Been There

Rovinj, Croatia

OK. So the title is a little cocky, forgive me. I have a friend we met in Peru who has dual citizenship both there and in the States. He owns his own guide company and can't stand it when people say things like "oh, been there" or "we did..." (fill in the blank with a place). He mentioned one day that, in a big way, it demeans the place and people of that place, and he is right. You may as well say "I conquered," because it has the same feeling. So my title here, "Been There," does come off as cocky, but please believe me when I say it's a good cocky. I was not the guy I am now about half my life ago. I feel I have gained so much wisdom, empathy, love, and experience because of my travels, and I want the same for everyone. You see, my wife and I decided way back when that life is short. I mean, life is short. As we get older, we comprehend this more. So we told ourselves that we wanted to see this planet and all it has to offer. We want to taste the foods and drink the wines of those far off places that too many can't or just don't want to go to. Someone once told me they wanted to die with a million bucks in the bank. Not us. We trade our money for experience. Experience....and along the way, something wonderful began to happen: a greater love for humanity. We learned, too, that old Sam Clemens was right:

"Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.”

So please, enjoy my travels as if you are planning to go there, because you should.

Intro: What a Tool

Here we go. I've got years of travel and miles upon miles of searching out cool places in the world. So where do I start for my first blogcast? Which place will be the kick-off to sharing where I've been and what I've learned? Time-out: Before I get nostalgic and romanticize about my favorite places to be, it's important to know a little bit about me and how travel has changed me. You see, I grew up behind the Orange Curtain. If you don't know what that is, I'm talking about Orange County, California, the U S of A. Birthplace of Richard Nixon (his library and childhood home are down the street from where I grew up, in fact). Once a stronghold on ultra-conservative values, it has lightened up a bit over the last two decades and has even turned into a majority blue county (although I still don't see it in the way things are done, but that's another post). Take these conservative values, mix in an ultra-strong Christian and Mormon church presence, and of course, a majority of the population being upper middle-class white, and there you have a recipe for my own misunderstandings, and dare I say, ignorance. Now I'm not bashing me "being white" it's not about that, and don't get me wrong: It's an area with a majority of great people and a terrific place to live; wonderful place to raise a family. However, I had some "influencers" in my life that when I look back now, may not have been the best accelerators of growth and kindness for a young kid who was always trying to figure stuff out. A kid, being the youngest of four, who always put other people's opinions and words above his own (still working on that part of me). Thankfully, my family was nothing but open and accepting, so let's get that out of the way. Never were there any issues of racial indifference or bigotry. I am so grateful for that. My parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, and cousins (in my circle of influence) were all very open and just cool people. That said, many of my friends growing up in my teenage years had a different view of things. My high school was 95% white. The other 5% were literally classified as "other," and that "other" consisted of five African-American kids, five Asian kids, four Indian kids, and several (of the 5%) were Hispanic. Looking back, I never had any concerns or thoughts about race, I just knew I was white, everyone else was too pretty much, and if you weren't, it seemed to me there was more of a cultural difference than of one in skin color. That was more interesting to me anyways. Even though I was aware those in the "other" category looked different than I did, I thought it was really weird that they ate different foods, wore different types of clothes, even smelled differently than what I was used to. At times, I couldn't understand why their ways, foods, and smell (really!) were so different. I never thought to criticize it, I just wondered why. However, I had some incidents in high school (now that I look back) where some of my "click" was more than critical of other races, and it leaves me with a bad feeling in my stomach that by association alone, I may have been viewed in that same category as they. As a matter of fact, do you remember that Geraldo Rivera episode that pretty much started the whole out-of-control drama reality talk show craze? The one with the skin heads throwing chairs and such and Geraldo took one off the nose? Well, some of those skin head idiots that started the melee went to my school. That was the atmosphere I was around in "The OC" at the time (and that term, "The OC," came on later in my life as a result of a resurgence in that ultra-rich-white-conservative crowd, eventually making a TV show about it).

So when do the travel tips and stories begin? Soon I promise! Just stick with me so you can see when, where, and how the positive transformations took place in attempt to give you a better understanding of future travel stories and posts.

Now, take that kid up there, and give him a college baseball scholarship to an inner-city school, and let's see what happens. I still remember my 2nd day on campus at Cal State Los Angeles, stealthily nestled between downtown and East L.A. I was living in the dorms, had just made it up the stairs (the campus is perched on a hill with all parking and dorms located about 10,000 steps below), when two tall, muscular, African-American males started to walk in stride with me, shoulder to shoulder, one on each side of me, almost squeezing me between the two of them. Now, I am 6'4", and these guys were a good 2" or more taller than me. They were wearing the Malcom X-type eye glasses along with the bow ties. As one of them rubbed their shoulder against mine, he said "Can a devil fool a Muslim?" and the other, while still walking stride-for-stride with me, bumped my shoulder nearest him and said "Not now days, not now days." Coming from where I came from, you can imagine what an eye-opener this was for me. It was that same sort of experience the day I moved into my dorm, just a few days before I was a devil. I got to my dorm door, and saw two names: mine, and my roommate's. "Kwodwo," and then his last name (which is not necessary to reveal for the point of this story). I sat there and stared at it.

"K-W-O-D-W-O." I didn't even know those letter combinations were possible in the English language, let alone how to pronounce it. If proper nouns were allowed in Scrabble, this name would score some serious points. Kwodwo was our center-fielder, coming all the way from the Virgin Islands (a place I had never heard of at the time, but would end up happily visiting later on in life). Kwodwo was one of the best persons I ever came across.

My college baseball coach, John O. Herbold III. Believe me when I tell you, there will be PLENTY of material from this guy on this site.

As you can see, culture shock was a bit of an understatement. I am still searching the demographics up, but from my memory, Cal State Los Angeles in 1989, was about 23,000 students at the time, and Caucasians made up less than 50%. I remember because I used to complain that there were no good-looking girls on campus. I used to say "4 out of 5 girls in college are attractive, and the 5th girl goes to CSULA." Granted, that's a horrible thing to say, full of cockiness and misguided privilege. Just the fact that I was associating demographics with attractiveness should fill you in on the mindset I had at the time (but take heart: I married a beautiful woman of cultural and ethnic diversity). So remember the point of this pre-story: that's the kind of person I used to be. I wasn't mean, I was just flat out ignorant. That 4 out of 5 statement was wrong on so many levels, and I'm remorseful about that type of attitude in my past. However, I'm glad I was given the opportunities in life to be able to look back and recognize how selfish and narrow-minded those views were (albeit they were unintentional), and I am thankful that they happened because it feels like my growth has been tremendous from where I was to where I am going. And that's what this is all about here: Ask yourself, are we set in stone? Are we the same person from birth to death? Of course not, but the real question is, do we want to be the same person all the time? Does being a douche bag all the time release an endorphin in you that is greater than the urge to be understanding and express empathy? Well, I know some people like that, and based on the things they say and the way they act, they are the same now as they were in high school and before. Who knows what they have endured to keep them in their place, it just seems like they don't question anything and they are stuck in neutral, revving their engines but not going anywhere. Well, not me. I want to go somewhere. I want my wheels to be moving forward, my engine to be more than idling and driving me to better places. So that's why I said yes to my grandpa when, a couple of years after graduating college, he asked me to take him to Oaxaca, Mexico, so he could see his friends and the pyramids one last time....

oaxaca, mexico

With a side trip to Chiapas and the Palenque Ruins

Once again, I was confronted with the challenge of trying to pronounce a combination of letters I had never seen together before. "O-A-X..." Wait. OAX? Was it pronounced like "oaks" but with an X? Wait wait wait. OK, even though my high school was vanilla and cream in a blender, I did grow up around Hispanics when I was younger who were new or fairly new to the United States, I had heard and listened to Spanish before we had moved to the area my high school was in. My mom even said I came home from pre-school one day speaking Spanish as I was around it so much before we moved to a mostly white neighborhood. So what in the heck was I trying to read? Oaxaca? "Sure, my boy!" (My grandpa Bud used to call me "My Boy" all the time. "/Wo-HA-ka/" he said. "Ohhhh, ok." We were at a family function in my back yard. I remember thinking, in my first-response-is-always-a-negative-one way (a trait I have pushed myself to get rid of), "nah, I don't want to give up my summer, it's cool." I was in my 3rd year as a teacher, recently single-and-ready-to-mingle, and was just used to shutting such ideas down without ever putting any thought into it. However, as I was about to tell him I wasn't interested, an image of a book my dad had in our house flashed in my head. It was Erich von Daniken's Chariots of the Gods, the book which basically set the Ancient Alien theories into motion. I had also been reading The Earth Chronicles series by Zecariah Sitchin, another great author out to prove we are not alone. As I thought about those books, and remembered a story about a sarcophagus which was filled with an 8 foot skeleton in southern Mexico, along with it's lid that depicted what could be a man flying a rocket ship - all thousands of years old - well, that sort of imagery stoked something in me that over-turned my first reaction to my grandpa and I looked at him and said, "Yah, I'll go with you." I couldn't believe I just said that. I had never been out of the country (well, like I mentioned earlier, I did make it to the Virgin Islands via my parents' 25th anniversary where they wanted the family to take a cruise). I had only been on an airplane three times, was supposed to be coaching baseball at the school in the summer, and was not even thinking about a trip. And yet, literally out of the blue, my grandpa asked if I wanted to go and I somehow, some way, muttered out I would. It was weird, it felt like I was saying no, even as I was saying yes. So glad I did....

Flying in to Oaxaca...or somewhere around there.

So off we went. My grandpa, who was a young-spirited old guy, was 87 at the time. He was an entrepreneur who ventured from place to place his entire life, the last few years at the time mainly living in Hawaii with my aunt and uncle (all on my mom's side), never really settling for one job or place. He used to own restaurants in south Orange County, among other things. I remember being at one when I was very young, and watching a structure fire right next to his place. Not sure why I remember that, but as a kid it was something else to witness. He really wanted to go back to Mexico. He had been all over Central and South America. He was one of the first American tourists to visit Machu Picchu, not long after it was re-discovered. He and my Nana (who was technically my mom's step-mother), would go there all the time. He would bring back those hand-made Peruvian beanie hats for us. As a kid I thought they were ridiculous, but now I wish I still had them.

