CARS, TRAINS, PLANES, FERRIES AND BUSES

Yes, Jords and I have sampled the transport smorgasboard. It was a great trip: one of those ones where the journey is the destination or whatever the saying is, as the last week saw quite the carbon footprint.

The reason the journey was the destination, or rather, the destination was the journey, was that neither Jords nor I had time or inclination to research said destination, so the plane tickets I bought landed us quite a distance from it.

We were headed for Baja California, and I bought a couple of plane tickets to Culiacan, which as it turns out is several hundred kilometres not to mention a gulf of water away from our destination: San Jose del Cabo.

Getting on the plane was enough of an epic. At 4.30am, we left my birthday:



aka the wig party. That's actually me on the left, Jords on the right.



I brought a little gift (plastic cup half-full of tequila) for our cabbie, Vicente. Too late, Jordan queried the prudence of such a decision. Forgetting he was taking us to the airport, I said, 'don't worry, by the time it hits we'll be long gone.'

But no, Vicente performed the task of delivering us to the airport outstandingly. We arrived two hours before takeoff. Unfortunately, I hadn't performed the task of naming destination quite so outstandingly, and we were at the wrong airport. By the time we worked this out (I'd forgotten to bring any flight details so we were going up to random airlines asking if they had our names) that time margin had shrunk by half an hour.

Unfortunately the other airport was an hour away.

Shit.

I called the airline from the next cab, and they told me we HAD to check in an hour before takeoff. Projected arrival was 40 minutes before takeoff. Our new cabbie went in to bat for us, driving along cajoling the airline man.

Then he announced 'trust in God', which could have applied to doubts about road safety, or doubts about air travel.

We made it. Next we knew, we were on the plane, asleep.

We got off the plane, caught a taxi to the bus station, then a bus to the next town, a taxi to the ferry stop, a ferry overnight to La Paz, and then another bus, and then a taxi, and then we were at our destination. The whole thing took a mere 30 hours.

From here we hired a car. It is almost a year since I've driven and oh my lord I'd forgotten how much I love it. I think in a past life, I must have been a truck driver. Or a people smuggler. Or something requiring lots of driving.

It was just like old times.

So, not surprising that we couldn't find out way out of San Jose del Cabo.. or that I got clocked for illegal right-hand overtake within ten minutes of getting behind the wheel.

The cop was very pleasant. I explained that I hadn't driven in a while, that we'd just arrived and that we were lost. None of this went far to dislodging his belief that - despite being stuck behind a massive slow-moving truck on a wide dirt road with no markings, I mean, let's face it .. who WOULDN"T overtake??? - some sort of penance should be paid.

How much? I ask.

500 pesos. He says.

That's $50. No way. I suggest that I'd been thinking more along the lines of 100 and he immediately capitulates and tells me not to pay him now. Well, I don't have time to drive around looking for subtle spots to pay a bribe, so I tell him forget subtle, it's now or never.

He then offers to rectify the third problem: we're lost and can't find out way out of town.

For the next 10 minutes, we enjoy a police escort out of San Jose del Cabo. Lights and everything, he's cutting through traffic, speeding.. really making sure no time is lost.

Then he pulls over, points us to the exit for open road, and tells us we're very beautiful.

And that, I am pleased to say, is a typical Latino cop.

Baja California is beautiful, rolling hills covered in shrubbery and cacti. We drove until we saw a little dirt road going off the highway, and ended up in a field of horses and goats, which spilled (via a ridge) onto the longest, most deserted beach you've ever seen.

We wondered why it was so deserted, until I tried to enter the water and discovered it'd be a good place to commit suicide, if your prefered manner of dying is by drowning.

Then we hit the road again, had an amazing lunch in Todos Santos, and drove to La Paz.

The diving was shit. Really really shit.

Nightlife too. Met some sleazy George Bush supporters who stalked us that night, travelling from their town to our town to eat at the only good restaurant, leaving us no option but to sweat it out in taco shop with no aircon.

It was wonderful, because we met a little kid called Diego (son of the owners) and Jordan practiced her Spanish on him. Really gorgeous kid, pics coming.

I had to bring forward my departure by a week, because of the looming doco that I should be doing right now (as I write). So that gave me two days to do the 16 hour train ride up the Copper Canyon. Amazing, beautiful.. one of the guards kept taking us to the off-limits back carriage to see waterfalls. He was obsessed by them.

Then, at 3pm, Jordan said 'hey Michelle, does Friday start with 'v' in Spanish?'

"Yes, yes it does. Why do you ask?"

"Because I just saw a newspaper and I think today is Friday, not Thursday."

Shit. That means my flight is tomorrow morning at 7am and I'm only halfway up the copper canyon. Can't change the flight because there are no flights on Sunday, and returning Monday would be professional suicide.

I stayed on the train. All the way to the end. Slept soundly in v shitty Chihuahua (just put in as many 'h's and 'u's with that word, and you should be right.

And here I am. Home.

FINALLY THANK THE LORD THAT'S OVER... ONLY ONE 50MIN DOCO TO GO AND THEN I'M HOMEBOUND!!!!!

http://www.abc.net.au/rn/sportsfactor/stories/2007/2029931.htm

RADIO NZ NIGHTS - CORRES REPORT

http://www.radionz.co.nz/nr/programmes/nights/20070904

NIÑO LIBRE

Last night I went to polish off the last of my Sports Factor story on Lucha Libre.

It's on the general ridiculousness, sorry, 'cultural machoism' of the Free Fight and last night's foray was great fun.

First I interviewed a lot of people between the age of 1 and 6 about what they like about Lucha Libre. While none of the one-year-olds actually said, "It's amazing because it instills aggression and machoism in us from a very young age", that's ok, because it's all in Spanish and I can just dub it in the voiceover.

(For any americans reading this, that was a joke)

I'd already contacted the media person, Sandra, who wrote me a one line response that all I needed was media ID and a zoom, neglecting to mention that I had to be registered beforehand and be on the door. A bespectacled man tells me I have to come back during the week and register at the office, before coming back AGAIN to do my work.

No thanks.

I'm going to employ a little Fernando-ism. I tell him I don't need to take my camera in (omitting a mention of my mini-disc recorder and mic) and somehow convince him to let me enter for 'a very short time'. I leave my $1500 camera with a lady in a raincoat called 'Tere', who smuggles it inside her jacket, tucking it under her armpit. I wonder if I'll see it again.

The spectacle, to be honest, is amazing. The sound of bicycle pumps powering car horns, heard from a distance without a hangover, is compelling. The ridiculous men in the ring are quite amazing, and I have a great time.

I emerge half an hour later with all the sound I need, and Tere dislodges my camera from her armpit. She is a lovely lady, Mexicans are very warm (not just their under-arms).

I'm going to try 'assertive' (pushy) more often.

HOME JAMES

or is that just a quote my mum uses and nobody else?

Whatever the case, 1.30am Sat night finds me sitting, exhausted in the Rio de Janeiro airport, waiting to be processed out of the country.

There's all manner of people-watching pleasure to be enjoyed. A woman with the most striking resemblance to Miss Piggy I've ever seen. You'd think if you looked that much like her, you wouldn't curl your hair in EXACTLY the same style. Her mother looks like she might have once shared the trait, before massive amounts of surgery that have left her looking more like Michael Jackson With A Miss Piggy Hairstyle.

I don't know if it's the late hour, but I always find myself thinking these mean thoughts in airports. It was the same leaving Mexico, a stream of consciousness like:
"Denim with denim, when will Mexico learn it's just wrong. Why do people wear it like a suit here? Why is that woman wearing gold heels at 3am in the airport? God, that is one hairy guy. Whoever gave that poor lady those foils deserves to be shot."

Unnecessary, all of it.

Back to the here and now in Rio and I'm fascinated by a couple. I can't work out where they're from but they're young, maybe 25. They first catch my eye because of his Inspector Poirot moustache. Not many 25 year olds outside of the south coast of India have moustaches these days. He looks exactly like one of those classic skinny detective characters, or maybe someone from Fawtly Towers, I can't put my finger on it but it's rivetting. Actually, yes, Manuel from Fawtly Towers, that's it.

