We´ve been in Mexico for a year this month & just before we return home I thought it would be nice to do a bit of a round-up of the most surprising or unexpected things over the past year, good and bad.
1. Its as simple as ABC
… if you have a smartphone. It´s easy to worry about things like where you´ll stay, how you´ll find your way round, or how you´ll communicate (when you don´t speak Spanish very well). But travelling is just so easy these days. With the Airbnb app on our phones, it's quick to book accommodation and we found plenty of availability even just a day in advance. Google maps prevented many an argument on road trips, and has been our indispensable city guide. Google translate has been an absolute godsend on many occasions, helping us scrape by with our very sub-standard Spanish! The phones have also been great for entertainment. I loved listening to podcasts and music on long car journeys, with our portable speaker. And WhatsApp & Skype have been perfect for keeping in touch with people. We have dual sim phones, so get local rates as well as being able to keep our UK number. Gone are the days where you need map-reading skills, have to write letters, use a portable cassette player or traipse around town asking if there is availability at each hotel!
2. Street Sounds
Mexico is noisy! It strikes you immediately, and it really is the audible manifestation of the country´s life and soul. Generally upbeat, amusing and very persistent, I can´t say I´m totally used to it, but I will definitely miss it when I leave.
Street vendors tout for business, aided by bells, loud-speakers, or anything else they can find that will draw attention to themselves. One of the companies that delivers gas in Oaxaca City use a jingle that ends with a loud “moo”. Each truck seems to cover a very small area, so you tend to hear the same jingle half a dozen times a day. And there are 3 competing gas companies, plus water companies, and all the other noises in the city. I still have days where the "Zeta, Zeta, Zeta gas!" jingle is stuck in my head. In San Cristobal de las Casas a chap sets off a cannon firework every few hours. There are no pretty light displays, its all about the noise! And he seems to be at it 24 hours a day.
Buskers are also everywhere. So much so, that many restaurants have to use a queue system, so each busker gets their turn; diners are never without music! The restaurant is of course playing its own music, and it is rare that you will dine without competing sound systems. As I write this (during lockdown) there is a 5-piece brass band outside busking for money from people in the surrounding flats. This is the latest innovation now the restaurants are all shut. Trumpets feature heavily, as does enthusiasm (over talent).
3. The Aztec and Mayan legacy
There are so many archaeological sites in Mexico that there isn´t time to see them all or money to excavate them all fully. We must have visited around 20 sites altogether, all of them quite different, and all very interesting. I tuned into my inner Indiana Jones in some places, where ruins of ancient cities were battling it out with nature for supremacy. I love scrambling through the jungle, over tree roots and rocky escarpments to find a pyramid hidden in the undergrowth. We were pretty much the only ones there most of the time. In one of these we saw a baby deer bounding into the trees, and in others, big beaded lizards loved basking on the exposed pyramids. Some of the sites had cenotes, the underground river system created by the meteor they think killed the dinosaurs. They are really the only water source in the Yucatan, so a great place to build a city. In one of these pools we were able to swim, among the water lilies and dragonflies. It was totally magical. Some of the museums are jaw-droppingly awesome too. Gold and jade masks, huge elaborately carved pillars, sacrificial altars, and so much more.
4. Mexican´s don´t do nature!
Before we arrived, I had hoped we´d be able to go for lots of treks or bike rides through the countryside, taking our tent for overnight stays. But we didn´t really do any of this. There are very few places where you can go for a walk in the countryside. Most nature reserves are distinguished only by having more trees than elsewhere. With a few exceptions, they are absolutely not places for recreation or conservation. And the rural roads are not great for walking or cycling on - they are generally busy, as most people avoid the expensive toll roads, and they don´t have pavements or cycle lanes. Mexicans generally just don´t go for walks or bike rides.
We also found quite a disrespect for the natural environment, though it only takes a few people to spoil a place and we certainly met a lot of Mexican´s who do care about the environment. The Yucatan is a particularly fragile place and unfortunately the east coast, from Cancun south, is a huge tourist attraction akin to Costa del Sol. Hotels are built without adequate sewerage systems, and so the waste leaks into the underground cenote system. Some cenotes are sadly not places you´d want to swim anymore. And to think this used to be the only source of drinking water in the region!
Off the coast there is a huge problem with Sargassum seaweed, created by a mix of global warming and fertiliser run off. The result is that the once crystal-clear blue seas are now brown with seaweed, the once golden sands are now piled high with rotting (and very smelly) seaweed, and the sea life is suffering. Coral is dying, turtles are struggling to come ashore to nest, and no one can go swimming. I really can´t see how that Riviera Maya (as that strip of coats is known) can sustain tourism unless something radically changes.
There is some recycling, though its not common. What is more common is that people dump their rubbish by the roadside and set fire to it. The most shocking thing we saw was a group of women throw a black bin bag of rubbish into the sea. It was a strip of coast in a nature reserve. They had been on the beach swimming and having a BBQ. When they got up to leave, all their rubbish went straight into the sea. I was so shocked! Of course, I had to retrieve the bag and take it back to a bin in town.
5. Mexican´s do do community and social conscience
There´s a really strong sense of community and solidarity in Mexico. I think this is rooted in the national pride that comes from having overthrown the Spanish and gained Independence. I think people now feel it´s up to them to make Mexico the kind of country they want it to be. Diego Rivera, the famous 1920´s political muralist is lauded as a national hero and the Zapatista movement, named after the famous revolutionary, is still a powerful force fighting for worker´s rights today, 100 years after being formed.