My grandpa arrived at my parent's house, bags packed, and carrying a large white box. As we were riding to the airport, he started telling me stories about the pyramids there and some old friends of his. Back in his days as a restaurant owner, he made lots of friends in the business. One of them was from Oaxaca, and had moved back and started a resort called Alejandria's, on the coast near Puerto Angel. My grandpa had been wanting to go back for years and see his friend, as well as visit the pyramids he loved to talk about. I looked carefully at the big white box he had, with old-school rope tied around it in a way that would allow him to carry it like a purse, and noticed the box was a microwave. A big one. My grandpa had promised his friend he would bring one to him, as the last time they had spoken (which was probably years prior), his friend complained of not having a microwave at the resort. So my grandpa wanted to surprise him with a new, nice, BIG, microwave. As we exited my mom's van and hugged goodbye to her, he gave me the microwave and said "check your bags in, this will be your carry-on."

Okee Dokee.

I don't remember much of the flight there, but do remember the descent down to the Oaxaca airport. I literally didn't know where it was on the map, nor did I bother to check before we went, so I had no idea where we were going. We stopped to connect in Mexico City, it looked pretty smoggy as we flew in, didn't really have a layover, and jumped onto a smaller plane. I was in a band at the time, and two of the guys in the band were brothers whose parents were from Mexico. Prior to the trip I remember trying to find phone numbers of places near the capital town center of Oaxaca, and having the brothers speak Spanish to the unsuspecting folks we called trying to book a place. We didn't have much of an internet back then, so I had to research some places to stay as my grandpa asked me to find a place and book it (what was he thinking?). Unfortunately, I was not able to secure anything before we left and I was a little tardy telling my grandpa this. I let him know just a couple of days before we left, and he told me not to worry, we'd find something. What? Like, just show up and find something? As the plane turned and descended towards the runway, we flew over a baseball stadium. Not a field, but an entire stadium. I remember thinking "I wonder if Fernando Valenzuela ever pitched there..." I was such a tool.

Seeing a baseball stadium was comforting for me, I was a player and a coach for pretty much my entire life, so I couldn't be that far from home, right? However, I couldn't stand the thought of not having a place to stay when we got there. What if everything was booked? Would we be sleeping on the streets? I mentioned it to my grandpa again as we walked down the roll-out stair case from the small jet, and he reassured me everything would be fine.

As we walked across the tarmac into the baggage building, we had to pass customs. Let the new experiences begin! As I walked up to the gate, my huge microwave in one hand that I had just carried about 300 yards from the airplane to the baggage area, and my suitcase that I just picked up from the cart that brought it in from the plane in my other hand, I noticed a line was forming in front of me with some heavy duty painted shapes on the ground. We followed these painted markings and patterns, staying in line, until we got to this big traffic signal at what appeared to be an entry gate. It literally was a traffic signal, except there was no yellow. It was a red light and a green light. The people in line would walk up to it, press this big game show-type button, and the traffic light would tell them their fate. Everyone in front of me pressed their luck and got a green light. My grandpa was next. He smiled, hit the button like Fonzi from Happy Days would, and was gifted with his green light. "Your turn, boy!" he shouted at me. I smiled nervously at the federal agent waiting for me to put my stuff down. I set the microwave down, my suitcase sort of fell over to the side, and I pressed my luck. Everyone behind me let out a "ugh" noise as I looked up and saw a big fat red light. Now what? The federal agent was looking at me like I knew what I was supposed to do. I had no clue. Did it mean I wasn't allowed in Mexico? Did I have to go back? Did someone put something in or try to smuggle something in my bags? Could I be the first star on the not-yet-made Locked Up Abroad? WTF? Well, I guess the federal agent didn't speak English, I didn't know Spanish, so he looked at me and started pointing to my suitcase. "Abierto. A..bier...to" he said really slowly, as he pointed to my fallen suitcase. "Ohhhh....open, I get it." Again, I was such a tool. As I opened my suitcase, he yelled "no no no!" and kicked it into the space between these yellow lines that made a box at the bottom of the traffic signal. So I guess my suitcase could only be examined in this box space painted on the ground. I put the suitcase into the box shape, and opened it. Three agents came over and started pawning around in my stuff, putting my clothes on the ground, looking through everything, tossing my underwear onto the floor. Really. After they searched through everything, they smiled and said in a thick accent "OK. Proximo!" So now everyone was waiting to get in behind me, it was their turn to press their luck, but I was stuck there picking up all my clothes from the ground and stuffing them back into my suitcase. I looked up as I was crouched over like Bob Boone behind the plate (he was a baseball catcher for the California Angels), and saw my grandpa smiling and laughing. It was great. I was scared out of my mind, but I knew we'd be fine because he didn't have a worry in the world.

The quintessential "I have arrived" picture: I'm traveling, I'm young with a little bit of cash, I gotta' get a beer and look smug. I really didn't like beer, but like I said, it was quintessential.

"My boy, get us a taxi." I dragged my suitcase and that huge microwave (that was starting to become a huge pain in the ass) out to the street, and hailed a taxi. I had never been in a taxi before, not even in the states. Everyone in California has a car. Taxis were for people in New York, not California boys in "Oaks-haka." We got in, and I looked at my grandpa, and he looked at me, and then the taxi driver looked in the mirror. "Donde?" he said. I knew what that meant, but I figured my grandpa knew where to go, so I looked at him. "Don't look at me, boy! You were supposed to get us a place!" Whaaaat? "But you said..." and he cut me off laughing. "Don't worry, I'm just teasing. Tell the driver to go to the circle." Oh yah, the circle. Lucky for me my ex-girlfriend's best friend gave me a little calculator-looking thingy that was really a translator. Pretty high-tech for that time, so I pulled it out and typed in "circle." It took forever. I kept hitting enter but it just looked like I made a typo. "Circulo" kept coming up. Oh, wait. That's Spanish for circle...ok. "Circulo, por-favor!" I said to the Taxi driver in an obvious White-American accent. He laughed at my attempt of self deprecation and hit the gas. We were off.

Oaxaca is both a state and a city, the capital city of the same name. I really didn't expect old, Spanish-style architecture. Like I said, I was clueless. But what a first trip to get indoctrinated into the world of travel.

Gotta' love my man purse. Worn out of fear of pick pocketing, kept on because it gave me a sense of bad-assery. To the left, my grandpa chilling on an old column ruin. Now there's true bad-assery: 87 years old here and farting around ancient ruins like he's Indiana Jones. He even mocked my sock/sandals combo.

We made it to the town center, or the "circulo," and paid the taxi driver. Luckily I bought some food transferring planes in Mexico City, because I was unprepared not having really any cash on me. I had some 100's in US dollars, but no one could break them. I had some change left from the airport food purchase and that was plenty to cover the 25 minute taxi ride from the airport to the town center. Cool. It's not very expensive here at all, I thought.

We got out and there was a little fountain. I wish I had taken a picture of it, it was cool. It was in the center of town, and literally the town streets made a square around it, but it was called "circulo," so I just accepted this "square-circle" mentality and went with it. "If I remember correctly, my boy," my grandpa said, "I think there's a place or two up here we could get a room" and he walked to a corner building at the square, and went upstairs. He came down (mind you he has been here many times before but still didn't speak a word of Spanish) and said "grab our stuff, we're going upstairs."

We made our way into this place that was kind of like an ice-cream shop that also sold novelty stuff. It was very clean, lots of white everywhere. A nice lady took us upstairs and into this huge room, overlooking the entire square. It had a bathroom, shower, two beds, a small kitchen...I mean, if Air BnB existed back then, this would have been a prime pick. Better yet, my grandpa said it was about $12/night. Awesomeness.

So, we were to be there for a week or so, take a bus to Chiapas to see Palenque (ruins and pyramids), stay there and other sites around there for a few days, return to Oaxaca City via bus, then fly to the coast near Porto Angel and Porto Escondido to visit my grandpa's friend. After 3 or 4 days there, we would fly back to Mexico City and connect home. Remember, I have the microwave with me. Just reminding you, as you should feel sorry for me having to lug that thing around most of North America like I did.

I unpack in the beautiful all white room upstairs, look outside with a nice warm breeze coming in through the window, and see the square. This is cool. This is actually very cool. Lots of restaurants and bars, lots of people walking around, just a cool plaza to be in. Thinking about it now, after traveling so much, I wish the states had more plazas like this and others around the world. So simple yet so rewarding. Anyhow, the typical routine while staying there was we would have a trip planned in the morning, come back for lunch, walk around the square a bit until an early dinner at around 4. My grandpa would then retire between 4 and 5, and I would go out looking for fun. I would sit at different bars and talk to people, meet locals and tourists, and just have a blast. What an incredible injection of freedom and life, and I wasn't even in my home country that professed to be the leader of freedom.

We did some sight seeing, went to Monte Alban and the ruins there. Went into an ancient field-type stadium where they played a game like basketball but with their feet, and the losing teams would get beheaded. That was different. We also went to a mescal factory (mescal is like advanced tequila...Oaxaca is known for their great agave plants that make it). We got a little tipsy with all the free flavored samples they gave us. We found some ruins along the way, I remember literally pushing my grandpa up the huge stone steps, about 3 feet each step, to get to the top of a pyramid-like structure. Just me, mi abuelito (as all the locals were beginning to call him), and a complete sense of freedom, newness, and adventure. What an amazing time in my life and I couldn't believe it was happening. If I had any fear, any apprehension about where I was going and what I was getting myself into, it was gone. If you knew the sort of negative stigma that I was led to believe that Mexico had, you would understand why I had those anxieties. But clearly, I was mislead, I was mistaken. There I was, in this amazing, beautiful landscape, surrounded by blue skies, big and puffy white clouds, and mingling with beautiful, genuine, and friendly people just going about their daily lives, smiling at me as they could see what a squeaky-clean newcomer I was to the whole experience. And the fun was just beginning...(Scroll down below the pics of Monte Alban to find out where the fun begins)

These were all taken with those plastic throw-away "panorama" cameras you could buy in line at Sav-On, return them there where they would extract the film, and get an ice-cream cone while you waited. Who says things have advanced for the better?

Let the Games Begin

A typical night in "el Circulo" for me - a Russian girl, two local girls, drunk and overly-horny Spaniards, and little ol' gringo me.

I'd like you to imagine being 25, having a good job with lots of time off, and leaving your roots and everything you think you know to go explore the world...just to find out that it was way better than you were ever told it was. That people outside of your known free world actually are cool and love to have fun. Better yet, they don't judge you like you them (or at least, they didn't reveal that...even though I may have in my inexperienced nervousness about being far from home). Yes, I was starting to catch on to this traveling thing. You see, I was programmed to do the pledge of allegiance, say my prayers, and thank God I wasn't in a country like Mexico. Please understand, the programming I received was not intentional, it was all fear-based and out of self-perceived love. Most of this rhetoric coming from society and my neighborhood at the time. Well, was I ever able to prove it all dreadfully wrong.

