Mexico City Airport June 2005
When I realized the mistake I'd made, raw panic and white hot terror washed over me. I broke out in a cold sweat. I couldn't breathe. I felt like throwing up and I just wanted to die.
I was stranded at a foreign airport in a city of 20 million without my plane ticket, without my ID, without my wallet, money or purse. And my ride to the airport, the vehicle I had left my purse in was miles away by that time. I had my backpack and some clothing, an Ipod, but that was it. No working cell phone. I did have a calling card I could use to make calls from a pay phone, or really a memorized number and corresponding code meant to make international calls. And I had a folded up piece of paper in my pocket with the phone number of the land line to the place where I'd been staying but no address. I knew the section of town however, Herradura.
I was fucked. This would be the second time I would miss a flight out of Mexico City.
My Spanish was conversational at best. I could order food, locate a bathroom, make purchases, hunt down drugs, curse in colloquial slang and ask someone to speak to me more slowly - beyond that my vocabulary was pretty limited.
I immediately tried calling the house where I'd been staying only to get a busy signal. I realized I had not disconnected the modem when I finished using the computer and it would most likely be hours before this was discovered by anyone. Frantically I kept trying back only to get the same result. That's the definition of insanity right? I was definitely going insane. This was undoubtedly the worst trip of my life.
Eventually I gave up and went outside to smoke a cigarette. All around me people were waiting with their luggage to be picked up or hailing taxis. After a while, a middle-aged Mexican woman approached after noticing that I was clearly in distress. I understood she was asking me what was wrong and offering to help.
I did my best to explain the situation in my pidgin Spanish how I was stranded and needed to get back to where I had been staying but couldn't reach anyone by phone and didn't have an address or money for a taxi. She explained to me, and somehow I comprehended her softly spoken Spanish that her son was picking her up and that I could come with them - they would do their best to get me back to where I was staying but first they needed to go by her son's office.
TO BE CONTINUED...
I was stranded at a foreign airport in a city of 20 million without my plane ticket, without my ID, without my wallet, money or purse. And my ride to the airport, the vehicle I had left my purse in was miles away by that time. I had my backpack and some clothing, an Ipod, but that was it. No working cell phone. I did have a calling card I could use to make calls from a pay phone, or really a memorized number and corresponding code meant to make international calls. And I had a folded up piece of paper in my pocket with the phone number of the land line to the place where I'd been staying but no address. I knew the section of town however, Herradura.
I was fucked. This would be the second time I would miss a flight out of Mexico City.
My Spanish was conversational at best. I could order food, locate a bathroom, make purchases, hunt down drugs, curse in colloquial slang and ask someone to speak to me more slowly - beyond that my vocabulary was pretty limited.
I immediately tried calling the house where I'd been staying only to get a busy signal. I realized I had not disconnected the modem when I finished using the computer and it would most likely be hours before this was discovered by anyone. Frantically I kept trying back only to get the same result. That's the definition of insanity right? I was definitely going insane. This was undoubtedly the worst trip of my life.
Eventually I gave up and went outside to smoke a cigarette. All around me people were waiting with their luggage to be picked up or hailing taxis. After a while, a middle-aged Mexican woman approached after noticing that I was clearly in distress. I understood she was asking me what was wrong and offering to help.
I did my best to explain the situation in my pidgin Spanish how I was stranded and needed to get back to where I had been staying but couldn't reach anyone by phone and didn't have an address or money for a taxi. She explained to me, and somehow I comprehended her softly spoken Spanish that her son was picking her up and that I could come with them - they would do their best to get me back to where I was staying but first they needed to go by her son's office.
TO BE CONTINUED...