Mark In Mexico: Mexican Rodeo

With only days left to go here, I find myself in front of the computer more and more. Maybe it's a way of hiding from the upcoming changes? Or maybe I'm starting to get back into a Canada frame of mind?

Much of the time I still spend studying Spanish and looking for those obscure language patterns that are oh-so-hard-to-find in printed courses but are so commonly used. I always know what they are and simply need the details. But that information is hidden like an image in raw jpeg code. Connie asked me why bother to study Spanish still? I guess being in Australia is a little bit like being surrounded by people who speak a different language but it's not quite the same motivation. For me it's a way of staying connected to the energy here and of course it would be nice to know even more Spanish whenever I return to a Spanish-speaking country. But mostly my right-brain language patterns are just so good that I want to keep exploring them and see where they lead. I'm even using them now to help my conversation friends learn English. It's nice to finally be learning what I've been trying so hard to learn all this time.

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I'm still surprised by the welcoming attitude that I continue to receive here. It's last Wednesday and I plan to go to an art opening but it is pouring rain. Finally it stops and I step through the puddles on the cobblestone streets to find my way to the cavernous Institudo. There is a brightly-lit room in the back from which excited chatter bubbles into the large plaza. When I enter the room a client and friend immediately sees me and comes over to greet me an enthusiastic hug. She is looking great and tells me that her whole life has changed. She asks if I still have time to see three more of her friends and I say of course.

It is pouring rain again when I leave, so much that I can barely make my way a block up the road to a place to stand under an overhanging edge and wait for the rain to subside. No such luck! The rain continues blissfully unaware of my walking schedule. There's light spilling onto the misty spray that is being thrown up by splashing cars and I run into a restaurant thinking I'll order a beer and wait it out. In a bar in the back I squeeze into the only remaining chair and start chatting with a Texan and a Californian. It turns out this is an ex-pat hang-out bar much like Chilis in Toronto, and it feels a little bit like a twilight-zone experience with a portal to a fun world instead of a dark one. I get to know everyone at the bar and play some Neil Young and Blue Rodeo on the jukebox to give everyone a taste of Canadian music. It goes over well and one of the guys plays some Guess Who in response. When the restaurnt closes they ask me to join them in the late-night bar up the street but I tell them I have to work the next day. The rain has stopped and I poke may way through the puddles shining brightly in the light of the near-full moon.

In Toronto you can walk the streets for days and not see anyone you know, or at least anyone who wants to say hello. On a busy day here I drop into a restaurant in between clients and find one of my most interesting clients there so we share lunch together. Then my Spanish teacher from the free Wednesday class shows up and gives us robust hello and tells me that he has put something into the next class especially for me (as I tend to ask a lot of questions). A few days later I walk with a few friends on a tour of the art openings of the evening and people greet me in each art opening and in the street.

Speaking of the twilight zone...Four times now I've been out with a woman when another woman who I've been seeing has seen us together. This means that now there is no one left as latina women are very possessive and these experiences have effectively turned all of them off me (one of my rewards being a long lecture on the evils of Mexican men who always cheat)...a case of the antisynchronicities of the universe creating a circumstance that had the same probability of happening as that of winning the Powerball. Maybe I should play the lottery!

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One day I am rewarded for frequenting the Mexican fondas (small family-owned food stands) with a flyer on the counter advertising a bullfight. This has been one of the must-do events on my list and I'm ecstatic because I'd heard rodeos don't start until summer. I talk it up with some new friends and the next day we make our way through the pulsing throng of dancers celebrating the Dia de los Locos (think Caribana in Toronto) to a sleepy street where the Plaza de Toros is located and turns out to be as deserted as an abandoned farmhouse. We ask someone in a nearby tienda where the event is and it turns out to be on the edge of town. It takes some time to find a cab while walking through the partying tourists but eventually we find one who takes us out on the highway to a small stadium surrounded by a chain-link fence that doesn't appear to have a gate.

We squeeze in through an opening and make our way towards a small stairway in the stadium. We each give 50 pesos to a woman who is sitting in a pickup truck taking bills and tearing off tickets. Once inside we realize we have hit a gold mine, a small outdoor venue that is only a quarter full and is basking lazily under the afternoon sun. We sit behind a man selling beer and wait for the events to happen.

The program varies from the tacky to the outright fascinating. At one point a bull escapes and runs around the parking lot outside the stadium while pursued by four men on horses. He runs to the far corner of the large lot and escapes three or four lassos before his legs are snagged and he is pulled to the ground. A few moments later he shows up again in the stadium to be taunted by the young matador.

Meanwhile, in front of us a drunken cowboy tries to get our attention. He's very talkative and from time to time one of us goes to sit with him when the events slow down and he becomes the more interesting attraction. He's angry that they didn't have a more powerful bull for the bullfight and concerned that the new bulls that have just been brought in on the truck will hurt his horses, which are being used outside the stadium. "You never know what they're going to bring,"

he drawls in a Mexican accent. "Those are the nastiest bulls and they kill horses." He talks about how he likes Mexico more than the US. "In Mexico you can do anything! We're free here!" he exclaims with a smile. "Every night I get wasted and drive my truck around and spin my wheels and no one cares." He tells me he was dealing drugs in the US and was put in prison for five years. "Then they brought me to the border and told me never to come back. They thought they were punishing me, but they were rewarding me, man!" he says with passion. He looks at me thoughtfully and says, "You've been there too haven't you?" I'm not sure what he's talking about so I ask a couple of questions. But what he's talking about is supposed to be understood. "You've been there too. I can see it in your eyes." I don't know what to say to this so I don't say anything.