Says Price Charles, Homeless Propagator of History: "Unbelizeable"

The moment our bus parked at the station in Belize City, the doorway was mobbed by men and women clamoring in thick Caribbean accents. The motley crew weren't passengers for the next bus to leave, but an array of unofficial taxi drivers aggressively competing for our business and bags.

One grabbed us, convinced us he wasn't a scam artist, and off we drove toward a nearby hostel. The blocks of the city we covered were mostly concrete and dilapidated wood, connected by sandy, potholed roads. Belize City rests on the water, home to an almost entirely English-speaking Caribbean population, some latinos, with a number of transplants from India and especially China, who have a monopoly on Asian cuisine and convenience stores. American hip-hop, baggy shorts and basketball jerseys outfit the culture of youth, and the bloodshot eyes of policemen discredit the posted signs decrying drugs. Every taxi driver and many corner-lounging pedestrians accost tourists with drug-procuring offers, and beggers are aggressive again, hounding tourists, the all too obvious sunburned ghosts gliding at a pace too fast for a rasta-haven.

Our personal leetch called himself Prince Charles, a well-educated homeless man rambling on about Belizean history and allegory. Our denial of his services didn't deter him from leading us to a guest house as light dwindled, we on the Lonely Planet designated less-safe side of the bridge, nor did it discourage his uncanny tracking abilities, appearing with magnetic reliability every time we stepped outside until our departure the next morning, constantly working us for a "little piece of cheese." We ate delectable stew chicken with rice and beans, the Belizean staple, at a nearby restaurant before settling down for the night with a bagful of Beliken, the excellent national beer, entranced by cable TV, making a triumphant return from its fading hold in mythology, cheering USC's upset by Oregon State. (Too bad I've missed every Panther's game since the opener, UM's historic comeback vs. WI, and PSU's defeat of Illinois. Plus hockey season is starting. Ahhhh, fuck...)

Rural Belize has a low-country southern US feel, green, marshy terrain and one story houses on flat lots, others mounted on stilts, people in flip-flops or barefoot, shirts optional. The seedy city rush opposite the beachfront relaxtion we craved, we ferried to Caye (pronounced key) Caulker, a Belizean island, early the morning after our arrival in the city. A forty-five minute boat ride transformed Belize into a sand-paved paradise spotted with reggae bars and small, open-air diners.

It's the down season, so we're the only inhabitants at Tom's Hotel on Caye Caulker, a large, barebones beachfront hotel a few minutes walk from the main strip. Where we paid US$40 for relative luxury in Belize City, we're back to less than US$20 total on the island. Beer in Belize is sold only in single, heavy bottles, however, and never cheaper than BZ$3 (US$1.50), so booze and food constitute larger expenses, even with affordable, filling meal options like stew chicken, rice and beans. Waking up on the island for the first time today, we've already booked an additional three nights, scoped out a handful of eateries and a liter of Belizean rum.

I've wasted no time establishing myself as the crazy white boy (by which locals have several times referred to me), miffing the ganja-gangs huddled in the shade or strolling sans-shirt in the midday heat, scorching sun unimpeded by cloudless skies, as I sprint by on a ill-timed run. "Boy, ya know ya gon' kill ya'self doin' dat," yelled one dreadlocked artist as I sped past a meandering biker, another inquiring, "Boy, where ya goin'?" the second time we crossed paths, inevitable on the tiny island I could cover on foot in less than 10 minutes. The agonizing second half of the run lent credence to their incredulity, and if I wait only a few hours more in coming days I can share the sea breeze at sunset, the island engulfed in total black by 6:15pm, quiet and deserted save a few operational restaurant-bars and Chinese-owned convenience stores.

Chetuhell

Chetumal, a Caribbean coastal city bordering Belize, is drab and excruciatingly hot by day. Unless you're lucky enough to be in a bank, swanky hotel, or a freezer in the sketchy backstreets (which unfortunately comes with the bad luck of being a dismembered corpse), you're sweating faster than you can replenish. My bed, in our fan-cooled sauna at Hotel Ucum, is an ever-damp sponge, unable to dry in the pervasive humidity, all the clothes I've worn since yesterday morning moist rags. My urine is fluorescent, a melted crayon colored sunset. Showers are illusory, precipitation masking perspiration.

The city is far more appealing at night, slightly cooled by sea breeze and the descended infernal sun. Lighted shops, bars, and restaurants glow and beckon, decorative lights in Mexico's colors adorn posts and light fixtures lining the streets, luminescent leftovers from independence days celebrations. Street vendors materialize, unanimously competing for the bacon-wrapped hot-dog market, which, apparently, is thriving.

Stomachs grumbling, Jackson and I scoured the streets, many of the comida corrida lunch spots having lowered their metal garage-door store fronts. After retracing our steps, having walked over a mile past hundreds of hot dog vendors and little else save the tacos and tortas we've gorged upon for weeks, our shirts glued to our backs anew, we entered the closed-air market we'd eschewed at lunch. The peripheral stand was visibly open, a few customers scattered about the plastic tables. We walked to the kitchen window to verify they were serving still.