She looks like Marisa Tomei and holds the honest belief that his role on this earth is to make sure she's happy. She passes the time with activities like being photographed (by him), directing him on how to stack their bags correctly, complaining, rousing, changing out of patent leather heels into flip flops (at least she's sensible) and complaining.

It's like watching a road crash, for some reason I'm rivetted.

Finally I get them out of my system and head for the boarding area. Five minutes later they arrive and plonk their massive amounts of hand luggage down right next to my head, which is encased in hoodie for the purposes of sleeping. You'd think that'd be the implication, but no, the loud complaining and equally loud placating continues until we finally board. Finally, sleep is near.

I make myself comfortable in the window seat, and am just closing my eyes in the upright position (no reclining permitted before takeoff) when I hear a familiar sound.

It's her.

Are they stalking me? The thought momentarily crosses my mind that they are spies (ok, so I'm tired and irrational) but I dismiss it as spies are supposed to blend in with the furniture and she acts more like the world is a table and she's dancing on it.

He takes charge of stowing the hand luggage, and in the process of demonstrating his manliness crushes the carry-on luggage of several other people, which makes me wonder if perhaps they may be Israeli.

(borderline humour)

Then does undoes all his good work by taking off his suit jacket (on which he was carrying her backpack and I found myself a little distressed about the shoulder pads getting crushed. Why is he wearing a suit on the plane anyway?) to reveal a waitcoat. This guy has read way too much Agatha Christie.

She then reclines her seat into my face. Definitely Isreali. (SORRY! not funny I know...)

I consider several courses of action, including popping my head over the seat and yelling at her, popping my head over the seat and hitting her, but opt for the more subtle, kneading my knees into the back of her seat.

The results are less than stunning.

Anyway, make it home ok and find myself stuck in an immigration line two hours long with 'mauricio'. He's Brazilian and ready to handle topics like "are latinos less trustworthy than Australian men?", "could you have bought a house if you hadn't done all that travel?" and "quirks of language" (where I unwittingly disclose that I hate Portuguese. Honestly I have to stop doing that.

We really pass the time nicely, but not nicely enough for me to stand by him when he comes out of customs to discover his baggage has been lost. I know, I'm a terrible person, but staying just would have led him to believe that I'd make a dependable wife.

No hard feelings though, because (yes I am writing this post facto) he wrote the sweetest email a couple of days later to say that he'd gone to California and:

I liked a lot to talk to you and your way of thinking etc...I haven't seen you before but It seemed that I knew you before from the way we talked (you know what I mean)? ...but my trip just
changed the direction and I am here right now in california ok!

OK!! Sweet...

The first thing I notice is that the air still smells like sewerage, but in a nice familiar sort of way.

FRIDAY .. I'M IN LOVE

Actually, I~m not.

Woke up in pitch blackness with a very itchy head. Great, nits are just what I need right now. Turns out it's 10am but the curtains are just very good.

The shower is brutal, as there's no hot water in our new down-market hovel... err hotel.

Fern doesn~t want to offend his ex-boyfriend~s cousin~s boyfriend by moving back out the day after we arrived, after he'd fixed us up in a room with four beds (read: dorm). I mean, as I said to Fern, it's only possible to sleep in one bed at one time so we don't need the other two beds. Whatever the case, we~re staying.

We finally step out for our long-awaited beach day - to soak up some of Ipanema Beach's best rays - to discover it~s actually overcast and blowing a gale.

We opt for Plan B which is, you guessed it, eating.

We enter a cafe just as some pigeons are flying out, and have the usual bad coffee and delicious pastries. Where is all the good coffee in this country, that~s what I want to know. I mean, fine, take my cigarettes, take my alcohol... but don~t take my caffeine, please.

We pass a pleasant breakfast reminiscing about the northern territory and ... gosh, I can't think what we natter on about.

We then walk the length of Copacabana - I take pics and record sound.





Then Fern gets a call from one of his friends/love interests, and we jump on a bus to orka (pretty sure that's not how you spell it) - which it turns out is where Rio's second biggest tourist attraction - SugarLoaf - is located. I have yet to get to the statue of christ, one of the world's seven wonders.. but I have seen a LOT of rent boys (one of the world's lesser-known wonders)

I strongly recommend a walk around the base of Sugarloaf to anyone, it made me wonder why I live in Mexico. Francine and I drive to a running track plonked in the middle of the city, a couple of thousand metres above oxygenated air, but not out of reach of the ubiquitous fumes... and run around in circles. Yes, there are nice gum trees there, but that~s about the extent of the eye candy.

Here, the air is thick with oxygen instead of fumes, the view is amazing both out to sea AND on the track... and it feels like home, on my skin, in my lungs and under my feet.



The vista of rocks jutting out of the sea, rainforest dropping into water, little old fishing boats bobbing about in the bay ... and monkeys, yes, MONKEYS in the trees of the rainforest... is amazing.



I left the boys to themselves and came back to Copa where I discovered the perils of walking unaccompanied by a male. My head is still itchy.

On the bright side, my idea to slightly amend my print feature from Straight Male Rent Boys Who Sell Sex to Male Tourists, to Rafael: The boy from Ipanema / Ipanema's Icecream Boys went down a TREAT. That is because Rafael is actually a god, and the pics are amazing. I will post them when I get back to Mex.

So not all is lost.

SHOOTING STAR

We wake at 7am. Rafa is coming to pick us up at 8, to get the best sunlight. I read that somewhere, about early morning sunlight being the best for photography. So being such a professional, I insist on an early start. I suspect 'early' actually refers more to 5am sunlight, but surely we're in the general zone.

First, we head to our new hotel in Ipanema, which Fern has secured through his ex-boyfriend's-cousin's-boyfriend, and discover it to be a towel-less, shared-bathroom, blanketless, mirrorless, breakfastless step down... for the same price we were paying before. The only added bonus is dogpoo, which adorns the hallways care of a mangy-looking dog that wanders around as if it's at home (which, i dread, it is)

Rafa comes with his array of different coloured Speedos, and we all head to Ipenema beach. Walking along the beach, Fernando breaks the news about us not having an article about rent boys to include him in, as the exception. Hard to talk about the exception when there's no proven rule. We are just doing the pics for his benefit, so that he's got something to show around.

The photo session is amazing. Honestly, I can't believe we have found such a god.



After hours of poor old Rafa standing, oiled, in various poses in the stinging sunlight.. we all head for lunch. For photographic excellence, I had to act a bit flirty, to get the best from the subject, and Fern is now insisting I can't NOT sleep with Rafa after all that flirtation. It~s starting to get annoying.




Not having heard back from Andrea (Mr OECD of Senior Economist fame) about the interview request, Fern decides to pay him a personal visit. A handwritten note at reception of his hotel will really turn things around, he insists. In his words 'noone turns down Fernando DF, I mean, does he know who I am. Um, hello Andrea, Fern DF Freelancer with ABC Radio here.' All the keywords.

He sets off on thonged foot to Ipanema's poshest hotel. I head to the net cafe and pitch a slightly amended story angle 'hey Luke, what about we ditch the straight rent boys in amazing clubs selling sex to gay tourists in favour of Rafael, the boy from Ipanema who sells acai on the beach, but not sex?'



Fern gets back from posh hotel with news that Andrea has checked out, suggesting maybe we should email him. He already has the subject line worked out: 'THANKS'.

Fern and I then upload 38 of our most compelling Rafa pics to the net (for pitching purposes) over the space of six hours, due to a couple of slight hitches on the internet. Quite a few slight hitches actually. We are both wired, totally exhausted.

By the end of the night, we have been in here so long that I know what song is coming next on the loop tape. Unfortunately, it~s Lilly Allen, Smile, which really grates in all its off-key glory. God I hate that song.

OOPS (F*ck) I DID IT AGAIN

For some reason the inverted comma button here is right under the 'esc' button. I could kick something.

MIXED RESULTS (read: FAILURE)

(if reading this post is as laborious as executing the day was, best skip to the next one)

Wednesday: I've taken to doing up schedules in order to fit all our hectic movements. Time in Rio moves at a different pace, maybe because we walk everywhere. YOu wake up and next thing you know it's 1am and you're going to bed.