Above you see a picture I took of a typical night in Oaxaca City for me. After my grandpa would retire, I would hit the bars and pubs. It was easy to strike up a conversation with just about anybody. I would grab some food, usually some sort of mole´ (as aside from mescal, Oaxaca is known for it's wonderful chocolate-based mole´), grab a Corona (ok, craft beer was not a thing back then and Modelo scared me), and just wait for the first unsuspecting person to sit next to me so I could pin their ears back and let them have it. And it happened all the time, and I didn't even need to pin their ears back. In the picture above, I had met a few different people one day and we hung out for a few nights together. The blonde girl on the left was from Russia, but had lived in Mexico City since she was a girl. I could not comprehend a blonde-haired, blue-eyed devil like me being a Mexican citizen speaking fluent Spanish. It made no sense to my ignorant mindset at the time, but I didn't question it, we were having too much fun. Next to her was a dude from Spain, his friend (the other guy across from him), the blonde-girl's friend between the two Spaniards, and a local girl on the right whom I remember as being proper and confident (and the picture here definitely supports my memory).

My Russian-Mexican friend with Linda, a cute little local girl who would walk around town each night selling gum and crickets. "Chicle´? Chopalitos?" She would say. Yes, they would sell chopped up, pan-fried crickets and spice them up with a little dried mole´. Yes, I ate them (tasted like beef jerky). I don't remember the names of the friends I met in the circle, but I always remembered this girl Linda. She was living in poverty yet she was clean, extremely confident, and you could see in her face that she had bigger and better things on her mind for such a young girl. My daughter now is about the age of Linda here, and I can often see this same look in my daughter's face that Linda is making here. I wonder what ever became of Linda. Makes me want to go back and find her to see how she's doing.

What's funny about this group is we met each night for three straight nights, basically to drink and have fun. We had a blast together, although when I asked the Spaniards why they came to Oaxaca, they stated "To get drunk, take mushrooms, and have sex." Turns out Oaxaca is also known for their incredible psychedelic mushrooms. I had never tried them, but I was beginning to think the Spaniard to my right (the one in the picture with his tongue out), was on them. He kept buying me shot after shot of Mescal. It got to the point where I told him (as he understood my English just fine) "you know, I can't pay for these drinks. If you want to keep buying them for me, I am thankful and will drink them, but I must tell you now, that I cannot pay for them!" He smiled and ordered more Mescal for us all. I took that as a "no problem" and continued to pour them down.

As the night went on, it was clear he was getting wasted. He was a little dude, about 5'5" (sorry, he was 1.4 meters, what am I thinking), and as his eyes began to half-close, he looked at me and said "Do you remember why I came to Oaxaca? I've had my mescal, I've had my mushrooms..." then he put his hand on my knee and opened his eyes in a not-so-drunk fashion. OK. What is going on here. We're having fun, lots of laughs, and now in front of everyone he's making a sexual advance on me. What a pig! Ha. I'd always wanted someone to hit on me so boldly, I just thought it would be a cute girl when it happened. Although I had drank a lot, I had my wits about me still and looked him square in the eye and said "That's nice, but I must decline. I like girls, I hope you understand." The table erupted with laughter as the bill came at the same time. The waiter handed it to me, I gave it to my frisky Spaniard friend, and then the party started. In a huge, overly-dramatic (but apt) swinging motion, he swiped all the glasses and dishes off of the table and on to the ground. He stood up and yelled in a great, Spain-ish (not Mexican Spanish) accent "This is bull shit! I buy you these drinks all night and you don't want me?! You pay! YOU PAY!" Now, as Curly in City Slickers once said, I thought to myself "I shit bigger than you." This dude was tiny compared to me, and a fight was just not even going to be fair. But let's back up. A fight was not going to happen because I'm just not a fighter in that sense. I don't like to fight. I was a collegiate athlete and pretty coordinated. I don't think this guy posed a threat, but I was not about to find out. I smiled at the rest of the table, put down what I thought was my fair share (I did end up paying for half the bill for the entire table), and made my way back to the cute white room my grandpa and I were staying in. The short walk back was not long enough to process in my tiny, Orange County mind what had just happened. Oh well, I sort of laughed to myself and went up the stairs. When I got back, I thought my grandpa would be sleeping like he was the two nights before at this time. Instead, the light was on upstairs. As I walked in, he greeted my with a concerned face. "My boy, we got a little problem."

A Douche for his Cola

Somewhere on the way back from Monte Alban in the beautiful state of Oaxaca. Man, I always pictured Mexico as a desert! Such a Gringo.

"What? What's wrong?" I started to get nervous. I just got hit on by a Spanish Guy who was clearly embarrassed by my rejection to him, maybe he knew I was staying here and tried to extort money from mi abuelito. My grandpa came back with "I haven't gone to the bathroom in over 4 days. You know, crap. I haven't crapped in four days and I need to get something for it. You need to find a doctor tomorrow or else I'll be in bad shape." Oh. OK. Not what I thought, way not what I thought, and, hey, I can manage this. I have my little calculator translator thingy, I'm sure I can muster something up that will get the point across to whomever I find that can help. "OK, I'll wake up early and see if I can get some help." He smiled and sort of patted my head and said good night. I tried to sleep, but between the Spanish hand which was more like a "Roman" hand with "Russian" fingers (a little international humor), and the impending bomb cyclone my grandpa was about to have, tired was the last thing I was. Well, maybe it was all the mezcal starting to kick in, as the room started feeling like I was on the love boat in a Oaxacan tropical storm.

So the next morning we woke up bright and early. Each time I think about that place, I think of how white and clean the room where we were staying was. We would leave the window open and a warm breeze would come in filling the room and blowing the really white curtains around like friendly ghosts. I asked my grandpa how he felt and he wasn't doing so well. He didn't let it show, but I could tell he was pretty uncomfortable and in a little bit of pain. "I need an enema, my boy." If they had emoji's back then, I would use this one . I love my grandpa, but I didn't come with him here to perform a colon cleansing. He saw the look on my face and assured me he was going to perform all rear end functions on himself. That was better, I thought. I headed down the stairs and out the door. The nice lady who rented out the place was sweeping downstairs and said "Buenos Tardes!" to me with a big smile. It always seemed she was cleaning when we went in and out. It was a great place.

I started down one of the many little alleys looking for a doctor's office. I kept seeing these little green plus signs all over the place. I had no idea what they were, but I must have passed 5 of them before I finally peeked inside of one and saw all sorts of medicines. Duh. It was a pharmacy of course, but back home they didn't use those little green plus signs, they used words like Thrifty and Long's. They even used words like "Drug Store," although I thought the universal green plus sign was cool. It's caught on in the states now I know, but I think they sell a different kind of fix if you know what I mean. I walked in, ready to type away on my little calculator thingy that was supposed to have tens of thousands of words that would pop up on my command. So I confidently walked up to the counter, where two nice women were working - both dressed in white like nurses, even with the little old school nurse hats - and I smiled and began to type. "M-y g-r-a-n-d-f-a-t-h-e-r n-e-e-d-s..." (I would never type the whole thing out as I didn't want to be rude, so I would break my statements and questions up so I could read it part-by-part to them and keep their interest). "Mi abuelo necesita..." I had their attention, and I typed in "enema." "ERROR." What? Error? I tried again. "ERROR." What the...? This thingy thing was supposed to have tens of thousands of words at my disposal, and it can't come up with a simple medical term? I tried to say it in Spanglish to them. "En-e-ma-way" (I used to always hear my Spanish speaking friends say "way" at the end of their sentences, so I tried it..and yes now I know what it means, and it's wasn't helpful). "Ummm," I stuttered, "En-e-MA." Maybe switching the accent would do the trick. Nope. Confusion abounds. "Um..." and I tried to think of other ways to say it. Hmmm. How in the hell do you request an enema for a grandpa? "Um...Por favor," here I go, "Necesito una ducha para mi cola?" Translation: I need a douche for my tail. Bingo! Big smiles and laughter came from the nurses. They walked back and returned with exactly what I needed for mi abuelito. I paid the small price and walked out confident that I could survive anywhere, any time, any situation. Bear Gryllis had nothing on me (well, it wasn't a show yet but you know what I mean).

I got back to our room and walked past the nice lady, still sweeping, and went up those clean white stairs. I got into our room and didn't see my grandpa. I got a little scared because I knew I took longer than expected and maybe something happened to him. I looked out the window, the curtains still softly swaying around from the warm morning breeze, and didn't see him outside. I got a little panicky and turned quickly to run out and see if I could spot him. As I hustled to the stairs, and then I heard the toilet flush. Out walks my grandpa with a big smile on his face. "All's clear, my boy. No need for the hardware, I got it out myself!" I won't tell you how he described it, and you can thank me for that. Off to another adventure.

We had a light dinner, I remember I ordered some chicken enchiladas with mole. I had never heard of mole, maybe I had it once or twice in the states, but all in all, I was in experimental mode so I gave it a try. Oh. My. God. Mole. Real mole. Like, this is where it originated mole. A bit chocolatey, but not sweet, incredible consistency in my mouth and over the enchilada....arghhhh. It was a Homer Simpson moment. Tender fresh chicken with this mole and that chalky cheese that goes with it. OMG. My world has been rocked. Not only is travel extremely liberating, fun, exhilarating, empowering, and amazing...it comes with really really good food! How was I not traveling early? Man, this is freakin' rad.

So now that I know what to order once a week for the rest of my life, let's get back to the scene. We were in Oaxaca City, my Grandpa just passed a baby he gave a name to that I won't mention, he's ready to retire at sunset and I'm ready to mingle. Hasta luego, Abuelito. I put on my spiritual pullover shirt (it's the closest thing I owned to a hippy-type shirt, it was a gray short sleeve with a v-neck and beaded embroidery around the collar sort-of-thing). I hit the town, not with the usual crowd of bi-sexual Spaniards, but on my own looking for a new vibe. I started walking down some alley ways just to see what I've been missing. Now, coming from So Cal in the states, alley ways were strongly recommended to avoid at all costs. Los Angeles was really the only place I knew that had alleys and neighborhoods that had them, I was told, were full of Bloods and Crips. Shame on me for even thinking I would go walk into one, at night, in some strange country called Mexico. As I wandered around, I noticed some really neat shops, cute cobblestone side-streets, and just a fully new experience to what I thought I knew. Man, travel was cool, there's no doubt about it. Now, if you know me, you know that I am a huge U2 fan. Right now, in 2020, I can tell you I've see them over 25 times in

concert, in four different countries. But back then, I had only seen them a few times, all in So Cal. So when I was walking down just another really cool alley in Oaxaca, and I spot this little sign over a door, lit up in a classy way, that says "U2 Bar," I have to wonder, "is it aliens?" OK, maybe I didn't ask that, but I had to investigate. I went inside and WOW, what a bar.