Before we were able to attract the attention of any attendant, I heard a whisper to my right, turned and saw an elderly woman not so much inviting but demanding our presence. She stood shrouded in shadow, obscured by posts running from floor to ceiling, some illicit dealer arroz y frijoles and who knows what else, maybe tacos of shredded tourist fresh from the freezer. We approached apprehensively, noticing she stood in front of another kitchen, smaller and less aesthetically attuned, a one-woman dining operation. Of the many things she said, we divined, as much from the menu as her words, that she was eager to cook us platters for 50 pesos apiece. We acquiesced to her enthusiasm, promised plates of carne asada and bistec, which ended up looking identical, with salad, papas fritas, plátanos fritos, arroz y frijoles.

The lights flicked on and grandma worked into a frenzy, slicing, dicing, and frying her way into our hearts. A true home-cooked meal emerged fifteen minutes later with a basket of fresh, hot tortillas. The plátanos fritos I crazed cost us a few pesos more, so we ended up paying 60 pesos each. When dropped 150 pesos for her kindness and efforts you'd have thought we'd saved her children from imminent death and bestowed riches immeasurable, bowing her head up and down, stammering exaltations, gesticulating towards the heavens. Wearing broad smiles and distended bellies, we sauntered back to our hotel, having promised grandma we'd visit La Peninsula again next we return to Chetumal.

Dan and Shannon, biker friends we made yesterday -- riding all the way from Asheville, NC! and about the only other gringos in town -- left for Belize this morning. We're awaiting our bus to Belize City, hoping we don't have any holdup at the border, getting conflicting information since yesterday about an exit form we may or may not need (Update: we had no problem crossing). My initial impressions of Chetumal were too severe, but it's not a place I need more time to see.

Port-O-Death

Have you ever wanted to sleep inside a Port-O-Jon, a place where you're scared to open your water bottle for the omnipresent threat of rapscallion poo-pixies aching to spread their infectious dusts of poo-borne illness?

If so, enjoy a toiletside seat on any first class ADO bus running Mexico. I just endured 8 hours bathed in the stench of human feces, souped in stale, dehydrated piss, contracting Hepatitis A by proximity. Call me a first-world elitist, but the smell of human waste is one to which I refuse to become comfortable. The little lady beside me had no problem falling asleep, while I spent the last 8 hours plotting ways to stem the stench, suppressing my gag reflex.

Because I was wearing flip-flops, my old go-to when confronted with an overpowering odor, covering my nose with a dirty sock, wasn't an option. I did have an empty pastry bag, prime for huffing, flakes of sugary dough and smears of strawberry goo lining the inside, which I considered rubberbanding over my head, around my neck, for a sweet descent into oblivion. But, alas, I had no rubber bands in my carry-on. If we'd been traveling on a recycled US school bus, the "chicken buses" I'm so anticipating, I'd have quietly violated the no limbs out the window regulation to tempt decapitation. But, then, on a school bus there'd be no bathroom to defoul. And, suddenly, I find myself slightly envious of third-world simplicity.

In a particularly disturbing moment thick in the delirium of 3am, the offending odor reimagined itself as streetcart grilled elote, of which I'm a recent devotee. It's 4:30am, I'm in the Chetumal bus station until the town wakes up, and I hope the fact nobody is sitting near me doesn't indicate the malodor of shit has seeped into my skin and clothing.

Why can't the bus leave sooner?

I just finished polishing the lenses of my $15 Wal-Mart aviators, 'cause I'm a pimp like that, which technically means I'm pulsing with as little or much pimpishness as is required that I'm preparing to leave Mexico reminded that titties exist outside of Skinemax only by change-begging mothers nursing from the gutter.

The Mayan ruins at Palenque are absolutely marvelous, enormous monuments set in the sweltering jungle, like something out of an Alien vs. Predator movie -- a series which, no matter how much it sucks, can't possibly compete with the utter sucktitude of Palenque the city, with which the ruins have the misfortune of sharing a name. The city is a grimy little strip with all the amenities but none of the character or charm of the cities we've visited thus far.

I want to burn our shabby hostel, Posada San Vincente, to the ground. Sure, it's only US$7 each per night for our own beds and private bath, but...

1. The hot water that's advertised doesn't flow to our quarters.
2. The cooler full of free purified water "pours" at a lollygagging trickle, constantly changing the part of the spicket it dribbles from, so filling my empty 2-liter bottle playing catch-the-droplets takes ten minutes, all the while I must keep the slowly filling bottle held aloft.
3. There's no toilet seat, so we have to spread cheek or scoot to the front of the bowl to avoid falling in.
4. The welt on my head that currently extends my height two inches, courtesy a "traditional" Mexican doorway, has trained me to duck anytime I enter a room. This evening, however, shivering after a shower only a penguin could love, I almost punched out the ceiling bulb while drying my hair. Anti-American sentiment apparently spreads into architecture.

(I'd rather chase sleep on a bumpy bus ride than stay here another night. As it is, that's what we're doing tomorrow night, escaping this pitiful blemish on a night bus to Chetumal, from where we'll quickly tour Belize before jumping into Guatemala for language school and diarrhea.)