Schedule looks like this:
8am: run
9am: brekky
10am: research + call: gay org, neri, andrea goldstein (OECD), Le Boy
3pm: sauna
8pm: Fernie DATE / Michelle INTERNET

Day looks like this:
8am: Fernie ridicules Michelle for not going for a run
9am: walk to bakery, devour several pastries
10am: it all comes a bit unstuck.

Fernando tells me I've really blown it by letting Andrea 'get away' (so true) and he takes over the role of re-finding him while I go about finding out what Andrea can talk about. Fernando has all the traits I lack: tenacity, assertiveness, insistence, shamelessness, and bluff. I can't bluff. I have all the traits that you'll find if you go to thesaurus.com, 'antonyms' for tenacity etc.

My research includes googling "What is the OECD?" (oh, come on, who actually really knows?), "Andrea Goldstein", "Andrea Goldstein, Slim", "Andrea Goldstein, emerging markets" and other inspired combinations.

Over the course of the day, Fernando's quest to pin Andrea (yes, we have taken to pronouncing it like a woman) has him calling: France cellphone (voicemail), conference organiser to find out where Andrea is staying in Rio, organiser's contact, organiser's contact again, organiser's contact calls back with hotel name, information for hotel number, hotel (from ambient setting of public phone right beside watering hole, very professional) hotel again to leave a message when phone rings out.

Fernando hangs up the phone looking pleased, announcing triumphantly, "We've got 'im."

Actually, we've got his hotel. If it happens to be one of those rare 5-star establishments with no security and only one guest staying, he's quite possibly right. We have got him.

The afternoon is peppered with references to 'what Andrea calls back' as we go to check on Fernando's annointed sauna.

It's another juxtaposition. Suddenly I am walking through the doors of a mysterious converted house, where a dykish-looking woman tells us the owner doesn't come in, they have to wait for her to call. Fernando does his insistent thing, and succeeds only in pissing her off. We leave our number and exit.

From here, we set up camp over the road to watch the rent boys arriving. This way, Fern says, we can choose the ones we want to interview tomorrow. When we are granted access. With our camera. And mini-disc recorder. And female genetalia. Did I mention one of his traits is optimism?

Something strange happens. It's compelling. Every few minutes a beautiful, pumped up macho boy walks up the street, looks over his shoulder ... and then slips through the door. They all make sure they are not being watched.

So, when one guy gives the street a really proper once-over, to discover me and Fern unabashedly staring back, enraptured, he keeps walking past the door.

MC: Not a rentboy then?
FD: Definitely a rent boy.
MC: Well, where's he gone then?
FD: He's hiding.
MC: Oh come on you can't be serious. Look, he's just buying a phonecard.
FD: Stalling. Trust me, it's a diversion.

The young stallion turns his aviators towards us and stares back. Then he walks to the phone booth, near where we are standing, and picks up the receiver, never taking his eyes off us.

MC: Come on, let's go. Honestly, we don't want to blow our chances by stalking the staff Fern. Let's come back tomorrow.
FD: No, we should talk to him.
MC: And say what?
FD: He probably thinks we're a couple looking for action. They find that exciting, because they have to do men all the time so when a woman comes up, that's good.

Too-ing and fro-ing continues. The phone rings, it's Marcelo Neri (poverty expert)'s assistant.

We turn, take the call, and turn back to find the Aviator Dude with his phone pointed squarely at us, taking photos. He looks quite sinister.

The hunter has become the hunted. Is this how he felt?

We retreat, for a cup of tea around the corner, and say 'hello' as we pass him. He looks a little startled.

I think we've blown our last chance. I head off to see a man about a poverty problem, and Fern goes on his date.

HARD DAY'S NIGHT

I just wrote a whole really long post, pressed one button and it all deleted and can't be retrieved.

That sums up the last two days.

GIRL FROM IPANEMA

Well, almost. We~re moving from one dodgy hotel in Gloria to another dodgy hotel in Ipanema tomorrow.

Brazil: I saw in my birthday surrounded by gay men watching Witney Houston drag - for researching purposes. We were in Le Boy, which has become more Le Dirty Old Man in the intervening three years since I was last here. Back then, it was gorgeous guys as far as the eye could see, and amazing go-go dancers as high as the eye could see. Hence our return, as I~ve promised DNA magazine and 3000 word feature on straight male go-go dancers who sell sex to men.

Like much of life, the years have robbed it of its beauty and youth.

Still, I managed to find two pleasant little cuties who I like to think of as "Where's Wally: the couple"






I saw the birthday out doing some good solid navel-gazing, and resolution-making. My 20s were hard, but for a reason. I~m happy to be here, at this age, and full of hope.

Today is a little stressful because I~m not sure where we~re going to find aforesaid go-go dancers, if we~re so out of the gay loop in Rio. Also, Fern~s involved in some international sting operation involving a kidnapped French child, a remote town in Brazil (his current home) and Interpol. And he~s also illegal at the moment because he~s overstayed his visa. That combined with his on-again-off-again relational difficulties have left things a little strained.

Also, I can~t smoke as I am 30. I~m looking at the future and it~s so smoke-free I~ve gotta wear shades, that just isn~t quite so joyful in this precise moment.

BRAZIL V MEXICO

Sure we think of Latin America as one big, happy family, but after living in Mexico the subtle differences start to become apparent. ie:

- in Brazil you can walk down the street in shorts without men having heart attacks

- even if they do look at you in Brazil, they hiss as a sign of appreciation far less often.

- often you're being ogled by someone you want to ogle back (in stark contrast to Mexico, where it's more likely you'll want to vomit back)

- in Brazil, it's two or three kisses on the cheek to say 'hi' and 'bye', in Mexico one suffices.

- in Mexico, if you sneeze in public eg on the bus, everyone in hearing range will say 'salud' (bless you). In Brazil, noone says anything.

- in Mexico, if you're in an eating establishment and someone leaves or enters, they will say 'provecho' (bon apetit) to everyone who's eating. In Brazil, noone says anything.

- in Brazil, there are people inside the ATMs. In Mexico, the ATMs are empty of people

- in Brazil, if someone asks you for spare change and you have it, you give it to them. In Mexico, you ignore them.

So, in a nutshell I think it would be fair to conclude that:

- Mexico is friendlier, except when it comes to the people who drew the short straw in life.

- Brazil is much better place to be a woman, on every level. Unless you happen to be the woman who was employed to sit in the ATM.

I'm serious. There was a whole wall of them, with one or two actually functioning. And as I went to take my receipt, I saw fingers pushing it out. Now that's what I call over-employment. You can't call it an automatic teller machine if it's actually a human teller machine.

RADIO NZ CORRESPONDENT'S REPORT

This message will self-destruct in one week:

http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/nights/20070807

click on Americas Report.

I leave for Brazil in six hours and haven't yet packed or (more pressingly) written my ten-minute Sports Factor story ... on Lucha Libre. Better get cracking.

NEVERLAND... ANYONE??

Jemima says the expat community here is full of people with Peter Pan complex. Maybe I exaggerate and she was just referring a few individuals... but whatever the case, Monday morning 4am when I found myself in a children's playground doing mazes, slippery slides and 'who can swing the highest' competitions with two highly-respected foreign correspondents and a Mexican artist, I was inclined to agree (just for record, I'm pointing finger at me. And maybe SMJ).

Well, more the next day when I woke up to find the back of my legs bright purple, bruising sustained during aforesaid competitive swinging... but unnoticed due to the anaesthetic properties of tequila.

(I won, just for the record)

But then, when I realised why my ear was really quite sore, I revised my concurrence. It brought recollections of the cement animal sculptures (is the best word I can find, but kids' style) with holes in the middle, and my claim that I could be the one to fit through the middle, despite glaring disparity between the size of my body and the size of the hole.

I got my head through no worries. The shoulders, not so much so. And then discovered that it's a lot easier to get head through, than back out again. As I half stood there, bent over with my head on one side of the sculpture and body on the other, hearing voices somewhere above me talking about calling the fire brigade in the morning (how do you break a solid cement animal without breaking the not-so-solid flesh-and-blood animal stuck in it?????) I decided there was only one thing to do. I crushed my ear into a shape it was never meant to be, and pulled.

