The Ascension of Cerro Tec

I was fortunate enough to only go to school three days a week this semester. Every Tuesday-Wednesday-Friday I would share a taxi with a bunch of French people (or hop aboard the Route 20) out to the boonies and into the confines of the TEC. And every Tuesday-Wednesday-Friday I would look up at a clear, green, peak just above the school. And every Tuesday-Wednesday-Friday I would say to myself, or the nearest uninterested person “man, I really want to climb that.”

Well, this Friday my dream became reality. I set off south with Joseph, my good Luxembourgian friend, in his Chrysler Spirit— appropriately named the “Poderoso” (the mighty one). Joseph, or Luxembourg as I am apt to call him, has been a much-appreciated companion over the last few months. A tall, skinny, totally European-looking fellow, Joseph has a gift for languages and a peculiar, hilarious sense of humor. He’s quite intelligent, likes coffee, and shares a lot of my thoughts about the culture within our “prestigious” private university and in Méxcio in general. And he’s one of the few other people from school that think going downtown to have a drink and talk is just as viable a Friday night activity as spending it on the booming dance halls of Cuerna’s hottest clubs. We get along well.

Many times we’ve met to have a beer or a coffee and talk like two old men about the exchange student life in México. Our main beef is about what we call the fresitud of the TEC culture (fresa: well, it means strawberry, but it’s also a sweet adjective to describe someone as superficial, materialistic, fake—something like preppy) Our bulletproof theory is that the lives of the rich Mexican kids at school are confined to 3 places: the TEC, Galerias (the city’s mega-mall), and a handful of exclusive-ish discotecas. Many of my compatriots have been swallowed whole by the TEC crowd, so it’s refreshing to talk to a fellow critic of the lifestyle.  

He’s going to be here for the whole year and has expressed the desire to find a Mexicana soul mate, so we often talk about how discouraging the pool of Mexican females is at Tec Cuernavaca. The superficiality sucks (you can’t carry on a conversation with these girls unless you talk about Galerias, the movies, gossip, or something related to name-brand consumerism). The spoiledness is often unfathomable (it’s grotesquely common for them to be talking on their iPhone, flipping through the same 21 songs on their iPod touch, driving their brand new VW the mall to buy $2000 peso shoes…you get the point). And the makeup culture is insane (I think that, if the TEC girls ever remove the gallons of makeup they slap on (which is a big “if”), their faces shrink to about half the normal size). 

Suffice it to say that Luxembourg and I enjoy a good chat.

We also enjoy a good adventure, which is where we were headed in the Poderoso on Friday. We parked on campus and set out on foot towards the base of what we call Cerro Tec (Tec Hill). 

Online photo of Cerro Tec from the west side ot the building.

Not 200m from the hive of luxury, opulence, and flojera, we stepped onto the dirt roads of Acatlipa. From the convenience-shop-lined main street, we started to ascend the hill and the further up we climbed, the poorer the living conditions became. From decent middle-class Mexico at the bottom, the houses began loosing luxury features like paint and water reseviours. Later windows and doors became scarce. At the top, the houses were nothing more than piles of rocks pulled from Cerro Tec (I still don't understand how they stayed upright).

We followed Cresta Fresa (Fresa Ridge) to the very top and found an incredible, stonewalled cornfield. Incredible because somehow the plants were growing up through pure rock. 

Corn on the Rocks

We wondered at the sheer labor that was expended to plant and harvest the maiz in such an austere mountaintop and envisioned old men hobbling around on the rocks in the hot sun for 12 hours and making next to nothing. On the other side of the summit, we found what we were looking for.

Miles and miles of countryside...and this. If that's not surreal, I don't know what is.

In the middle of the Morleos "campo" sits Tecnologico de Monterrey, Campus Cuernavaca. An absolutely space-age building in a country of cinderblocks. It loomed below Cerro Tec like something out of a bad sci-fi movie. We pictured that old working man, coming direct from his stone-pile house, harvesting corn on the side of the mountain and catching sight of TEC--full to the brim with ultra priviledged, ultra lazy Mexican youth, many of whom are destined to live out their days without llifting a finger to do any real work. "Un poco pervertido, no?" Said Joseph.

Luxembourg. The TEC is his oyster.

We stood there for some time, thinking about the incredible contrast that exists in Mexican culture--a contrast played out right before our eyes. "Traes la bazooka?" (did you bring the bazooka?) asked Joseph (Now you see why I like this guy so much).

Where are your Rebel friends now??

In addition to being good exercise, our little excursion served to give me a mental picture of the divide that exists here between the rich and everybody else. And it made me realize that,though I can recommend Cuernavaca as an awesome place to study abroad, I think that my end-of-term report on the school will read something like this:

Though I did learn a good deal (especially in Destrezas Comunicativas with Prof. Sergio), I developed a fairly intense distaste for the school itself which seems to attract the least interesting, least motivated students in Mexico. If you're ok with shallow friendships and reverting back to a middle school maturity level, the TEC is your spot. Otherwise, see if you can find another school where "Fresa" has a negative conotation intead of being a compliment. In fact, ask that question exactly. And if you do decide to go to the TEC, a bazooka may come in handy.