Street art portrays themes of solidarity, the fight against oppression and the revolution. Street protests are common – there is a protest about something most days somewhere in Mexico. Usually it’s for workers’ rights, in one form or another. Some of the protests last several weeks, with protesters camping on the streets for the duration of the protest.
A sense of community is an important part of people´s lives; with lots of community events – rodeos are popular in more rural areas - and of course you have day of the dead in the southern states. In Oaxaca, weddings are celebrated on the streets, with a procession of people in fancy dress, led by dancers on stilts accompanied by a brass band (of course!).
In the mountains outside Oaxaca, a group of villages have clubbed together to form a commune, over which they self-rule. Most people are subsistence farmers, so it’s a very poor community, with a small amount of tourism being the only real source of cash. The tourist guides work just for the tips – the rest of the money is communal and goes to the upkeep of the village, as does any money from renting cabanas to tourists. From this money, the village pays for services – water, electricity, etc – which doesn´t happen elsewhere in Mexico. Surrounding villages make money from forestry, while the commune prides itself on managing the environment sustainably, thereby attracting tourists but also preserving the area for generations to come.
6. Tensions with the ex-pats
There is a huge retired ex-pat community in some parts of Mexico – with Americans and Canadians buying second homes along the coast. It was particularly noticeable to us in Todos Santos, Baja California. The locals and the ex-pat communities don´t really mingle much. The ex-pats are generally much wealthier than the locals, not all speak good Spanish, and they tend to hang out in the more expensive bars and restaurants. Because most ex-pats are retired, they don´t pay any taxes in Mexico. However, they do expect services to be good, and you do hear them gripe about the quality of roads or water provision. Some, though definitely not all, feel that their foreign currency is a massive benefit to the local economy and therefore they should be provided with good quality services. They have no consideration for the fact they are not paying taxes for these services and many of the people providing them with goods and services are on very low wages. The nice people we hung out with didn´t share these views, but I think the majority of "Greenbacks" did.
This is in particularly stark contrast to the local population who are generally really quite poor. You often see mums or whole families on the streets collecting for hospital treatment for their son/daughter. There is no universal healthcare, and treatment is expensive. Its heart-breaking seeing people collecting small change from passing motorists, knowing that whatever they raise will not even scratch the surface of the cost of treatment, but will take them away from their loved ones for hours & hours just when they are needed most.
7. Everyone´s a mechanic!
Unfortunately, this is something we´ve had
plenty of experience of! We have a very old (2002) Honda Civic. And the roads in Mexico are not kind on vehicles. Many roads are not tarmacked, and there are speed bumps and potholes everywhere. Which all adds up to any car getting a lot of knocks. I think our car did pretty well, considering. Nevertheless, it likes its “Spa days” at the mechanics. In fact, I think it was on a mission to visit every mechanic in Mexico! And its also quite partial to the odd lift from a tow truck now and then!
Whenever we broke down there was always someone on hand to help. In one place a chap on a motorbike swore that a bit of cold water would help, so off he went, returning 5 minutes later with a big bottle of water. And to be fair, it did work for a few miles. Another chap recommended the use of a lime, which he duly applied, and, lo and behold that also worked – again just for a few miles! In general, though, we found proper mechanics to be pretty good at getting the car back on the road in the shortest possible time & at the lowest possible cost. Which worked for us! And we only had one issue which wasn´t properly fixed & had to be re-done. Which isn´t bad considering we visited at least 1 garage per month.
8. Surfin´ ain´t so easy
So, I thought, we´d take a board out a few times & then we´d be able to surf. I imagined, after the first week, we´d be going out on our boards, catching the big waves & having a blast. How wrong I was! In fact, we had 5 lessons, plus plenty of practice, and that resulted in us being able to catch most of the smaller waves. We never got so far as to try & catch the really big waves in the month we spent at Cerritos beach. And it was exhausting! As our technique improved, it was a bit less tiring, but even then, we could only go out for a couple of hours before we had to call it a day. I found it challenging just battling against the current and waves, to get out far enough to even think about surfing. My dreams of being a great surfer are well and truly over! It was fun though.
9. Dog worship
Mexicans absolutely love their dogs, and you can´t walk 10 yards down the road without seeing a dog. I think a lot of them are latch-key dogs, so you see them lolling around on the street doing their own thing. In Mexico City, in the posh neighbourhood we stayed in, there is a popular dog school.
Rich Mexican´s pay good money to have their dog picked up from their house in the morning, taken to the park, enrolled in dog school for the day, and delivered back home in the evenings. Around 30 dogs attend dog school, and they are incredibly well behaved, sitting quietly in a long row, waiting their turn for a stroll round the park.
10. Mexican cities are wonderful!
Perhaps the most surprising thing about Mexico is how wonderful the big cities are. And I generally don´t like cities! I expected Mexico City to be polluted, dirty, full of traffic, and so full of people you wouldn´t be able to move. But in fact, its´s the very opposite. The streets are clean, tree lined, and heavy traffic is contained to a few large roads through the city. There are lots of parks, and, on a Sunday (which is family day in Mexico), many of the roads are shut to traffic. People are out cycling, roller-skating and walking. Mexico City, like other big cities, has stunning colonial-era architecture. There are lots of outdoor plazas where people congregate and eat street food or watch the world go by. Cafes and restaurants have tables and chairs on the pavements, and overall, it has a very tranquil feel to it. But with trumpets!
All in all, we´ve absolutely loved our year in Mexico, and can´t wait to come back to finish doing the few things we´ve not managed to do when the trip got cut short.
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