El Vago en Suramerica

Coming straight out of Guanajuato…

I like this city very much. It is built over a number of hills (Cerros), and any of its steep streets could give way to an incredible view of the colorful houses and varied architecture. I live at the top of Cerro del Cuarto, which can be a pain because it is a fairly long walk back to the house; from our roof, however, is a spectacular view of Guanajuato. Cerro del Cuarto is supposedly a dangerous neighborhood, but the area we live in is very middle class and quiet. The biggest threat here are the giant dogs behind some fences or standing on the roofs, who bark incessantly as you pass.

I`ve walked all over Guanajuato. Walking through this city is exhausting but always exciting. There are so many little alleyways to explore, so many staircases and hilltops and surprises. It is a city with few traditional streets, and lots of little alleys and long, winding staircases. You never know where one of these winding alleyways will take you. I walked through my barrio, Cerro del Cuarto, and most of it is rather poor. I find it interesting that in the United States, the poor people generally live in the city and the rich in the suburbs, while elsewhere the poor live on the fringes of cities.

My second night here I went to a hippy bar, and met lots of mexican hippies. That was definitely fun. Two nights ago I went to a party of friends of my host brother. I quickly made friends with some of the kids there, but we basically ended up yelling at each other the whole night. Good natured yelling, of course. Then I went with this kid to some of the bars, and he took me around to nearly every bar in the city center. In just 2 hours, we went to about 8-10 bars. Last night, I went to a Chinese opera. The dresses and colors of the performance were very impressive, but after 2 hours we felt like killing ourselves. My friend Miguel was going to have a party, so we invited some random people around us to come. Then walking through the city, I ran into some more friends, and they came as well. It was a fun, if subdued, gathering. Then we went out again, and met some more random people, and went to a bar. Once again, I didnt get back home until 4 am.

I`ve had some other random adventures here as well. I was walking through some streets, and two kids were trying to move a big bucket full of dirt. I offered to help them, so we lifted it together and attempted to put it in a dumpster. As we lifted the bucket over our heads, we lost control and it fell on the ground, creating an enormous pile of dirt on the sidewalk. We fell over laughing, and were suddenly good friends.

There is this kid who is probably about 10 years old, who always hangs around in a plaza in the center. He seems to be drugged out already, leader of some future gang in Guanajuato. My first day here he approached me and began spewing out insults in an uninterrupted stream for several minutes. He then punched me, and waited for my response. I had no idea how to react; here was this little kid trying to pick a fight with me, yelling swears at me and expecting me to respond the same way. Since then, it has happened at least 2 or 3 more times… sometimes i insult him back, and sometimes i just push him out of the way. Bizarre…

I was wandering the other day through a fairly poor, outlying neighborhood of Guanajuato, atop a big hill, and this random guy approached me. “What`s up?” he asked, in fairly good english. I was certain he was going to mug me or something, considering that beside his friends was a big empty bottle of beer, and the three of them looked absolutely menacing. In any case, I had no real choice, so i talked to him a bit. He told me that I should take a picture of the impressive view we had, so I was sure he would take my camera. I took the picture, and he did nothing. I then asked how I could get down to a road on the hill below. As it turns out, the way I was going to go is guarded by big ferocious dogs; another way was easy and safe. The person who I had expected to rob me instead saved me from a very dangerous situation. Sometimes help comes in the most unexpected places.

And by the way, I`m not actually traveling to South America but to Neverland.

All of the comments have been great. It is very nice to hear from the people back home.

Keep it real.
Dan

Tags: Mexico

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 13th, 2005 at 1:07 pm and is filed under Mexico. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.