i sit down to send this on the day the US government kill bin laden. does it strike anyone else as odd that they had a live twitter feed of, basically, an execution? why, then, was the US so up in arms when someone leaked the video of saddam getting hanged? because murdoch didn't own the rights to the DVD? if there was technical difficulties would they have waited a while? was bin laden's mum watching live on the same video link? when the revolution comes, will it be morally ok to allow dear barak to watch his own summary end live and uncensored as it happens? anyway, on with the blog...
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(some of this written post-acapulco)
I am on the move again. My stay in Yelapa (see the last post) kept extending itself as i fell deeper into the forest canopy of all the things i love to do... literally. The list of things that I LOVE DOING goes something like this: jamming with thoughtful and enthused musicians, playing gigs, swimming in the sea, looking at the sea, cooking with sharp knives and fresh, local produce, waking up to birdsong, massages, the sun, hanging around wise, positive people, having space to think about things, trees, girls with multi-coloured eyes, friendly strangers, having lunch whilst listening to a podcast of From our Own Correspondent, making a little money here and there doing things i enjoy (like carrying peoples' bags) sleeping in hammocks... yelapa had ALL THAT in ABUNDANCE. can you believe such a place exists? if you don't, go there and see for yourself. there were several 'doesn't get better than this' moments, my favourite being my first experience of KAYAKING TO A GIG with my clarinet in a waterproof bag and the calabash wrapped round my back. being paid for said gig in margharitas and chilli shrimp. reading the tao tse ching in a hammock on top of a hill eating fresh guacamole with no pants on (hummingbird buzzing around in the background)... In the last 4 days I played 2 gigs with a couple of great musicians from Mexico City; we took turns on clarinets, saxophones, guitars, cuatros (mexican 4 stringed guitar), percussion and voice, and had I stayed we really could have boiled the lid off the pot.
I could go on but i think you get the idea. but, alas, all good things must come to an end and after a month the blossoms had all fallen off the tree and it was time to tighten my contact lens case and head south.
You may have heard about all the dead bodies they keep finding in Mexico, the ones with the heads chopped off and suchlike. Two states below Jalisco, Michoacan and Guerrero, are centres of the narco-traffiking and killing (which, i might add, is in a large part fuelled by wanky coked-up american stockbrokers and ivy-leaguers who i am sure don't give a fuck that their $50 a gram habit is fuelling an economy in guns, blood and despair a few hundred miles south of their parents' condos) and I had been warned by americans and, significantly, other mexicans, just not to go there, and certainly not to hitch there. But the other option was to go through Mexico City, the biggest and most polluted city in the world, something i just didn't fancy. And the coast road was beautiful and slow and i had been on it since Vancouver and shit, why would anyone want to kill me? So i made my sign and thumbed south on a really hot morning last friday. It was slow going, and getting into the afternoon when i hit a market town and was accosted by a muscular drunk guy with a beret. Total stereotype of an ex-army 40-something who used to feel respected and needed and worth something in the army and, since he left his uniform behind, has flailed in a world that doesn't give a fuck who you used to be or what you have done in the past, but just what you have to offer and how much it costs. So he drinks from the morning and by midday the demons are circling.
He spoke good english ('The CIA are monitoring everything i do...') and gave me some 'tips' about where i should hitch, and then moaned for a while about how i was lucky because i was white and would get lifts, but he wouldn't. I moved away and stood in the hot, hot sun thumbing and waiting. eventually i got a ride 40miles down the road and when i got out at a petrol station realised that this drunk had been on the back of the truck the whole time, and now we were in the middle of nowhere together and he was clearly going to squeeze me for what i was worth to him. He wanted to use my white face as a ticket somewhere, anywhere i guess, and it wasn't in the spirit of cameraderie, though he was pretending to be nice.
