the tsunamis are coming; the tsunamis are coming

"Emergency. Everybody to get from street.


"Emergency. Everybody to get from street."


With those lines, Alan Arkin, as Lt. Rozanov, attempts to create a diversion on Gloucester Island to get back to his submarine. Of course, the lines are delivered in a cheesy Slavic accent. You need to add your own Tillamook to this piece.


The movie was "The Russians are Coming, The Russians are Coming." One of those 1960s comedies whose script was as funny as its politics were naive.


The ploy, of course, being a mere MacGuffin, did not work.


But the version visited upon Melaque on Wednesday did -- sort of.


The Mexican state of Jalisco has installed a series of 27 units to detect tsunamis on the 290 kilometers (180 miles) of its Pacific coast to give warning to fishermen and coast dwellers. That second category is near and dear to my heart -- and the rest of my body.


If unusual wave activity is detected, a recorded message is supposed to be announced on speakers prominent enough (portrayed above) to restore Winston Smith's trust in the Ministry of Truth:

This is a message from the State Civil Protection System. A seismic shock has been recorded that may cause a tsunami. We ask you to locate evacuation routes and remain alert to further messages.

Of course, that is not the message that I thought would be announced -- at least not with those words. It would be announced in Spanish, not English. Or so I thought.


On Wednesday I found out that I was half correct. The announcement is in Spanish -- then, in English.


Perhaps it is a ploy to convince Americans and Canadians that they will not be left to play extras in an Irwin Allen film if the great flood comes. There is nothing more disconcerting than sitting on your veranda watching the ocean recede while all of your Spanish-speaking neighbors are reenacting The Grapes of Wrath.


Well, there is one thing more disconcerting. Watching the receding ocean change its direction to prove that global warming is not the only way to increase tide levels.


I was on my way back to the house after a morning of Spanish lessons and vegetable shopping when I heard several chords -- as if Gabriel might be sounding the final trump.


I was wrong -- unless God had decided to announce the Second Coming with a bureaucratic warning in Spanish.


The end of days was not upon us. At least, not in reality.


The male bureaucratic voice announced in ribbon and seal tones that this was merely a test of the tsunami and cyclone (I was not aware of that additional purpose) warning system.


The test consisted of ever-escalating code colors and dire warnings. Unfortunately, none of the subsequent warnings were identified as being mere drills. They were authentic enough to cause my neighbors to ask me if we should be doing something.


I checked the streets. Some of the tourists in fact were packing up to leave the area. It was almost as if Orson Welles had been reanimated to plop Grover's Corner in Jalisco. But not quite that panicked.


At least, I feel a bit more comfortable with the warning system. Most of it appears to be well-considered -- with the obvious exception of the drills.


What no one has rehearsed is how to evacuate the 10,000 people who are shoehorned onto this narrow alluvial plain. Hills are close. But the roads are very narrow.


And I do not think I am being ethnically insensitive to point out that queuing up is not a Mexican habit.


Perhaps, I should merely hold out for one of those Russian submarines that Hollywood finds so helpful as a plot device. MacGuffin or not.