But the Palenque ruins. Unforgettable, many incredibly well preserved, with steep steps leading to buildings rife with chambers, passageways, and towers, many portions of which are still open to public exploration, a rarity in the protective modern world of ancient wonders. All sorts of mystery surround the Palenque ruins, like those at Monte Alban. Mostly, why did such supposedly tiny people insist on building such gargantuan stone steps, and so many leading up to every edifice? If each step is knee-high on Jackson and me, long-legged Americans both, how did miniature Mayans ascend to their spectacular creations? One can only assume each climb was a strenuous endeavour requiring arms, legs, and stamina. People who spent a day accidentally climbing to the wrong building, at the top overwhelmed by the frustration of an advanced civilization that couldn't conquer intelligent stair construction, would simply volunteer for ritual sacrifice.

By the way, a new term for those occasions you encounter a pair of girls, half beauty, half beast: "Nickel and dimed."

A lot'a piss.

Just navigating the aisle to the bus back bathroom, much less landing a stream of urine in the toilet with one wobbly hand while the other grips a safety rail for the stability to prevent ones skull from playing pinball with the claustrophobic walls, is a treacherous undertaking on a first class bus winding down the speedbump-littered mountain pass from San Cristóbal de las Casas to Palenque.

We're leaving the crisp altitudinal clime for buggy jungle, trading sweatshirts for layers of sunscreen and insect repellent. If plans progress accordingly, we'll visit Palenque's ruins this afternoon and be on our way to Guatemala tomorrow, though I vow to return to Mexico before home, once I have a conversational command of Spanish, for a more thoroughly authentic experience. And to fulfull Michigan-made summer promises to spot an elusive Chupacabra; what I do upon discovery is a mystery for the moment.

Chiapas is a gorgeous, mountainous state, with outcroppings of money averting the casual observer's attention from the pervasive poverty. Shacks and shanties seem the norm, leaky-roofed showers perhaps as likely as any other for their inhabitants. Mornings are delicate and serene, sleepy towns waking up as wisps of smoke curl skyward, the odd worker trudging uphill, wares in tow, to some roadside stand, woodwalled and tinroofed, hoping for a day's take of peses that wouldn't cover my Chick-Fil-A dinner back home.

But a pile of pan dulce those pesos will afford, and probably do, judging by the carbohydrate paunch that is such a popular accessory amongst Mexicans. But I empathize, unable to honor my daily swearing off of pastries, failing every time I pass another panaderia. Running better make its way back into my daily routine before I fulfill the jealous wishes of every fatty who's ever witnessed this lean-boy's buffet dominance. For now, at least, metabolism suffices.

Maybe I'll get a chance to workout on the court, basketball so far appearing more the national sport than futbol, soccer jersey-clad, one-hand dominant Spud Webb wannabes clogging lanes not penalty boxes, vying for rebounds. The universal language of sport sounds ideal, my pathetic Spanish alarmingly unimproved after eleven days of immersion; reconciling my instant-gratification-or-give-up nature with the long-term burden of learning a language is a struggle. If I'm immune to the purported wonder-working of Guatemalan language schools, the six-month minimum I've imposed upon this trip could shrivel faster than a forlorn alcoholic's skin in the Central American sun.

Back home they call me Skeeter

There're are two massive gringo madmen running rampant through the streets of San Cristobál de las Casas, the picturesque town in the Mexican state of Chiapas in which lightly armed Zapatistas, black bandanas covering their faces below the eyes, staged a minor revolution not so many years ago. Wearing shorts and sandals, singing R&B at piercing pitches and patronizing every panaderia, pasteleria, and dulceria lining the streets, we're beasts of boredom with insatiable appetites for simple carbohydrates.

Yesterday we enjoyed a day excursion to the nearby Cañón del Sumidero, an adventure made more exciting when our fifteen-passenger van broke down on the way to the launch point. Thankfully, Mexicans are exceedingly nice and another bus, from a different company, stopped to assess our troubles soon afterward, graciously allowing us to crowd their bus for the final 15km. Once we arrived, we donned life jackets and were hustled into twenty foot motorboats, taking off upriver into a pristine, verdant canyon sandwiched by sheer, majestic rockfaces and peaks towering hundreds to one thousand meters overhead. Birds circling trees many hundreds of meters overhead cast shimmering shadows against the canyon walls, and massive crocodiles sunbathed on sandbars along the riverbanks, still as statues as butterflies fluttered about their snouts. On the way back to San Cristobál we stopped over in Chiapa de Corzo, a fine enough town but anticlimactic compared to the awesomeness preceding.

San Cristobál has grown on us too, transformed in my opinion by its own weekend nighttime transformation. The town, typically quiet save the wild west market center, the labyrinthine expanse of stands, tents, and alleys flooded daily with townspeople, jumps off for the weekend. Fly rides rocking suicide doors, custom paintjobs and lights cruise the suddenly congested streets; the zocala grows packed with a young, well dressed crowd; and bars, coffee shops, and restaurants before unnoticed are suddenly deluged with customers, all the central streets inundated with foot traffic stepping to the beat of live music calling from many enticing establishments. The guys look suave but the girls unbelievable, wearing jeans so tight they can't possibly fit a peso in their pockets. Many of the indigenous girls are beauties themselves, though dressed in vibrant, flowing garb, outstretched arms ornamented by beads and jewelery they can never afford to stop hawking. For us, walking the steets was at once the highlight of the week and a depressing reminder of our español inadequacies.

