Mexico

27/11/201: As the old saying goes: “You can take the duck out of England, but you can’t take the England out of duck.” England, as we all know, and to some extent all of the countries that make up IONA (Ireland’s cool, but not exempt) is full of awkward, shy people who can’t walk down the street without getting into one of those silly dances with someone coming the other way. You know the kind: you both step one way, then both go the other. You both smile, say “oo-erp,” in almost unison before you finally succeed in getting past and walk off, smile fading, each thinking what and idiot the other is, and what a stupid hat they were wearing. We’re grumpy and we’re awkward; awkward first. Sometimes I try to forget the cursed English awkwardness I was born with, as does Pól (like to forget his Irish curse -he’s not English and I would never imply that, ever). We make friends in hostels, chat to waiters in restaurants, sometimes we even make people laugh with a mean and awkward humour which involves one of us insulting the other with a certain amount of gusto not expected when calling your partner a cloth-eared bint. If we’re lucky, our audience can’t help but laugh, most likely from embarrassment and confusion, but that’s not the point. We’ve been told on a number of occasions (and that number is no higher than 3) by a number of people (again, 3) that we’re a funny couple, and then they (those three people) spend time with us and that makes us feel warm and fuzzy and forget that we’ve spent the evening calling each other names in order to make these new friends. But sometimes, indeed most of the time, our north-of-France lack-of-cool is a presence in everything we do.

Today is our last day in the best city in the world. At the moment the best city in the world is San Francisco. It’s a bright and sunny morning and so I came out to take a walk and enjoy the autumn weather before we go back to the swampy humidity of jungly places (we’re flying to Thailand this afternoon). Pól is back at the hostel playing laptop (it’s a new toy, he can be forgiven), and as I was dandering through Little Italy, I decided to get a coffee and go and drink it in the park opposite the cafe, in the fresh air where the sun was shining and there were pigeons and people doing tai chi. #commasareimportant

This particular place was a bar we’d had a drink at a few nights before, so I was confident I knew how the door worked (fears of pushing instead of pulling, or tripping over a hidden step will often stop me even trying to go into some places) and as everyone in the States is super friendly when they’re at work (and a lot of the time when they’re not, weirdly), any nightmare situation of a waiter ignoring or pretending to not understand me, such as happens frequently in Spain, was out of the question. I ordered a latte and took a seat at the bar. “How are you doing today?” asked the waiter. They always ask that -I think it’s the law- and anyone not from the states and without the confidence to just answer with an account of their day knows the turmoil one goes through in deciding whether to answer with a simple “fine,thanks,” whether to be polite and add on an “and you?” whether to risk sounding like a tit and Americanify your answer as in “I’m goooooood” and so on ad anxietum. Most of the time in these situations Pól and I look at each other and wait for the other one to answer, so by the time we pipe up a “we’re goo… fine…we’re fine,” the person who’s enquired has gone away and we’re reminded of the fact that they didn’t really care in the first place and were just being nice (because it’s the law).

The waiter this morning had nowhere to go though: he was trapped between the bar and the cash register (that means till in the US), and having been deprived of company for the last half hour, I decided to tell the waiter I was sad because I was leaving San Francisco. Three people had ordered ahead of me, and the time it takes to make four coffees was enough time for the waiter and I to have chatted about where I’m from, where he’s from, what brings me to San Francisco, the date line (the one in the Pacific Ocean, not the show that catches sexual predators), the weather, and our surprise that Beanie Babies didn't end up being the great investment everyone thought they were going to be (joking with that last one. Plush toys will obviously never make you money). All through this chat I was painfully aware that the waiter might be itching to not be talking to a duck sitting on a stool wearing a pair of sunglasses indoors (in my defense they’re new and I love them), but he was so pleasant I couldn’t stop talking. There’s a guy in our hostel who, despite being from England, lacks the shyness he should have inherited (probably because he lives in London) and just sits in the lobby (that’s American for the reception) and talks loudly at the reception staff in an accent which is half Burnley and half Knobhead, about the fact that he lives in London and his views on cities like London, all because the reception staff have asked the question the American constitution states they must ask everyone they make eye contact with. I was worried I was starting to sound like that guy and so when my coffee was finally ready and I’d paid and tripped out of the door, I was horrified to see that the bench I’d earmarked for sitting and drinking (in the sunshine, away from the pigeons doing Thai chi) was directly in view of the cafe. The last thing I wanted to do after such a pleasant interaction was stay in view of my interlocutor. What if he thought that I had enjoyed our 90-second chat so much I was going to write my phone number on a napkin, leave it in my empty cup on the bench, then watch from behind a tree until he retrieved it, called me, asked me out on a date, and if he didn't, find himself followed home and killed? I didn't want that. So I went to a different bench, in the shade. And now I’m cold and covered in pigeon poop.

