in and
doesn´t stop for the next 15 hours. Volumes of water
dumping from the sky, relentlessly bashing us in the
little boat. Our party are looking fairly grim. As
darkness falls, the thunder and lightning become
increasingly aggressive. We spend several hours playing
cards to pass the time until we can sleep. Both of us
are now bored and more than ready to leave the jungle
and see some civilisation. Its getting desperate. We
are now scraping for ways to entertain ourselves,
inventing new games, such as - how many life vests can
you put on in under a minute - and - how many games of
shithead can we play before losing the will to live.
Staring out at the ceaseless rain and unbroken
darkness, it does feel as if even God himself has
forsaken this land. Even the dog has jumped ship. It
literally flung itself into the river and swam for
freedom. That night I sleep even less, as images of
flash floods causing land slides fill my brain and I
am convinced the camp will be washed away.
As we load our aching bones onto the little plane
once more, it is with enthusiasm. This time to satisfy
our overwhelming desire for a decent shower, massage,
and general de-jungling session. I ache to see a car.
Hear the sounds of a city. Drink a beer. Neither of us
are jungle girls. We both have a pair of high-heel
shoes in our backpacks. It is time to hit the
dancefloors of Brasil. The southward journey
continues...
horrifying journey to get here. For most of the
journey the speedometer nudged 160k and the driver
slowed down only once to point out a dead body on the
roadside, lying beside the mangled wreckage of a car.
So less than 24 hours later, contemplating the worlds
smallest plane (with just 5 seats) and a pilot with
alcohol on his breath, I start to wonder if we are not
being just a little irresponsible.
The engine splutters into life and we racket along the
runway, finally ascending the open sky. I have never
experienced flying in a plane with the windows open,
boxes of coke cans under my seat and the controls just
in front.
The scenery is stunning and we feel every whisper of
breeze and shudder of the planes wings. Mystic and
brooding tepuis (flat table mountains) and roaring
waterfalls fill the windows. It is exhilarating.
Canaima (the town closest to the falls) could possibly
be one of the most striking places on earth, with
waterfalls pounding into a lagoon with a reddish tinge
to the water, caused by an agent in the soil. The first
day of the trip we will not see the falls, but
progress up the river in a wooden boat and visit
lagoons and smaller falls along the way.
Our party comprises the two of us, a late-middle aged
couple from Aruba - Baba and his wife - and three
elderly Venezuelan ladies. We have not chanced upon
the party trip. The camp is basic in the extreme and
when we arrive after dark, soaked through to the skin
after a long journey upstream in driving rain, there
is no electricity.
There is also no alcohol and our cigarettes have been
sacrificed to the elements and are limp, wet and
broken. There seems little to do after we have eaten
and we crawl into our hammocks at about 8.30. The
deafening throb of crickets and other cries from the
surrounding wilderness feed my over-imagination and
the most sleep I can snatch is in periods of minutes
and marked by curious lucid dreams.
The camp´s dog decides to plant itself directly
beneath my hammock and begins to lick its bottom and
scratch its fleas into my ear. Not wishing to disturb
my fellow hammock dwellers, my feeble whispers of
"shew, shew" go unnoticed. The dog stays put. I am
forced to resort to some loud expletives and slapping
movements with my hands, which provoke a gnashing of
teeth and a hurt whimper as the mangy creature limps
off.
Ciara is now awake and we both dissolve into a shushed
giggling fit as I explain the dilema. The rest of the
night passes more or less like this. There´s nothing
like a good night´s sleep. And that was nothing like a
good night´s sleep.
Stiff and weary at about 6.30am, we cannot bring
ourselves to get under an icy cold shower and we pull
on the still-damp clothes from the day before. I
ponder what effects of sleeping in a banana shape are
having upon the elderly amongst us. They are beginning
to look a little worse for wear and bleary-eyed.
We pack ourselves onto the boat and make our way
upstream to the falls. We have to cross several
rushing rapids on the way up, which pound the boat and
scratch the motor. I´d always wanted to try white
water rafting, but I´d supposed it would be in a raft.
Not in a beaten-out, over-sized canoe. The trip up the
river is a test on our aching bottom and back muscles,
as the wooden bench offers not one once of comfort.
The life vests now double up as seat cushions and the
lesser-abled begin to look progressively more peaky
and grey.
But the thick, green vegetation and rushing red river,
peppered with frothy white rapids, keep our minds
occupied. At last we catch a glimpse of the falls,
obscured by the dense jungle, tall, proud and
imposing. It is now that our group splits into two -
those who will tackle the hike to the falls, and those
who will wait at the bottom. It is not particularly
strenuous, but littered with thick tree roots and
low-hanging branches. The path becomes increasingly
steeper as we advance to the falls and the insects
more bountiful, as we slap and shreik and swish our
way up.
Suddenly they are reveiled, staggeringly high and
pouring into the lagoon at their feet. The beauty and
impressiveness of the Angel falls is not in the volume
of water, thundering angrily, like Niagra, but more in
the sheer size and staggering steep height.
Bathing in the icy-cold pool at the bottom and staring
up at the cascading water is a phenomenal, almost
sobering experience. We sigh contentedly before hiking
back down to a hearty lunch of chicken and mashed
potatoes.
