colorado to mexico

From Boudler we had planned on driving to New Orleans where we hoped to arrive in time for Halloween revelry. On Tuesday night though, at 10:30 pm we still hadn´t left Boulder. I was leaving a bookstore (I´ve been searching for a copy of this book for months!) Ben and Mike told me that we were no longer planning on leaving for New Orleans. Instead, we would drive to Chihuahua, Mexico. An hour later we were full of enthusiasm and packed once again into Mike´s small car.

Driving through the plains at night the stars were more beautful than I´d ever seen them. The sky was planetarium clear and I wanted then to study astronomy. Unfortunately I want to study everything. I don´t know what will happen.

We crossed the border into Ojinaga, a town described to us as an authentic Mexican border town. Initially we drove straight through, but 30km down the road we stopped at a checkpoint and were told that without passports we were allowed no further into Mexico. A little dismayed we turned around and headed back in Ojinaga. We found a decent hotelroom for 170 pesos (just under $17), and then went out for dinner and to see the town. We went to two bars, in both of which I felt uncomfortable for reasons other than the language barrier. The first bar felt like a locals only place, and we were ridiculously overcharged.

The second bar provides the better story. We were crossing one of the main roads in central Ojinaga when a man approached us and began speaking to us quickly in hushed Spanish. I didn´t know what he was saying, but from his body language I could tell that it was something like ¨Stay back! Notice how I twitch as if on some serious drug and so consider me to be something of a shady character¨. Mike told us that he was trying to sell us drugs. Once we´d made clear that we weren´t interested he pointed to a bar across the street, "the Bikini Bar", and motioned that we should go there. Surprisingly, Mike seemed to think it was not a bad idea. Ben reminded me that you can´t steer the 2-4-P-W and we went inside.

Immediately we stuck out like the trio of sore thumbs that we were. I saw a pool table in the back that wasn´t being used and went investigate. I found no balls or cues. When I returned Mike and Ben were sitting in a small booth with three women. I sat in the booth behind them and took out my notebook to write. Before I could put pen to paper a man sat down across from me. He continuously smiled and raised his eyebrows. Even in my native tongue and culture I have difficulty with sublte communication, and there, in the Bikini Bar, I couldn´t figure out what he was trying to say. I was watching, puzzled,when he began to sing to me. He recognized my shock and began to sing more softly, as if it was the volume of his serenade that was making me uncomfortable. I alternated between laughing and shrugging my shoulders and looking at my notebook as I wrote. Mike came to my rescue by pulling a chair over to the end of their booth and motioning for me to sit with them.

The new booth was a little less awkward. A few times Mike and Ben ended up dancing with these girls, but I successfully avoided anything of the sort. Periodically a suspicious looking man would peek his head in the door and one of the girls would go over speak quietly with him while they both looked at us. This may have been nothing, but it made me a little uncomfortable. At 12:30 when the bar closed the girls asked us to go to a private club with them. It cost 250 pesos, and we´d have to ride there in the back of a pickup truck. While two of the girls tried to convince us to travel with them, the third was talking to some much older men to whom the pickup truck belonged. I opted out immediately, and after a moment Ben did too. Mike wavered, but ultimately decided just to come back to the hotel. So ended my first night in Mexico.

We spent quite a bit of time the following day trying to explain to US customs that we were traveling but didn´t have an itinerary, and that we´d gone to Mexico on a whim, and that we´d hope to get to Chihuahua, and that we weren´t carrying drugs. After a couple of hours they seemed to believe us.