About three weeks ago, my brother called.
We had been talking about my flight north for Thanksgiving. So, the call was not a surprise.
He started off: "I'll meet you at the Los Angeles airport on Wednesday."
"Why?" I responded. "I'll be at your house in Bend [in Oregon] later that night."
"Wrong. We are going to race in the Baja 1000."
And so began my latest little adventure. I have never even attended the Baja 1000. But my brother has been a team member -- along with my niece -- for several years.
So, if all goes well, I will have met my brother at the Los Angeles Airport, and we will be heading south into Baja as you are reading this.
And what will I be doing? Well, let's put it his way. Remember the scene in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade when Indy's father read obscure clues from his diary? Indy asked (with irritation in his voice): "What does that mean?" And his father answered with laughter: "I don't know. We'll find out."
That is exactly how I feel. I know we are participating. But I am not certain in what type of vehicle. Nor do I know if I am navigating or driving or serving as cannon fodder for the course. But, you know what? We'll find out.
Someone is bound to ask this question, so let me answer it. My doctor does have concerns about me traipsing off on another boy adventure. Not because she is concerned I am going to have a heart attack or a stroke (though that could happen to any of us at almost any time), but because she has not yet found the proper combination of medication to deal with my triglycerides. She was not impressed with my suggestion that we set fire to my blood and let the fat burn out like some abandoned West Virginia coal mine.
I will undoubtedly make some promise to her that will be physically impossible to keep. But she will feel better, and I can have a good time with my brother.
If I can get internet hookups, I will keep you posted on the race. If not, there will be tales to tell in another week.
This may look to you like a box of Whoppers -- what Americans usually think of when they hear the term "malted milk balls." Or, as my father called them: "malted moth balls."
But, for me, the box is crisp (sometimes damp) dark nights on the unlit streets of Oak Grove. Going door to door with my brother telling the neighbors to cough up the candy or dire (unspecified) things just might happen.
A cross between Obamacare and the Mafiosi. The day, of course, was always 31 October.
When I saw the pictured box at Comercial Mexicana -- one of our large grocery establishments that masquerades as a department store -- it brought back the smell, the feel, the sounds of those fun nights in the 1960s. So, I thought I would try to resurrect the taste, as well.
As you know, I do not care for sweets -- and I really do not care for chocolate. But I have always been very fond of the malt ball that hides under the cocoon of sugared paraffin.* I grabbed a box and dug into it on the drive back from Manzanillo.**
Have you ever found a product that you liked as a kid? Maybe Twinkies. Or those Hostess fruit pies sold in the high school cafeteria. Remember how good they were when you were young? Pure ambrosia.
And remember what happened when you tasted them as an adult? How dreadful they were? What happened? Did the recipe change? Did we develop better taste as adults?
I don't know the answer. But that was exactly my reaction to the Whoppers. The coating has always tasted a bit like a brown candle to me. It is not really chocolate at all. For me, that is just fine.
But the big disappointment was the center. I always looked forward to the crunch of the malt ball with its yeasty tones. Even that was missing.
It must have been the heat and humidity, but each center was reduced to a gummy caramel. No crunch. No yeast. Like a box of Milk Duds that have gone very, very bad.
There is a lesson, of course, to be learned from these attempts to buy memories. It can't be done. We have already paid the price of memory by experiencing it the first time.
The Whoppers do not matter. But those chilly October nights will always be a part of who I am.
And I will always have my brother to experience new things. Like the Baja 1000. And that is where we are headed today.
* -- If you are fond of
malted milk balls, I strongly recommend you try Maltesers -- the British
version. Far superior in all respects.
** -- Before you reach for
your "what about your diet" lynch kit, all of these events happened in
late October. Long before my days of diet reform.
Lewis Carroll must have had a hand in creating Melaque. At least, some of the sub-cultures.
While walking to the village yesterday, this sign caught my eye. My irony radar set off its high alert. What kind of thinking goes into a sign that announces a business as "We are Mexican," and then spells it out in English?
Well, you know the type. We cannot get away from labeling ourselves -- even when we come to Mexico. The "we" in that sentence are the expatriates and tourists who seem to thrive on these divisions.
The expatriate-tourist crowd in Melaque is not very large. We come from a handful of countries. Primarily, Canada with both English and French speaking contingents.
The rest of us are from The States, Ecuador, Colombia, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Italy, and Germany. I am certain there are more countries represented. I just cannot think of them at the moment.
But the nationality labels are not what divides us -- though there is some of that. Instead, we tend to coalesce around authenticity parties.
Here's what I mean by that. Everyone wants to have an "authentic" experience in Mexico -- whether they live here or whether they have come down for the short haul.
But people have varying expectations about that authenticity. Let's take food as an example.