On the return to the camp, the rain sets in and
doesn´t stop for the next 15 hours. Volumes of water
dumping from the sky, relentlessly bashing us in the
little boat. Our party are looking fairly grim. As
darkness falls, the thunder and lightning become
increasingly aggressive. We spend several hours playing
cards to pass the time until we can sleep. Both of us
are now bored and more than ready to leave the jungle
and see some civilisation. Its getting desperate. We
are now scraping for ways to entertain ourselves,
inventing new games, such as - how many life vests can
you put on in under a minute - and - how many games of
shithead can we play before losing the will to live.
Staring out at the ceaseless rain and unbroken
darkness, it does feel as if even God himself has
forsaken this land. Even the dog has jumped ship. It
literally flung itself into the river and swam for
freedom. That night I sleep even less, as images of
flash floods causing land slides fill my brain and I
am convinced the camp will be washed away.
As we load our aching bones onto the little plane
once more, it is with enthusiasm. This time to satisfy
our overwhelming desire for a decent shower, massage,
and general de-jungling session. I ache to see a car.
Hear the sounds of a city. Drink a beer. Neither of us
are jungle girls. We both have a pair of high-heel
shoes in our backpacks. It is time to hit the
dancefloors of Brasil. The southward journey
continues...
Anacondas in Venezuela 2005
It’s something like 7 o clock in the morning and I have already had a hearty breakfast of platanos, eggs and cheese. I’ve seen the huge orange sun rise up over the plains and, as I crawled out of my hammock, found a curious, spiky green caterpillar beneath me. At home, I don’t achieve anything much before midday. In Venezuela, I am standing in a swamp, heart in my mouth, searching for anacondas.
It’s one of those things you do when you’re on holiday, although you’re not really sure why. Propelling yourself over a cliff edge or scaling a lofty mountain suddenly become more appealing when they are handed to you on a glossy flyer or sold to you by a ruthless tourist tout.
Something like 15 minutes passes before we here a cry from the small group of llaneros "ANACONDA!!!" I watch with fascination and fear as these young, wild-looking boys begin to wrestle with the 7-metre-long reptile, calling at us to come closer. In our group of about 7 or 8, each of us manages to hold a section of the 120 kilo creature which, shedding skin, leaves a souvenir on my back.
To cool down and clean anaconda skin from us, we are taken to a river to swim, which meant propelling ourselves from a 4 metre high rock in to the murky waters below. I felt ashamed of my fear as the accustomed, adventurous "tour guides" back flip and dive bomb in to the pool. I breathe deeply, screw my eyes shut and launch myself into the air, landing with a splash. I felt relief flood into my body until I looked up and realised that the rest of my group had declined the chance of a dip, electing instead to lance nylon wires, barbed with meat into the waters. I wondered what they were doing until I saw the wire pull and a razor sharp toothed piranha struggling as it is pulled out of the water.
I don’t know if I’ve read about this somewhere but, is it a good idea to swim in piranha infested waters? Night falls and out come the musicians, playing their famous jigging music, jorope. The young llanero who has been undressing me with his eyes will not take no for an answer and we are first up on the dance floor. It’s actually quite fun and fuelled by enough shots of rum, the company claps and cheers as we dance for hours, quite the stars of the evening. He looks my deeply in the eyes and asks me if he makes me nervous, saying that he will protect me from the anacondas and crocodiles, when what I need most is protection from him. Declining his offer of an "adventure" under the stars, I go to bed giggling. Next stop... Isla Margarita. I am in need of a few pina coladas to soothe the aches and pains of my time in the wild.
It’s one of those things you do when you’re on holiday, although you’re not really sure why. Propelling yourself over a cliff edge or scaling a lofty mountain suddenly become more appealing when they are handed to you on a glossy flyer or sold to you by a ruthless tourist tout.
Something like 15 minutes passes before we here a cry from the small group of llaneros "ANACONDA!!!" I watch with fascination and fear as these young, wild-looking boys begin to wrestle with the 7-metre-long reptile, calling at us to come closer. In our group of about 7 or 8, each of us manages to hold a section of the 120 kilo creature which, shedding skin, leaves a souvenir on my back.
To cool down and clean anaconda skin from us, we are taken to a river to swim, which meant propelling ourselves from a 4 metre high rock in to the murky waters below. I felt ashamed of my fear as the accustomed, adventurous "tour guides" back flip and dive bomb in to the pool. I breathe deeply, screw my eyes shut and launch myself into the air, landing with a splash. I felt relief flood into my body until I looked up and realised that the rest of my group had declined the chance of a dip, electing instead to lance nylon wires, barbed with meat into the waters. I wondered what they were doing until I saw the wire pull and a razor sharp toothed piranha struggling as it is pulled out of the water.
I don’t know if I’ve read about this somewhere but, is it a good idea to swim in piranha infested waters? Night falls and out come the musicians, playing their famous jigging music, jorope. The young llanero who has been undressing me with his eyes will not take no for an answer and we are first up on the dance floor. It’s actually quite fun and fuelled by enough shots of rum, the company claps and cheers as we dance for hours, quite the stars of the evening. He looks my deeply in the eyes and asks me if he makes me nervous, saying that he will protect me from the anacondas and crocodiles, when what I need most is protection from him. Declining his offer of an "adventure" under the stars, I go to bed giggling. Next stop... Isla Margarita. I am in need of a few pina coladas to soothe the aches and pains of my time in the wild.
No Shirt, No shoes, No worries, Belize 2001
OUT of the corner of my eye I could see the two men under the tree. Horizontal and relaxed, shaded from the penetrating midday heat, one chewing on a long blade of dry, brown grass, the other pulling on a cigarette.