It was still early in the night, so it was just me, the bartender who was really cute, and a guy from Chicago I believe. I can't really recall where he was from, but I do remember his name was Johnny. Johnny and I sat at the bar, the U2 bar, and started talking about where we were from, what we did, and why we were in Oaxaca. U2 was playing in the background. No, really it was. It was great. I had my first taste of international taste in music, and it appeared the my taste was not uncommon, and that made me feel good. As Johnny and I kept chatting, more and more people started to filter in. We started to talk with the bartender, I believe her name was Monique, and found out she was from Switzerland. She spoke very good English, and came across as a really smart person. She told us both her story, how she felt unfulfilled in Switzerland and came to Mexico one year on holiday (everyone else in the world calls their vacations "holiday," and they don't say it as a noun, they say it as a verb). She loved Oaxaca so much, she decided not to go back, at the tender age of 25. Now, I want all you over 25 people to imagine yourself in a foreign country, no family or support system, and just decide that you are going to stay there and figure out your life and how you are going to live it. She was closer to 30 at this time, but I was at this time the same age she was when she left it all and moved here. What balls. Absolute huge balls. And she was a girl. Remember, I was still under the general impression that girls wouldn't do something like this, that young people like me were not capable of branching out on their own in a foreign country and just living without a steady job, college education, and a retirement plan. I mean, that's what I was sold and everything else was just second class. And yet, here she was, doing it. Not just doing it, but having fun doing it. Running her place, a really cool place, very clean, very classy...and taking shots with us, enjoying her experience. I can't tell you how crazy I thought it was that the bar owner, while working, was taking shots with her customers. I was so brainwashed into American culture that I thought she was going to get in trouble or something. It really showed me how ridiculous my preconceptions about how things were supposed to be were, and even now how backwards some American mores are.

So here we were, drinking with the cute owner/bartender, starting to get loose and have some fun, listening to my favorite band, and more and more people start walking in. I just happened to have my plastic throw away camera and started taking pics, because, when you are drunk and cell phones haven't been invented yet, you start taking pics at every and any opportune moment.

Above you see Monique (or was it Dominique?) with some patrons in her fine U2 bar. To the right is Johnny with the cap on. Between Monique and Johnny in that top right pic is a guy from Netherlands who, clearly, has not been drinking (much?). Another one of Johnny and myself. Man, I look so young.

So, I'm enjoying my time at the U2 Bar. I mean, what fun No limits, no worries, no sense of time....time...oh yah, I should get back to my Grandpa because we are supposed to leave tomorrow for a bus to Chiapas. Like, early. I don't want to disappoint him, and I don't want to not be able to get up. We'll be back here for a couple of nights after the pyramids down south and some time on the beach with my Grandpa's friend, so it's not like it's a goodbye, goodbye, it's just a goodbye, see you soon, I'll be back next week. What a fun time.

I walked out of the U2 Bar, and looked at my watch. It was 4 am. And the place was still going off. Wow. Who knew. I guess in other countries they don't have a stop time for booze like they do in the states. Maybe if the states would loosen up a bit on all these Protestant-based rules, we may be less of a stuffy place and more of a living-your-life place. Oh well, I wasn't there at the moment, and I was really happy not to be.

As I walked down the alley back to our place, a forced thought entered my head: Am I safe? Here I am, pretty drunk (but still with my wits), in a dark alley, a foreign country (that is supposed to be dangerous according to everything I've been told), and I was by myself. Granted, I am 6'4" and was a college athlete, so I think I can handle myself pretty well if I needed to, but I remember thinking "I am supposed to be afraid in situations like this, but I'm not. I'm good. As a matter of fact, I'm great. Screw everything I've been told, this place is awesome." As I came to that conclusion, a white Federale pick-up truck drove up the alley and right by me. Police dressed like soldiers with big rifles were in the back of the truck as it whizzed by me. I was safe. Were these soldiers going to give me a hard time? Nope. They kept on driving and I kept on waddling back to our place. What a night. Travel is the best.

South to Palenque and the Pyramids

The "ruins" at Palenque, pre-processed food diet.

Unbelievable. I mean, I am in Mexico, I just walked down a dark alley at four in the morning with soldiers driving by with guns in the back of a truck. Everything I was ever told about Mexico said that I was going to be kidnapped by the local cops, put in jail, and forced to watch a donkey show with a girl. Why wasn't this happening? Maybe, just maybe as Bernie would say, things aren't what they're cut out to be. As I awakened from my bed in my ultra-clean white room, my grandpa started raising his voice: "Come on boy! We gotta' bus to catch!"

I got dressed, and I made sure to make the bed a little and put a couple of dollars on the pillow (my college coach used to make us tip the hotel maids after road trips with our meal money...not my favorite thing while on the road trip but in retrospect, a very sound concept). As I went to gather my belongings, not much, just my clothes, my fanny pack and that damned microwave, mi abuelito said "No, you only need a few things. We're just going to be down there a few days and we can keep our big stuff here at this place." I had never heard of such a concept, but yes, we brought all our stuff downstairs (including the microwave), and the nice lady put it into a closet for us and we told her we would be back in four days. We said goodbye, and our wonderful hostess took one hand off of her broom to wave goodbye to us (seriously, sweeping is all I remember her ever doing), and we haled a taxi. We headed towards the main bus station where my grandpa filled me in on some advice. "Boy, you need to book a first class ticket to the pyramids of Palenque, in Chiapas." Again, some crazy letter combinations in these names I never thought possible, but cool none-the-less. "Make sure it's first class! We don't want to be riding with chickens!" Clearly he was privy to something I wasn't aware of. As the taxi driver dropped us off, we got our tickets and loaded up our stuff.

I remember my grandpa also telling me to bring a jacket. He said not to pack it. In my head I was thinking "Well, really? It's sunny and about 80* right now, is it going to be cold where we are going?" That made no sense to me since Chiapas is the southern most state in Mexico, bordering Guatemala (which for you non-geography buffs is considered Central America, and Central America is near the equator....so why the jacket?) As we boarded the bus, I inquired as best I could to the driver about the difference between first class and second class. He spoke decent English, and let me know that second class has no air conditioning and you can bring animals inside. He pointed to another bus and yes, he was right. Not only could you bring animals inside, but you could hold on to them as you held yourself on to the outside of the bus, like, anywhere on the vehicle you wanted to sit (or stand, or dangle as some did). Good job, grandpa. Score another one for mi abuelo.

The bus was very big, very modern and comfortable. As the bus driver turned on the engine, the A/C kicked in and we began to egress. About 5 minutes into the ride, I had to put on my jacket. About 6 minutes into the ride, I took one of the blankets that they left on everyone's seat and wrapped myself up tightly in it. And yet, another point for my grandpa. He sure knew what he was talking about when it came to Mexico.

As we headed South on this bus, I was still sleep-deprived from my night at the U2 bar, so I crashed pretty quickly. The bus was very comfortable, with a reclining seat and lots of leg room. The window shades were pulled down as it was still early morning and a lot of people wanted to close their eyes. I was one of them.

I slept pretty good until about 11 am. I was a little bummed that I was so tired because I always enjoy looking at the scenery in new places, especially in mountainous areas. What is up there? I wonder what is behind that? Look at that mountain, I wonder if anyone lives there? I wonder if there are some ancient ruins up there? Those were my thoughts as we ventured through what looked like Jurassic Park. Just a crazy, winding road along the spine of a mountain top, with intense rain-forest jungle all around. A thunderstorm was brewing, and before you knew it, intense rain, lightning, and thunder. This was cool. I loved weather. I seriously thought a T-Rex was going to jump out of nowhere and tip the bus over. A very cool kind of excitement indeed. I drifted back into a deep sleep and felt very alive as I did.

When I came through, we were no longer in a mountainous jungle region. In fact, we were on a grassy plain at a gas station. Totally flat and boring all around. The bus had come to a stop and I was ready to get up, go outside, and stretch. "Alto!" a voice yelled, in a very convincing way. Just as I turned to see where it came from, soldiers dressed in full camouflage gear with crazy machine guns in their hands boarded the bus and began looking in every seat (regardless of whether someone was sitting in it or not). They were using the barrels of their machine guns to poke through people's belongings, including mine. Although I didn't feel scared or worried, I did feel a sense of violation and helplessness. This was something that definitely wouldn't happen back home (well, not back in that time frame anyways). It was a bit upsetting because there was nothing I could do. These guys were armed to the nines and one false move or one incorrect pronunciation of a word that I didn't understand could set them off. I didn't like that feeling of inferiority. It was one of the few times on the trip I was glad that the USA did things a little differently, and I hope to convey to everyone that although there's been a negative undertone to the culture and country I grew up in, there are way more positives than negatives. I still can't figure out why each country, religion, and culture of the world can't just take the best practices of each other and live by them worldwide. I sometimes feel like the American Christian churches have brainwashed their clergy into thinking the Bible is a nationalistic book, and worshipping the Bible and your country equally will get you a seat at God's right hand. That's another post altogether (and based only on my experiences in that same church)... Anyhoo, the soldiers didn't find anything and left the bus, and we got out to stretch while they got gas.

Now, at this point, I'd love to show some pictures because what happened next was totally off the charts as a new experience. I only had a small point and shoot plastic camera that had one roll of film, and I had a panorama throw-away camera that was mainly for landscapes. I left my cameras on the bus anyways, so I wasn't able to take a picture of what happened next. As we were stretching our legs outside, the driver of our bus finished putting gas in and reached into his coat and pulled out a huge flask, like, "how did he fit that into his jacket" huge. He unscrewed the top and started to down what was inside (and what was inside was probably very worthy of being in that huge flask). WHAT? That's our driver, what is he thinking? Just as I was about to say something, he opened up one of those upward-hinged doors on the outside bottom of the bus and pulled out a big metal drawer (the kind you would see in a morgue). He pulled this thing out and wouldn't you know it? Another driver, fully dressed in uniform and professional dark blue coat, popped out of that death drawer and took the keys from the first driver. That thing was literally a metal drawer with a pillow and blanket in it, not much bigger than the driver himself, and he got out and the other guy popped in. The driver who got out pushed the first driver back in, literally like a frozen morgue drawer, and shut the outside hinged bus door downward until it clicked tight. Whaaaat? Wow, what a trip.

