Livin' La Vida Loca

I chose this title as its about the only Spanish I know, thanks to Ricky Martin... but I don't know that it's necessarily appropriate in this instance... you'll have to see and let me know...

We left Las Cruces and from there it was only about 40 minutes drive to El Paso, Texas. To be honest, I didn’t really think very much of El Paso because it was really just another city, and also the road signs were really confusing. If you actually followed them you just went around in giant circles. Every other sign seemed to point to Mexico, but in a conflicting or contradictory direction to the previous one, and then once you got on that road there were no more signs (usually an indication that you’d made a wrong turn). So after a very long time messing around trying to figure out where to go, I finally spied out of the corner of my eye a very small, partially obscured sign for the pedestrian bridge to Mexico and we followed it down to 2 guys in fluoro jackets waving down people with airline batons into their car park. It cost like $3 to park all day there. We grabbed our stuff and set off for the bridge. The bridge was really cheap, it cost something like 60 cents to cross over the border into Mexico Absolutely no one checked our passport leaving the US or even arriving in Mexico, so all that worry and bitty internet research re visas for Mexico was completely a waste of time. The only customs officer we had anything to do with on the way over was a US one who came up and had a bit of a go at us for taking photos on the bridge, as we were therefore stationery for a while there and apparently that area is ripe for “jumpers” - people who try jumping off the bridge into the US as illegal immigrants. To be honest I don’t get it, that side of the footpath is one way into Mexico, so how a Mexican would be there (obviously coming from Mexico) jumping into the US I don’t know. Plus Agnieszka and I clearly look like Mexican refugees or something, don’t we.

Anyway, we moved on. I was glad we were walking into Mexico and not taking the car, because the traffic waiting to get into the US was backed up so far it would’ve taken literally hours to clear. Everyone wants to come to the States, I guess. Land of opportunity and all.

We stepped off the bridge into Cuidad Juarez and it was as if we’d arrived on another planet. The stark contrast between wealthy, affluent, first world America and its poor third world cousin is the like the difference between chalk and cheese or black and white. It really hit you fair in the face. The smooth, well paved, well maintained roads, new, shiny vehicles of America as opposed to the dirty, dusty, uneven and unkempt footpaths and old, broken down jalopies of Mexico. It was really stark.

We walked a little way down the street and felt like we were back in the Middle East again (“come look my shop” or “You want taxi? Taxi to city centre” - even though its a very short walk). As we hadn’t really had breakfast (not that we really did most days, anyway), we stopped off at a quaint little cantina and ordered an omelette.

All I can say is, I hope their cooking hygiene standards in the kitchen are higher than their bathroom hygiene standards, because in the bathroom we found dried vomit in the sink which had obviously been there quite some time. I would hate to get food poisoning from this omelette!

Fortunately the food tasted pretty good and I didn’t seem to suffer any adverse effects... not yet anyway...

After brunch we continued our jaunt down the dusty road to a crossroad, opposite which was the old Town Hall or something. Now its the local museum, and as it was free, we decided to go in. All in Spanish mind, but it seemed to have a good display of Mexican Revolution history as well as a small, but good quality, art gallery.

We then spent some time wandering the streets, and found a lovely little park in front of the beautiful Cathedral, but still, the level of poverty around was quite depressing, so it wasn’t long before we found overselves heading back to the border. En route Aga tried to download her photo memory card to CD at the local pharmacy. This turned out to be quite a palaver, as the woman working the machine firstly didn’t seem to know how to use it, and then secondly after about 40 minutes of ‘burning photos to CD’ it blasted thing locked up! Well, there was no way we were going to waste another 40 minutes there, so we told the woman not to worry about it and then ran out of the shop before she could make us pay for the partially burned CD (which of course is now no longer usable!).

We had a quick look through a general bric-a-brac market that had clearly seen better days (“come look my shop”), and then made for the border. En route we were approached by several beggars, including a US one who gave us some sob story about needing several dollars to get back to the States, and he’d been on some mercy mission to get his daughter out of Mexico, or some rubbish like this - but it was clear he was either an alcoholic or a crack addict with Parkinsons, so we left him alone and walked across the border.

At the border again we had to provide our intimate details and list of bodily functions before being allowed back in. We jumped in the car and then we were off on the highway again... off to Tombstone, Arizona...