5 Most Salient Memories: Chihuahua

Chihuahua is a sprawling jumble of a desert city, blanketed by a perpetual cloud of dust and pollution.  As far as the tourist goes, there's basically nothing to see, which is perhaps the reason I failed to encounter a single other white person in my seven days there.  Yes, it's an unimpressive city, and if all I'd seen were the buildings and museums I doubt I would have stayed in Chihuahua more than two days, but with all the friendly people I met and the amazing experiences my host Abiel included me in, in that short week Chihuahua grew to be a place I truly learned to love.  Looking back on my time there, these are the five experiences that stand out the most:


1) Hanging out for four days behind the counter of my host's art store, laughing and joking with three of the workers (Kenia, Fuyi, and Michel).  I learned more about mexican food and culture from them than I ever could have imagined.


2) Learning to swim the backstroke, all in Spanish.  When your ears are filled with water and there's an impossible echo-- not to mention the splashing waves and other people yelling-- it's sort of an exciting act of pantmime.


3) Seeing an interior designer doing his thing in a person's home.  It's truly a thing of beauty to watch the paintings being chosen, the colors being selected, and the furniture being laid out so as to best accentuate the natural beauty of the room as well as highlight the natural advantages of the home's owner.

4) Getting the VIP treatment at the most expensive and exlusive bar in Chihuahua (granted, this was because I was there with several millionaires; I guess I was part of the entourage, which is still kinda cool)

5) Dancing for two hours with a cute 22-year-old Chihuahuan schoolteacher while getting tips on how to pick up chicks from a local guy who acted as my wingman for the night.  The girl was ultimately not that interested, but the wingman was such a genuinely nice guy and taught me a lot about Mexican women (with which he was clearly quite successful, based on what I saw).  It's odd how many incredibly nice and helpful Mexicans I've met in so many unexpected places.

Dulce's Bust

It was in Chihuahua that I first became acquainted with the cruelties that can be wrought by fame, fortune, and beauty, for it was there that I met a woman who had been marred by all three since birth.  Her name was Dulce-- the Spanish word for ''sweet''-- and already in her teens she had been christened by society as ''the legend of Chihuahua.''  It seems fitting then, given the incessant worship she received, that I should meet her at a party thrown in her honor, for I was at Dulce's house to celebrate her 30th birthday.

From the moment my friend Abiel and I arrived, I began to see how Dulce's life was ordered.  The house itself was huge, placed firmly in the most exclusive gated community in Chihuahua.  From the outside one saw the ornate windows and the attractive, well-kept façade.  Inside one was met with spacious rooms, vaulted ceilings, and hand-carved wooden tables gilded with solid gold.  Beautiful Egyptian-made chairs with intricate designs further added to the awesome display of wealth.  Yet as I admired the furniture, I couldn't help but notice the otherwise empty, white-walled rooms.  There were no pictures, no books, no plants or paintings or signs of any life.  It was as if wealth had been simply dumped into the cold, hollow rooms to try to fill them up, like money stuffed in a hole to plug a leak.

When I finally met Dulce she was sitting upon a leather couch, watching a monstrougly large television that, along with the couch, herself, and a bust, almost fully described the items in the room.  At first I didn't even notice the bust, so transfixed was I by the strange and indifferent expression on Dulce's face; she showed no interest at all in the show she was watching.  And while the bust had momentarily escaped my attention, it was soon reverently introduced to me by the friend with whom I'd arrived.  It was a life-size mold of a human body-- Dulce's-- from shoulder down to mid-thigh.  Cast in a ghastaly green glass, the mold had been taken naked, unabashedly exposing each rich curve for the viewer to admire.

Yet as I turned to compliment Dulce on the bust, a compliment which was clearly expected by all present, I was suddenly struck by the contrast between her past and current glory.  She'd lost a lot of weight; she'd later tell me she had been having trouble sleeping and was on anti-depressants.  Her long, once-blond hair looked brittle and grayed, like dried straw turning to dust.  Her skin was pallid; her fingers long, narrow tendrils which only added to the look of emaciation so strongly hinted at by her tall, thin form.  She was still called beautiful, and in truth there was a beauty to her face when she smiled, but like the smiles themselves it was a rare and transitory thing.

At first glance the bust had seemed to me an expression of vanity, but looking at Dulce I saw it now in a different light: it was a sad monument to the sun-lit pinnacle of her life, and with every passing year it became an ever-deeper testament to the tragedy of her fading youth.  It was a melancholy anchor, and looking at Dulce now I felt myself grow sad.

We went to the store-- her, Abiel, and me-- to buy food for the party.  With frozen pizza and uncooked pasta we returned to Dulce's home to find she was out of gas.  We couldn't cook anything.  I remember thinking how odd it was that one of the richest women in Chihuahua should run out of gas, but also thinking about what a poignant metaphor it was.  For all the luxury and presentation, she was out of gas.  There was nothing left.