More ruins at Palanque. Mind Blown. If these are ruins, I must live in ashes.

So we kept driving. I used to wear a watch back then. I hate jewelry, but wore a watch back then not to keep time but to look like I was someone who needed to keep track of time. Big difference. Anyways, I kept track of how long we were on the road. After watching the drivers switch roles from the death drawer to driver and after the Mexican military were poking through my belongings with their weapons, I figured I'd better start keeping track of time to make sure my numbered days on this earth were recorded. After all that commotion, the drive turned into a pretty regular bus drive, the kind I had when I was a baseball player. I had played in college and in some great collegiate summer leagues where we had some great bus trips. I was a pitcher and tore my biceps tendon after agreeing to play for the Milwaukee Brewers Class A team in Pocatello Idaho, so my professional days never materialized. But my college days, especially my summer leagues, well, those were the bomb. I played in the Cape Cod League for the Harwich Mariners. That league is the primo of the primo for college players. As a matter of fact, 1 out of 6 players in that league make the big leagues. Had I taken that opportunity a bit more seriously, who knows how far my bank account would have expanded. But, you never know with stuff like that. Like my bitter old college coach used to say, "You know, one thing kept me out of the Big Leagues, and that was ability!" So, maybe that was me as well.

So, this bus ride was long and steady after all the excitement. We ended up traveling 21 hours from Oaxaca City to the ruins at Palenque. I had no idea where we were, what we were going to do, or where we were going to stay. I asked my grandpa if I was supposed to have booked a place here, and he said no, we'll just find a place. Wow I love his confidence.

We grabbed a cab at the bus station and asked the driver to take us to somewhere we can sleep near the pyramid ruins. He hurried off and about 20 minutes later, he dropped us off at a hostile that was about 1/4 mile from the main entrance to the pyramid ruins. We were in thick jungle, it was like nothing I had ever seen before, and I loved it.

While traveling, you meet others on the same wavelength.

The Hostile at Palanque

So, here we are, two gringo Americans with barely a few bags in hand and stepping out of the taxi to lush, green lawns surrounded by thick vegetation and a crazy blue sky. How freakin' rad is this. I wish I was there now. We walked to a little hut that was the office of the hostile where we had hoped to stay. We walked in and secured a room with its own bathroom and shower. My grandpa made sure we could get our own bathroom as he had done this before. Looking back, it's clear he had travelled a lot in his life because I have too now, and when I do, I do know that there are many places in the world where you can stay and if you don't know, you may end up in a room with someone you don't know, and share a bathroom and shower with dozens of people. That's just the way it is, but my gramps knew better and made sure we got a place where we could do our business in our own comfort and privacy. Maybe after his douche and cola bout in Oaxaca City, I should have known we would always need our own private rest stop. Honestly though, it's not a big deal and I don't mind sharing bathrooms. If you think about it, when you check into a hotel, you're not the only person that had ever used that room and bathroom; in fact, you're way down on the list of occupants, so what's the big deal? They clean it anyways for shared rooms or private rooms (as they are called), so who cares (for the most part!). Either way, getting our own private room with a bathroom and shower at a hostile was another point for mi abuelo.

So we get our room, and have some time to kill. Like most hostiles, there is a central area for guests to mingle. And wouldn't you know it, all the other guests are similar-aged females from Europe, and they're on an adventure just like me. Well now, isn't traveling awesome? Why yes; yes it is.

So in that picture above, these two lovely ladies are from Denmark. I don't remember their names unfortunately, and please don't judge me for not remembering (they were super cool and I was all about trying to hit on them, but they had that Euro-sense about them that protected them from American swine like me, even though they still wanted to hang out!). So despite my best efforts to romanticize them, they still invited me to a night out after dinner. As usual, my grandpa retired early and I met up with the two girls in the lobby area. One of them was holding a bottle of tequila, and the other was holding a machete. Please forgive my lack of a better explanation, for I need to tell it like it is, and I'll say it again. One of them was holding a bottle of tequila, and the other a machete (why weren't cell phone cameras invented yet? Do your best to picture that scene).

Off we went. "Where are we off to?" I asked. "Just follow us" one of them said, in that beautiful everyone-from-Europe knows-English accent of theirs. It was dark out. There was a full moon, like, the biggest full moon I had ever seen. It was so bright white, and the craters on it were so dark and more noticeable than I had ever seen before. I heard a slashing sound, and watched this Danish girl hack away at the bush. We were literally in the middle of the jungle it seemed, the moon was all but gone, accept for beams of its light softly penetrating the vegetation and making its way to the ground I was on. Slash! Slash! "Um, are we lost? Where is the trail?" "Just follow us" they kept saying. I was starting to think I may end up in a river somewhere, or after watching her slashing skills with that machete, I may end up in several rivers. I have to admit, I was a little nervous. When I was young, my mom would never let me go anywhere, like anywhere. While all my friends took the bus service to the beach in the summers (before we could drive), I had to stay home. "You'll get eaten by sharks if you go to the beach! You'll get kidnapped by someone! You'll get pulled out into the water and drown!" I mean, I heard every excuse why I couldn't go to the beach, or pretty much anywhere else, as a kid (love you Mom!). So all those reasons of why I couldn't go anywhere slowly crept back into my mind with each slash and step we took through this intense nighttime jungle. Then it happened...

Ok, just had to use a little literary trick there to make you think something was up. What happened was I started to hear a thump, then another, from ahead in the distance. The thump was in a pattern, and sounded like a mini truck with huge speakers. Yes, it was music I heard, dance music. It kept getting louder, but I couldn't see through the thick of the jungle. The moonlight was still peeking its way through the bush and trees, and then I started to see what looked like colored disco lights. Literally one more hack and slash, and we were in a small clearing no bigger than my parent's backyard - about a half of a basketball court - and outside of that clearing was thick, unadulterated forest. On this clearing were about six 4' x 8' ply wood planks thrown down onto the ground to make a dance floor, a make shift bar with the classic palm tree fronds supported over it to give it that tiki-hut look, some make shift disco lights and an old-school ghetto-blaster (run by a small generator), and lots, dare I say it again - LOTS - of alcohol.

So, yah, this was really cool. Full moon just over the trees in the clearing (like, a huge, bright white body in the sky), seriously in the middle of nowhere jungle, warm night air, an apparent risky venture with Danish girls and a machete (and that bottle of tequila was already half way gone), and now a dance floor with more booze and music....all just out of nowhere. Incredible. This kind of stuff was not even on my radar, yet here I was doing it, experiencing it all. Life was amazing.

So I talked to the guy running this place. He was from Texas of all places. He was about 35, maybe 40, wore a Texas-style cowboy hat, even at night, and had decided to cash out in the states and move down to this jungle to just enjoy his life. Another person like the Swiss U2 bar owner. Just give it all up, head down, and live a life of fun and a lot less stress. Me being a young twenty-something still, that was how I perceived him . Now that I'm in my late 40's, I wonder if it really was less stressful to do that? Did these people have 401k's? Did they think about their retirement? I'm sure, with the certainty that they made their moves, that they must have known the risks, most likely didn't have a lot of money anyways, and just followed their hearts. How freakin' rad is that. There's all these people in the world, all these systems set up to give us security and comfort, but what we gain has a price, a sacrifice. We sacrifice our true nature the most, I feel. We sacrifice that "this is what I was meant to be" so often in trying to get a cush life and retirement. To this day, I know I'm not living the best life I can because I'm afraid to just give it all up and do what these people are doing. I know I would make out fine, I would be taken care of. My whole life I've been taken care of when I take risks, yet, can I take the ultimate risk and grab the fam by the hand and just head out to parts unknown to live out our lives as ex-pats? My wife is all for it, so it's not anyone else holding me back. My daughter has been to 23 countries already, by the age of 7 seven, and can sing happy birthday in 3 languages. Would I be endangering her if we just sold it all off and lived off of what we've made thus far? I mean, we could. There are places in the world that we want to be in, yet are we as safe as we think we are? The truth about it is, we're probably safer. Yes we have amazing hospitals here in the States (notice I didn't mention our health care system, that will be for another post), but honestly there are amazing doctors and really good facilities almost anywhere you go in the world, well, within a short flight if you need it anyways. The point is, you start realizing what it is that is holding you back is the familiar. The same thing that drives me away to travel so much is the same thing that keeps me at my job, at my home, and not growing like I can: the familiar. It is mainly a big part security, part habit and ritual, part family...all those things that you wake up and do over and over again, all those same places you go over and over again, all those same people you see and interact with routinely...all those familiar things are what keep me from being like that Texas Cowboy or that Swiss U2 fan. They are the same things that get me daydreaming of some Croatian beach, yet keep me in place to only visit that beach and not move there. You see, my grandpa did it right. When people ask me what he did for a living, the only thing I can come up with is that he was an entrepreneur, long before there was such a thing (at least in today's sense). He went from job to job, not to make a living, but to create his life. Big difference. He never thought about what kind of work he wanted to do next, instead he thought about where he wanted to be, what he wanted to see, and found just enough work to do it. Sure he dreamed big with some of his jobs, like owning restaurants and what not, but ultimately, he was all about the adventure. It hit me that night that he was just like that Cowboy and Swiss girl; he lived life on his own terms, not bound to any job or paycheck. Wow. It made me feel like a coward. Here I am, in the middle of the jungle, dancing with these amazing people in this incredible setting in the middle of nowhere, and I realize I am a coward. It didn't hit me full throttle, though. Being that I just started my career as a teacher and coach, and realizing that the two things I wanted to do in life (be a rock star or a professional baseball player) were not quite finding me the way I'd like, well, there was no way I was going to give up that teaching credential I just started using, and the steady paycheck that came with it. Nope. I was at a crossroads in my thoughts. That same credential and job had allowed me to be right there right then, in that incredible scene with brilliant and fun people. If that job allowed me to do that, then was I such a coward? Was I a fence sitter then? I'll take a little fun here and there, a paycheck more than not...it was a bit confusing for me. I'm still torn by the same feelings and I'm 50. At what point do I leave the nest and put all the eggs from that nest into one basket and bet on black? Just give it a shot and see what happens? My gramps did it, those other two did it, perhaps it was my turn? Hmmmm (and on an updated note: I did recently do just that).