At least in Mexico there was none of that. Don’t get me wrong, most of the people we met and talked to were friendly (and/or a bit drunk) but the Mexican friendly is somehow easier to deal with, mainly because we’re (usually) friendly (and/or a bit drunk). We began our month in the Yucatán peninsula in Cancún, of course, and went straight to the family-run hostel we’d booked (so family-run the running family was constantly in the kitchen eating one meal or another, meaning awkward1 and awkward2 had to keep their distance, using the “we’re wanky vegetarians” excuse whenever they asked us to join them). Cancún is a bit of a massive, ugly city, but we stayed for a couple of days in order to get our laundry done. Times were tough clothing-wise as we’d just been in Cuba where the price of laundry was extortionate and you had to bring your own mangle. We’d managed to catch the tail-end of rainy season, so we sulked our way around a shopping centre, then sulked on the beach, overlooked by rain clouds and a thousand hotels we couldn't even afford a bag of Doritos in. Even Bubba Gump’s (yep, a Forrest Gump-themed restaurant and an old favourite) kicked us when we were down by having removed it's one vegetarian item from its menu. In the place on the page where the veggie burger had been there was just a picture of the smiley poop emoji and the words “don’t be a wanker”. There were Americans everywhere eating deep-fried shrimp and drinking cocktails. Not just in Bubba Gump’s, that’s pretty much what Cancún is like in general.

Things got brighter (metaphorically, it was still rainy) when we went to Tulum, which is a little to the south along the coast. If Cancún is the playground of the richer, older generation, Tulum is the playground of the richer, younger generation. Being too old to be able to listen to the earnest yammerings of a well-intentioned gap year (pronounced yah) student who’s just discovered their spirituality and too young (but only just) to don a visor, a bumbag, and order a platter of shrimp and a cocktail, we spent our time at the beach getting wet, whether in the sea or not, and getting drunk with an Austrian girl who, despite doing yoga, turned out to be as cynical as us. We visited a nearby beach called Akumal, which is used by turtles as a breeding ground. There’d been talk of hiring snorkels and getting a good ol’ gander at the sea tortoises, mainly from Pól, as I have little love of sea swimming (I’m more of a frolicker) and no desire (I’m scared) to get anywhere near something that lives in the ocean. After half an hour of flapping around with my face in the water, when Pól suggested a break I realised how desperately happy I was not to have come across anything bigger than a Nemo, paddled back to shore and sat under my umbrella (not parasol, umbrella) while Pól tried a different part of the sea and found turtles (terrifying) and rays (holy crap!). We heard later that sharks (little ones but still, enough to kill me instantly of fear) had been spotted in the bay and I thanked my wussy stars I’d stayed out of the water.

The good thing about Tulum is that the hippie presence means there’s a lot of veggie food about, which we ate a lot of. This was especially fortuitous as we were about to embark upon a week and a half of food scarcity, but we didn’t know that and we set off for the eco village volunteer place with high hopes and dodgy stomachs.

Our route took us through Valladolid, a hectic yet pretty colonial town far enough inland to have the kind of temperatures that make you wish you were back in Cancún eating a shrimp platter, drinking a cocktail and enjoying the sea breeze. Two great things about Valladolid: there is a cenote right in the middle of the city, and every night there’s a light show on the wall of the monastery, which tells the history of the city with graphics and an English translation which puts anything I’ve seen in Spain to shame. From there we took a second-class bus further inland, two and a half hours to a tiny town so off the tourist trail the frog lady who sold us the tickets asked us what the hell we were doing going there, and were we sure we didn’t want tickets somewhere else, like Cancún? Second-class buses differ from first-class buses in that they sell as many tickets as they can, regardless of the number of seats available, and so the idiots who wait until the last minute to get on the bus because they’re visiting the bus station bathrooms every five minutes have the pleasure of standing in the aisle. These buses will stop pretty much anywhere you want them to and so, given the general aversion to walking anywhere (Mexico and the US are so very similar) and tendency to snack on donuts (again, so damn similar), we found ourselves engaged in a game of FatPersonTinyGap, in which we were one side of that tiny gap, about once every ten minutes.