Forget Peter Pan. The entire incident puts me more in the idiot category.

But, God it was fun.

CENTRAL AMERICA QUIRKS

MEXICO:
Cabbies:



People will picnic anywhere, even in the middle of the Zocalo / main square:


Shopfronts leave no room for ambiguity re their line of work:


GUATEMALA:
False (and freakish) advertising is not shunned. This sign says, 'we can pierce your baby's ears and more.. .without pain':




Fully-grown people can tend to be exceptionally small:


Shopping trolleys are avoided unless absolutely necessary:




In fact, there's no limit to what can be carried on one's head:



CUBA:
Many Cubans have never used a camera:

PERFECT DAY

Today's the most beautiful day I've ever seen in Mexico. The air is dry and warm, and for some reason is giving my flashbacks to Grade 7: Friday afternoon in knickerbockers playing softball on a sports oval of freshly cut grass. It's a nice feeling.

Another separate email from the deputy editor at Gay Times assured me the article was interesting and well-written, but not general enough - and sorry Andrew but Dep Ed trumps Travel Ed so I'm going to pick up my shattered ego and keep on running.

OUT ON ACAPULCO BAY.. AGAIN

When Denise the Brazilian showed up on Thursday, lobbying hard for me to come to Acapulco, it was one of those decisions that just made itself. Without too much thought, I found myself sitting in the back of Carinthia's car trying to work out what 'la peda' was.

As it turns out, it's the noun for drunkenness (is drunkeness already a noun?).. and over the course of three days I discovered that for these 11 Mexicans, it's less of an occupation.... more of a religion. The god:


Tequila on ice, ice on tequila.

This group knows how to put on a good party: they hired a 15-bedder house complete with cook, cleaners and a waiter, and bought enough alcohol to put the Cunard to shame (don't ask me, I just googled 'most famous cruise ship in the world' for the reference). The house was amazing, from its perch on the Las Brisas hill, it looked out right across Acapulco Bay, which is an amazing view even for an Australian.



Last time I went to Acapulco, it was with the business crowd and I had a new boyfriend to use as a crutch. This time, it was just me, the publicity crowd, a blowup whale that featured highly in the the activities of 'la peda'... and sink or swim.

To an extent, I sank, even with a flotation device at my disposal. But that's ok, I guess. It was an interesting experience, succumbing to the waves of indecipherable chilango Spanish, with more double meanings and word-plays than a good Enid Blyton novel.

Yes, I can speak Spanish. No, I can't speak Chilango. It's like learning a whole new language... like watching Amores Perros without the subtitles. Just keeping up with the general theme of conversation was enough for me, getting the incessant jokes was beyond me.

So, basically I was the social equivalent of an anthropologist, who hovers on the edge of a tribe watching its behaviour through binoculars from a safe vantage-point in the long grass.

It's amazing the things you notice when the limits of your own communication, and ability to grasp what's going on, relegate you to the ranks of fringe dweller. You notice things like: the Argentinian doesn't chew when he eats, the alpha male (with the unlikely name of 'Gatsby') has a deformed left nipple, the alpha female (who goes out with the alpha male) is perfectly comfortable dancing in front of an audience of 12 in her gold shoes, the two 'gorditos' (fatties) who got together whilst plastered were actually quite embarrassed about being teased the next day.

I also made the interesting discovery that fringe dwellers make their own allegences. I've never had too much to do with the introverts before.... I begrudgingly allow them their place in the crowd, while quietly resenting them for not contributing more. I think of them more as eating a good meal that someone else has cooked without even bringing wine.

But sitting on the couch with Ray and Arturo watching everyone dance and perform for each other, I discovered a sort of comfort in this role.

Ray had his own role: DJ. He took all his frustration at being shy, and channelled it into the most amazing soundtrack for a weekend I've ever heard. He never ventured more than 10 metres from his mixer, which had two ipods perched in it, and attempts at conversation sometimes felt as if they were an annoying disruption to the central task of making sure one song segued perfectly into another. I soldiered on though, assuming that this was just shyness. If it wasn't, he thinks I"m the most annoying person in the world.



Arturo, possessor of the most beautiful set of lips in the world, channelled his shyness into a different seamless progression: cigarettes. I have never seen anyone smoke so much, and found myself wondering how he found any breath to talk at all. One of my weekend highlights was the (inevitable) trip to the service station for more cigarettes when we talked about a lot of not very much, and I felt myself again.


Needless to say, with all that concentrating, I had to sleep a lot. It was amazing actually, after all those weeks of strange sleep patterns, to suddenly possess the ability to nod off at the drop of a hat. Not sure whether it was the oxygen-rich, moisture-laden air, the unfiltered sunshine, or the need to escape that sinking feeling of being the only person who's not laughing... but sleeping was a task I performed outstandingly.

Unfortunately, it was not one of the more cherished skill sets in this group. Even public farting gained more kudos than the ability to sleep. eg. my 3am efforts were glossed over and met with sympathetic looks, like 'don't worry, maybe you'll do better tomorrow night'. I didn't.

But today (apart from having done something to my ciatic nerve, I suspect by jumping onto the inflatable whale) I feel great.

The last moment my back felt like itself:


Actually, from the pics Sarali just sent through, I now understand why my back is so sore, as it seems I ditched my anthropologist role for La Peda and spent a good few hours either upside down on the whale, or dancing.


And thus floated.

ONWARDS AND UPWARDS

Well, if you can't do it metaphorically, you may as well do it literally.

It's time to return to the land of the living. Enrique the doorman thinks I am a freak who only leaves the house at 10 or 11pm and comes back around 5am. He has probably assumed I'm a prostitute.

So, today it was sun sun sun. Tomorrow, it's climbing a volcano. Yes, there's been yoga this week.

This arv, I went rockclimbing at the gym. That's the thing about paying more for a gym membership than you spend on the rest of your life put together: there are ridiculous options like rock walls equipped with instructors and shoes. And harnesses, which are always handy.

When I'm not holed up at home, in what we will refer to as the Special Period, I climb about twice a week.

We have a problem: kissing.

Now, when my climber-spotter relationship with Daniel began, I was very new to Mex and didn't realise you had to kiss everyone you ever ran into in a day.

Now that I do, I can't just start kissing him all of a sudden... so what do I do? I'll tell you what I do: every time, I barrel up to the rock wall, halt suddenly (at least two metres from target) and wave awkwardly.

Waving doesn't cut it in Mexico. Waving is to Mexicans what bum puffing is to smokers. What grape juice is to alcoholics. What masturbating is to sex addicts.

Come to think of it, I"m not sure I know exactly what masturbating is to sex addicts, so let's just move on, shall we?

Anyway, Danie's not sure I can do a story on the Homo-erotic Undertones in Lucha Libre Within A Repressed and Macho Culture, because he's not sure there are Homo-erotic Undertones. Which would probably be quite crucial to the story...

BORN TO RUN

For a group of girls most characterised by their ability to fill entire evenings with relentless consumption of alcohol and cigarettes, our latest goal could possibly be construed as a fanciful one.

A half marathon.

Bring it on, I say. There's nothing like the prospect of serious physical pain to force regime-change.

Francine was the only person who said, '21kms, you've got to be KIDDING' - ironically she's the only one of us who can currently run more than 10.

Anyway, September 9: Tara, Julia and I have a date with Medellin, Colombia. I have been banking on our altitude-inspired advantage. We're training at 2300 metres and the race is at 1500 so I thought that'd count for at least a few kms of fitness.

Unfortunately, then I did some research. In the eyes of many, altitude training is a myth.

Never mind, onwards and upwards. Or downwards as the case may be.

Francine likes to run to stay trim: after a small Mexican doctor told her he was 'overweight', she came to Parque Chapultepec and lost 12 kgs in the space of a few months. Now she is an utter babe.

She has no concern about the fitness at all, which is lucky because my legs are long enough that I can stagger along gasping for breath while she trots along beside me saying 'no Michelle, you don't call him and say you miss him. You are increasing your value. Let him come to you. Value maximisation, that's what we're doing here.'

