(this vacation is like a honeymoon at the exact time we took our real honeymoon last year, so we call it #2 (ha ha). i did not hand write anything while gone. all you read is from memory. no laptops were allowed to be taken. so, in this manner, what you read will be out of order. i'd call it "catches of thought" or "moments of memory." either way, i feel robert altman would approve.)
i guess the most shocking things, the things i wake up in the morning thinking about, the things that won't leave my cranium, are overall just disturbing.
where's the beauty you might say. where's the sense of appreciation to have traveled farther than anyone in my family since they came over from scotland and england and ireland?!
believe me, i'm trying to find it.
timeshare
the timehsare guy wore a purple shirt just this side of not too shiny. he wore rimless designer glasses and had the voice of a salesman. "Only 90 minutes of your time," he told us, "no pressure at all. You know why? Because this is such a good deal I don't have to worry."
i scratched my ear, uncrossed and recrossed my legs, took another soma.
the "compound," the "resort" that we are unwittingly visiting is 25,000 acres in size. that's right. they cut the jungle right up. where did all those animals go? why didn't i ask purple-shirt guy what happened to all those animals? why didn't we tell him this kind of construction digusts us? instead we wasted five whole sunny hours on him and his spiel like morons. he asks us, "Want to take a picture?" we say, NO. at the end he shamed us for not being able to afford "such a tiny amount." i walked out saying, "I've been here too long. I'm leaving now. I'll be out front, guy." and i did not say goodbye to the man we had been fake socializing with for the last five hours. i did not look. i just left.
30 minutes later, guy comes out and says, we need you in here. i go inside to sign some bullshit papers like i'm being released from the prison it feels to be. i am asked by a fat, ugly un-smiling woman if i was told certain things about the resort. at the end, without changing her expression, she asks us two more times if we want to buy. we had been saying no for more than an hour. it was too much to take. i didn't care when we left and very audibly told guy, "THIS IS FUCKING UNREAL! FUCKING BULLSHIT!"
they didn't even pay for our very long cab ride back to the ferry or directions out of the compound to find a cab. we footed the taxi bill and got the hell out. we asked the driver to take us to a good beach as now it was too late to swim in caves, the main thing i wanted to do on the whole trip. the main thing. couldn't do it. cabbie takes us to a beach that rivals anything i've ever seen on TV. people are everywhere. EVERYWHERE. we find a nice spot to people watch since there's no way in hell we can leave our stuff to go swimming. we drink more don julios and sol beer. i have the best plate of shrimp ceviche i have ever even come close to. we laugh and forget the hideousness that was the previous five hours.
on the way back to the island a young couple, maybe 13 years old, dance together in the aisle to the live mariachi band playing on the second floor. she is giggly and adorable. they are too cute for words. i swallow more somas and a couple percodans i picked up on the way to the boat. later i find out that instead of throwing trash away as i exit the boat, i throw away 10 $7 pills that are unavailable in the united states.
the horror. the horror.
arrival
we get to our hotel and eat immediately. the food is beyond description. incredibly delicious, like what's the secret ingredient in fajitas? how are these soooo good? we are so tired though from traveling overnight from sfo to miami on the aisle and middle seats, then five hours in miami in which i actually slept on the floor after describing the idea as completely disgusting. on that flight, we leaned against each other, pillow in between, which made for 5 hours of 10 minute naps; every time someone moved we were both awake.
after getting dinner at the hotel restaurant, we go straight to bed. what time is it? we don't even wonder. we are so tired, it seems impossible to be anything other than midnight. at some point in the night, guy says, "LOU." i awake. what? what? LOU, let's watch tv. let's go out. What? i wondered. isn't it like 3am? no, it's 10pm. this is beyond comprehension. i feel a sudden need to move. go out. get out. get out of the sleeping and sitting positions i've been in for the last 17 hours. guy says no. i'm staying. i'm watching tv. i am so mad, i go out by myself. it is midnight. i walk the streets looking for a bar. i'm terrified but too mad to stop. the streets are empty. there is one fancy hotel across the street. an all-inclusive. i get kicked out of the all inclusive. they make me feel like a criminal, calling the policia and staring at me as i walk out. but i'm a nice girl in a skirt. i am directed to the nearest dive. i approach it. the front door opens to a metal spiral staircase. there is no clue as to what is at the top. i go anyway. there are three men. one is the proprietor. he is very nice. his name is daniel and he gives me a free shot of tequila, "Welcome to Mexico!" i leave and say i'll be right back with my husband who is sleeping his vacation away. i go get guy. he's into it. he follows me there. we have a wonderful time drinking Sol beer and Don Julio shots. "Very nice to meet you my friend," guy says to Daniel, "We will be regulars. we'll see you again."