No money? No problem. Birthday beer on a bench is (almost) free.

Inside the earth, looking out.

After a week of DamnWeShouldHaveVolunteeredInAhostel, it was time for birthday weekend and so, for lack of a guidebook, we headed back to Tulum as it was the only place we could figure out how to get to by bus from Buttfucknowhere and where we knew we’d get a good feed. The kindly Germans who’d adopted us back in Argentina happened to be in town (cus they loved us really) and so we met up with them and drank bottles of beer and cans of Jack Daniels and ginger beer in the street like any self-respecting 31-year-old would until I was so drunk I had to go back and Skype my mum and moan about how much I missed her on my birthday. Fortunately, the weather was good and so we got in a birthday swim (frolick) and had dinner in the kind of place which mistakes eating vegetarian food for a desire to have kale put in everything and cheese in nothing, which was slightly disappointing, but we went elsewhere for birthday pudding and all was well and there were no more tears.

Despite our initial plans to volunteer for three weeks (and our need to save pennies after haemorrhaging money in Cuba) we jumped ship after just a week and a half. After a long chat in a vegetable patch, Pól and I concluded it’s better to run out of money somewhere in south east Asia than be convicted of murder in Mexico, which is where we were headed if we had to spend one more day around the boho brigade and their sticky fingers (they nicked our beer and our food, I’m not saying they had dirty paws. They did though).

We took a bus to Chichen Itzá (that accent means the “a” is pronounced “ahhhh” and makes anyone saying it sound like they’re taking the piss), stayed a night in an overpriced hotel nearby, and paid the enormous entry fee to get into the site. I say enormous; it’s about 12€, which isn’t so much I suppose, considering a couple of drinks in a San Francisco bar cost about 2€ more than that. The thing about Chichen Itza (let’s remove that annoying pronunciation) though, is that beyond the famous steppy pyramid there are many more ruins, but they’re pretty much obscured by the million stalls which have been set up all over the place, and any awe you feel at seeing this 1400 year-old wonder is lost in the sound of “one dollar, only one dollar,” and your view is obscured by the porcelain bird being thrust in your face by the person telling the massive lie about its price. At least a glass of wine and a beer in a bar on the west coast of the states is free from the hawkers. There are fewer yanks there too.

After studying a map of the area (Mexico) and weighing up our options -we considered “popping down” to Belize (I realise what massive dicks we must sound like), and there were other ruins, beaches and towns to be seen- we decided to be lazy (“keep things simple,” we said) and head back to the coast, to a town between Tulum and Cancún, called Playa del Carmen. If Tulum is for rich young twats and Cancún is for shrimp platters and cocktails, Playa Del Carmen is… a bit of a shit hole. Pól’s parents had been there a few years before and couldn't say a bad word about the place. When we googled where they’d stayed and saw it was about a mile away from the lights, tequila shots and novelty hats of where we were staying, it all made sense. When you’re staying next to the Hard Rock Golf Course you’re unlikely to wake up with a drunk French guy in your bed (unless you’ve paid for it, of course), and wake up with a drunk French guy in our bed was what we did on our first morning in PDC (cheap side). And we hadn't paid for it. “All part of the hostel experience,” the rat-faced receptionist suggested when we complained (whinged), as if you’re somehow missing out on one of life’s great experiences when you manage to sleep through the night without being woken at 6:00 because you’re foot’s gone dead due to the bad decisions of a Gallic teen who can’t take his Bacardi Breezers. We changed hostel to somewhere with less party, but more Hare Krishna chanting. It was like asking to change seats on an aeroplane because the person next to you is snoring and drooling on your shoulder only to be seated next to Nigel fucking Farage. We managed to deal with the #dickheadsinourhostel by spending most evenings down at the beach with cans of beer and a Swedish girl we’d met and managed to convince to spend time with us (Pól must have called me a cloth-eared bint in her vicinity). We had to stay away from the hostel  because every time they started up their chants, Pól began a rendition of Our Father which, as a heathen, I can’t be in the presence of for more than thirty seconds. Plus the beach at nighttime is one of my favourite places, even if the only place to pee is in the sea…