By morning the town returns to low-key, Jackson and I again the centerpieces of attention. I ran this morning for the first time during the trip -- motivated by the mountain of pastries I consumed over three meals yesterday -- a surprisingly easy 50 minutes given the approximately 2000m altitude to which I've apparently already acclimated. It was a good head clearer, and we've both admitted to having a few solitary, shaky moments during which we questioned our commitment to traveling and its affect on our futures; but we too concurred that new excitements soon swayed us back to the journeyman's camp.

Moreover, we're laughing so much it's proof we're summiting the pinnacles of relaxation and happiness. Our melodically and harmonically superior duets are soundtracks to all moments, breaking into spanish-littered english song sitting in our bedroom or benched in the zocala, walking to the fruit market or sipping tall beers on the hostel's rooftop terrace, eyelevel with the roofs and rooftop shanties encircling. We're practicing R&B for at least thirty minutes daily, not merely for the pantydropping potential but for the love of the music! From time to time we veer into hardcore/metal territory, never forgetting our roots, finding infinite hilarity in filtering words like mariposa and helado through the voice of Satan, splayed over some sludgy breakdown. And walking through town I'm constantly amazed by the resonance of the crumbled No Limit empire, blinded every few steps by a shriveled indigenous geriatric flashing her silver-and-gold studded grill.

Last but not least, we laughed hard for no less than thirty minutes last night, an ab workout courtesy the word "skeet." Indeed, the conversation started steeped in vulgarity, the part of speech variations of skeet being uniformly funny and well-worth exploration. Somehow the conversation devolved into a country-fried skeet circus, replete with heavily redneck-accented pronunciations and exlamations of skeet, skeeter and the like. ¨Round here they call me Skeeter.¨ ¨Back home they call me Skeeter.¨ ¨They call me Skeeter round these parts.¨ We rarely get through any of the above statements without bursting into laughter. Jackson has renamed himself Skeeter Letchworth for the duration of this trip. Seriously, if you were here with us, no funnier conversation has ever taken place, and a night's sleep did nothing to dampen the hilarity.

Patrick, the Pastry King

It's never a bad day when you see a fanny pack. Or, for that matter, man capris and other fashion faux pas courtesy our Euro-traveling brethren. And every day my immune system conquers the traveler's diarrhea lurking in every bacteria-laden bite of street food is reason to crack another cerveza, but, moreover, to be increasingly daring in my patronage of questionable curbside vendors. I might miss Thanksgiving in the US, but it's everyday during this end-far-from-seen vacation.

Our small hostel in San Cristóbal de las Casas, Hostel Conejo, is a few renovations short of humble, but it does boast hot water and a pot-smoking, rum-sipping twenty-six year old divorcee owner who wants to have sex with every female foreigner he can seduce to the hostel fresh off the bus. For once, we witness a man who lives by the admirable creed, "It doesn't matter what you look like." (Since handwriting this post last night, we've changed hostels to another for the same price, Hostel Plaza Central, which at 60 pesos each per night provides quiter, private rooms if less character, but the front desk attendent is another cool dude. A good change.)

I'm finding it a bit difficult hostel-hopping. Not for the usual expectation: my OCD stricken self being unable to function outside a realm of absolute order, repetition, and cleanliness. The day-to-day holds plenty surprise to distract me from the absence of ritual and the presence of personal reek. I'm a misanthrope by nature, despite the smiling facade that frequently fools bored gas station attendants and old ladies. I tend to expect the worst of people until experience proves otherwise, and I have little patience for the daily repetition of identical introductory conversations, characteristics hardly conducive to making friends in the short term (though that's hardly to say I haven't met some great travelers already, nor that I've loathed every moment of conversation). Sometimes I wish it were otherwise, but I'm never immediately interested in conversing with someone unless they're offering me a drink or making overt and affectionate gestures toward my crotch. I suppose that makes me a mild asshole. Maybe I can score copious quantities of prescription pain medication at a corner pharmacy, anything with euphoria for side effect.

San Cristóbal de las Casas is a nice, quiet town, if sometimes in a menacing way. It's certainly poorer and dirtier than Oaxaca, which still holds the crown of Best City Visited, and San Cristóbal's long, seemingly unoccupied alley-width streets lined with typical, brightly painted, window-barred domiciles and housefront shops tend to energize the mind trained to expect kidnappings and muggings. Still, it's a charming town, and Latin America's affinity for vibrant paintjobs is among its most endearing features. Packs of mangy wild dogs are less so, though none has attempted to snatch a pastry from my hands, so we have no beef. Yet. However, I do find myself secretly hoping for an exploding predatory large cat population to tear and claw the region back into a more personally preferential population balance. That's probably for the parade of truckbed-caged wild cats we saw on display in the streets of Oaxaca, jaguars and panthers and more, a free and uncoordinated market-side spectacle, full of kids risking their hands and wrists with flicks and waves inside the bars, within inches of severing-capable jaws.

I'm excited to eat an expat-run Isreali restaurant tonight, which, according to a Jewish traveler at our last hostel, serves excellent falafel (Update: it does!). The variety of quality international food is one of the greatest attributes of the US. But, whatever I miss about the US, it isn't cell phones, though Jackson and I both keep experiencing phantom vibrations in our pockets.

For those who've always wanted to hear me sing, our ever-improving and -evolving "I've got the voice of an angellll!" duet keeps us giddy and everyone else confounded, perhaps revealing too much of our current mindset in its newest, melodically identical incarnation: "I'm gonna stick my dick in an angellllllllll!"