first day
we go to the town square for breakfast/lunch and to see what san miguel is all about. we immediately fight due to parking problems. guy lets me out. i get a table at a restaurant and wait. i am angry and i don't know why. after breakfast we walk the town square. we seperate at one point and i tell guy that i'm going over here, to this pharmacy (and i point) to see if they have somas. he's going next door to the bank. he doesn't see where i point, where i'm going to go. when i come out i can't find him. i panic. it's panic like when you can't find your car keys or the other shoe, but it's me, a woman, alone in a foreign city i know nothing about and i can't find my husband. i turn and turn in circles, each second building into an unnamable force. finally i see him. i yell at him, not caring about making a scene, "Never leave me alone!" he calls me ridiculous and fucked up for being scared. especially the part about being a woman. he says gender has nothing to do with danger in foreign cities. i tell him maybe because i've been assaulted i'm afraid. he says he's been assaulted. i say if i was you when i was assaulted there would have been no assualt. he says nothing. we get more beer and don julio. pissed off on vacation again.
i start to panic again when i realize it's already three o'clock and i have yet to feel the sun on my skin. i feel an urgency to experience everything as soon as possible before it goes away. this drives guy batty. he gets really uptight calling me stressed out. i explain maybe it's because i grew up in a town where everyone i knew got vacations like this, but not me, not ever. i have a lot to catch up on. he says, maybe. i'm afraid i won't ever get it again. he says, maybe.
that afternoon something extraordinary had happened. we find a way to purchase somas, marijuana and cocaine all at once. we spend $195, buy some chilean wine and go back to our room to party. i make guacamole with onions using the dish our handtowels came in, guy's leatherman and the backside of a hardcover book we find in the room. this is fun. this is a fun night. we are laughing and talking for hours. then guy loses the cocaine. can't find it. there was more. where is it. he has hidden it from himself. he says he's going for more. before i can protest, the door is slammed and he is gone.
and i am alone again in a foreign country with my husband out trying to score drugs. i feel we are stupid beyond belief. i take messed up pictures of the room while he's out.
snorkeling
these reefs were once called the most beautiful in the world by jacques cousteau. not anymore they're not. hurricane wilma ate them for lunch a few years back. we see two, three fish. it's cold. it's overcast. we don't snorkel for long at the hotel. we just end up drinking more tequila and eating more fajitas.
there are several "eco-parks" on cozumel. this is like for people who are not staying at a hotel and have accommodations at hand. more like for people who are camping or there for the day. the price again strikes me down. i have a heart attack. it's $30 each for us to snorkel in yet another wrecked reef and sit in yet the same lounge chairs and drink yet the same drinks. a total dud. what a waste. at least guy gets some good underwater shots of my crotch. funny how that's all he got besides a coupla stripey fish.
that night on our way back we decide to stop at the first place we see to get dinner. turns out to be Albertos. very low-fi feel to the place, very loud '70s rock playing. the restaurant is plastic chairs and table on sand and then water and that's it. guy checks with me, "can you take the rock music?" he knows how sensitive i am to music. i say i can because it's from my childhood KFRC days when i used to stay up until midnight when casey kasem announced the number one song (the only one i can remember is Bette Davis Eyes. not sure of year). we are seated and sated.
i go to use the toilet (don't throw toilet paper into toilet please! a sign reads)...
...and when i come out guy has already picked out dinner. "a whole crab and a whole lobster for $45!!" hmmm, i think. i hate messy eating. that sounds so messy. we call over the waiter. he shows us exactly what is being offered: three sizes of lobster tail. the first, the small one is what we see here in the stores for $30 a pound, being sold grilled here for $45. the second is really big and is marked at $90. the third, just like in the Three Little Pigs fairytale, is so massively gigantic, eating it would make your stomach explode. this one, he says, this one is for two. it's is $113 grilled. i tell guy, we can't buy this stuff. i can eat more fajitas. seriously. this is insane. he shuts me up. shh shh shh, don't worry. "we'll take the middle one" he tells the waiter and off he goes. i say, how can we afford a $90 piece of fish?? that freaks me out! we can't do that! he tells me he thought it was only $45. and not to worry. who cares? he says. relax. i know he's right, but i'm having a very hard time with the cost of everything. life is not about money. like my friend D. says, "You can always make more." i try to be zen. i accomplish this when the food hits my mouth. when food makes you close your eyes, it's something more than food. it's a trip to heaven. our eyes were closed again and again with every bite. the water washed up soft on the sand. no wind.
1 comment:
beautiful writing Lou.
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