The week in PDC dragged its heels like Nigel Farage being reminded that it's closing time at the Cock and Chuff until finally the day arrived when we’d booked accommodation on an island called Holbox (pronounced “Holbosh”) and could escape via bus and boat to there. Holbosh was such a treat after the plastic sexfest of Playa (plastic for the twenty thousand tonnes of souvenirs we had thrown in our face when we walked down the street every morning - sexfest because wherever we looked, there was dripping flirtation between two or more people of the kind that would no-doubt lead to face-palming regret the next morning, but was fine as long as the over-priced Chardonnay was flowing). Unless you can afford to stay in accommodation that costs a lot more than a Subway sandwich per night, and unless you like battling with waiters to get your change back after paying the dinner bill: “You’re not leaving a 50% tip? Oh I’m sorry, I thought you were rich westerners with money to burn,” I’d suggest staying away from PDC; there are much prettier places around (though they do have the only H&M in the region. On second thoughts fuck that, it's living hell).

There's no H&M on Holbox; there’s not much of anything actually. It’s one of those places (I imagine) that in twenty years’ time when it's completely choked with tourism (there is a lot of development going on), we’ll show off for having visited before it “changed”, just like those smug feckers you encounter all over the place who compensate for their insecurity about being 60 and staying in a hostel dorm room with a smartypants worldliness that essentially says “Thailand was better before you were born, so fuck you and your (in our cases fading) youth”. On the island, as long as it's clear, the sunset is spectacular. It's the kind of sight you waste your phone battery taking pictures of and then wish you hadn’t because the photos are rubbish and you feel like you missed the whole thing. There are shitty beach bars selling beers for one euro and nicer bars just two minutes away renting hammocks for ten. That will be one of the things I rue the disappearance of when I’m old and (even more) annoying: cheap beer. That and the prices of the delicious(ly unhealthy) food you can find around the little town. We spent four nights on Holbox and on the last night lost the fight with a headstrong German girl who insisted the air con remain off overnight. We caught the ferry back to the mainland ready for temperatures less swampy, though our flight to cooler climes wasn’t until the next morning. We met briefly with our German friends again in Cancún and compared notes on our Mexican experiences. They had travelled all over the peninsular, into Guatemala, climbed volcanoes, and met a Klaus Kinski lookalike who had moved to Uruguay because a stone had told him to do so. They are so polite they pretended to be impressed by our tales of pineapple planting, beach sitting, and meeting a pair of Santa’s helpers lookalikes who pretended to hitchhike instead of taking buses because How To Be a Vacuous Spewer of Postmodern  Bullshit had told them to do so.

Given that our flight was at 8:00 in the morning and I like to be at an airport with enough time before a flight to be able to walk to our destination and back again, should it be necessary, we didn’t see the point in paying for a hostel in Cancún on Tuesday night and instead took the latest bus we could, which got us to the airport for 22:30; a little late for my liking but never mind.

Unfortunately, our parting memory of Mexico will be of a night supervisor in terminal 2 ushering us back outside the deserted check-in hall, telling us the airport was about to close, that there was nowhere we could wait and we’d have to go to a hotel (we couldn’t even wait outside as they were about to spray the entire area with chemicals. Not chemicals!!). He also informed us that a taxi to the nearest hotel would cost 50€, but that he could help us get one for thirty if we gave him the money upfront. Given the transparency of his intentions I’m amazed anyone has ever fallen for this obvious scam, although someone wiser than us who's met Jorge in Havana might say the same thing about him so I shouldn't judge. We took the name of the supervisor in order to report him to the airport authorities and put an end to his trickster ways. I’m joking. What we really did was thank him for his (dishonest) advice and scuttle off to terminal 1, which was open and would stay open all night, because it's an international fecking airport. To calm our nerves after our brush with bunco we spent our remaining pesos on airport-priced Sol and Doritos. By the time the money ran out we were in the right state of mind to face a phenomenon we’d managed to avoid talking about since it's announcement a fortnight before. Sadly, the feeling soon wore off and by the time we landed in the country which had just elected an angry bag of orange play dough into office, we were as tired and sober as the poor bastard assigned to teach the president elect how to wipe his own arse will soon be.