So we went to her sister's, who has four children and plans to start a business.  There was gas there and we cooked the food.  I was in charge of the pizzas, but the oven had only one rack, and so could only fit one pizza at a time.  And by the time the second pizza was done, the first was cold again.  The pasta kept boiling and boiling but it seemed like it would never get done.  Meanwhile I kept switching the pizzas out-- being unsure when the pasta would be ready-- but no matter what I did it seemed like one pizza was always cold.  I remember staring down at one of the cold pizzas lying there on the counter, so cold and miserable, and for some reason thinking of the bust in Dulce's living room and wishing I could just keep this pizza warm, like that would mean something.  But I couldn't.

Back at the party, eating pasta alfredo and lukewarm pizza, we celebrated Dulce's birthday party.  The image of the bust was still stuck in my head, so I asked Dulce if it'd be ok to take a picture of it, thinking maybe that would help.  A rare smile crossed her lips and she said of course.  ''It's very interesting,'' I added, trying perhaps to justify myself.  She laughed, flattered, and added coquettishly, ''well, it's me!''  And, in a wave of sudden pity, all I could think was, ''no, it was.''

Corey

By the time the big rig pulled into Albuquerque I had grown rather concerned that I'd made a horrible mistake.  The last two days had been Hell.  Breathing in deeply as I stared straight ahead, I tried to muster a compassion for Corey that I wasn't sure I felt.  At best it lay buried deep beneath layers of frustration and anger.  For those past two days he and I had sat trapped in the cab of his truck, unpleasantly enduring each other's company as the miles passed slowly by.  He thought I was naive, ''indoctrinated'' by the education system; I knew he was insecure, nervous, and lonely, and that it was to hide these feelings that he put forth a brash, stubborn front.  To admit that his views might be bigoted or to revise them in light of new evidence would be to admit a flaw within himself, and it was against this mindset that I had been forced to converse.

The mood of the conversations would twist and turn, dipping into the bitter exasperation of politics before wending into his beliefs on God, his divorce, or the son in Philly he sees once a month.  At times I was the enemy, other times the therapist, and all too often I was the witness -- witness to a man who wanted to believe he was happy, who tried desperately to convince me of it as if that would make it true.

He was twenty-nine and had been driving truck for eight years, crisscrossing the nation on a weekly basis.  'A thousand miles a day is pretty normal,' he said.  Given that his truck maxed out at sixty-five, that meant he drove around fifteen hours a day, and after the two days we drove together I can't say I doubt him.  It was a miserable existence -- staring numbly at the passing signs and cars with nothing but the gutteral churning of the diesel engine to drown the silence; somehow that just made it feel deeper.

His days were punctuated by two notable events: times to get gas and food.  While sitting in a greasy truckstop diner he admitted that he rarely ate at sit-down places anymore; he disliked all the people around.  Instead, he'd often get fast food, retreating back to the solitude of his truck and eating as the miles continued by.  Lately even that had been too much trouble.  He showed me a shelf lined with cans of beans and Campbell's Chunky soups.  ''It's faster, you know,'' he'd remarked at the time.

And speed of delivery was everything to Corey.  He spoke proudly of driving through the night when on a tight schedule and boasted in particular of the time he took a load from LA to Atlanta in under 48 hours.  ''Left on a Tuesday night and was there by Thursday morning.''  It was one of the highlights of his career.  None of this was legal, of course -- truck drivers are limited to driving eight and a half hours in any twenty-four hour period.  Still, the dispatchers looked the other way, and Corey had developed a kind of accountant's sleight-of-hand on his worklogs that would make even Bernie Madoff proud.

He was impressive at what he did, pouring everything he had into it.  Both mornings we woke up at 3:30 am to continue onwards, the six hours of sleep showing as plainly on his face as on mine.  He had no hobbies, no passions, no interests.  His radio was a forgotten relic, rarely used.  He had six trashy audiobooks, all Westerns written in the same exaggerated style of good versus evil and right versus wrong.  He loved that writer and said he could probably recite those books by heart.  The books were frustrating in their depiction of the world, but by the time my own exasperation with Corey's bigotry led me to suggest that we listen to one, they seemed like a breath of fresh air.

I spent a long time trying to understand why Corey picked me up, and even longer on why he didn't throw me out.  He even bought my lunch one day, in recompense for a meal I'd bought him.  He was lonely, true, but I began to see that -- beneath layers of jaded misanthropy and self-aggrandizing political beliefs -- he was also, somehow, a nice guy.  He told me how back in Pennsylvania, before the divorce, he'd been a volunteer firefighter.  He told me of how he responded to an accident, of how he watched a child die in front of him, and I could hear the tremor in his voice.  I learned of the grandfather with Parkinson's that he'd tried to care for, and of his despair when he finally realized it was too much for him.  And eventually I saw that, underneath it all, Corey just wanted someone to care for.  So isolated from mankind, he just wanted to touch some other life with a kindness stifled deep inside him.