“That’s total evidence of this tropical climate, that tan you got right there baby – you look like syrup,” the first one drawled, removing the straw from his mouth.
His friend sat up and a large, lazy grin spread across his face, wrinkling his thick, jet-black, skin. He pushed his dreadlocks out of his eyes, cooing, “I like the way you walk baby – why don’t you come over here?”
I received their comments with a mixture of mild irritation and amusement. The men here are forward. The beer and cuba libres flow freely and the Caribbean sunshine goes to the head like an intoxicating drug.
Strikingly set apart from its Latin neighbours, Belize, home to a diverse mix of people and cultures, often feels like several different countries at once. The Creoles (descendants of the African slaves and British pirates who first settled here) speak the official language of English with musical lilt, Caribbean flavour, and poetic license.
Spanish is the first language in the north and some towns in the west, where the Maya and mestizos (persons of mixed European and Central American Indian ancestry) concentrate. Garfunas (of South American Indian and African descent) dominate the south, and small pockets of Europeans, Chinese, East Indians and North Americans also make up Belize’s improbable population, adding to its unique charm and character.
Creaking and bumping into Belize City by bus is truly a feast for the eyes. Chaotic and bustling with activity, loud voices can be heard selling oranges, pineapples, cigarettes, jewellery, clothing, and, as I wouldn’t put past some shady Belizeans, their own grandmothers.
Whether they are trying to sell something, help you out, or scam you, the colourful language and facial expressions used by the friendly Belizean people always bring a smile to the face. “Honey, you could die three times and still come back,” responded the boat hand when I asked if my ticket to Caye Caulker was good for the return journey.
The cayes are numerous islands that bask in the shallow warm waters of eastern Belize. The essence is on relaxation, with street signs on the pedestrian Caulker reading ‘Go slow’, ‘Hesitate… you are here’ and, my personal favourite, ‘Betta no litta’.
The sound of reggae beats and smells of charcoal grills fill the air, beach huts and ramshackle hotels dot the length and breadth of the caye (about four miles long and only 600 metres at its widest point) and brightly coloured hammocks swing from palm trees.
Five star luxury it isn’t. Caye Caulker is a poor man’s Caribbean. Shrubs and roots pepper the white sand, and there are few places to swim or sunbathe because of mangroves and lack of space that is not covered by grass or buildings.
Yet despite this, Caulker maintains a certain amount of charm and character. Serving mainly as a jumping off point for the coral reefs, it is largely uncrowded during the day. Those who remain on the caye can be found swinging in hammocks or diving off the jetty into the deep waters at the ‘split’ (so-called because of Hurricane Hattie that literally split the island in two in 1961).
Over the years, Caulker has suffered the wrath of many powerful and dangerous hurricanes. This is evident in structural damage to flimsy beachside hotels. Many palm trees lie broken or bent along the shoreline, and Caulker’s most popular swimming spot, ‘the split’, is testament to the devastation a fiercely whirling hurricane can wield.
The islanders who live here are familiar with the tropical storms that ravage their home every year. Living in fear of a hurricane large enough to raise their houses to the ground means that their houses are little more than a few slats of wood nailed together, as if the less ostentatiously they build, the less they will have to rebuild when the time comes.
Children run around with dirty noses and huge smiles. The older ones launch into triple back flips off the jetty, throwing themselves into the air, daring each other to jump higher or further, or splash louder. Theirs is a lifestyle handed down by parents who have witnessed how fragile life can be. No one here takes themselves – or anyone else – too seriously. There is a sign hanging outside the Sand Box bar which reads:
“No shirt,
No shoes,
No shit,
No problem.”
On the third night of my stay, I went to the Sandbox and unexpectedly witnessed the capabilities of a tropical storm firsthand. I watched as the ink-blue sky was suddenly illuminated by a fork of lightning, followed by a rolling boom of thunder. I saw the black silhouettes of the palm trees swaying against the backdrop of the night and felt the power of the wind.
The rain poured furiously. Sheets of water fell from the sky, blowing sideways into the bar, as it was caught by a heavy gust of wind, drenching those inside within seconds. The bar tender ran towards the door and pulled down the wooden hatches, winking at me.
As crash followed crash, and the intensity of the rain continued, I asked a local near me about Hurricane Keith – the last major hurricane to rock the island. He chuckled as he described the noise of the wind and the ferocity of the rain.
“I heard that wind and it was like he saying ‘I got a whole lot more where that came from!’” He stopped suddenly and looked sombre, his face taking on a deadly serious composure. Gesturing towards the hatches, which were rocking fiercely in the wind he said, “this sound just like Keith.”
My horrified face must have been a picture, because he took one look and let out a loud, belly laugh. “Honey this bar wouldn’t be here no more if this was another Keith!”
The next day, wandering lazily along the caye, the sun was out and the puddles had drained away. Food stands and tour operators were open, and tourists and locals were swimming in the clear waters again.
Deciding it was time to go out on the reef, I was bombarded with offers. Huge, brightly-coloured banners plastered with underwater pictures are displayed outside every store, and it is hard to see much difference in the services offered.
My concern was that I would end up on an overcrowded party boat and have to compete for space and equipment. I began to examine some of the flyers I had picked up before noticing a small painted sign reading ‘JUNI’ in white letters on the side of a beach hut.
A man of about 60 was gently rocking on a chair on the balcony, looking down at me with an expression of faint amusement.