Usually at that point, all I want to maximise is oxygen to lungs so I just make understanding noises and hope she keeps talking.

We are on the way out of Parque Chapultepec, after an easy 8km jog which canvassed topics like: Is Mr UN a cabron dirty-dog player who triple times women and then dumps them? Should breast implants be resisted purely on the basis that your boyfriend is pushing for them (YES!) and why do Mexicans wear tracksuits to run in the middle of summer? (Francine: "little fatties think they're going to sweat out 20kgs of fat in one afternoon. Huh.")

We are driving the wrong way down a one-way street out of Parque Chapultepec, and Francine is explaining value maximisation,

"You should make sure you are unavailable at least once - twice is better - when he wants to see you. Also, I'm going to make sure I tell Cachai that Mr UN is all over you like a rash so that then he'll tell Iñaki ... as soon as someone else starts sniffing around, that's what drives them crazy."

"But Francine, isn't that game-playing?"

"Game playing? God no! It's the truth. Oh shit, is that a police car? Is he coming after us? Oh fuck, no way. Hang on, I've just got to pull over. Oh great, he's going to want a bribe. I've only got a 500 and there's no WAY I'm giving him that."

She gets out of the car, the policeman explains that she was driving on the cyclists track, not to mention the wrong way down a one-way street. I watch them in the rear vision mirror, Francine is using WAY too much good Spanish to now be able to pull off the flakey foreigner 'I'm new here' tack.

She comes to the window, "I bet the little runt wants me to pay him. Can you see my registration papers? They're in the glove compartment, have you got 20 pesos, maybe 50. No, I don't want him to see you reaching for your wallet because I don't even want him to think about money."

Traffic police are among the least-respected occupations in Mexico. I'd say they rank even lower than the guys who fence off bits of the curb, wave their arms while you're parking, and then require you to pay them.

These guys just go around busting people, and getting paid bribes. That's it. There is no such thing as a ticket... the money goes straight into their pockets.

She takes the papers and returns moments later. "He's saying 'hay que pagar' - I have to pay. I played it dumb and said 'are we going to the delegation'. But he's saying that he'll lead us out to Constituentes because we're lost."

We're driving along behind the police car, all its lights flashing and Francine is saying, "I do NOT want to pay this guy."
We reach the roundabout and the police car passes the exit for Constituentes, and plants itself in the exit to a dark street that appears to lead nowehere. He's waving us past.

If there's one thing I would say I do well, it's staying calm in pressurised situations. While Francine is blistering about what the f*ck are they doing... I say,
"Are we going to do a runner?"

I mean, let's face it, the police car would have to do another whole lap of the roundabout to catch us and then get past all the traffic.

Francine floors it and we take the Constituentes exit. To show that we're not actually doing a runner, we smile, wave and call 'Gracias', to the cops who are now doing emphatic hand movements to tell us to follow them.

Francine is now driving like a madwoman, and I'm starting to think the traffic police will have to catch up with us in five minutes anyway to clean up the five-car pileup we're about to cause... she's slipping through green lights and swerving around gridlocked traffic.

As she drives, she does a running commentary, "Huh. Couldn't take the bribe in the open so they wanted to get us away from public places did they? Wants a blowjob down a dark street does he? Well, I'm not giving a blow job to that little fat fuck. Got to be kidding."

Over the course of the 20 minute journey home, it seems every second car on the road is a police car with its lights on. So the trip is punctuated with "Is that our guy Michelle?"

"No Francine, there is no way they could have caught up to us, not with the way you were driving."

Most of them are just harrassing microbuses, tailgaiting the poor things yelling 'avancele' over the dictophone. What social purpose they're serving, I'm not sure.

So there we have it, Francine and I have successfully done a runner from the police.
I feel we should be playing the soundtrack from Thelma and Louise, but unfortunately all she's got is Luis Miguel, whose teeth are WAY too white.

I go home to savour Monday night with an apartment, TV ... and a beer.

SHAKIRA SHAKIRA!!!!

If I could swap identifities with any woman in the world, I'm sorry Hilary Clinton, but it would be Shakira.

Which is lucky, really, because I'm sure she would feel the same way... about me.

Having temporarily forgotten that her concert was on last night, I had to make a last-minute dash into el Centro when Tara and Gabe discovered everything was ready to rock'n'roll. The Zocalo in Mexico City is huge, and was completely crammed with people from six hours before the show. To give an indication of the level of pants-wetting going on in Mexico, they closed all other tourist attractions (museums etc) for the entire day.

With lyrics like these, you can understand why:

For you, I'd give up all i own
And move to a communist country
If you came with me, of course
And I'd file my nails so they don't hurt you

Mmmm... the layers of meaning.

The goal of finding G&T in the middle of a crowd of 200 thousand people was an epic journey that served as a personal metaphor for life. I spilled out of the metro and followed the hoards of post-adoscent boys, trying to look less excited than they actually were, but unwittingly giving themselves away by sporting even more hair gel than usual.

Extraordinarily, Mexico was exhibiting very strange behavioural symptoms. Anyone who's seen people drive in this part of the world will be shocked to discover that 10 blocks from the entrance, people started forming a line. For a free concert. I mean, there weren't even any gates to get through.

No thanks. I joined the flow of people walking alongside the self-imposed line-followers... and eventually - like a leaf floating on the river - found myself up against a dam wall. Bodies jam-packed beside each other as far as the eye could see.

HTF was I going to get to the other side of the square, and then into the middle?

Firstly I pretended I was 'someone' and entered the restricted section. Not so hard when you're wearing the outfit I had on.



Just kidding. We bought the Shakira! shirts and headbands after the show. I crossed half the width of the square in this manner.

Next, I joined a snake of adolescent crowd-pushers and let them carry me halfway to the stage, looking blank... as though it wasn't my fault I was being pushed in front of all the people who'd been waiting in the sun for hours on end. The only trade-off was that the guy behind me erection-assaulted me, so I turned around, scowled, and pointed my finger at him in a menacing way. Cheeky bugger.

Then I had to go several hundreds of people deep - left. This was the hardest part, I was on the phone trying to ubicarme... shouting 'Shatara Shatara, your hips don't lie underneath your clothes'. I could see people around me souring at the thought I didn't even know Shakira's name (not realising that I was doing a clever sample of song lyrics and then morphing with the name of my friend).

To anyone who tried to block my way, I looked helpless and said 'I'm alone... and lost', which was actually true.

Finally Tara's face, partly obscured by a black Shakira! headband, appeared through the crowd. It was quite a moment.

(Just to spell out the life metaphor: to reach the final goal, sometimes there'll be obstacles, sometimes you'll have to bend the truth a little, need the help of other people... and sometimes men will try to rub their penises on you even when you don't want them to. But if you stick to the goal, you'll make it. Phew)

When I say we 'saw' Shakira, it's actually a bit of a stretch. The Zocalo is flat, and Mexico has discovered periscopes - long cardboard boxes wtih mirrors in the top to see over the crowd. Now, if one or two people have a periscope, they are a great concept (for the people in possession). If everyone has one, well we're back to square one aren't we?



Everyone had one.

Tara, Gabe and I spent the entire duration playing pass-the-periscope, so for approximately one third of the show, I could look through a 4 square centimetre mirror, through a very thick forest of cardboard, to slivers of Shakira displayed on a screen. Seeing the actual flesh and blood on stage was completely out of the question, although I think I may have seen one of her sleeves once.

The rest of the night was spent looking up at the aforementioned forest of cardboard.

My usual thought in visually-challenged situations like this is, 'oh well, I'm here for the music... at least I get to hear this at live. Wow!'

Well, I don't like Shakira's music. I like Shakira. Also, Mexicans love a good sing along, and they know all the words to every song. Unfortunately the guy behind me had a great set of lungs, and was tone deaf.

So there we go, the life metaphor extends: sometimes you discover the thing you battled for and strained towards is an elusive illusion obscured by cardboard and drowned out by a cacophony.