Recuerdos de Oaxaca

In Oaxaca now, since midday Monday, and living is grand. Oaxaco is another brown smurf colony, we're still giants, but we're getting used to it now. Unfortunately, the only cute girls who are willing to make eye-contact with us are the ones stationed outside mezcal shops, and probably only then because they expect us to be drunk tourists lured by flirty smiles and eyelashes aflutter. The pleasant surprise, despite the fact that 90% of the girls in town are only waist- to chest-tall (another factor inhibiting eye-contact), is that the women in Oaxaca are absolutely gorgeous -- yes, the town is teeming with duplexes (our invented code for dime pieces). In our first hour in Oaxaca I witnessed more, in my judgement, beautiful women than I had in all our days prior in la ciudad. The difference between the DF and Oaxaca, besides vast variances in population, is that the cute girls in Oaxaca grow up to be beautiful women.

We were misinformed by one traveler at our DF hostel that the women in Oaxaca were bland at best, but his appreciation for beauty is now 100% discredited. That he also boasted la ciudad offered the most beautiful tourists should've been signal enough that his ambitions are entirely different than ours. I certainly did not come to Mexico to admire pigment-challenged Europeans.

Arriving in Oaxaca via first-class bus, Jackson had scoped out a number of possible hostels through our Mexico Rough Guide, but upon inspection, they proved either too expensive or no longer in existence. We ended up stumbling across one called San Fidel Hostel, a quaint establishment with unadorned double rooms for two-hundred twenty pesos per nights. It's a family-run establishment, and the family is absolutely accomodating. Our room has a fan (occupying the only electrical outlet), two beds, a small plastic table with two chairs, and a mirror, nothing more. There are two bathrooms in the building for travelers to share, but it's a small place, so competition isn't rabid. We're actually leaving via bus at 9pm tonight, heading toward San Cristóbal de las Casas, in Chiapas, MX, but the family has allowed us to lock our bags in their hostel7house until the evening, so we can explore the town today without having to torture our lower backs lugging around bulging, thirty plus pound backpacks.

The town (and hostel) is much quiter than the DF, but the Monday night Independence celebration and parade were anything but. It was raucous, with its own small army of port-o-jons and machine-gun brandishing police and military. A quick but fierce dousing of rain did little to stem the party. Jackson and I, standing approximately one-foot taller than anyone else, had a great view of the processions as they marched from the surrounding streets into the zocalo, and we amused two beauty queens drawn on a float behind an ATV by waving and smiling, then walking forward a few hundred yards to catch them again as they passed, this time blowing kisses, which were returned.

Oaxaca is generally more monied than Mexico City, and things a bit more expensive. Still, there are plenty of affordable options if you look. Panaderías are a daily habit, and vendors and market-stands are supporting our diets. Street food has yet to give us "runny tummy," though it is inevitable. Tlayudas are a great discovery in Oaxaca (actually recommended by another traveler in the DF), a Oaxacaquenan specialty that consists of a huge, crunchy tortilla layered with a bean spread, lettuce, onions, tomatoes, radishes, avacado, Oaxaca cheese, and sometimes meat and salsa. They are always larger than your plate, and I've bought them for as little as 18 pesos (without meat), and 40 with. Absolutely delicious. Tortas are cheap and tasty as always, and a street-side purchase of succulent mango provided much needed vitamins. The closed-air markets, of which there are several in town, are massive and crowded, with tiny alleys linking collections of vendors selling everything from shoes and watches to tortas and pastries, just yards away from hundred-foot lines of butchers all competing for the same business, with links and slabs of many colored and shaped meats hanging and laying about, permeating the air with the stifling stench of raw meat and rot, some stands ornamented by a hanging pig's head, or, in one case, half a head.

To save a little cash this week we've also treated ourself to a bottle of mezcal, in particular a cheaper priced, hand painted bottle with no indication of either proof or volume, and with some plant inside the bottle, swimming in the mezcal. Mezcal, for the uninformed, is, from what I gather, is something along the lines of unrefined tequila. It's harsh and, our bottle at least, proving incredibly potent, but mixed with Fresca Jackson and I have gotten plenty tipsy for two consecutive nights, and together we've still not finished the bottle, which is sized somewhere between one-fifth and one liter.

Yesterday we visited the nearby Monte Alban ruins, which are a collection of pyramidal stone establishments. Being there was more interesting than anything I can say to describe the experience, and maybe someday I'll actually post some pictures. I should note, though, that the ancient peoples had built a bunch of squat columns that we decided were antediluvian homage to Barry's penis. (Even thousands of miles away, making jokes at Barry's expense is a daily routine. Bart, I love you, dude. Also, ladies, Barry is, in fact, generously endowed. We don't call him Thunderballs for nothing...though this actually isn't the reason, either.)

