If you're in Arizona, like I am, you've been hearing about Mexico in the news almost daily. Sometimes it's SB1070, sometimes it's drug wars; we've heard it all. A couple of friends and I wanted to take a trip before school got in full motion. Mexico, with it's beautiful beaches and great food, was just too tempting to resist, in spite of the apparent danger (and a little bit because of it, actually). Mexico definitely lived up to it's reputation!
We wanted to go to Rocky Point, but no one wanted to risk driving their car into the country. We decided to park on the border and walk across. Mexicali was the closest to Yuma, where we were staying, so we decided to go there.
My good friend Jeff S lived in Mexico, so he was a great guide. I think we got a pretty real Mexico experience, but I'll let the pics do most of the talking:
Mexicali is actually a pretty decent sized city, as you can see above. Lots of cars, big open streets in some parts. It was actually not very touristy in most parts, which surprised me a lot. Once we got deep into the down-town part of the city we were the only Americans in sight!
You may be asking yourself: "How did he get downtown?"
We took a bus! In all honesty, I was a little spooked by the idea of using a foreign bus system, but Jeff assured me that we could find our way back, so we all handed the bus driver nine pesos and climbed aboard! Wanting to get the real Mexico experience, I sat down next to a local, who seemed a little uneasy by my presence. I tried to take the above pic as covertly as I could to not draw attention to ourselves.
Buildings in this state of disrepair were a very common sight as we walked around the city. Jeff asked some locals for directions to a good area for food. His directions led us on foot for about 15 minutes.
We went down a couple streets and alleyways (you can see Jeff W in one of them above) This was the only point I was really nervous throughout the whole thing; everywhere we went, we drew a ton of attention. People constantly asked us for "Just one peso," in broken English as we walked and several times a random man would yell "What are you doing here!?" menacingly. Jeff S instructed us to ignore them, saying we wouldn't run into problems if we didn't engage them.
I tried to be respectful and not take pictures of locals without their permission, but this guy was too legit NOT to take a photo of.
We also passed this truly disgusting building on our quest for food. I won't go into the details of why it is a disgusting building. I will only tell you that local, less then virtuous looking, women seemed to be advertising something at the hotel entrance. In a different photo you can see one of these women, but I didn't want to post it for several reasons. You can make your own inferences as to what kind of hotel this is. We actually ran into one of the staff managers for the hotel too.
We finally did find some food. You can see Jeff W selecting some pastries above. This place was awesome: the pastries were delicious, a poorly-made movie was playing on a small TV and they sold glass bottles of Coke that you were compelled to drink on the premises or pay extra.
Unfortunately I didn't get a photo of the taco stand we went to, but let me assure you, it was fantastic. The tacos were the best I've ever had and the restaurant was was filled with locals. We ordered a drink called "Jamaica Water" which is made of hibiscus flowers and water. It was also great. The building looked like a slaughterhouse was located in the back and the ceiling was literally dripping in grease, but that didn't bother us at all.
We talked to a lot of interesting people on the way out of Mexico, including one guy who told us he had jumped the border earlier that day and been taken back by Border Patrol. He let us know he'd be trying again soon. The guy in the picture followed us for almost an hour and a half. He turned out to be pretty cool though, and he let us take a photo with him. He followed us right up to the border and, admittedly, we were sad to part with him there. Jeff gave him the rest of his mango drink, and we gave him a Popsicle stick (at his request, he said he wanted to use it to build up his house), among a couple other things.