LUCHA LIBRE

Last night we went to one of Mexico's greatest attractions: the Lucha Libre. It translates directly to 'free fighting'... but is more like a choreographed dance of guys jumping all over each other.

Some people love it, I fail to see why.

Basically it seems to be any man who wanted to be gay, but didn't have the guts to come out of the closet contents himself donning a mask with spending half the night with his head between another man's legs (a popular wrestling move??) in what looks like an interpretive dance of oral sex.



There are two teams, the 'tecnicos' (the good guys) and the 'rudos' (you guessed it...)

Now, one glance around Mexico City will automatically beg the question of how they found men big enough to pass as wrestlers. Judging by the size of these guys' packages, it's a pretty fair guess to say 'steroids'.

For example, in the first round all the bad guys seemed to have been chosen for the size of their bellies - all the better to jump on you with - and all the good guys, for the minimisation of damage to genital area. I mean, the smaller the target...

I don't want to harp on, but they're all dressed in lycra so I will. The guy in the white pants could have moonlighted as a drag queen and he wouldn't have had to go to the bother of tucking his package up between his legs, because he didn't have one. It was distressing. Yet, he didn't seem the slightest bit self-conscious about it. You'd think if you were lacking in that area, the last thing you'd do is don tights and go on national TV, thrusting your groin around.

The most impressive bit is the way they fly through the air. One will dive off the stage/wrestling ring - often headfirst - and the guy on the ground will catch him. That's pretty amazing, when you're talking about guys who are 150 kilos.



Going back to the tights, some guys just wear big oversized undies, that look like nappies... except they're three sizes too small so they have a muffin-top issue happening. Looks really uncomfortable.

The finale came when one guy in plaster came out on crutches and all the bad guys started beating Mr Mistical with them (although, miraculously there were about 5 crutches). Then they demasked him. I think this is what you'd call 'foreplay'... who knows what happened out back in the locker room with after all that teasing. A bit of sexual healing, I'd be guessing.



These pics are not my handy camerawork, because cameras are prohibited. Kids on the other hand, can be taken in no problems.

Also legimate to carry in under your arm: noise machines. I've never heard anything like them but they make sirens seem like lullabies. The Mexican penchant for making more noise than any human could reasonably be expected to withstand, is manifested in all its eardrum-disregarding glory, as 10 men sit five metres behind me grinning as they 'play' what look like bomb detonators. You know the box with the handle that you push down? What comes out sounds like a party streamer on steroids, about five times the volume of a car horn. And their arms did not get tired.

CAN'T DO BETTE MIDLER REFERENCE

There's a weight that settles for the duration of a work trip. It's largely related to the unpleasant clash that happens when material wealth meets developing countries. ie. taking your laptop to Guatemala. Sometimes it feels like electrical equipment is met with a collective intake of breath, and than a race to nick it.

This being the case, it was with a sense of great relief that I found myself landing back in Mexico City. As we dropped through the ubiquitous smog, I saw a little green and white VW beatle cab - it was so familiar - and suddenly I felt safe again.

The plane was about ten metres from the tarmac, I had my usual realisation of the miracle of flight - by which planes land without crashing - and suddenly there was a scream of the engine, the nose pointed up again, and the airport was disappearing behind us.

Hmmmmmm.

A couple of options: either someone had f*cked up the landing, and needed a Take Two.... or the plane was being high-jacked by the lesser-known Central American Al-Qaida operative. Those dark horses.

You'd think if you were taking a plane-load of slightly unsettled passengers for Take Two, you'd mention it over the intercom. "Hey guys, sorry, was too busy savouring the chocolate chips in my cookie and forgot about aligning correctly. Let's try that again.'

But as the silence lengthened, and people found themselves looking around the carriage to guage their reactions, by other people's behaviour... I started wondering whether maybe I'm underestimating the power of conviction amongst Central America's terrorist population.

So, I just contented myself with a bit of reckless navel-gazing instead... in the face of my current relational difficulties (to quit, or not to quit, that is the question)

Relationships are kind of like flying, you're sky-high when everything's running to schedule. And strangely, when they end, it's never a smooth landing... there's always some sort of crash and burn.

So maybe, sometimes, as you're just about to hit the tarmac for another crash landing... you decide instead to point the nose skywards one more time. Just hoping that maybe this is the plane with wings that can keep flying, and with a fuel tank that - like a neverending packet of timtams - won't run out of aircraft fuel.

That's hope.

And what of the crash and burn, as you drag yourself burned and bleeding from the wreckage? Months and years in intensive care, that's what. Last week T looked at her watch and said 'oh my GOD. Oh GOD! I can't believe it. F's birthday was yesterday and I didn't remember. Oh WOW!' and I thought, God it's a long road to remembering to forget. Years of clawing your way back to 'before'.

As I write, I listen to J and M downstairs talking and laughing... their burns are healing nicely.

I watch my hands as they type, and they look old.

MEATLOAF

Another music-related title stretch.

The optimists of the world say that you can take something from every failure.. even relational ones. Well, I do.. but not in the hippy everything-has-a-reason sense. More the enraged everything-is-f*cked sense.

Not so with Luis (Dec-Jan). While his ideal girlfriend would probably have been a cadavar, judging by the amount of effort he wanted to put in, we had one good conversation. I took it with me.

It's like food. If your life is filled with amazing meals, you don't notice the exquisite mocha baked cheesecake you scoff unthinkingly whilst chatting about the new rockclimbing instructor the gym.

But if you've been living on rice and beans for three weeks, you do.

Same with conversation. And given that Luis and my time together was characterised by long silences, which seemed impossible to fill, that one great conversation we had stuck out like a mocha baked cheesecake among rice and beans.

It was the meat in the oven convo. The general gist is this: once in your life, you have to take all your meat, and put it in the oven. Kind of the non-vegetarian version of eggs-in-one-basket.

It means you're risking everything, and you have to stick by that decision to make it worth that decision.

On the strength of that conversation, I didn't just take off to India to explore new, undiscovered diving sites. I stayed here to run against the strong wind of resistance that is freelance journalism.

I'm glad I did, so then why turn around and take a job in PR, no matter how well paid? I know where my passion is: it's the off-the-meter stress, it's the robberies, the assaults, the police incidents and chats with transexuals, priests, dissidents, femimists, poets, taxi drivers... and then pasting them together into something that's mine.

Anyway, so I left my meat in the oven.

THE RELIGION REPORT

http://www.abc.net.au/rn/religionreport/stories/2007/1924264.htm

TAKE A LOAD OFF, FANNIE

F*cker, more like it.

This time yesterday, things were more normal. I had rung to check on a bus back to Xela from Antigua, and all was fine. Fun as the chicken bus was, I didn't want to do it again. I wanted to sit on a shuttle bus and not watch my things like a hawk.

So I booked a shuttle for Sunday afternoon, back to Xela, and relaxed. Thing is, they overbooked and kicked me off the bus. So I booked another one for this morning, and gave myself over to a night of good food with Sylve.

We ran into the boys from last night: a Dane called Emille (great name... for a girl) and a pom called Ben (great name, for a boy).

They were more fun the night before after a few tequilas, but we had a nice night and then headed home because Sylvie had a 4am bus. There are no cabs in Antigua at midnight so we walked. We came across a quintessial Aussie with blonde dreadlocks who was wandering the streets with his hostel key extended, just in case he found the door to his hostel. He was totally lost, and swearing the requisite amount. "I mean, it was fucking here a fucking second ago, ahhh shit."

A guy passes and asks for a cigarette and the aussie says, "No...smoko" realising too late he doesn't know the word in Spanish for smoke.

We leave him pointing his key at random doors and getting shooed away by random doormen, and hit the dark part of the walk.

I notice a guy following us, it's the cigarette guy. So I tell Sylvie to wait for him to pass. He doesn't.

He starts crossing the road towards us, and I back towards the light. Sylvie runs. He's asking for money. I tell him we don't have any.

He reaches inside his jacket, and I don't want to know if he's just bluffing - I really don't. In truth, I'm scared.

"Vamas a gritar," I say in my most tall voice. "We will scream." He keeps coming.