“Are you Juni?” I asked. He nodded calmly, fixing me with an intense gaze. At last he said: “If you’re looking to go out on the reef, I have something very special going on out there.”
I liked his soft brown eyes and the coral cross he wore around his neck. I liked his calm manner and knowing expression. He was the type of person whose presence made you feel safe and I decided to go to the reef with him.
.
Although nurse sharks enjoy a placid reputation and are rarely provoked, I was nervous as we sailed into Shark Ray Alley and I could make out the shape of one swimming beneath our boat, the magnifying quality of the water making her appear huge. Juni had timed our arrival just as the powerboats, heaving with sunburned bodies, were leaving.
He threw out the anchor into the green waters below and, in his unhurried manner, turned to face us: “I am going to tell you a story. You will never have heard anything like this before.”
As he stood on the edge of the boat, he looked like a mythical character, serious and earnest. “Almost ten years ago I was in my boat when I came across a female nurse shark that had been speared by a fisherman.” He spoke softly, as if confiding a great secret.
“She was weak and bleeding. So I brought her some food and stayed with her for a while. The next day I went back and fed her and stayed some more time with her. I went back every day and, after three weeks, she was up. She was better. She swam with me all day.”
He paused and looked round at each of us, as if to make sure we were listening, and then continued. “One day I noticed that she was getting fat. I called her gordita,” he smiled: “I did not realise that she was pregnant.”
He went on to tell us of how she had two babies and, although one of them died, the other had three babies of her own. For ten years now Juni had returned almost daily to swim with his sharks.
As beautifully as he told the story, I could not help but feel cynical until we spent a couple of hours with his shark family. On that day, just three of them came, the grandmother and two of the young sharks. As soon as Juni splashed into the water, they were by his side. They followed him closely, and we followed Juni.
Every movement he made, they moved with him. When he rolled over and when he swam, they did too, playing with him as he turned them over and stroked their undersides.
Juni beckoned to me underneath the water and I swam close to him. He nudged one of the baby sharks toward me and I patted her back. Her skin was scaly, like the rough surface of a cat’s tongue. Juni turned her over and I held her in my arms for a moment and stroked her soft belly.
Swimming with these sharks gave me an insight into how intelligent and peaceful they are. Each beautiful, graceful movement they made and their acceptance of us was touching.
I was unnerved only when they speedily changed direction, making a sudden U-turn, and three metres of shark swam towards me. Their two barbels (thin, fleshy, whisker-like organs on the lower jaw that sense touch and taste) hanging low, like teeth, provoking an irrational fear of sharks instilled in me from watching Jaws many years ago.
But there was no malice in these sharks, just an inquisitive playfulness. When Juni led us back to the boat he gave the sharks one last pat on their heads, and a morsel of fish each before they swam off away from the reef and out of sight.
Watching the sharks go, I realised that I had never felt such a close affinity with wild animals before, and it was elating. A smile appeared on my face that refused to fade.
As we sailed back to the caye with the warm air blowing in our faces, I noticed the name painted on the side of Juni’s boat – Trinity. I asked him why he had chosen this name. He smiled and said “My boat, my ocean, my sharks… my trinity.”
Juni was a man who needed nothing more in his life. The wooden slatted beach hut, lack of family, even a home that was rapidly being built upon and blighted in the name of tourism, mattered little to him. Out on the blue horizon are his family. On his boat is his home.
Caulker was evacuated just two days after I left. The strong winds of Hurricane Chantal, with gusts of up to 100km per hour stopped just short of being a classified a true hurricane, whose winds much reach over 119km. I thought of Juni, and the words he had spoken through a wide smile: “I like hurricanes, they control the gringo population.”
“That’s total evidence of this tropical climate, that tan you got right there baby – you look like syrup,” the first one drawled, removing the straw from his mouth.
His friend sat up and a large, lazy grin spread across his face, wrinkling his thick, jet-black, skin. He pushed his dreadlocks out of his eyes, cooing, “I like the way you walk baby – why don’t you come over here?”
I received their comments with a mixture of mild irritation and amusement. The men here are forward. The beer and cuba libres flow freely and the Caribbean sunshine goes to the head like an intoxicating drug.
Strikingly set apart from its Latin neighbours, Belize, home to a diverse mix of people and cultures, often feels like several different countries at once. The Creoles (descendants of the African slaves and British pirates who first settled here) speak the official language of English with musical lilt, Caribbean flavour, and poetic license.
Spanish is the first language in the north and some towns in the west, where the Maya and mestizos (persons of mixed European and Central American Indian ancestry) concentrate. Garfunas (of South American Indian and African descent) dominate the south, and small pockets of Europeans, Chinese, East Indians and North Americans also make up Belize’s improbable population, adding to its unique charm and character.
Creaking and bumping into Belize City by bus is truly a feast for the eyes. Chaotic and bustling with activity, loud voices can be heard selling oranges, pineapples, cigarettes, jewellery, clothing, and, as I wouldn’t put past some shady Belizeans, their own grandmothers.
Whether they are trying to sell something, help you out, or scam you, the colourful language and facial expressions used by the friendly Belizean people always bring a smile to the face. “Honey, you could die three times and still come back,” responded the boat hand when I asked if my ticket to Caye Caulker was good for the return journey.
The cayes are numerous islands that bask in the shallow warm waters of eastern Belize. The essence is on relaxation, with street signs on the pedestrian Caulker reading ‘Go slow’, ‘Hesitate… you are here’ and, my personal favourite, ‘Betta no litta’.
