Backfill

The how and why of the adventure, or perhaps “hows and whys”, came from all directions. Two boys bent on seeing the world piece by piece stepped up onto a ragged Greyhound bus. Their quest for the time being: head south and return with a “piece” of Mexico in tow. What the two would do with such a thing is currently speculation at best but obviously it seemed worth the price of two cross-country tickets and 30 hours of their lives—both given without reservation to the rather disorganized bus company.

Caleb and James began this journey and this account is through the young eyes, romantic heart, and fairly cynical mind of Caleb. That’s me. And though it would be infinitely entertaining to write about the entire semester in the third person, I decided that I would not. It seems that writing in that voice gives you absolute superiority and while I’m not against it, I thought it would be weird to have absolute authority over myself as a character in my own story. Then I got confused. So I wrote in the first person.

Grammatical issues aside, James and I were on a bus. With all the other people that ride greyhound buses. I attempted to describe that crowd last night but met with failure so I’ll not try again. I know everyone’s eager to hear all about the bus trip, but there’s really not that much to report. We both slept a lot. We decided that if one is able to sleep easily on a bus then it is a viable means of transport. In truth the trip to Laredo, Texas was composed of 30 of the shorter hours of my life. The universe must have been contracting that day, you know, squishing the hours together or something. The universe contracts when you sleep.

A chemical spill on I-40 forced a sidetrip down to Chattanooga before we hit Nasheville and that spelled a 2 hour deficit which our driver was determined to shake. This meant that we had 0:10-0:15 minute layovers instead of 0:30-1:00 long ones which was grand, except we weren’t able to cook any part of the stash of food we brought along. Fortunately we were able to survive the wide and bumpy Arkansas roads and huge traffic jams outside of Dallas on oranges, cheese, and lil’ smokies (as well as a Subway sandwich that George, our longtime busmate, insisted I have after a 4am bus-cleaning crew stole my sandwich.)

In celebration of our arrival in Laredo (23 hours after the above sandwich-theft) we walked out to a very Spain-influenced park and cooked pasta with vodka sauce next to the eternal flame of the Laredo veterans’ memorial. Some water boiled over our small pot during the cooking of the second batch, soaking or stove. Ever resourceful, James set the pot upon the eternal flame to finish cooking. “I think” remarked James “that those veterans would be so proud of their flame being used so well.”

We took turns at communicating via my computer and having as close to a shower as one can in an especially filthy public restroom. Before dawn we had packed up and were headed for the border.

From what I read in the news, I gather that the US has something of an issue with border crossings. Mexico has no such issue, I guess, because after the federales checked our bags a woman who I assumed to be the immigration officer pointed into her country and said “Go.” And we went. There was a fleeting trial associated with trying to acquire that lovely currency called el peso, but soon we hopped aboard a city bus for the Central de Autobuses. At that moment I knew we had made it, made the transition to traveling in Mexico. Figuring out public transportation and knowing that the rickety (route numbers were spray painted onto the windshield) old school bus you’re on is headed where to need to be is more than just a symbolic measure of your ability to exist in a country. At the central we were welcomed in and sent on our way to Monterrey within a quarter of an hour. The quality of the bus slapped us in the face as we boarded. For we travelers who had just spent over a day on a Greyhound, it felt like stepping into a royal palace. The bus had real air conditioning, not the “oooh, we’ve got freezing air coming from this phantom crack somewhere near the window” that the ‘hound offered. The seats afforded nearly horizontal reclination and they actually had movies playing (alibi dumb ones, but whatever.)

Susie, an MTW missionary, met us at the bus station in MTY and drove us in her dusty Subaru to Apodaca a city-like institution north of the actual Monterrey city where a man, Eraclio, and his family have begun a little church in what was once their home. We walked up the stairs into the sanctuary which was a medical clinic for the morning and James was reunited to his beau, Helen. I’ll spare you the mushy stuff; suffice it to say they were happy to see each other and they both smiled a lot.

We two newbies tried to make ourselves useful and were marginally successful. Early in the afternoon, the clinic was broken down to accommodate the afternoon’s vacation bible school for the neighborhood kids. They served us a wonderful meal and we were able to hang out with the folks there (teams of short term missionaries, interns, regular missionaries...you name it) which was great. Incidentally, there were guys there from both N.C. State and Duke, which proves the ubiquity of the ACC.

As with all VBSs, this one was largely a disorganized mass of tiny bodies and big toothy smiles—a fact that was made all more noticeable by the small language barrier that existed—but it was quite enjoyable nevertheless. When the “campamento del verano” began to wind down, I drifted from the sidewalk where kids were running relays into the narrow street in front of the church and joined in with mix of non-VBS attendees from the barrio tossing an American football. For the next hour and a half I played and talked with this rag-tag gang of boys which grew by the minute. I learned their names and took great pleasure in making them laugh as I showed off the sillier side of my Spanish. James joined in after a while. We were summoned back to the church by Helen to find we had missed the debrief for the day and that our streetside shenanigans were not smiled upon by the higher-ups. We apologized, but our attempt at contrition was met quite coldly and after diner I left, never to return.

[Here it must be noted that James was content to stay with the interns and short-terms (who were all awesome—not contributors to the coldness factor) owing in no small part to the fact that his novia was one of their number. This effectively left me on my own, but I could not complain because a short cab ride was the only thing between me and my return to el centro de Monterrey (as detailed in the post entitled “14 July 2008”)]