First Stop: Mazatlån, Mexico

My Home Away From Home

Mazatlån truly is my home away from home.  My parents started bringing my brothers and I here when we were little.  From mine and my mother's calculations I was about 12 or 13 years old which means I've been here close to 15 times, coming almost every year including during my time in college.  Many of the same people who welcomed us fifteen years ago still welcome us, still host us and still share their stories with us.  Javier and Ophelia, the mother and son beach vendors remember our inappropriate cowboy music that we used to listen to on pocket speakers before iPods and speakers were so common.  They remember my brothers Reed and Jake running around as kids.  The sweetest little man, Manuel, greets me as I pull up to what I remember as a comfortable, safe and relaxing place.  

These people I am talking about are all at Pueblo Bonito, where we usually stay.  This year we are staying at El Cid El Moro, just down the street.  But it isn't the same here so we travel just to sit on their beaches and see our friends.  I often wonder if they think of us as their friends or something like it.  Maybe, but maybe not.  We could just as easily be someone to wait on.  Someone to sell their "Mexican junk" to (their words, not mine).  Of course they see more tourists in a day than hotel workers I may come in contact with in my lifetime.  But for some of the more genuine Mexicans I meet here, I believe kindness exists and I believe we are friends.  

One of the more difficult aspects to Mazatlån are the vendors and salesmen/women.  Being inundated by offers for timeshares/Stone Island tours/knockoff sunglasses/cheap pot/fake opals/real silver/Mariachi music/a seat at a restaurant wears on someone.  Throughout the years I have learned to hear it as background noise.  And although I do not believe in being particularly rude or stern, I am realizing that ignoring the person is just as rude.  I cannot think of an instance in the US where I think it would be acceptable to completely ignore someone talking to me or trying to get my attention.  I'm not saying there isn't one and everyone has done it as some point.  But not taking the time to acknowledge another human being is absolutely rude.  Sure, I may have five swimsuit wraps or too much Mexican silver jewelry to count at home that I have collected over the years.  But that does not mean I have the right to pretend they don't exist.  What is the harm in speaking to people?  Whether I am interested in whatever is being sold, I feel like I have a duty as a human being to be kind and acknowledge another human being.

It's how I feel most of the time, anyway.  It is impossible to talk to everyone and I have no intention of doing so.  But a "No, thank you," is better than complete aloofness.  On the other hand, the few times I have stopped to talk because I thought maybe this person didn't have another agenda, I was completely wrong.  I can be annoyed but everyone has to make a living.  And although in general my travel style is to be immersed in a culture, I am a little embarrassed to say that is not why I come to Mexico.  Not that it isn't a beautiful and rich culture.  But by this year I feel like I have seen what Mazatlån has to offer in years past and I am here to relax.  Before my vacation before my other trip.  Wow, that sounds bad when you put it on paper.  

Where am I going with this…..?

Oh yeah.  So I do love it here.  And for the most part the people are genuine and good.  And I appreciate those kind of people.  I don't have to understand another person to be able to respect them. Or that's at least a philosophy I can strive for, anyway. 

This reminds me or a quote. "People travel to faraway places to watch, in fascination, the kind of people they ignore at home," says Dagobert D. Runes.