The sound of reggae beats and smells of charcoal grills fill the air, beach huts and ramshackle hotels dot the length and breadth of the caye (about four miles long and only 600 metres at its widest point) and brightly coloured hammocks swing from palm trees.
Five star luxury it isn’t. Caye Caulker is a poor man’s Caribbean. Shrubs and roots pepper the white sand, and there are few places to swim or sunbathe because of mangroves and lack of space that is not covered by grass or buildings.
Yet despite this, Caulker maintains a certain amount of charm and character. Serving mainly as a jumping off point for the coral reefs, it is largely uncrowded during the day. Those who remain on the caye can be found swinging in hammocks or diving off the jetty into the deep waters at the ‘split’ (so-called because of Hurricane Hattie that literally split the island in two in 1961).
Over the years, Caulker has suffered the wrath of many powerful and dangerous hurricanes. This is evident in structural damage to flimsy beachside hotels. Many palm trees lie broken or bent along the shoreline, and Caulker’s most popular swimming spot, ‘the split’, is testament to the devastation a fiercely whirling hurricane can wield.
The islanders who live here are familiar with the tropical storms that ravage their home every year. Living in fear of a hurricane large enough to raise their houses to the ground means that their houses are little more than a few slats of wood nailed together, as if the less ostentatiously they build, the less they will have to rebuild when the time comes.
Children run around with dirty noses and huge smiles. The older ones launch into triple back flips off the jetty, throwing themselves into the air, daring each other to jump higher or further, or splash louder. Theirs is a lifestyle handed down by parents who have witnessed how fragile life can be. No one here takes themselves – or anyone else – too seriously. There is a sign hanging outside the Sand Box bar which reads:
“No shirt,
No shoes,
No shit,
No problem.”
On the third night of my stay, I went to the Sandbox and unexpectedly witnessed the capabilities of a tropical storm firsthand. I watched as the ink-blue sky was suddenly illuminated by a fork of lightning, followed by a rolling boom of thunder. I saw the black silhouettes of the palm trees swaying against the backdrop of the night and felt the power of the wind.
The rain poured furiously. Sheets of water fell from the sky, blowing sideways into the bar, as it was caught by a heavy gust of wind, drenching those inside within seconds. The bar tender ran towards the door and pulled down the wooden hatches, winking at me.
As crash followed crash, and the intensity of the rain continued, I asked a local near me about Hurricane Keith – the last major hurricane to rock the island. He chuckled as he described the noise of the wind and the ferocity of the rain.
“I heard that wind and it was like he saying ‘I got a whole lot more where that came from!’” He stopped suddenly and looked sombre, his face taking on a deadly serious composure. Gesturing towards the hatches, which were rocking fiercely in the wind he said, “this sound just like Keith.”
My horrified face must have been a picture, because he took one look and let out a loud, belly laugh. “Honey this bar wouldn’t be here no more if this was another Keith!”
The next day, wandering lazily along the caye, the sun was out and the puddles had drained away. Food stands and tour operators were open, and tourists and locals were swimming in the clear waters again.
Deciding it was time to go out on the reef, I was bombarded with offers. Huge, brightly-coloured banners plastered with underwater pictures are displayed outside every store, and it is hard to see much difference in the services offered.
My concern was that I would end up on an overcrowded party boat and have to compete for space and equipment. I began to examine some of the flyers I had picked up before noticing a small painted sign reading ‘JUNI’ in white letters on the side of a beach hut.
A man of about 60 was gently rocking on a chair on the balcony, looking down at me with an expression of faint amusement.
“Are you Juni?” I asked. He nodded calmly, fixing me with an intense gaze. At last he said: “If you’re looking to go out on the reef, I have something very special going on out there.”
I liked his soft brown eyes and the coral cross he wore around his neck. I liked his calm manner and knowing expression. He was the type of person whose presence made you feel safe and I decided to go to the reef with him.
.
Although nurse sharks enjoy a placid reputation and are rarely provoked, I was nervous as we sailed into Shark Ray Alley and I could make out the shape of one swimming beneath our boat, the magnifying quality of the water making her appear huge. Juni had timed our arrival just as the powerboats, heaving with sunburned bodies, were leaving.
He threw out the anchor into the green waters below and, in his unhurried manner, turned to face us: “I am going to tell you a story. You will never have heard anything like this before.”
As he stood on the edge of the boat, he looked like a mythical character, serious and earnest. “Almost ten years ago I was in my boat when I came across a female nurse shark that had been speared by a fisherman.” He spoke softly, as if confiding a great secret.
“She was weak and bleeding. So I brought her some food and stayed with her for a while. The next day I went back and fed her and stayed some more time with her. I went back every day and, after three weeks, she was up. She was better. She swam with me all day.”
He paused and looked round at each of us, as if to make sure we were listening, and then continued. “One day I noticed that she was getting fat. I called her gordita,” he smiled: “I did not realise that she was pregnant.”
He went on to tell us of how she had two babies and, although one of them died, the other had three babies of her own. For ten years now Juni had returned almost daily to swim with his sharks.
As beautifully as he told the story, I could not help but feel cynical until we spent a couple of hours with his shark family. On that day, just three of them came, the grandmother and two of the young sharks. As soon as Juni splashed into the water, they were by his side. They followed him closely, and we followed Juni.