There's little we miss about Mexico City, though gazing out at the hazy expanse from the hostel terrace was awe-inspiring. Also, I have to say we miss the LA raised Mexican we met, who knew about one hundred words in English if fifty of them were "motherfucker," and who maintained an all-night conversation that was essentially, "What's wrong with America? Why do we have borders?" Though we agreed that brotherhood is a great ideal to strive toward, it eventually became tiresome agreeing with the repetitive sentiment framed by and littered with unusual uses of motherfucker. However, he did give us a new exclamation, whether it actually exists or not: as he spelled it, "Dwebo!" which translates to "Hells yeah," and which was especially enjoyable in his stereotypical Mexican-American accent. That reminds me, Mexicans speaking english stuggle to pronounce the "th" sound, transforming the word third into turd, a source of frequent amusement. Wait, again, what grade are you in? Also, Mexicans love metal, including Pantera and BTBAM, though they don't know Columns...yet. Lastly, Jackson and I have been engaging in a wonderful duet, well harmonized, which can spring into song at any given moment. The entire duet consists of us singing and repeating the phrase, "I've got the voice of an angel!" oftentimes at incredibly high and sexy pitches. Lastly, we are trying to introduce the expression "Word!" to the world, sharing the word and concept with Mexicans and foreign travelers alike. Currently, "Palabra" is spreading through Mexico with remarkable ease.

La Ciudad

There isn't a word in the English language that sufficiently describes the urban expanse that is Mexico City. It is sprawl on steroids, density unparalleled spread beyond the horizon, full circle, stacked stories high, shanties for rooftop garnishes, at night a distant glow of etheareal embers.

We're staying at a hostel, Hotel Catedral, a block behind the Zocalo, the central square in Mexico City. As luck would have it, we arrived at the beginning of the weeklong annual celebration of Mexican Independence. The truckloads of machine-gun toting military and police personnel patrolling some radius from the Zocalo are more unnervering than reassuring.

The kilometers around our hostel are packed with every sort of shop and street vendor imaginable, milling with thousands upon thousands of patriots and police disregarding every common sense law of car-packed street navigation. Honks, whistles, and shouts comprise the omnipresent aural assault, with the malodor of sewage, garbage, and exhaust intermittently disrupted by wafting scents from streetside food vendors hawking tacos and tortas for mere coin, bills for those who prefer the relative health standards of a sit-down restaurant. But we're here to steel our stomachs and stretch our dollars, so we'll brave cramps and diarrhea for sublime tacos al pastor from a fly-swarmed cart. Last night I sampled a plate of delicious platanos fritos -- "Si, con todo," I instructed the seller behind the rickety cart -- smothered by various colored icings and sauces from squirt bottles, and I've yet to suffer any consequences; Jackson, too, survived his three hotdogs for twelve pesos. Tonight wé've resolved to sample the giant-kerneled corn grilling on every block, often off the cob and mixed with chilis and mysterious sauces. Hunks of dried fruit the size of fists made window shoppers of us when we pass one dulcerias, and panaderias abound, selling assorted breads, cakes, and pastries for small stacks of pesos. I experienced postre de las tres leches for the first time an hour ago, the moistest cake I´ve ever had the pleasure to devour, and it'll remain a staple of my diet as long as it's available. Dollars are accepted most places, but we're dealing in pesos, which equate to approximately one dime apiece. Nearly forty-ounce varieties of excellent Mexican beer, including many we don´t see stateside, sell for less than 20 pesos.

We stand out walking the streets, a head taller than most, wearing white shoes we've renamed after supermodels they're -- excuse me for lack of a better term -- eye-fucked so frequently. But I'm less paranoid already, after two days of working myself through throngs with their spitfire español. I won´t wear the stomach-bound money belt I purchased anytime soon. I will be wary, however, of beer companies' promotional chicas. Supposedly the girls promoting Victoria wield a device that electrocutes the daring, or more likely meatheaded, so severely that they are unable to release the grips until the devious cerveza vixens, having had their fill of agonized screams and faces contorted by anguish, cut the flow of electricity. As Jackson describes it, complete with convulsions, "jiggling your bones" for free Victoria almost sounds like a fun game, just one that would never be legal in the US outside of government-sponsored torture sessions.

For about $15 per night, our hostel is quite nice. We're in a dorm with three bunkbeds, a shower and toilet. The hostel is sex stories high, with a restaurant and bar on the main floor, a rooftop terrace and bar, another balcony, and a kitchen, laundry service, and this cheap internet cafe (from where I'm transcribing these previously handwritten entries). We're provided a mini-buffet breakfast of fruit and bananas, cereal and milk, yogurt, bread and jelly, and coffee. The cereals are corn flakes and Cocoa Crispies, and something fiber-rich that resembles twigs. I miss my cereal stocked cupboard. (Our first morning, however, we tried cochinita pibil, a traditional Yucatan breakfast of spiced and shredded pork piled upon bean paste on a tortilla. Sensational. A candied gauva mixture we snacked upon later was equally enlightening.) With the hostel dinner nothing more than one helping of an iceberg-romaine blend and a side dish that was one night scrambled eggs, another tortillas piled with undiscernible gunk, I'll have to rely upon cerveza and panaderias to keep my weight up.

Past my initial fear of being pumped full of automatic gunfire from the menacing government forces, I'm more concerned about our hostel shower. Jackson described the emitted stream of water as a missile, which I promptly dismissed as nothing more than a firm stream. Upon engaging the shower, missile stream proved an understatement. I'm convinced our showerhead is one step removed from the riot control water cannons I expect to see unleashed in the streets any of the coming nights, to control the surging masses celebrating independence.

We bus to Oaxaco tomorrow morning at 8:30am, so we'll take the Metro from the stop adjacent the Zocalo to the southernmost bus station, then ride six hours in luxury for a mere $36 each. All of you still in the US: suckas!