There are two major parties. The Purists, who will eat only Mexican food prepared in a Mexican kitchen by Mexican hands. And then there are the Bridgers, who will eat most any food without regard to the nationality of either the restaurant owner or the cook.
Like most reductionist theories, there are a lot of people who slop over into both camps. I have not mentioned The Picky Tourist, who will eat nothing unless it looks, smells, and, tastes just like the early bird special at Denny's. I didn't because The Picky Tourist is in the same category as the griffin and manticore.
If I had to wager on the provenance of the sign on the wall, I would put it down to clever marketing. The proprietors are playing on the partisan spirit of the Purists. Eat here. We are Mexican. Come be authentic with us. We are not like those Canadians down the street. Well, except for our menu.
It is a clever little ploy. But I often wonder why we allow ourselves to be pandered to in this fashion? Why do we divide ourselves up into two groups?
Maybe it is human nature. We certainly do it in politics.
I just finished reading an article by Jay Nordlinger bemoaning the overuse of the word "establishment." A word that had little categorical meaning, but has now become one of those terms used more as an insult than an analytical tool. It was this paragraph that got me to thinking about our Purist-Bridger division.
In early 2003, a bunch of us were sitting around figuring out where we stood on the impending Iraq War. A colleague said: "I know what the neoconservative position is, but what's the conservative position?" In reality, there was no cupboard from which you could pluck conservative positions (or neoconservative ones). You had to think: "What's the right thing to do, or least wrong thing to do? What is the wisest or most palatable of the options?"
I wonder what our social scene in Melaque would be like if we simply asked: "Where's the best place to eat that will offer me a culinary adventure each time I visit?"
Of course, the sentence is loaded with my values. So, what I will do is use that as my own guide. And I will make a deal. You don't tell me what to eat, and I won't tell you.
In Let's Explore Diabetes With Owls, David Sedaris handles the most difficult division amongst Americans -- politics -- with his inimitable humor. In the process of making fun of his opponents, he does a Veg-o-matic on his fellow believers.
In the last month of the presidential campaign, I tuned in to conservative talk radio and listened as callers considered the unthinkable. One after another, they all threatened the same thing: “If McCain doesn’t win, I’m leaving the country.”
“Oh, right,” I’d say. “You’re going to leave and go where? Right-wing Europe?” In the Netherlands now, I imagine it’s legal to marry your own children. Get them pregnant, and you can abort your unborn grandbabies in a free clinic that used to be a church. The doctor might be a woman who became a man and then became a woman again, all on taxpayers’ dollars, but as long as she saves the stem cells, she’ll have the nation’s blessing.
I couldn't have said it better. I wonder if David would like an "authentic" Mexican dinner on me?
Today is Veterans' Day in the United States. In Canada and Great Britain, it is Remembrance Day.
It is the day we specifically set aside to remember all of the servicemen who have protected our values -- in war or in peace. But its roots are in a specific war. World War One. The war that was to end all wars. And to make the world safe for democracy.
Both phrases are now associated with President Wilson, even though the first originated with H.G. Wells. Of course, nothing of the sort happened. The Twentieth Century was filled with one war after another. And the world is no safer for democracy than it was in 1918.
And 1918 is important for our tale. Because it was on the 11th day of the 11th month at the 11th hour of that year that an armistice was declared in Europe ending what then seemed to be the most brutal war of human history. Since then, we have honored not only the men who fought in that war, but also anyone who served in the armed forces in the pursuit of an orderly and peaceful world.
Today I joined a restaurant-full of Mexicans, Canadians, and Americans to honor the fallen and the living in uniform. The ceremony was simple. A playing of The Last Waltz. A moment of silence. A reading of In Flanders Field. And then the singing of the national anthems of the United States, Canada, and Mexico.
I was honored to be asked to read the poem and to lead the singing of the American anthem. Even though, I managed to Robert Goulet the lyrics on the latter.
My little error did not take away from the true sentiment of thankfulness of the people who participated. And we had the very personification of what we were honoring in our midst. Elton Ellsworth is a regular Melaque visitor. But more than that, he is a veteran of World War Two, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War.
For those who have died, For those who have served. For those who stand on guard today. I salute you.
Tomorrow is Dia del Cartero hereabouts. If you left your universal translator on the Enterprise, that means Postman's Day.
For me, it means thanking the three men who sell me stamps, send out my cards and letters, and ensure that my ever-increasing pile of mail gets to my postal box. They do a great job.
These pages have included several entries about my love affair with the Mexican mail service. If I mail a letter to The States from here, it will be delivered up north between 10 and 14 days. And letters sent this way arrive on a similar schedule.
The only problem I have had is with magazines. My print issues of The Economist are once again showing up in my box -- even though I can read it through my internet subscription. I now read The American Spectator solely online.
Babs recently sent me a card from San Miguel de Allende. If I remember correctly she said this was her first use of the Mexican mail system. I had it in hand within 5 or 6 days.