Remember that Tiki Hut in the middle of the jungle? I did find a picture. Remember those two Danish girls? Well, these aren't them, and I have no idea who they are, but their picture with me ended up on my camera somehow. How did I NOT get a picture of the machete?

As I was letting those deep thoughts of self-cowardice and the courage of others creep their way into my night, it dawned on me to drink, dance, and have fun. I mean, come on. Look where I was. Look what I was doing. This was rad. Somehow or another more people showed up and the night went on. I probably drank too much, because there's a picture or two that got onto my camera (that I didn't even know I had) and well, one of them is up there. Now am I sorry about that? No. I'm sorry that I don't remember what happened after a certain point, or how we all made it back to the hostile in one piece, but we did. I was still in awe at the fact that I actually did something I never dreamed was possible, or could even conceive. I dance floor in the middle of the jungle. Go figure. What a great experience.

Palenque. An amazing archeological site that must have hosted some of the smartest civilizations known. This was the site that had the 8' sarcophagus with with an astronaut carved on the lid. You know, the ancient alien stuff that intrigued me to come here in the first place.

OK. Night is over. My grandpa was up early as always, and told me to get up so we wouldn't miss out on the continental breakfast. Smart. I dragged myself up and showered in our private bathroom (thanks again grandpa!). I got dressed in a jif, and we walked to the commons area. We grabbed a few pieces of really good tropical fruit and some hard boiled eggs. Made some toast and walked out to see the "ruins" that were the main lure for me to go on this trip. Ancient Aliens was not a TV show yet and the internet was not quite what it is today (well, it wasn't even a thing yet even though it's framework was being laid down at that time). So, I had with me a journal and two books. The journal was cool, it sort of helped me keep track of some things I saw and did (even though it wasn't a totally honest thing at the time..you see, I thought it was cool to take notes in a journal, and didn't really take notes in the journal to actually get anything out of it, other than to try and be the cool traveling guy that had a journal). The two books I had, though, were cool. Chariots of the Gods by Erich von Daniken and Genesis Resisted by Zecharia Sitchin (part of a series of books called the Earth Chronicles). Both books not only stated, but presented valid evidence of ancient knowledge that should not have been known back so ancient, you know? (Not my best grammatical moment there, but you get it). You see, the claims in these books come to the same conclusion: That we are not alone in this universe, and that intelligent life that far exceeds our own abilities and technology were here on this planet long ago, and the sarcophagus at this site in Palenque is a prime example of evidence left behind. Now, don't quote me on

precise facts here, but according to my research, this particular carving was on the sarcophagus (coffin) of King Pakal who lived from 603-683. Now, the eight foot bones thing is still debatable. Okay it could be myth, too. I can't really find evidence of that but I'm telling you, that was part of the story and lure that brought me there. So I'm going with it, I just won't state it! So, this coffin here, it looks like a typical meso-American carving, but when you turn it from sideways to vertical, well, it takes on a new meaning. Many believe that when turned vertically, it looks like a man going up in a rocket. I didn't need much of a stretch of my imagination to see it, clearly because I want to believe in such things. I mean, what do we really know about where we come from? As a matter of fact, I often

think that this should be the single most important topic in our species' history. People make fun of me for that, but I truly don't care. I mean, if this stuff is true, then think of all the lies we've been told. At some point, if this is true, this information was either covered up or just flat our lied about throughout the modern history we've all been taught. And if so, then why? It really takes you down a rabbit hole that I will discuss in my Tinfoil Hat section of this site, but for now, back to my story (after a couple more pictures of the rocket man of Palanque).

So here we are on our journey, my grandpa and I, on a short side trek to Mexico's southern most state Chiapas from our main stay in Oaxaca, and we're at another pyramid site. Funny, I distinctly remember standing near a structure there and looking at a heavily forested hill behind it. In looking at the hill, it was in the shape of a very large pyramid, as if the heavy growth of the tropical jungle was growing over a yet undiscovered structure. I even walked up to a worker there, most likely a custodian, and in my best Spanish, tried to have him look at the shape in the forest I saw. I think he understood, and he looked at it behind the structure we were standing on. I pointed up the one side of lush vegetation, to an apex, then back down the other side. He understood, I am sure, but he disagreed. To me it was clear as day that the forest was oddly shaped like a large pyramid behind the structure we were standing on, but the worker told me with a thick Spanish accent, but in English, "eet's a heeel" ("it's a hill").

OK. I'll take that. I don't think it is, and if someone would have given me a machete, I would have hacked my way into the base of a newly discovered ancient pyramid. I was sure of it, but my grandpa had other ideas. "Boy, let's go get some lunch and pack our stuff, we gotta' catch the bus back to Oaxaca!"

So, my curiosities were put on hold as we walked to the little indoor snack bar that sold little sandwiches and other things. We got a coke and light snack, and haled a cab to take us back to the bus station which was about 15 minutes away. Apparently, my grandpa knew I was enjoying myself and let me fart around there much longer than we needed because we were cutting it close. We had a 1 o'clock bus departure and it was about 12:15 as we were stepping into the cab. We said our symbolic goodbyes to this wonderful place and headed up the road back to the bus station. As we were driving back, I recall seeing some soldiers training in the forest with real guns and what not. I asked the cab driver what was going one and he said they weren't national soldiers, but they were Zapatistas, a far-left libertarian socialist group that controls much of the area in and around Chiapas. WHAT? You mean, I just saw rebel fighters in person, like in Star Wars? Well, their political preferences could be debated, but that didn't interest me, I just thought it was cool that such a thing could exist right before my eyes. One of them even waved to me in a friendly way, so I waved back. Crazy. As we continued to drive, I noticed on the other side of the single lane road that cut through the heavy forest, a huge motorcade of cars and trucks, all with Mexican National soldiers, and thought "Oh crud, they're going to snuff out those other soldiers!" I inquired to the cab driver in my broken Spanish, which was becoming quite understandable to the locals by this time, and he let me know that although the two sides did not get along, there was a truce for the day because someone named Vicente Fox was going to be giving a speech there, in an effort to get the two sides to get along. Vicente Fox would become the president of Mexico, but he was not quite that role yet. I remember seeing a billboard advertising him going to be there to speak. He was dressed in farmer's clothes and a farmer's hat on the billboard. Funny, I remember seeing the same billboard in Mexico City, but he was wearing a suit and tie on that one. Politicians are all the same, I came to realize.

So, we get to the bus station, after about a 15 minute drive, and it's coming up on 12:30. This bus is loading up and will depart at 1:00. "Uo oh!" My grandpa said to me. "Boy, you gotta go back. I think I left my wallet at that cafe at the pyramids!" "What? I mean, can't we just go without it?" I asked him. This was the first time my grandpa showed a little bit of uneasiness (other than the constipation day). He was generally concerned about getting his wallet back, and convinced me to get back in the cab and go get it. Here it was, 12:30, the bus leaves in 1/2 hour, and it took 15 minutes to get here...without the motorcade on our side of the street. Yah, that long line of cars and trucks with soldiers in them holding huge guns, yah that one. I would have to get by that thing, find the wallet, and get back all within 1/2 hour (and remember how long it took to get here without traffic!). Ok, let's do this. I ran back to the cab and smiled at the taxi driver who just dropped us off. He smiled back in a way that told me he understood exactly what we needed to do. As I got in the cab and he started driving, just for the sake of making it official, I told him what we needed to do, but he was already flying down the road back to the Palenque site. He knew our bus was supposed to leave at 1:00, and kept going faster and faster. OK, I'm a little nervous, but, no worries. I spoke too soon. The motorcade was quickly approaching, however, he did not slow down. I started to say something, but he swerved to the other side of the road and started honking his horn madly. Like, madly. This was the first time I thought I may get injured or even die on this trip. Not only were we speeding on the other side of the road, but we were doing it as we passed a huge motorcade of heavily guarded soldiers who were there to protect a political figure (most likely from madmen like us in this car). We were literally swerving in and out of this motorcade, getting up to about 80 mph, then slamming on the breaks to get out of the way of oncoming traffic, all while these soldiers were yelling and waving their guns in the air at us, really. The driver, however, seemed to enjoy it. With every motorcade car we passed, I noticed the soldiers were actually smiling and laughing as our honking mad-car was speeding by them. They were waving their machine guns, but they were waving them in a victory sort of way, like wishing us Godspeed and good luck. My nerves settled a little bit as we reached the front of the motorcade and they pulled off to a clearing on the right, where I saw the guest speaker delivering his speech to a modest crowd. Wow. Back on our side of the road but still going fast.

We got to the snack bar pretty quickly. I didn't have the time of course, so I had no idea how we were doing on the bus departure. Although I'm certain we got there pretty quickly, it felt like an eternity as I was positive we were either going to crash, burn, and die, or, get shot at by the Mexican National Security Forces protecting the next president. No matter, we got there and I ran in and the same lady who gave us our sandwiches was still working. Before I could ask if anyone turned in a brown wallet, she held it up from behind the counter and smiled. Wow! I was so happy. She handed it over because she remembered this gringo, and I had nothing to give her in return. I remember my grandpa had no money in that wallet, just some pictures and credit cards, along with a standard CA Driver's License. We didn't bring passports on this trip, they never really looked for that stuff there back then.

Wow, I felt really badly that I didn't have any money to give the nice lady who held onto my grandpa's wallet. I looked at her with my palms out, as if to say, "I'm a poor white boy from Orange County, I have no..." and she sort of stopped me halfway through my expression with a big smile that said "Don't worry poor white boy from The OC, I got your back. Down a shot of Don Julio in my honor." I learned when I was really young, but reaffirmed it over and over on this trip, that it's always better to be too nice than to be a jerk. She remembered me when I walked in because I smiled and tipped her the remaining change I had in my pockets when we left, and she gladly held onto my grandpa's wallet until I returned. Would she have done that had I not tipped her? You bet. Would she have done it had I been a jerk? I'm certain she would have. People are nice. I was learning that more and more now, and my views on the world were changing. You see, we are the world (thank you Quincy Jones). You and I are what makes this place we call Earth. We can make it however we want to, but I guess we just have to agree on what we want.