Every movement he made, they moved with him. When he rolled over and when he swam, they did too, playing with him as he turned them over and stroked their undersides.
Juni beckoned to me underneath the water and I swam close to him. He nudged one of the baby sharks toward me and I patted her back. Her skin was scaly, like the rough surface of a cat’s tongue. Juni turned her over and I held her in my arms for a moment and stroked her soft belly.
Swimming with these sharks gave me an insight into how intelligent and peaceful they are. Each beautiful, graceful movement they made and their acceptance of us was touching.
I was unnerved only when they speedily changed direction, making a sudden U-turn, and three metres of shark swam towards me. Their two barbels (thin, fleshy, whisker-like organs on the lower jaw that sense touch and taste) hanging low, like teeth, provoking an irrational fear of sharks instilled in me from watching Jaws many years ago.
But there was no malice in these sharks, just an inquisitive playfulness. When Juni led us back to the boat he gave the sharks one last pat on their heads, and a morsel of fish each before they swam off away from the reef and out of sight.
Watching the sharks go, I realised that I had never felt such a close affinity with wild animals before, and it was elating. A smile appeared on my face that refused to fade.
As we sailed back to the caye with the warm air blowing in our faces, I noticed the name painted on the side of Juni’s boat – Trinity. I asked him why he had chosen this name. He smiled and said “My boat, my ocean, my sharks… my trinity.”
Juni was a man who needed nothing more in his life. The wooden slatted beach hut, lack of family, even a home that was rapidly being built upon and blighted in the name of tourism, mattered little to him. Out on the blue horizon are his family. On his boat is his home.
Caulker was evacuated just two days after I left. The strong winds of Hurricane Chantal, with gusts of up to 100km per hour stopped just short of being a classified a true hurricane, whose winds much reach over 119km. I thought of Juni, and the words he had spoken through a wide smile: “I like hurricanes, they control the gringo population.”
18 Nov 2009
Cold floors, lofty mountains and revolting Bolivians
The blue and gold steam train heaves its way along the
track, rickety racketing as we progress to Aguas
Calientes, the village of Machu Picchu.
Getting up at 5 O Clock was no picnic. The freezing
morning air stabbed at my lungs as I pealed back the
thick, woolen blankets on my bed and set barefoot onto
the cold and shiney floor.
Dancing from one foot to another in the dark, I
fumbled for the ligth switch. I scooped up my
belongings and set out into the slowly awakening
street, walking labordly with my pack on my back,
breathing constraindly in the thin air.
Cusco is not as high as Lake Titicaca where, at nearly
4,000 metres above sea level, the lack of oxygen makes
your head spin and your heart flutter as your lungs
scrounge for air, but even so any exersion, such as
walking quickly or heavy lifting, and you can really
feel the strain.
Machu Picchu was worth all the never ending hours in
the bus; the discomfort; even the flue that has
gripped hold of me. When we arrived at 6am, the ruins
were shrowded in mist but you could feel the presence
of something amazing; a whisper on the air; an
invading sense of wonder.
As we struggled up the opposite mountain, Hyana
Picchu, the mist began to clear and we could, for the
first time, get our first real glimpse of the lost
city of the Inkas. Tears sprang to my eyes as the
magnitude of its beauty and the realisation of a dream
completed flooded in.
The path to the top was slippery; partly paved with
narrow and treacherous steps; partly stark mountain
side with nothing but a shakey rope keeping you from
plunging into an endless abyss of white fog and
striking green plants. I have to confess to somewhat
losing my composure on the way down, as the path
seemed to zig zag in front of my eyes and my mind
played images in front of me of tumbling into
infinity.
The next day, sadly, my hilarious and interesting gay
travelling companion, Sky, left for Chile and I set
off to Bolivia, only to be told that the Bolivians
were revolting (in the protesting sense of the word)
and that the border with Peru was closed.
I´m not getting a lot of love with border crossings
this trip. Do I wait for the Bolivians to calm down
and forge my way on to La Paz and a flight home from
there... or do I head back to Chile? I have to confess
to feeling somewhat weary after nearly 100 hours on a
bus. What can i say? I guess I´m just not as young as
I used to be!
track, rickety racketing as we progress to Aguas
Calientes, the village of Machu Picchu.
Getting up at 5 O Clock was no picnic. The freezing
morning air stabbed at my lungs as I pealed back the
thick, woolen blankets on my bed and set barefoot onto
the cold and shiney floor.
Dancing from one foot to another in the dark, I
fumbled for the ligth switch. I scooped up my
belongings and set out into the slowly awakening
street, walking labordly with my pack on my back,
breathing constraindly in the thin air.
Cusco is not as high as Lake Titicaca where, at nearly
4,000 metres above sea level, the lack of oxygen makes
your head spin and your heart flutter as your lungs
scrounge for air, but even so any exersion, such as
walking quickly or heavy lifting, and you can really
feel the strain.
Machu Picchu was worth all the never ending hours in
the bus; the discomfort; even the flue that has
gripped hold of me. When we arrived at 6am, the ruins
were shrowded in mist but you could feel the presence
of something amazing; a whisper on the air; an
invading sense of wonder.
As we struggled up the opposite mountain, Hyana
Picchu, the mist began to clear and we could, for the
first time, get our first real glimpse of the lost
city of the Inkas. Tears sprang to my eyes as the
magnitude of its beauty and the realisation of a dream
completed flooded in.