My Life in Ziplocs

We're only a few hours into our indefinite adventure, high above the craggy western US, flying toward San Francisco as part of the world´s most awkward-yet-affordable route to Mexico City, where we'll touchdown this evening.

Jackson and I are a like-minded pair. Both left-handed, tacos, beer, and chicas are the sole motivations for our journey into and throughout Mexico, Central America, and wherever else impulse carries us. While devouring tacos and hoisting beers, held in our left and right hands, respectively, our handedness will decrease the likelihood of our bumping elbows. And where are the chicas, you ask? Ah, the imagination...

My High Sierra Compass travel backpack finally arrived at 5:22pm yesterday evening, a full 12 hours before we were to depart Davidson to catch the first leg flight. I was taking one final hot shower at the time, relieving the stress of minutes before witnessing the UPS man drive directly past my house. My contingency plan involved assualting Jackson and stealing his bag, but I´m glad to have him along in full capacity. I´ll need someone to trip to distract and occupy our pursuing kidnappers, or as a friendly offering to the chop-and-burn ritual killers who my mom keeps suggesting are gonna get me. Let 'em try, momma! In a land where full-sized adults rarely stand larger than American kindergartners and carry fractions of the fast food padding, I´ll finally be the towering, fearsome foe I´ve always pretended to be on internet message boards or whenever I´ve been lucky enough to confront an unaccompanied minor chutes-end of some playground slide.

I´m going to miss American beers, the myriad, superlative microbreweries spotting our drinker´s landscape; Kalamazoo, MI´s Bell´s Brewery and Ashville, NC´s Highland Brewery foremost on my tongue. I won´t miss American beer prices, however, except happy hour specials that render palate-awakening microbrews affordable, or Charley´s of Ann Arbor´s nightly pitcher specials of LaBatt, which fall in line with Mexican affordability.

Come to think of it, I should´ve poured a Bell´s Two Hearted Ale or six into the assortment of plastic grocery bags and recycled Ziplocs I have emcompassing nearly every non-clothing item in my backpack(s) -- one becomes two with the detachable daypack/carry-on. When I walk, I crinkle like I´m wearing and smuggling a year's worth of Pampers. All I know is I wouldn't approach any adult I suspected of wearing diapers, so maybe my waterproofing measures will prove crime deterrent too.

Unfortunately, my apparent Pamper-donning might repel precisely the type of illicit behavior I hope to attract. I tiptoed into a women´s restroom at Charlotte Douglass International Airport this morning, occupying a stall and expecting my toe-tapping sex signals to snare a lascivious stewardess for a toilet-top tryst. The tested methods of closet-homosexual republican congressmen have no noticeable effect in Charlotte Douglass' concourse B. I repeat: concourse B is not a hotspot for foot-flapping fuckfests.

I apologize to the uninitiated for that vulgar outburst. ¨"Toe-code hookups" doesn´t breed the same impact.

Jackson and I will soon be recording a weekly for-pay video segment tentatively entitled "Dos Gringos Desnudos." However unlikely, in my porn-star fantasies the tapings will employ the surplus box of contraceptives I´m hauling and an array of libidinous latinas.

A Foodie's Future

I'll wake with high school teachers tomorrow, long before birds begin chirping, and devour my final bowl of American cereal for a cruel, indefinite period of breakfast deprivation. If living in fùtbol-obsessed lands swarming with latina lovers, and brimming with cheap cervezas to accompany endless processions of tacos y enchiladas al pastor, can't quell my morning lust for Tony the Tiger, Lucky the Leprechaun and their poor, mascot-less granola cousins, Tucan Sam might invade my wet dreams. If that happens, I may soon materialize on the nightly news, a CNN blurb describing an unkempt glossolalist ransacking the cereal aisle at the Super Wal-Mart nearest the Mexico/US border, making whole grain angels amidst a field of Frosted Shredded Wheat and Kashi Go Lean Crunch.

Tonight I bid adieu to friends at Lempira, a fantastic Honduran eatery that has been my favorite Charlotte restaurant from my first bite. The piquant, open-faced ground beef enchiladas, garnished with cabbage and hard boiled egg, are a tantalizing departure from the equally delicious Mexican fare that is too often assumed to be representative of all cuisines south of the border. The sublime platanos fritos are dessert disguised as a side dish, so nobody will think it excessive when I proposition Cookout or Chick-Fil-A for a breakup milkshake on the ride home.

For now, all I can do is sit on the porch, enjoying the storm, a procrastinator anxiously awaiting last minute UPS delivery of my travel backpack. For days, all its contents-to-be have been arranged on my bedroom floor, homeless and forlorn. I ponder a detailed statement from my health insurance provider, mysteriously documenting two CAT scans instead of the one anticipated, courtesy a drunken spill while celebrating Kerry's graduation from Michigan months ago. Is my head so bulbous it exceeds the normal capacity of top-notch medical equipment? Will it stand out as a special prize to the unidentified culprits behind the mass decapitation and body-barbecuing that was recently unearthed in Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula? Will I achieve legendary status like the Chupacabra, perhaps earning a price upon my head?

If, indeed, I am ever decapitated, I wish my severed head to serve as a birthday piñata -- Fireballs for my eyes, Twizzers Pull-N-Peel for my brains -- in honor of the years of babysitting and camp counseling that are funding this early retirement.