Now the fun began....I'll spare you the speeding details, but let's just say I made it back to the bus with about 3 minutes to spare. When I ran out of the cab and smiled at the Taxi driver, my grandpa smiled from ear to ear and paid for the cab. He laughed and said "Boy if you could have seen the look on your face when that cab pulled out of here, you lost all your color and I thought you were going to pass out!" He laughed, and we walked on to the bus and to our seats on our return to Oaxaca City. Unbelievable. I started writing this recollection so long ago, for this blog-cast, and I feel like I have pages to go still. Forgive me, the details just come rushing back as I sit down to type about it. I hope you don't mind, but it's very therapeutic for me. Another reason travel is so awesome, the memories that flood back in are real, they aren't foggy, and you don't have to think about them, just like the truth. I asked my grandpa at dinner on that first day together in Oaxaca City if he had any regrets in life. He smiled and said "Only the things I never did, everything else I learned from. It's like telling the truth, boy. You never have to remember what you said when you tell the truth. So I live my life with no regrets either." I didn't quite catch on to how he connected those two things at the time, but as I get older, it continues to make more and more sense to me.

If you look in the lower left of my picture here, you can see pyramid-shaped tree lines just behind the temples

"W," Pen Pals, Ceviche on the Beach, and that French Girl.

How in the heck does George W. Bush come into all this? Well, sit back and listen. I mean, I need to wrap this thing up, but I just keep remembering more and more - which, is rad. Remember, this trip was about 3 1/2 weeks long, but it felt like a lifetime, and to this day, was one of the most liberating times in my life. So, we took the 21 hour bus ride back from Chiapas to Oaxaca City, where we had 3 days more to hang out before we finally get to go to Puerto Escondido to drop off that damned microwave and hang out on the beach at Alejandria's, a resort that one of my grandpa's friend's from the restaurant business in OC now owned and was fixing it up to reopen again.

So we're back in Oaxaca City, back in that really cute place that was all white with the nice old lady who never stopped sweeping. We walked back in after getting out of the cab and she smiled, gave us a big hug, and unlocked the closet where our suitcases were. I don't remember much about the bus and cab ride back, but when we did get back, I was a bit tired and rested that first day back in the capital city. The next day my grandpa and I decided to go check out some historical things, like the big church in town built by the Spaniards. While we were there, we were in a hallway looking at old documents and paintings in a museum near the old church, and I heard the sound of a Texas accent behind us. I turned and looked and there were two girls, right around my age, and they both had these amazing smiles that just lit up the place. After my bout in the rain forest with machetes, wrong way taxi-drivers, and Zapatistas training near Vicente Fox, I figured I could approach anyone about anything. I approached the girl with the Texas accent, as I couldn't make out the accent of the other girl. I can't recall just what stupid things I said, but it must not have been too bad since I got smiles from both girls. I do remember commenting on the one with a Texan accent, and asked her if she was from Texas. Honestly, I can't remember if she was or wasn't, but we seemed to hit it off right away and conversation came easily. There was a lot of laughter and fun with both of them, and as you can see from the picture above, they took to my grandpa well as he did to them. So, the one on the left with the Texan draw was named Darla. I remember she had a long German-type last name, ending in "burger" or something like that, and I feel terribly that I don't remember. Turns out, Darla and her friend were pen-pals. Her friend was from Mexico City and they were childhood pen pals which I thought was really cool, especially since it was real pen-and-ink writing, long before the internet and social media. Darla flew in to Mexico City to meet her, and from there they headed down to Oaxaca for some sightseeing.

As the day went on, we found ourselves continuing to hang out with each other. My grandpa would tell stories, the girls would laugh, and I would laugh along with them. It was a fun time. Really innocent and new. I was beginning to take a liking to Darla; she was cute and really smart. They were both really cute and smart, actually, and I was happy to be in their company. Turns out, Darla was a personal advisor to George W. Bush, when he was the owner of the Texas Rangers and I think governor of Texas at that time. We talked a lot of baseball because she would go to the games with him a lot. Her job was to inform him about the people and relationships he had with them each time he had trips or important meetings. Say he had an engagement somewhere, she would get there a couple of days before he did and get all the names and stories down and report back to him with who he was meeting, how he knew them, and so on. I thought that was cool. I mean, when you get to that level of "big," you're going to know (and need to remember) a of people.

So as we continued to hang out, it was clear Darla and I were growing fond of each other. I really enjoyed hanging out with both of them, but when we met the next day, with my grandpa, Darla and I seemed to do all the talking with each other, and the others didn't mind at all. They both had smirky smiles on their faces as we would walk ahead or behind them. I didn't want the other girl to feel uncomfortable around my grandpa since it was obvious as the time went on that Darla

and I were hitting it off, but she was really cool about it and so was my grandpa. We ended up spending 3 days together, going to a movie, hanging out and so on, and the end result was a nice romantic kiss goodbye when we had to part. I hadn't kissed a girl in a while at that point, and it felt good to know I was still able to make connections like that with good people. My grandpa and I were headed to Puerto Escondido the next day, and I had a microwave to deliver. I've always remembered Darla (and God I hope that's her name), and I always wondered if she stayed on board with "W" for his trip to the Whitehouse. If so, I'd love to hear some of her stories, she was really good at telling them.

So, it's the last leg of our trip. 3 more days and we're dejando Mexico...that's leaving Mexico....my Spanish was getting better.

As we got back to the airport, I noticed the plane we were walking to, carrying that big-ass microwave with me, was about as big as that microwave. It was a single engine propeller plane that seated 8. It had a single Captain and a single flight attendant, but you couldn't stand up a single time in it and it had no bathroom. Here we go! The flight wasn't too bad, although the floor started filling up with smoke when we reached our maximum altitude. Not sure what that was about, but...we made it. My grandpa had no idea where his friend's place was, all he kept telling me to say to the taxi drivers was "Alejandria's on the Beach." Sounds about right.

So here is where details get a little foggy. This part of the trip included some really good food, a whole fish, some really bad food, a lot of beach and big waves, a smoking hot French girl, a rescue, a near hospital trip, and Montezuma's revenge. Those are the main focal points I remember for this leg of Mexico, and the details in between are foggy for a good reason. I think viewing the picture below explains a bit here.

As you can see, I seem to be enjoying myself...immensely. It never dawned on me until writing this that maybe I was having a little too much fun at this point in the trip. Check out my grandpa and his two friends. My grandpa, who was pushing 90, was keeping me from falling over. His friend was on board as well. WTF was I thinking? That's pretty rude, in retrospect...meet someone for the first time, they take you in, feed you, show you around, and you become such a blabbering idiot to the point that they need to help you walk back to the car and drive you back. You see, at that time, I had finally let my guard down. We were going on three weeks in this once "unknown" country, where only

"foreigners" lived...ha, I mean, that's how I thought (seriously, how do normally good people arrive at such a backwards way of thinking? It's almost embarrassing). And once we got to my grandpa's friend's place, we were no longer alone. We had back-up, reinforcements, locals. I could let my guard down and be the dumb tourist finally, with no worry about consequences and mis-perceived safety issues; we were good. That being said, I started downing beers like water. But let me digress a minute here with some details.

Three places pop into mind here: Puerto Escondido, Puerto Angel, and Le Alejandria. You see, my grandpa kept telling me his friend had a resort...but was it called "Le Alejandria" or was it the village of Le Alejandria, or maybe both. As we rolled in the very first day, we were dropped off at a large facility, about 100 yards inland from the beach, that had been cleared of many of the trees and replaced with a main building and several palm-frawn topped huts. We took our bags to the main building, which was in essence a cafeteria and I could not wait to deliver that big-ass microwave that literally sat on my skinny white legs the last four hours, both on that plane made of legos and the taxi ride over. As we walked in and were greeted by the biggest smiles you've ever encountered, a quick scan of the are revealed about four microwaves in the cafeteria kitchen...so...yah. My grandpa hadn't been there in a while, and he was a man of his word. He had promised his friend that when he came back again, he would bring a microwave. Good ol' grandpa, always keeping his word! When I set the microwave down, and my grandpa's friend and his family looked at it, they truly did not remember that my grandpa had promised them one. "Well," I thought, "at least this will make a good story some day." (I don't even think they took it out of the box!)

So, here we are at some of the finest beaches in the world. Puerto Escondido is pretty amazing, along with Puerto Angel, and a major surfing event had just concluded. My grandpa's friend's resort was nearby both of those places, but his resort was being renovated and looked like it had been closed down for a while. Didn't matter, we were staying in a cool little grass hut that had A/C and a nice view. His friend's mom would cook for us all, and she made some great dishes. One of them was a fried fish, like, the entire fish, eyeballs and all, breaded up and served on a plate with a lime and some fresh salsa. I really didn't know how to eat it...was I supposed to cut the head off and dig out the meat? Or was I supposed to pick it up like a popsicle and crunch crunch away...? It was clear, we weren't in a tourist place, we were in a small local village and I was learning how they did things. It was awesome.

As you can see, Puerto Escondido has a world-class break. We came out one morning to watch the waves and the surfers. Growing up in So Cal, I was no stranger to the beach and to nice waves, however, since just about everyone I knew growing up surfed, and I didn't (I was always playing baseball in the summertime), I opted to rent a boogie board. This place had a weird break that I had never seen: there was a shore break that came out of nowhere, and way out past the shelf, about 100 yards out, the monster waves were breaking heavily

Ceviche and the French Girl

No way was I going to attempt to ride those big ones way out there. It looked like they were 15' on the face, way out of my league. No worries, there was a little jetty that sort of separated the men from the boys, and I was happy to boogie with the boys. As I rode a few waves and

got acclimated, I noticed the water began behaving differently. Where I was standing, it was about waist deep, then suddenly the entire shoreline would rush out and I would be standing on sand, then when I turned around, a huge wave was about to crash on me. It was definitely not the type of wave I was used to from So Cal. I was getting hungry so I went in to grab a bite to eat. As my grandpa and I sat on the beach, two young boys were going around selling ceviche in small plastic cups with bags of corn chips on the side. "Sure!" I ate grasshoppers in Oaxaca City, what could be so bad about eating raw fish mixed with several other unidentifiable objects in what looks like

murky sewer water, being sold by a couple of seven-year-olds? "I'll have two!" I gobbled them both up. I hung out with my grandpa a bit on the sand. He didn't seem his normal cheery, excited self. It makes me wonder if we showed up unannounced, as if they did not know we were coming. I also look back and wonder if I was just being a complete D-Bag. I mean, I was realllly comfortable at this point in the trip, almost cocky. I'm always nice, that's never an issue, but I wonder now if I was overdoing it at this point in the trip and that my grandpa was a little bit over it. It didn't matter. We were at the beach, the weather was amazing, and what mine eyes had laid upon at that moment I will never forget...