But all of that is merely the job. What is more important is that I enjoy talking to Saul, Julio, and Ramon. When I go in to check my box for mail, we stand around and talk about soccer, the weather, accidents, recent deaths. The type of conversation you would have at a small town post office in southern Oregon. That is, if the participants knew only a few words in each person's language.
But it works. Guys don't need lots of words. For me, that is fortunate.
Dia del Cartero is the day that all of this service is honored. Patrons of the post office drop off small gifts or tips during the week (the office is closed on the day itself).
In my case, I combine their Christmas gift with my Carterois tip because I am usually out of the country for most of the winter. And that will be true again this year.
So, I will use three of those tiny, girly cards that grandmothers use to give gift money to their grandchildren, and stuff a 200 peso note into each of them.
Small change for three workers in an institution that is central to my life in Mexico.
According to my Blogger dashboard, this is my 2000th post.
2000. It does not seem possible. When I sat down on the evening of 19 December 2007 to tell Andee, a blogger in Chacala, about my scouting trip to Mexico, I am positive I had no thoughts of still tapping away almost six years later.
John Calypso has a program that tells him how many words he has written. I don't have that capability. But I know there have been a lot of words that have gone out over the internet under my signature.
What has changed most has been the number of daily hits. Back in 2007-2008, I thought I had hit the big time with 80 hits. That figure is now regularly close to 4000 each day.
Of course, those are hits, not readers. All bloggers get lots of spam hits from the exotic climes of Ukraine, India, and Thailand. And there are also the Google searches that bring up my "floating butterfly," "naked youth," and "flag of Mexico" posts. I suspect they each represent a distinct interest group. And they pass by without stopping.
But the core of regular readers and commenters has grown. Living in a rather small community, people often stop me on the street to say something nice about the blog. The people who cross to the other side of the street may have other opinions.
I have thoroughly enjoyed the past six years-- honing my observation skills. Whether there will be 2000 more posts remains to be seen. But you will soon see what I experience at the Baja 1000 and my road trip to Central America.
So far,it has been a great ride. If you stay on board, I promise more of the same.
Coffee drinkers rejoice. Your filled cups are at hand.
La Taza Negra is open for roasted coffee sales. And the full coffee shop opens on 19 November.
I talked with Ben Boyt yesterday after his arrival in town on Thursday. His return trip was unusually eventful. And in it lies a cautionary tale.
Ben and his dad headed south from Oregon in his dad's truck. The trailer they were towing contained the Boyt family's personal goods, supplies for the coffee shop, and a recently-purchased coffee roaster.
They decided to enter Mexico the same way I entered five years ago -- through Lukeville. All went well at the border crossing. They drove across the border after showing their documents and headed south to the first customs stop.
Anyone who has crossed at Lukeville knows that nothing is signed very well. The protocol is that all drivers are to stop in the parking lot right at the border and take care of entry issues in the office.
That didn't happen. Ben and his dad thought it was odd that no one had mentioned visas. But they drove on to what was once the major customs and visa stop.
They went past the first set of offices without stopping. That turned out to be what was probably mistake number two.
Their first stop was when they received a red customs light. Ben opened the trailer for the inspector, who immediately honed in on the roaster. When the inspector discovered nothing had yet been declared, the trip came to a halt.
A four day halt. They were ordered back to the border where Mexican customs impounded the truck and trailer -- and all of its contents. Ben and his dad waited for the officials to determine if there would be a fine or if everything would be confiscated.
It turned out to be a mixture of both. If they would pay a fine of $12,000, the vehicle, the trailer, and personal goods would be released. But the roaster would be forfeited.
At that point, Ben's dad needed to return north, and Ben decided to join Alexa and the kids in Dallas for a few days while Customs considered a fine reduction. When Ben returned to the border, the issue was still unsettled. So, he hired a shipper for the few goods that were released, and hired an attorney to assist in lowering the penalty.
And that is where everything rests right now Ben returned by bus to Melaque to open the shop. The rest of the family will arrive soon.
The precautionary tale that Ben passes along to everyone coming across the border is to do a bit of research before bringing anything into Mexico. Mexico, like every other country, has regulations that it enforces -- something that those of us with a libertarian bent often down play. As Ben says, his decision to "wing it" turned out to be a bad decision.
For me, though, the story is once again about relationships. Ben is a member of our church. The moment we heard there were difficulties at the border, people volunteered to do what they could to assist him -- including a willingness to take their vehicles to Lukeville to bring him and his goods to our little harbor of Melaque. You might call it the Dunkirk spirit.
And through it all, Ben and Alexa exercised their faith. As great mentors for the rest of us.
Years from now, Ben and Alexa will be telling the Tale of the Prodigal Roaster. And how all good stories come at a cost.
Welcome home, Ben.