"De verdad, vamos a gritar," and just as I am opening my mouth for one of those dream screams, where you open your mouth but only a whimper comes out, he turns and leaves us.

We wake four hours later for our early buses. Mine is late, and it ends up being a guy in a car. He loads me up, and drives me and a snoring old blonde American to Guatemala city, the opposite direction from Xela.

She gets out at the airport, and he dumps me at a generic bus stop.

"But I could have done this myself from Xela," I say, "I bought a shuttle ticket."

There's no arguing over this, it appears, so I flounce my things onto the bus and as I'm putting them on the floor, the bus guy tells me that I have to put them in the console. It's prohibited to have them on the floor.

There are five 17 year-olds watching rape porn on a mobile phone in front of my. It's not what I need at 6am. One of them is looking at me in an unnerving manner.

I am busting and I have a four-hour trip in front of me.

Three hours later, I really think I'm about to burst and I'm REALLY thirsty, but I can't drink because I"ll exacerbate the problem. I'm also really hungry, but after watching the roadside urinary antics of all the men on this trip, I realise the same happens with the food men because there are no toilets around, so I resist food.

The entire trip is threaded with cheerful cumbia music that bounces around in my head, with its off-beat accordians which are really really jarring when you need to go to the toilet.

At one point, on the strength of 'we are ten minutes away' from the girl with silver-rimmed teeth and a moustache, who is sitting beside me, I buy and drink a half-litre of orange juice.

I sleep. The ride goes forever. Then the bus stops and dumps us in the middle of nowhere. That's when I discover some MoF*cker has relieved me of my SLR camera, extra lens and worst of all, my microphone. My only microphone.

The result of this is that I can't file the stories I've promised, so my livelihood is gone... at least until I get back to Mexico.

I hurded onto a yellow school bus, which turns out to be a personalised service that drops everyone in the province at their front door. The roads are really bumping and I'm actually visualising my cargos soaked in urine. I wonder what would be worse out of that, and dying of a burst bladder with urine in my bloodstream.

That's when a religious nutter gets on the bus and starts telling us in a seering, relentless voice to repent. He keeps doing so for 20 minutes and I am so close to walking up and slapping him that I am sure my facial expression is pure hate. Then he goes through the bus asking for money - I mean, if he'd asked at the beginning for money to refrain from speaking, I would have been throwing it at him. But ... whaaaaaaaat?

That bus stops and everyone is hurded off it, and I find myself in a taxi. The driver just keeps saying 'What a shame, oh well, that's life' in a tone that suggests he thinks gringos have too many possessions in the first place. Fair enough.

Nine hours after setting off for the three-hour journey I arrive, with more urine and less net worth that I ever intended for this journey.

In a nutshell, I am really pissed off. The Pollyanna in me says at least I'm not pissed on.

CHICKEN RUN

When she heard that I was going to Guatemala for two weeks, Sylvie decided to pop down for a visit. We decided on Antigua.

So, on Friday afternoon, I packed my bags and bade my light-fingered (is that the adjective for THIEF?) host mum goodbye, and jumped on a chicken bus.

The brightly painted, smoke belching vehicles are so named for the fact that people bring chickens on them. Who would have guessed?

It was the most amazing ride of my life. It's the general size of a school bus, but Guatemalans sit three-to-a-seat for the journey - in this case five hours. I put my most essential items at my feet and plonked myself down next to two sturdy gentlemen. The downside of this was that there was only enough room on the edge of the seat for one of my two bum cheeks. So, for the next three hours, I applied myself to a major balancing feat. Every now and then I'd try to claw myself a couple of extra centimetres, but neither of them were budging.

It's hard to balance, because you have to hold onto something, but the aisles are packed with people standing, so it's a matter of finding a bit of space on a seat-top and then riding the twists and turns. Kind of like surfing, but not as fun.
Then a young man in an orange T-shirt got on and pressed himself up against me. Having experienced 'erection assault' on a bus in Ecuador once before, I was having none of this and spent quite a while glaring at him and twisting away from his pressing frame. Finally I discovered that neither he nor his penis had any interest in me, so just let it ride. Eventually I had one arm around my two neighbours, holding the seat behind, and one stretched across the non-erection-assualter pressed up against the guy on the other side of the aisle, holding his seat as well.

Once you've given up on the idea of personal space, it's quite liberating. I had hours and hours to watch the people around me. There was noone non-indigenous in sight. The mother behind me was letting her gorgeous, spitty little 2-year-old mini-man blow rasperries on the window. This is where LatAmericans get their immune systems from I guess.

Then a really fat old lady who was about 2 foot tall, got on the bus. She had one of the worst mouths of teeth I've seen - well, most of them were gone, and the remaining ones were dark brown. On her head she was carrying a bundle the size of her body, and as we careered around mountainsides I watched her balance it with three fingers of one hand, while the removed her fare from the folds of her clothing with the other hand.

Eventually, I felt so cramped and guilty that I offered her my seat and discovered that it's actually more comfortable standing up. So I spend the rest of the trip being gawked at by everyone wondering how a giant can have such long arms.

There was a mother wearing full indigenous dress, and very impractical green heels. She had two boys who could have been twins except that one was obviously two years older than the other one, so that would have been a weird pregnancy and we probably would have heard about it in the Guiness Book of Records.

Her boys were so cute, one was feeling a bit sick so she put some water in the top of a bottle lid, and poured it on his head. And then his brother rubbed it into his scalp. They both had big round heads and skinny little bodies with thin brown arms. They were the most beautiful things I have ever seen. Eventually she and one son got seats a few rows apart, so she pulled the second one up onto her lap and then patted her leg. The first son gave up his relatively comfortable space to clamber up onto her second leg and he and his brother fell asleep with all their little brown limbs entangled.

The bus stopped three times for roadwork, about 20mins each time. With all the windows shut, things get a bit warm and close, but people just chat happily between themselves and eventually the bus takes off again.

By the end, when people start ejecting themselves from the crush they have to negotiate themselves down the middle aisle, which parts like the Red Sea. Well, most of the aisle, apart from the backpack containing my laptop which didn't budge. You'd see people step down, feel something under their body weight and then step over it. My laptop may never be the same again.

The exhaust is carefully positioned in the exact place that when you finally spill out the front door, you get bathed in a farewell sea of black smoke. Every singe person, but you're so happy to be uncrumpling yourself that you don't really notice.

Then I jumped on another chicken bus and finally reached Antigua, where a friendly little chap told me about military service in Haiti while we walked to the centre. The hotel took a bit of finding, but eventually Sylv and I found ourselves sitting in a totally gringo cafe eating hamburgers and talking to a Norweigan firetwirler called Martin (gorgeous) and an evangelical Christian whose wife had spent a year in Guatemala to adopt their daughter, and somehow managed not to learn any Spanish in that time. But it was, apparently, God's will for them to have that baby.

Then we headed back to a comfortable room, where the beds had mattresses instead of foam, and the doors locked, and slept soundly.

Next day we visited what is quite possibly the most boring tourist attraction in the world. A convent, that belonged to an order of nuns with a name strikingly similar to 'capacino'. It was full of workmen, who just ogled us and made rude comments. And a guard who came into the room we were looking at, talked about the weather, and then tried to kiss us, and these slightly lack-lustre scupltures:

GUATE'S GOIN' ON....

I try to make all the title entries a song title, but yes, this is a bit of a stretch.

Anyway, am on Day Three in Xela, Guatemala.

I'm having a seriously good time. The great thing about 'echando la hueva' (being really lazy) is that then being really producive feels great.

The most distressing chapter of my life is now over: I have moved out of the 'mad'house. You cannot imagine my glee.

Must remember to write the sad story of Martin, the Rabbit.

Anyway, the tendency towards massive overpreparation to which I am so prone kicked in around 10pm Friday, had to be at the airport midday Saturday and somehow have moved out in the interim. Packing had to begin immediately.

It was unfortunate, because Thursday night ended up being a 6am job due to Iñaki hitting it off with my friends... which I guess is a good thing, as he's been avoiding them so long.