The path to the top was slippery; partly paved with
narrow and treacherous steps; partly stark mountain
side with nothing but a shakey rope keeping you from
plunging into an endless abyss of white fog and
striking green plants. I have to confess to somewhat
losing my composure on the way down, as the path
seemed to zig zag in front of my eyes and my mind
played images in front of me of tumbling into
infinity.
The next day, sadly, my hilarious and interesting gay
travelling companion, Sky, left for Chile and I set
off to Bolivia, only to be told that the Bolivians
were revolting (in the protesting sense of the word)
and that the border with Peru was closed.
I´m not getting a lot of love with border crossings
this trip. Do I wait for the Bolivians to calm down
and forge my way on to La Paz and a flight home from
there... or do I head back to Chile? I have to confess
to feeling somewhat weary after nearly 100 hours on a
bus. What can i say? I guess I´m just not as young as
I used to be!
Bed bugs, explosions and the biggest hotdog in the world
If they say the golden rule of travelling is to double
the amount of money you think you will need and to
halve the amount of clothes, then I would also say to
add on 50% to the expected journey time when
travelling any where, especially in South America; I
don´t know if it would have still taken 2 and a half
hours to cross the border between Argentina and Chile
had there been more than one window out of five open
and more than one member of staff working, but my
guess is that perhaps not.
So far we´ve put more than 55 bus hours behind us, the
last few by far the most tedious, as the modest
seating compartments afforded very little space and
there was a family of four occupying the two seats
behind us (Chileans carry their kids with them) which
made for constant, sharp kicks on the back of the seat
at 5am.... grrr.
Making our way up to the Northern tip of Chile, a 24
hour journey from the coastal resort of La Serena,
takes the Pan American highway through a never-ending
expanse of desert and salt flats; barren wasteland for
as far as the eye can see, with steep canyons and an
endless horizon. I´ve never seen star constellations
so clear and awe-inspiring.
It´s a little over a week since we left and it´s hard
to believe the distance we´ve covered in that time.
First stop was wine country, Mendoza, where we
indulged in the finest wines, drinking in the aromas
and flavours, commenting on the full-bodiedness of the
grape, as if we knew what we were talking about, and
then sheepishly ordered one bottle... the cheapest
they have.
Then into Chile, where the habbit of speaking as if
(as Matias so eloquently puts it) someone were
"squeezing their balls", has caused some confusion and
led to the sampling of some curious, unexpected and
yet delightful foods... such as the largest hot dog in
the world, stacked four inches high with avacado,
mayonaise, tomato and whatever else you desire ( or
say yes to without realising). This is the land of the
avocados; they grow on trees (sorry couldn´t resist ;)
Valpariaso was an interesting stop. City where stray
dogs roam free in the streets, ramshackle buildings
slide down the hills into the port below, and
sidewalks stained grey with the colour of age. Sadly,
we ended up calling it "city of the explosions", as
its state of disrepair saw more than one serious
explosion in the short time we were there. As we left
they were still rescuing people from the ashes of a
collapsed builing, which caught fire after a gas leak.
Very far from there now, after a day of relaxing on
the beach and contemplating the crossing to Peru, I
thought I´d write and update you all. It´s been an
amazing trip so far... In 8 days, I´ve crossed half
the continent, gotten very good at beach racket and
ball, been eaten alive by bed bugs, participated in
enlightening debates about Chilean politics, crossed
the desert, and even watched my first American
superbowl. Ahh the open road, never fails to surprise.
the amount of money you think you will need and to
halve the amount of clothes, then I would also say to
add on 50% to the expected journey time when
travelling any where, especially in South America; I
don´t know if it would have still taken 2 and a half
hours to cross the border between Argentina and Chile
had there been more than one window out of five open
and more than one member of staff working, but my
guess is that perhaps not.
So far we´ve put more than 55 bus hours behind us, the
last few by far the most tedious, as the modest
seating compartments afforded very little space and
there was a family of four occupying the two seats
behind us (Chileans carry their kids with them) which
made for constant, sharp kicks on the back of the seat
at 5am.... grrr.
Making our way up to the Northern tip of Chile, a 24
hour journey from the coastal resort of La Serena,
takes the Pan American highway through a never-ending
expanse of desert and salt flats; barren wasteland for
as far as the eye can see, with steep canyons and an
endless horizon. I´ve never seen star constellations
so clear and awe-inspiring.
It´s a little over a week since we left and it´s hard
to believe the distance we´ve covered in that time.
First stop was wine country, Mendoza, where we
indulged in the finest wines, drinking in the aromas
and flavours, commenting on the full-bodiedness of the
grape, as if we knew what we were talking about, and
then sheepishly ordered one bottle... the cheapest
they have.
Then into Chile, where the habbit of speaking as if
(as Matias so eloquently puts it) someone were
"squeezing their balls", has caused some confusion and
led to the sampling of some curious, unexpected and
yet delightful foods... such as the largest hot dog in
the world, stacked four inches high with avacado,
mayonaise, tomato and whatever else you desire ( or
say yes to without realising). This is the land of the
avocados; they grow on trees (sorry couldn´t resist ;)
Valpariaso was an interesting stop. City where stray
dogs roam free in the streets, ramshackle buildings
slide down the hills into the port below, and
sidewalks stained grey with the colour of age. Sadly,
we ended up calling it "city of the explosions", as
its state of disrepair saw more than one serious
explosion in the short time we were there. As we left
they were still rescuing people from the ashes of a
collapsed builing, which caught fire after a gas leak.