Marking My Territory

With us boys out of the house, numerous home renovations have left my parents' garage crammed with precarious stacks of boxes bulging with Kerry's and my every childhood knickknack, mounds of soccer camp t-shirts, eight years worth of Sports Illustrated issues, and everything else we've accumulated on our garbage-can eschewing journeys to Pack-Rat status. A receipt from a soda I bought in 6th grade? Gimme an hour.

My dad wants the kingly Prius to reclaim its garage domain, from which it's been ostracized at least 6 months, relegated to the driveway with the family junkers, wilting in North Carolina's summer inferno, birds defecating without mercy upon its surfaces, an ironic target since they're seemingly on the same side of the green fight. Thus, the boxes must soon find new homes, either having their contents donated or being moved to storage, and they need to bear labels identifying their owner, to avoid a scene of twenty-something brothers fist-fighting over a couple of Hot Wheels, Hardy Boys novels, and flattened Wheaties boxes. Which, if you know me and Kerry, is hardly a far-fetched scenario.

"Patrick, before you fly to Mexico City, make sure you've gone through all the boxes in the garage," began my father on the way back from dinner at Mert's, a legendary soul food outpost in uptown Charlotte.

Nearly comatose after the gluttonous coconut cake following my feast of fried chicken and catfish, cornbread, collards and candied yams, I yawned acknowledgment, "Yaaauuhhmmmm."

"And write your name on the boxes."

I mumbled again, a globule of drool encapsulating a coconut flake, a fossil from my meal, edging over my lip.

"At least pee on them."

He paused. I licked my lip and rolled my gaze from the passenger window to my chauffeur. I smiled, he started to chuckle, and my mom joined in from the back seat.

"No problem, dad," I said after a moment, reacquainting myself with words, "But maybe I'll just write a P."

Yep, one of those classic family moments.

Ruining Ambitions

Whooooooooa, crumbs. That's gonna be the title and chorus of my next music video, Puffy's producing and choreographing the next signature dance. It's a hip-hop track about eating muffins, mostly spilling crumbs on the floor and getting scolded by mom and dad, maybe having to do a little time-out. I just realized the album will probably have to be marketed to children. I'm gonna have to clean up the lyrics a bit...

Ok, I kinda fucked up on the road tonight but the laugh rewarding me was well worth the chink in my pride. I was driving down I-85, approaching the Poplar Tent exit. Sleep deprived and bleary-eyed, a barbecue and a handful of beers agents of attrition, I signaled for the turn. However, the turn failed to materialize as expected, hovering on the benighted horizon, a nocturnal teaser unobtainable for another thirty seconds, at least. Except I remained unable to perceive the actual distance to the exit, thus my signal kept ticking -- I'm sure all following vehicles were wondering when I was going to pull onto the shoulder to assess an automotive failure of proportions indeterminable to them. The part that's funny to me is imagining the way fellow commuters stared at me, what they thought about my driving. Because I do it myself, I'm sure everyone following was belittling me silently or complaining to fellow occupants about the moron ahead signaling a half mile before his turn. I chuckle at that knowledge.

Also, I'm almost positive that only when other people are high do they feel about food the way I do all the time. What I'm saying is if Little Debbie were a living Snack Cake Queen, I'd treat becoming her personal bodyguard the way a twelve-year-old ball prodigy in the most crime-riddled of projects treats playing pro hoops and earning pro loot -- anything to protect her from armies of cakey enemies. And at nights I'd be happy to reward her by eating whatever she commanded.

Lastly, this image has been popping into my head every few minutes for the last twenty four hours: a group of neighborhood kids pulling my dad around on a sled -- with or without a beer in his hand, whichever you prefer. Granted, some parents might object to my father's notions of amusement, but who wouldn't take advantage of an opportunity to derail the destructive tendencies of a bunch of kindergarten kamikazes who would otherwise be ricocheting throughout one's home and property? Seriously, what adult doesn't want to be pulled on a sled by children? And what kid doesn't have the energy and warped desire to engage in the type of pointless and burdensome behavior they'll learn to hate within a few summers anyway? Aren't kids born to entertain parents for as long as possible, proactive atonement for the "troubled" teenage eons the adults have to endure?

Harness the proverbial "crack of youth," the natural and tireless insanity that thrives from birth through age eight or nine. Hell, it'll keep the kids skinny. It's physically impossible to not crack a smile riding to a neighbor's house on a sled pulled by children, particularly his children, beer in hand -- especially when you're already embroiled in some tense interfamilial dispute! I'd wake up earlier every day if it meant I'd have more time to be transported by the grunt-work of children. DAMN MENACES! But, yes, that's practically the entire reason I'm always down to procreate, and why I want to leave kids in every country I visit: so I can have potential sled-pullers scattered worldwide, when I'm forced to flee my nation of residence.

Also [stealing this from Hayley's Facebook recollection of this past weekend], a funny moment:

Bruce: "You really do remind me so much of my sister. You act exactly the same, I love it, it's awesome."
Hayley: "Aww, that iss awesome. How old is your sister?"
Pibba: "Four."

I'm positive the mentions of cars, an interstate, and ambitions of international illegitimacy justify the insertion of this entire post into my "travel blog." Right, I'll try to restrain myself in the future. But deciding what labels to assign each post is becoming my favorite pastime.