The waves had picked up significantly, even in the little boys section. There were no lifeguards, and not many people around. I glanced out and there was someone struggling to get back in from the water, caught in a bad rip current. I grabbed my boogie board and ran out to see if I could help. As I got closer to her, words cannot describe the beauty I was taking in (and I'm not talking about the beach). She had short dark hair, barely past her neck, about 5'6", brown eyes and I'll spare you the details on her beautiful figure. As I continued to go further out towards her, it was clear she could not get back in, and as beautiful as she was, it started to get scary. A big wave was coming in, so I lunged for her with my boogie board and held on to her so she could grab the board and stay above water as much as possible. In the turmoil, after the wave past, she lost her bikini top. It headed towards the shoreline with the last wave like a cat running away from the neighbor's dog; it was gone. She made no attempt to cover herself (thank God), and smiled at me for helping her and softly said "merci." As she stood there , in her full beautiful glory, another wave was rapidly approaching. I had her jump on the board and I pulled her in with the leash until we were clear of the breaking waves. "Merci" she said again. Holy crap. She's French. I took French in high school. As a matter of fact, I took French in high school for this EXACT MOMENT. You see, my high school offered French, German, and Spanish. A good buddy of mine named Dave agreed that we should take French because "chicks would dig it." We went on to take two years, getting C's, but we had a great teacher who never gave up on us (even when we mainly messed around in there). Dave took the French name of Jacques, and I chose Jean Paul after Jean Paul Belmondo, the French version of James Bond. So, here I was, not in France, but in another country, and I'm standing with a naked French girl who is thanking me for rescuing her. OK, reality check....is this REALLY happening? Well, to try and make the situation a little more bearable, I grabbed her bikini top from the water and handed it to her. She gave me another "merci" as I asked her "parlez-vous Anglais?" to which she cracked the slightest little smile, exposing the cutest dimples I've ever seen, and shook her head "non." "Parlez-vous Espanol?" (which I figured she didn't, but I was doing everything I could to make this moment last as long as possible). "Non." Again, with the dimples. Then I broke out the big guns: "Je parle un peu français, est ce que ça va maintenant?" "Oui," she said, sort of putting her hands together, tilting her head a little, and smiling uncontrollably. To quote Doc Holiday in Tombstone, it was an "enchanted moment." By the way, even though I handed her her bikini top about 3 minutes ago, she still hadn't put it on. Just sayin'. Then, the unexpected happened: "Je voudrais te rembourser pour m'avoir sauvé. Puis-je vous emmener dîner ce soir ?" In other words, she wanted to "pay me back for saving her" and wanted to take me out to dinner that night. "Oui," I said, "J'aimerais ça" - I would like that. She pointed to a little cafe where the beach started, up on a hill, and said to meet her there when it gets dark. She smiled, put on her bikini top, and walked away all while turning her head to keep smiling at me. Holy cow. French class finally paid off! If cell phones were around, I would have called my friend Dave/Jacques and told him what just happened. It was unbelievable.

The End is Near

So as I walked from the shore back to my grandpa, who witnessed the entire encounter that just took place, he looked at me with the biggest grin on his face and said "boy, we'd better go back and get cleaned up, looks like you have a date tonight!" I agreed, and we walked back to our place. It was a few miles, but my grandpa enjoyed walking. Later on in his life, about five or six years after this trip, his knees went bad. The doctors refused to give him a knee replacement surgery, stating he was too old, to which he told them "If I can't walk around, then I don't want to live, and you'll be the one that will have to live with that if I die

Me, my grandpa's friend to the right, and his wonderful, beautiful family. No, that's not a t-shirt under my shirt, that's my classic baseball farmer's coaching tan.

in a wheelchair" - so of course, the doctors gave him his surgery.

The picture above was just after we got back from the beach. I had cleaned up, we had a family style late-lunch, and the grandma made me a terrific meal with homemade salsas and other delicious seafood yummies. One of the salsas she made was so hot, but they taught me to use a limon (lime) and squeeze the juice on my tongue to get rid of the burn. And it worked, of course. Man, the things you learn when you travel. So, as we were finishing up our meal (and you can clearly see the excitement in my face as I can't wait to get out of there and back to the French girl), I felt a rumbling in my belly. I excused myself to go back to our cabana to use the restroom, and from there, all I can remember was pain, agony, and then nothing. Yes, I lied down on my bed and literally blacked out. I don't remember doing so, but I was out cold, unconscious, and remained that way for almost 30 hours according to my grandpa. They had even called a doctor to come look at me right before I finally came out of it. You...have...GOT..to...be...shitting...me. Does this mean I stood up the French girl? Oh man. I can't believe I missed that opportunity. Never in my life had anyone looked at me the way she did that day on the beach, and I missed it because of an urge to try something new. What a disaster. Yep, it was that ceviche on the beach from those two boys. When I woke up in my bed, my grandpa's friend asked me what I ate, and I told him, and his face was both in laughter and disbelief. "You should never eat from the vendors here, especially the kids!" Now he tells me. I'm imagining the sewer water flavor it had was authentic. So with all the good I had been learning from my new travels abroad, there were also hard lessons to be learned: Do your homework, ask about safety (especially when it comes to health-related things like food), and for God's sake don't buy ceviche on the beach in a plastic cup from young boys. My grandpa lived about seven more years after this trip, and each time I saw him, and to his dying day, he would remind me "Boy, you better get back to Mexico, there's a cute French girl on the beach still waiting for you!"

Not my photo, but this is an actual sign from the beach I was on in Puerto Escondido. Good thing for me the French Girl couldn't read/understand Spanish.

All good things must....well, not end, but transition into something else. You see, there is no end. Like the cliche-turned-wow-this-is-deep-now-that-I'm-older lyric once said so eloquently, "oh ya, life goes on, long after the thrill of living is gone." We keep going, keep marching on, even when it's not any longer you or me. When you really start to grasp that concept, you begin to understand that not many things really matter in life. Really. Very few things, if even just a few, are truly meaningful. Love of course, and it's components of truth and goodness, with an appreciation of beauty, are probably the only things that go with us when we leave this place. I don't think any other baggage will get through the screeners when the time comes for there to be no more time. That said, it was time to take my grandpa home. It was time for me to get back as well. My friend Mike was getting married and the boys were going to go to our buddy Scott's cabin in the Sequoias to do a little bachelor partying in the woods together. My stomach was still not ok. I was in a lot of pain, and I couldn't hold anything in. I wasn't throwing up or anything like that, it was total lack of bladder control (aren't you glad I shared that?). Think of it this way: We had to get back on that little 8-person propeller plane and fly back to Mexico City this time. On a commercial jet, it's about one hour and fifteen minutes. On this Lego plane, it was four hours. That's four hours without a

bathroom and a complete loss of intestinal fortitude. I told my grandpa we were going to stop at a pharmacy on the way of out town. Not really knowing what to get, my only concern was preventing something disgustingly tragic from happening on that little plane for the next four hours. So I grabbed a bottle of Pepto Bismol, some antacids, some milk and magnesium chalky pill things, and a few other items I thought would put a cork into matters. I made my purchases, we drove to the little airport, I put way too much of the over-the-counter garbage into my body before boarding the plane, and within minutes of taking off, smoke was filling the little cabin again where we sat in the plane. Ahh, you gotta' love travelling! (Side note - whatever concoption I put in me worked to keep me in check until we reached a proper facility...just sayin').

Grow. It's about growing.
Next stop, Bosnia.

So that's it. I really didn't think I would recall so much after almost three decades of time gone by. But one thing I have learned as a teacher is that memory and learning, are attached to feeling. How you feel at a certain time is what you remember, not so much what you learn. Do you remember where you were on 9/11/01? Because of how you felt, you can remember just about every aspect of that day. How about on 8/11/01? Probably not so much (unless you had something significant happen that evoked a strong feeling). So yes, the feelings from my trip to Oaxaca were joyful, exciting, and new. Those are all wonderful states to exist in, and recalling accounts came back easily. It makes you wonder then, how can we make ourselves feel that way all the time? I always say after a vacation: "How can I make this my life every day?" After this trip, I began to travel a lot more, and when I got married to my amazing wife Kimberly, her travel lust was contagious as well and our days and years together have been filled with amazing sights, places, food, and above all, amazing people. And that's the point of all this. There are amazing people out there, and we are amazing people - you, I, all of us. We need to remember that. My transformation is always underway, but this first trip to Mexico with my grandpa really opened the door to a better world for me, and I so desperately needed it. I see people who used to be like me all the time, where everything from their daily decisions all the way to their philosophical ideologies and way of life, are all based on fear and ignorance. It's not their fault - they just don't know any better. People who travel to places not like their own tend to understand this more. It's my hope that someone will read this and get the urge to go somewhere they've never gone, do something they've never done, and be someone they've always wanted to be. And when they do, they need to keep doing it, because the everyday grind of job and society can really trap a person. So they, we, need to make it happen, not make an excuse. Dream it, dream big, fall in love with it, and make it happen. That's how we need to be. That's how we grow, that's how we transform from the closed-minded sheltered kid that I was to the curious and grateful person I am now. Am I done? I hope not. Not growing is dying, so I need to feed and water my soil, get some sunlight on my leaves, and let the wind push me where I need to be. Not moving, not pushing towards that is just muerte in my small opinion.

Been There

Intro: What a Tool

oaxaca, mexico

With a side trip to Chiapas and the Palenque Ruins

The quintessential "I have arrived" picture: I'm traveling, I'm young with a little bit of cash, I gotta' get a beer and look smug. I really didn't like beer, but like I said, it was quintessential.

Oaxaca is both a state and a city, the capital city of the same name. I really didn't expect old, Spanish-style architecture. Like I said, I was clueless. But what a first trip to get indoctrinated into the world of travel.

Let the Games Begin

A Douche for his Cola

South to Palenque and the Pyramids

Ceviche and the French Girl

The End is Near

Grow. It's about growing.
Next stop, Bosnia.

About Me

Join My Mailing List

Been There

Intro: What a Tool

oaxaca, mexico

With a side trip to Chiapas and the Palenque Ruins

The quintessential "I have arrived" picture: I'm traveling, I'm young with a little bit of cash, I gotta' get a beer and look smug. I really didn't like beer, but like I said, it was quintessential.

Oaxaca is both a state and a city, the capital city of the same name. I really didn't expect old, Spanish-style architecture. Like I said, I was clueless. But what a first trip to get indoctrinated into the world of travel.

Let the Games Begin

A Douche for his Cola

South to Palenque and the Pyramids

Ceviche and the French Girl

The End is Near

Grow. It's about growing. Next stop, Bosnia.

Join My Mailing List

Grow. It's about growing.
Next stop, Bosnia.