Very far from there now, after a day of relaxing on
the beach and contemplating the crossing to Peru, I
thought I´d write and update you all. It´s been an
amazing trip so far... In 8 days, I´ve crossed half
the continent, gotten very good at beach racket and
ball, been eaten alive by bed bugs, participated in
enlightening debates about Chilean politics, crossed
the desert, and even watched my first American
superbowl. Ahh the open road, never fails to surprise.
Heart ache, huge women and floating islands
Another bus, another woefully inapropriate film of
sex, drugs and violence playing inescapably loud
through the bus speakers. More desert scenery, but I
am climbing higher, towards the cold mountain passes
to the misty shores of lake Titicaca.
The people are different- The lady in the seat
opposite has a frilled layer skirt, so thick it rounds
out her already robust buttocks. Tight black braids
trail down her back and she has a bowler style hat on
her head. Dark skin etched with wrinkles reveals
secrets of a hard life. The baby she had tied to her
back with a woven, colored blanket bounces on her lap
and her 3 or 4 bags lay about her feet.
Life throws so many surprises at you, and more so when
you´re in unfamiliar territory. Six days ago now we
tried to cross the border to Peru in a 1960s cadilac,
loaded heavy with people and their belongings,
documents ready, only to be informed by the sombre
official that Peru no longer has any convenio with
Argentina and that Matias, with his Argentine document
could not pass. Even with a bribe of a few US dollars,
the official would not be swayed.
The last few days were spent in a state of confusion
and angst as we considered all options. In bitter
disappointment, the only choice we had left was for
him to return and for me to keep going.
The parting was unbearable; it wasn{t the fact of
being separated for a few weeks, as much as as the
thought of the unknown and the place of the parting;
in the desert of Northern Chile, as far from anywhere
else as we could be. I felt my heart rip from my chest
as his hand slipped from mine and the hot air warmed
my tears as they fell and choaked the back of my
throat. I saw his figure getting smaller in the mirror
until he was out of sight and I was rolling to the
border again.
The queue was long and the sun was harsh as I waited
in line for new stamps in my passport. The Chilean
side of the deal was neat and ordered; in stark
contrast the Peruvian side was pure chaos, as the
"gente" whipped themselves into a frenzy of sharp
elbows and stomping heels, desperate to be attended at
the window and heedless of any innocents in their
path.
The next hour passed in a blur as scores of over
weight indigenous ladies with ill-fitting clothing and
sullen facs proceeded to frenetically pass bin liners
stuffed with goods amonst themselves..some legal,
others not. They began running around and throwing
bags in to a dig out in the road, and stashing things
under their clothes, hats, children, the boots of
oncoming cars,in a desperate attempt to cheat the
officials, who easily turn their cheek once their
pockets have been siutably lined.
Through the window I observed the scene. It reminded
me of the movie, Chicken run, as the women{s flapping
movements generated clouds of debree and what looked
like feathers into the sky.
I was in Peru.
sex, drugs and violence playing inescapably loud
through the bus speakers. More desert scenery, but I
am climbing higher, towards the cold mountain passes
to the misty shores of lake Titicaca.
The people are different- The lady in the seat
opposite has a frilled layer skirt, so thick it rounds
out her already robust buttocks. Tight black braids
trail down her back and she has a bowler style hat on
her head. Dark skin etched with wrinkles reveals
secrets of a hard life. The baby she had tied to her
back with a woven, colored blanket bounces on her lap
and her 3 or 4 bags lay about her feet.
Life throws so many surprises at you, and more so when
you´re in unfamiliar territory. Six days ago now we
tried to cross the border to Peru in a 1960s cadilac,
loaded heavy with people and their belongings,
documents ready, only to be informed by the sombre
official that Peru no longer has any convenio with
Argentina and that Matias, with his Argentine document
could not pass. Even with a bribe of a few US dollars,
the official would not be swayed.
The last few days were spent in a state of confusion
and angst as we considered all options. In bitter
disappointment, the only choice we had left was for
him to return and for me to keep going.
The parting was unbearable; it wasn{t the fact of
being separated for a few weeks, as much as as the
thought of the unknown and the place of the parting;
in the desert of Northern Chile, as far from anywhere
else as we could be. I felt my heart rip from my chest
as his hand slipped from mine and the hot air warmed
my tears as they fell and choaked the back of my
throat. I saw his figure getting smaller in the mirror
until he was out of sight and I was rolling to the
border again.
The queue was long and the sun was harsh as I waited
in line for new stamps in my passport. The Chilean
side of the deal was neat and ordered; in stark
contrast the Peruvian side was pure chaos, as the
"gente" whipped themselves into a frenzy of sharp
elbows and stomping heels, desperate to be attended at
the window and heedless of any innocents in their
path.
The next hour passed in a blur as scores of over
weight indigenous ladies with ill-fitting clothing and
sullen facs proceeded to frenetically pass bin liners
stuffed with goods amonst themselves..some legal,
others not. They began running around and throwing
bags in to a dig out in the road, and stashing things
under their clothes, hats, children, the boots of
oncoming cars,in a desperate attempt to cheat the
officials, who easily turn their cheek once their
pockets have been siutably lined.
Through the window I observed the scene. It reminded
me of the movie, Chicken run, as the women{s flapping
movements generated clouds of debree and what looked
like feathers into the sky.
I was in Peru.
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