Jemima went out of her way to make sure he felt comfortable, as per their first converstaion:
I: So, what do you like about Latin men? (yeah, great opener)
J: Well, why don't we start with what I don't like about Latin men?
I: Sure, ok.
J: Their height (she says, looking down from her privileged position a full head taller than him)

Somehow he bounced back, and had both J and T lined up with blind dates before the night was out.

I was so hungry when the night began that our:
a) refused entry to Cibeles on grounds of not having booked - please, get your hands off it, did someone forget we're in Mexico
b) appallingly bad 'Vietnamese spring rolls' - that must have refered to what they were eating back in the war...

made me even hungrier, due to delay, and inedibility. Drinking on an empty stomach is never a good idea, but possibly made worse when martini, gin, tequila, wine and beer collide.

Needless to say, this rendered my Spanish language interview with a Mexican anthropologist on:
The slipping grasp of catholocism in Latin America: culture wars and rise of alternative religions"... slightly challenging.

Oh good. There's always the concern that your talent can smell the alcohol that's emenating from every pore of your body, even if they haven't noticed your bloodshot eyes.

In an attempt to counter the effect, I wore my new glasses. I still haven't got over the idea that they make me look intellectual. Actually, I am long-sighted so it really f*cks me up for walking around.. .and I nearly fell over.

My talent was not at all as I expected. If I had alcohol from every pore, he had hair. He was even growing a pretty serious patch out of his nose.

Anyway, from what my fuzzled mind could tell, he was very articulate (apart from my general inability to grasp his general message) and I went off to shoot the breeze wtih Jemima, the funniest person in the world

We talked about religion and after tiring of weighty subjects, talked about height. She once dated a guy who was 6"7 and people in the street used to walk up and basically ask about whether his height was reflected in his genetaelia. Bloody poms, so crass.

Then, unfortunately, we walked past a dwarf.

Apparently he's not sensetive about his height though, because he dresses up as a bear at the Lucha Libre and gets thrown around for the titilation of spectators.

Anyway, we ended up at the pool hall with Tara... and then, intriguingly, at the bowling alley. Jemima says that from her first degree, she mastered pool. From her PhD, she's on top of bowling. Who know what'll happen if she goes back to study again.

Anyway, then, decided to go home and pack. Hmmm... moving out, packing for a trip on which I embark at midday tomorrow... and only three hours' sleep under my belt from the night before.

There's nothing like a challenge.

CORRESPONDENTS REPORT

http://www.abc.net.au/correspondents/content/2007/s1908742.htm

I CAN SEE CLEARLY NOW

I stepped out to get some clothes altered and discovered it is a BEAUTIFUL day outside. I reproached myself for not stepping out more often, made a resolution to do a decent walk or run daily - which I knew I would break - and set off for the park.

I found myself at the same spot where I sat in a blue funk six weeks ago, and absent-mindedly observed that this time I felt an almost unbearable lightness of being: that the thing that had weighed so heavily on my shoulders back then, had lifted completely.

I also absent-mindedly noticed the faint smell of poo, fairly ubiquitous in Mexico City, but probably set to intensify with the temperature.

Then I started noticing all sorts of things that I hadn't seen last time: the monstrosity in the middle of the circle of chairs may possibly be the ugliest public fixture ever created.

It's a rectangular, beige block of cement - about eight metres high - which sits in a pool of water with fountains spurting up in a circle around it. There is pigeon shit all around the top, sort of dribbling down, and the pool is painted the tackiest bright aqua you can imagine.

It is surrounded by a ring of cement paving, which is surrounded by a chain of metal lace benches, on which I and my fellow man are seated. Behind us are fields of deeply shaded dirt, with those squared hedges tracing little labrynths all over them.

It's strange that we're all here, we've all placed the water/clock/fountain thing directly in our line of vision, but the sound of the water is soothing, only marginally dented by the high-pitched squeals of children, and there are sparrows flying around, so in Mexico City terms it is peaceful.

The first thing I notice, immediately after my happiness, the smell of poo and the ugly monument, is my company.

Two kids are riding round and round the water fountain, each lap takes about 20 seconds so I wonder why they don't strike off a little further afield but they seem perfectly happy. The little girl has metalic tassles fluttering from the handlebars and the little boy has a very round - if not fat - face, and not much else of note.

Across the way, there is an old man and woman sporting exactly the same shade of yellow-grey hair. She's got a walking stick and he's got a white cap, cast jauntily over his knee.

On the next bench is the second homeless man from my last visit here. He's wearing the same red parker and green trackie-dacks that he had last time, but his grey hair is so neatly combed that I wonder whether maybe he has a home and is just here to watch the children.

Beside him is a young guy in jeans, ensconsed in the book he is reading. Then there's me. Then there's the oldish lady in a navy suit and very high heels, smoking what appears to be a neverending cigarette.

Then there's the family that's spawned the two bike-riders, and beside them a girl who looks very cool, also reading. Then there's the mother's group - two blonde women and their blond children, one's behind is still exhibiting the effects of pregnancy.

And then there's the balloon man, with his omnipresent cloud of hot pink metallic air-holders above his head.

I find myself thinking that it's amazing how, despite the decor, these people are all happy. But then I realise of course I can't assume that, maybe this fountain is surrounded by sad people.

It's strange to look at the balloon man and wonder whether he's happy or sad. Half of Mexico City lives below the poverty line, and just because I'm sure he's in the poor half does that automatically rob him of his happiness?

Maybe I could say he's got a hard life. Or maybe I could say he gets to spend his days wondering in a deeply-shaded and peaceful park, making people's lives brighter with his wares.

I look at the homeless guy. He's looking at the kids and after I've wondered if he's a paedophile, I have an overwhelming urge to go and say, "Are you happy?"

Maybe he's got no home, but maybe he lives having a park as his home.

Still, hunger never made anyone happy.

Then, out of the blue, the clock in the beige concrete tower chimes. Beautiful chiming, it is. Kind of like an ugly person with a nice personality. Kind of like Mexico.

And that means I've spent 20 minutes here, looking at all this, and the chiming of clocks always makes me remember that time has passed. The water droplet from the fountain that was in the air a moment ago, is now in the pool with all the other droplets of water.

This happiness I hold, only sits in the moment in which I hold it. It's part of time, and gravity. Everything passes. What goes up must come down.

Iñaki was right: you can't hold anything, just because you want it to last.

You can't hold the moment that you feel this way. You can't hold the person who makes you feel it. So, what can you do?

I guess all you can do is make yourself the most likely receptacle for happiness to come to rest.

The scene starts to move, dismantle. Some big yellow and brown dogs start making the mum's group feel edgy, so they set off with their designer collection: strollers and babies.

The old couple totters towards my side of the fountain, really they're not making much ground, and at one moment are almost run over by the two kids on bikes. It's a strange juxtaposition, young barrelling over old... old getting out of the way.

The man is feebly waving a white napkin - maybe his signal to the children - and I am delighted to see the two old devils slip through a hole in the hedge and set off across the dirt. Why stick to the path if there's no grass to ruin? Why stick to the path anyway?

They leave in their wake the homeless man, who's stopped looking at children and is now noticing me noticing him being read to by the guy with the book. The guy with the book slides down the bench to be closer to him, and keeps reading. I find myself wondering what on earth is the nature of their relationship. They quite obviously came separately (if one arrived at all, or rather, woke up) so why is the young guy reading?

Then I notice the suspiciously thin pages of the book and the way the old guy is nodding politely but his eyes are sliding sideways: it's a Bible, I'm sure.

The stoic cigarette woman picks up her wallet and packet, and waddles off in her super-high heels.

A photo shoot arrives and I wonder why on earth they're photographing this girl here? Until I catch her profile and realise anything would look good compared to the background, so maybe they were hoping to distract the viewer.

As for me, I am a curly-haired foreign-looking girl wearing disgraceful sandals outside. Bathroom slippers (or what I prefer to call 'thongs') in the street. I pick up my Telcel bag and pass the photographers, noting that the girl is actually a guy with long hair.

The clock will keep chiming, the water will keep being thrust upwards, only to fall victim to gravity again. And people will move in and out of the scene.. they will make it as they come and go.

Some will be happy, some sad. Some will leave sad and come back happy. And that is what I call The Cirle of Life.