A couple of years ago i would have bitten my tongue and been super polite and, well, i don't know how i would have got out of the situation, maybe bought him so much alcohol he passed out then run away. but these days (for better or worse) i am more assertive and less concerned about the consequences of being blunt. i told him in my best spanish that there was no way we were going to get a lift standing next to each other on the road, that it was important for me to travel as expediently as possible and, therefore, i wouldn't hitch with him unless he 1. threw away his bottle of mescal and 2.went and sat out of sight in the shade and when i got a ride i would ask if he could come along to. i knew for a fact he wouldn't agree to the first condition, but infact more than that he generally got REALLY FUCKING ANGRY in a drunk out-of-control sort of way, started telling me i was a son of a promiscuous donkey, that this was his country, not mine, and i should fuck off NOW and started getting up in my face, bringing the mango stains in his chin into focus.
for, i think, the first time in my life i didn't show any fear or back off, just stood there and met his stare and told him again that he had a choice: stop drinking and sit and wait for me to get a ride, or leave me alone. i guess we were both weighing up our chances and i think perhaps we both realised if it came to it mine were better: he was clearly strong and taller than me but he was drunk and moved slowly and i was wearing boots and would almost certainly have the support of the petrol station people and the watermelon seller who by now had their full attention on us. he backed off. and went across the road and stared at me and brooded.
i took a deep breath and adjusted my silly-looking panama hat and went and bought some cucumber with salt, lime and chilli and talked to the watermelon man. he was the one closest to us and, though he was old, i think he was ready to weigh on on my side if the shit had hit the fan. when he saw my sign saying 'oaxaca' and noted the direction i was going in he looked at me like i was mad. 'you CANNOT hitch between manzanillo and acapulco' he kept saying 'es de massiado peligroso'- too dangerous. he looked at me in the eye and it wasn't a 'oooh well i wouldn't do that if i was you', it was a 'DON'T DO THAT! DON'T DO THAT!' and then he flagged down a passing flatbed, explained the situation of the drunk guy to the driver and next thing i know i am riding away, more than somewhat relieved.
So i figured if someone helps you out like that you should probably take his advice, and i took a 12 hour bus to acapulco and then another on to puerto angel, where i spent a day and a night finding out whether my 1989 'mexico survival guide''s (the precurser to lonely planet) description of a nearby beach, zipotec as a 'place to do as little as possible, wearing as little as possible, and spending as little as possible' still held true 20 years later. in the shared pick-up truck that passes for public transport here a woman gave me 3 different types of mangoes to try- one sweeter than sweet, another with skin like an avocado. since i have passed a stall selling 9- count em 9- types of mango...
on arrival i found a tired and extremely hot (40 degrees) beach with amazing waves, an extremely strong current, overpriced bodyboard rentals and local kids generally stoned senseless. some guy who seemed really nice took me to the nudist beach at the end of the bay and, over the course of a couple of hours, it slowly dawned on me that this was a gay beach, and the guy i was with wanted to fuck me. (he found a dead fish, said 'hey ben, here is something we can eat tonight' and waggled it around his dick) the culmination of this was when i went into the sea to do some bodysurfing and 4 naked men followed me in. it was... uncomfortable, but shortly after two mexicans with lots of kids came to catch sardines in nets for their supper, and i observed the fascinating scene of these gay guys in the water, the fishermen casting their nets, the kids picking the flapping sardines out of the nets and squealing with delight when their dad's caught a proper big fish, orange crabs moving at lightning speed to pick up the sardines left behind by the waves and carrying them back into their holes, two dogs looking lazy and bemused, the sun arcing down to crest the waves... it was almost worth the wierdness (infact i think it probably was worth it.) A scene full of life.
later i played percussion-based music with some of the various dreadlocked, adonis bodied chilangos (with one random italian), tops off, sweat in runnels down our backs even though we were sitting and it was dark. that night i lay in my tent as moist as a snail, aching for sleep to deliver me out of the heat. it was the hottest night i have ever been through and the decision to leave before i had to do it again was made.
the next morning i walked to the edge of town and, after a couple of hours wait, hitched one ride in a dodge ram 250km over a high almost-mountain pass clear to Oaxaca city.
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