Falling for the French Girl 1

“The French woman says, ‘I am a woman and a Parisienne, and nothing foreign to
  me appears altogether human.’”
                                                                                    Ralph Waldo Emerson




When Maximo pulled over, I knew what kind of day it was going to be.
There were three women in the back seat of his truck, and one of them was holding a big iguana by the neck.
“Guess wheech one is my wife?” He grinned through his four teeth.
My money was on the iguana.
We stopped and cooked a delicious soup of meatballs with eggs inside, before parting. I never asked anything more about the meatballs.
Through a maze of silver shops, I trekked to the other side of Taxco, where Salvador of the Wicked Laugh rolled to a stop. He bought me a coke and took me all the way to Acapulco. We arrived after dark. I was tired and there was no way to continue, so I found the Hotel Cora for 20 pesos and did the math. Each cockroach had cost about a centavo.
On the highway next morning, I had clearly entered another world. I was in the regressive state of Guerrero, in the progressive state of torpor. The heat was humid, the people darker, and everyone except me had at least one machete. They needed spittoons. This was the Costa Chica, a 200 mile-long coastal strip where most Afro Mexicans lived, settled by escaping slaves who migrated from Vera Cruz (but also across the Pacific from New Guinea, with Negritos from the Philippines). They came because the area was inhospitable and isolated, and transportation was difficult because of the summer rains so that, even today, there are few tourist attractions. The region is known for its independent spirit and viviendo. The shape of their round jungle mud huts came from Ghana, and the Ivory Coast. I got the feeling they drank. A lot.
One of them who drank a lot was Alfonso. He was definitely wasted when he insisted on taking me home for fresh milk and cheese. I was hitchhiking when he flagged down a bus and dragged me on. He paid the fare and hung on one of the straps asleep, despite the ranchero music and the screaming kids. I remember a seated women pulling down on one of her eyes, as a warning for me to be careful. Alfonso came to in time for us to get off at his parada ‘stop.’ We walked a long way into the jungle. Iguanas scurried off the path into the undergrowth, every two feet. When we finally arrived in a clearing at Alfonso’s hut, there was only one thing waiting for me. Watermelon. It tasted fantastic. By the time I walked alone back out to the highway, I needed another one.
A taxi driver from Acapulco on his way to see his girlfriend stopped to pick me up. We were both stopped a few kilometers later by soldiers, who searched us for drugs. They were clearly disappointed not to have found any. After my cab driver let me off at a dirt road turnoff, there were no more rides. There was sweat, and far horizon fire smoke, and a blood red sunset, but no more rides. I had run out of water. I thought I had run out of luck. And then I remembered the
Third Rule of Hitchhiking: Wait a bit longer.