Mexico Stories, Part Three
Sunday was wedding day. There's not much to say about the wedding except that it was beautiful and perfect and exactly right for the couple.
I had a moment of emotional complexity at the reception. The bride and groom are pillars of all their communities. Even with the wedding being in a small town in a different country, their guests filled up two hotels and spilled over into several others. It was beautiful to watch just how much love was there --between the two of them, of course, but also within the families, and among the friends, and the way that having them as friends in common made instant friends out of strangers. They are people who understand people. They create community around them wherever they go. And even as I was drinking it all in and feeling glad and grateful to be a part of it, that needling inner voice kept reminding me that I would never be any closer to this than the outskirts. I would never be a solid or central part of any large, close community. I would never, could never, have so many people who love me so much. One on one, no problem, but I just don't have whatever it is that it takes to form and build and hold on to community.
But on the other hand, I had the wandering stray dogs both literally and figuratively eating out of my hand. That's my thing. And anyway, it's a party, not a psychotherapy session. I shut the voice up and went back to dancing.
Monday morning Simran and I went into town for breakfast. After we ordered, it started raining. We were sitting outside, but under an awning, so no big deal there. Then it really started raining. Rain that Oly would be proud of. The kind of rain that has you drenched to the skin in the time it takes to run from the front door to the car. By the time our meal arrived, the street was full, the drain had given up, and every time a car, or even a bicycle, went by, that small amount of displacement sent water flowing up onto the sidewalk. We ate our meal with our feet held up.
Halfway through the meal, the rain stopped. Probably 20 minutes of hardcore falling altogether, and all warm. Yay for tropical rain. Way more fun than getting caught in a hailstorm at the equator. We drove back to the hotel without incident and right on time.
39 people from the wedding pitched in to charter a big cushy bus to take us to Chicken Pizza Chichen Itza. By the time the bus got rolling, the important roads were only damp. 39 people makes the cost of hiring a guide negligible, so we got explanations and stories as we wove through the throngs of (other) tourists and the merchants with their mountains of souvenirs ("one dollar, one dollar, diez pesitos, one dollar").
Away to dinner, then back after dark for a sound and light show, which was not nearly as exciting as we all hoped it would be. The light aspect looked like this
and the sound was the very same stuff our guide had told us already, only it was in Spanish, so group comprehension ranged from little to none. It was pretty, and if I'd had no expectations I would have enjoyed it quite a lot. It just got overhyped on the way by people who have a more San Francisco-based idea of what "sound and light show" might mean.
Then back on the bus. The bus ride was its own party, with an indulgent and well-tipped driver and a couple of stops for beer.
Back at the hotel, we went to reception to pick up our key and found that our room was not available. ¿Como? Turns out there'd been some miscommunication through e-mail that didn't get discovered. We'd intended to convey that our last night there would be the night of the 19th. They thought that we were checking out on the 19th, and so when we dropped off our key for the day and headed off, they didn't expect to see us again. Then they arrived to clean the room for the next inhabitants, only to find our stuff scattered all about. Big surprise for everybody.
But this was Mexico. One of my favorite things about being in Mexico is that no one there gets uptight about unimportant things or makes a big deal out of small inconveniences. They'd bagged up all our stuff and locked it safely in the maintenance shed. Our previous room was taken, but they had another one open. They helped us collect our stuff, and we moved to another cabaña. We confirmed that we hadn't been charged for that final night, and in the morning we made a trip to the ATM in town and got some more money for them. No problem.
After all of our misadventures on the way down, and simbubba's infected and aching mouth, and our unexpected late-night move the night before, we resolved, Rincewind-like, to have the most boring trip possible on the way back home. We succeeded.
I had a moment of emotional complexity at the reception. The bride and groom are pillars of all their communities. Even with the wedding being in a small town in a different country, their guests filled up two hotels and spilled over into several others. It was beautiful to watch just how much love was there --between the two of them, of course, but also within the families, and among the friends, and the way that having them as friends in common made instant friends out of strangers. They are people who understand people. They create community around them wherever they go. And even as I was drinking it all in and feeling glad and grateful to be a part of it, that needling inner voice kept reminding me that I would never be any closer to this than the outskirts. I would never be a solid or central part of any large, close community. I would never, could never, have so many people who love me so much. One on one, no problem, but I just don't have whatever it is that it takes to form and build and hold on to community.
But on the other hand, I had the wandering stray dogs both literally and figuratively eating out of my hand. That's my thing. And anyway, it's a party, not a psychotherapy session. I shut the voice up and went back to dancing.
Monday morning Simran and I went into town for breakfast. After we ordered, it started raining. We were sitting outside, but under an awning, so no big deal there. Then it really started raining. Rain that Oly would be proud of. The kind of rain that has you drenched to the skin in the time it takes to run from the front door to the car. By the time our meal arrived, the street was full, the drain had given up, and every time a car, or even a bicycle, went by, that small amount of displacement sent water flowing up onto the sidewalk. We ate our meal with our feet held up.
Halfway through the meal, the rain stopped. Probably 20 minutes of hardcore falling altogether, and all warm. Yay for tropical rain. Way more fun than getting caught in a hailstorm at the equator. We drove back to the hotel without incident and right on time.
39 people from the wedding pitched in to charter a big cushy bus to take us to Chicken Pizza Chichen Itza. By the time the bus got rolling, the important roads were only damp. 39 people makes the cost of hiring a guide negligible, so we got explanations and stories as we wove through the throngs of (other) tourists and the merchants with their mountains of souvenirs ("one dollar, one dollar, diez pesitos, one dollar").
Away to dinner, then back after dark for a sound and light show, which was not nearly as exciting as we all hoped it would be. The light aspect looked like this
and the sound was the very same stuff our guide had told us already, only it was in Spanish, so group comprehension ranged from little to none. It was pretty, and if I'd had no expectations I would have enjoyed it quite a lot. It just got overhyped on the way by people who have a more San Francisco-based idea of what "sound and light show" might mean.
Then back on the bus. The bus ride was its own party, with an indulgent and well-tipped driver and a couple of stops for beer.
Back at the hotel, we went to reception to pick up our key and found that our room was not available. ¿Como? Turns out there'd been some miscommunication through e-mail that didn't get discovered. We'd intended to convey that our last night there would be the night of the 19th. They thought that we were checking out on the 19th, and so when we dropped off our key for the day and headed off, they didn't expect to see us again. Then they arrived to clean the room for the next inhabitants, only to find our stuff scattered all about. Big surprise for everybody.
But this was Mexico. One of my favorite things about being in Mexico is that no one there gets uptight about unimportant things or makes a big deal out of small inconveniences. They'd bagged up all our stuff and locked it safely in the maintenance shed. Our previous room was taken, but they had another one open. They helped us collect our stuff, and we moved to another cabaña. We confirmed that we hadn't been charged for that final night, and in the morning we made a trip to the ATM in town and got some more money for them. No problem.
After all of our misadventures on the way down, and simbubba's infected and aching mouth, and our unexpected late-night move the night before, we resolved, Rincewind-like, to have the most boring trip possible on the way back home. We succeeded.