Back at the Albuquerque truckstop, as I stared straight ahead, I tried to pierce beyond my frustration and anger, to say goodbye to Corey with genuine goodwill.  I thanked him, acknowledged our differences but told him that I believed he was a good person and that I wished him well.  He grunted stoically, I closed the truck door, and he was gone.  And right now, somewhere between two yellow lines, Corey's probably driving.  But maybe someday he'll stop -- stop being afraid and alone -- and will instead open himself to the world and let mankind past that brash, stubborn front.  At least, that's what I'll hope.

Interview with a Backpack

Do clothes make the man?  I’m not so sure.  But what I do know is that luggage makes the traveler—or unmakes him, depending on its quantity.  Everyone’s heard to pack light(ly), but how does one balance that steady mantra against the multitudinous demands of daily life?  Well, I’m of course outside my realm here since I have yet to actually leave on this trip, but I’ve put in a lot of time reading up on the must-brings and the better-left-at-homes, and so below is my answer to the question.  I’m going to omit commentary and just stick to bullet points, but if you’re curious why I took this or didn’t take that, feel free to ask in the comments.  And if any prospective backpackers happen upon this page and are curious to learn more, I've added a list of helpful backpacking guides to the bottom of this post.  So without further ado, meet my baggage:

Clothes

 

-sport sandals

-2 pairs of quick-drying, light travel pants

-2 long-sleeve shirts

-1 polo

-1 microfleece

-long-sleeve underarmor shirt

-swimtrunks

-3 pairs underarmor underwear

-2 pairs of short socks

-2 pairs long socks (for mosquito protection)

-1 pair wool socks

-2 bandanas

-baseball hat

Documents, Sleeping Stuff, and Day-to-Day

Top left:

-license

-driving permit

-passport

-fake passport (to use as a decoy; made out of an old, expired passport)

-vaccination record

-yellow vaccination card

-camera, spare battery, second memory card, USB connection cord, and charger

-USB storage device

-small flashlight

-outlet adapter

-cell phone and charger

-audio recorder (why? I'm not entirely sure, just felt right)

-notepad

-pen

-journal

-book

-extra passport photos

-not shown:

-family photo and several of home

-laminated photocopy of passport (didn't have it yet)

            -debit cards

            -travelers checks

Bottom Left:

-earplugs

-pillowcase (to stuff with dirty clothes and use as pillow)

-small, super-absorbent towel

-sleeping bag liner (to use in lieu of a real sleeping bag)

-padlock and loop of wire cable (to lock backpack to secured object)

-small combination locks

-clothes line and four clothes pins

-sewing kit

-pocket knife

-spoon

Right:

-money belt

-4 ziploc bags

-woven change purse

-2 big paperclips for holding money

-rubber bands

-nylon string

-safety pins

-platypus-style collapsible water bottle

-travel chess set

-deck of cards

-keyring compass

-Thermarest lumbar pillow

-Spanish-English dictionary

-small insect repellent

-sunglasses case (with sunglasses)

-umbrella

-poncho

-nylon mesh daybag

Toiletries and Medicine

Left:

-toilet paper

-glasses and case

-contact lenses and solution

-toothpaste

-deodorant

-sunblock

-little bit of soap

-floss

-drain stopper

-lighter

-nail clippers

-tweezers

-toothbrush

-tongue scraper

Right:

-iodine (water purification) tablets

-antibiotic/antiseptic cream

-antiseptic toilettes (2)

-anti-itch toilettes (2)

-gauze tape

-painkiller

-diarrhea blocker

-laxatives

-cough medicine (Sudafed)

-dramamine

-bandaids

-latex glove

-lip salve (2)

-sore throat lozenges

-hydrocortisone

When it's all packed up, here’s how it looks:

That's it!  Compact, light, and hopefully far less enticing than some other traveler's luggage/backpack.  And with that, I'm off!

Backpacking Guides:

Written by well-seasoned backpackers with years if not decades of world-travel experience, the below resources are indispensible for the first-time backpacker.  All cover roughly the same topics— what (not) to bring, how to be safe, money, staying healthy, how to meet locals, food, keeping in touch, etc.— but each author gives his own perspective, and the degree of corroboration between them is encouraging for the nervous travel student.  Especially recommended is the first link, Travel Independent.

http://www.travelindependent.info/index.htm 

http://ease.com/~randyj/rjfootls.htm

http://www.perpetualtravel.com/rtw/

http://pleth.tripod.com/home.htm