You Ask a Lot of Questions 2

                                      “Only the neutral is free.”
                                                Thomas Mann, Dr. Faustus




The grease my fried eggs were floating on, was only partly cut by the papaya juice, in the market next morning. They got me to the Museo Rufino Tamaya, and its magnificent collection of pre-Hispanic clay action figures, and a lift the three kilometers from the gas station to the highway. It began to rain and stayed raining, until a gold miner with a broken leg, named Jaime, and his sidekick driver, Luis, slowed to pick me up an hour later. We stopped for a lunch of meat, frijoles and tortillas, and they let me off at a hospital turnoff, in the downpour. The next ride was slow but Isaac, the drug wholesaler driver of the VW van that gave me the lift, was anything but. I sat on the motor between him and his younger brother, Estevan. The road was all curves, though spectacular rain forest scenery. Isaac was addicted to speed. He ran over a chicken, nearly collided with three kids on a horse in Valle Nacional, and was about to depopulate the rest of central Mexico, when Estevan started vomiting out his window. We had a chat. I picked some grapefruit off a tree as a farewell present, when Isaac stopped for gas in Tuxtepec at dusk. Wholesale drugs were far too cheap in Mexico.
I was still walking in the dark when I met Xavier.
“Donde va?” He asked.
“Cualquier otra parte.” I replied. Wherever.
True to form, I was eating well with his wife, mother, sister, and two kids, ten minutes later. What a country.
A Muscovy duck woke me up early next morning, staking out his territory with tiny pellets. I put on my wet clothes, thanked them goodbye, and hiked back to the gasolineria. The attendents pointed me in three directions, before I got a lift in the right one. A megaphone car, driven by a Chilean ex-seaman and his friend, took me to Loma Bonita, where two civil engineers drove me to some unpronounceable, in their volkswagon, via the rural hospital they were building on the way.
I found some limes and ate peanuts for what seemed like hours, before Chris, an ex-tourist guide and the driver of a tractor trailer hauling expensive cars, double-clutched down long enough, for me to toss up Serendipity and hop in. I listened to stories of his sexual exploits, all the way to the Palenque turnoff. He was otherwise pleasant enough, and gave me a contact number for his son in Merida, but I was glad to get down. I saw my first anopheles malarial mosquito, just before I got to hang off the back of a cattle truck for the last few kilometers, along the tall grass and dirt road into town. Oh joy.
The Posada Alicia was decorated with plastic pink carnations on plastic pink tablecloths (pink and baby blue are primary colours in Mexico). There were mirror image representations of Aztec last suppers on the walls and babel babble of foreign voices within them. I got the last bed, wrung out my clothes, and fell asleep in the dampness and the hum of insects. They were whining in German and Japanese.
After a tumultuous night of tossing and turning, I was covered in bites. I gave the desk clerk five pesos to watch Serendipity, and started to walk to Palenque, through a canopy of tall jungle trees, buttressed with triangular fins, and strangled with liana vines. I carefully stepped over a column of leafcutter ants crossing the road.
Engine noise crept up behind me. I turned to see a vintage black Mercedes Benz, a beauty: silver grill, twin headlights, curved fenders, and a spare tire in front on the driver’s side. I stuck out my thumb. There was a conversation inside. The car rolled to a stop, and a front suicide door opened.
“Are you going to the ruins?” I asked politely.
“Ja… you would like a ride?” a white haired old man with cerulean irises replied.
“That would be very kind. Thank you.” I got in the back.
His Mexican driver shifted into first gear.
The floor was made of wood, as were the window frames. I looked down at the manual stick shift, as the driver’s glove returned to the steering wheel. It was embossed with a Wehrmacht eagle.
The driver shifted into second gear.
“Where are you from?” I inquired. Pause.
“I am Swiss.” He said. We shifted into third.
I looked down at the gearshift knob again. An angular swastika hung from the eagle’s talons.
“When did you come to Mexico?” Once more into the breech.
“A long time ago. Before you were born.”
I went for broke.
“What did you do in Switzerland?” White pawn to Check.
“You ask a lot of questions.” Black rook to Stalemate.
We were stopped at the entrance to the ruins.
“Thank you.” Stepping out of the car.
“Gern Geschehen. Safe journey.”