Nothing, Ninjas, and No Sharks

The scores are the same as they were before. So no need to recap. Just scroll down if youre really that much of a fanatic about it.

At the moment Calen is passed out on the floor of the bus station. I think whatever we bought at the farmacia out of a dramamine box was actually GHB. It might be a translation error, but to know for sure, im going to have to find a colloquial spanish-english dictionary and see if Dramamine is what they call roofies. Regardless, Calen is dead to the world right now. Maybe its malaria. I dont know. Whatever the case, I sort of envy him right now. If he can keep up this act, he may very well sleep through the entire 12 hour bus ride were about to take.

Every 40 passenger bus weve taken in Mexico has had 6 people on it. Us, the driver, maybe a chicken or goat, and a couple other people. But tonight, when the option was an 11 hour trip on the early bus we wanted to take, or a 12 hour trip on the late bus we didnt, the early one was completely full and the late one had only two seats left on different hemispheres of the bus. In Mexico they divide buses using hemispheres. They´re a cartography loving people. I dont know if this is my american entitlement speaking, but i think they should either kick some people off so we can sit together or send an extra bus so we can sit together or send us in a taxi for a comparable price so we can sit together. And it should probably be a taxi with a bathroom because i plan on taking plenty of pressurized beverages on this trip as well.

The place we are leaving is mazunte, which, in a rare occurence given the tendency of human beings to embellish and romanticize, actually lived up to the hype of a beach paradise as it was described. Only its the low season so there was no one there except us, a guy who was probably a bus driver, a chicken or a goat, and a couple other people. At no point could one look out on the expansive beach and be unable to count the amount of people on their fingers.

We stayed in a place called La Atarraya which was a fine establishment run by the Mexican Jason Ross, only his name was Cesar and he didnt have any 18-year-old-impulsive-decisions tattooed on his arms. Since we were the only ones there, we opted for the camping package which meant we slept on hammocks on this huge 2nd story, open air terrace covered by palm leaves and literally (not figuratively) looking out on to the surf which was about 30 yards away. The lower floor of the place is actually just sand. Its sort of like a gateway to the beach. We arrived on the day of a full moon which meant a couple things. High tide. Huge waves. And a night on the beach which was lit up so bright by the moonlight that you could walk around with eyes squinted like my mom when she´s drunk and still safely arrive at the destination of your choosing. I woke up in the middle of the night and walked down to the beach and there is really only one way to explain the experience, dreamlike. Everything was coated in a soft blue light, which was a sharp contrast to the blinding light of a beach day.

We became well acquainted with the beach. The sand was fine and soft. The kind of fine, soft sand we discovered, experientially, that can remain in any nook and cranny of your nether regions that it chooses (it chose all of them) without detection for 2 days. This was ninja sand. It went where it wanted, when it wanted without so much as making a noise or setting off an alarm. We only learned this lesson because we employed the same approach to hygeine as we did when we were 12. Swimming counts as bathing. What we started to notice is that even though we spent copious amounts of time in the water (yes, calen swam in the ocean, repeatedly) we still developed a stench that rivalled the smell of the mexican street seafood with which we had become so familiar. So eventually we showered, and found the ninja sand. We killed them all with our peppermint samurai soap. Their tiger style was no match for our d'wa-gone style.

The waves in Mazunte made me realize something and added a bit more cohesion to my otherwise disjointed existence. There are some things in life that you never really understand why they seem so important to you until that fateful day when the answer is revealed. I had a strange obsession when I was but a lad of 17 with learning how to do a yoga asana which, by its anglicized name, is called the scorpion pose. Maybe it was the cool name, or maybe it was the acrobatics of the pose. Whatever the case, i practiced until i could do it, never seeing a practical reason for all the effort. And without any (Gob´s) segue (that counts as the Arrested Development reference for this post), as i mentioned before, high tide meant big waves. Huge, crashing, deafening waves. Waves that make you appreciate the power of nature. Waves that pucker your ninja sand hiding spots. Waves that appeal to the reckless stupidity of people like ourselves. We reasoned that since we grew up in California, and California touches the ocean, that we must be an ocean people. So we surfed with the only thing available to surf. Our bodies. And in one of those classic misjudgements of ocean people that grew up in a landlocked valley of the state of ocean people, i got caught (it feels even dumber to admit that it was intentional, so I´ll pretend like I was an innocent victim of the cruel Poisedon) in a wave that slammed down with a special kind of torque that made my heels touch my cervical vertebrae, even though i specifically asked it not to. I got out of the water wondering what a fractured vertebrae felt like. But after about an hour all i had was a slightly sore back which was 100% after another hour, and a profound sense of gratitude for community colleges everywhere that make yoga classes fulfill a degree requirement. Sierra College, you saved my life. And thats not even the first time. You wouldnt believe how often calculating instantaneous rates of change or identifying a gerund has saved me from an untimely death.

So the beach was absolutely amazing. It was like living in Lost without all thje creepy people who, for no reason, are always lying to each other. But it turns out that doing nothing isnt really something im good at. I enjoyed myself immensely, but after two days and a combined total of about 8 hours in the sun and saltwater, and the vast majority of the other 24 or so in a hammock, it was time to move on. I do believe that it would be the perfect place for a large group of friends and family during the low season though. Or maybe if I could stay and paint for a month. Something other than nothing. Houses with kitchens and relatively modern ammenities can be rented on the beach for $300 per month and the cost of travel is negligible assuming you dont mind gambling your life on the bus ride. The food on the beach is amazing and cheap and fresh. There aren´t sharks, jellyfish, carpet fish or anything else that can kill you aside from the waves. They have fishermen that are more than happy to take people out to fish, sea turtles (get it?), dolphins, monsters of the deep, etc. There are internet cafes for checking email and porn. Somebody set that up. Aunt Karen, Im looking at you. You like email and porn in a secluded beach setting more than anyone.

So here we are now in the bus terminal with peeling faces, a few mosquito bites, serious fatigue, and against all odds, uninjured, waiting to take the later, longer bus ride to San Cristobal where our goal is to hook up with the Zapatistas. This is a task that is proving to be more difficult and less likely to occur the closer we get to the actual place. But its the meat of the trip, and so it merits a bit of struggle. Besides, what kind of goal would it be if there was a brochure or something? The things in this life worth doing usually involve a nonexistent, uncharted, or overgrown path. Things like meeting up with a group of well organized, indigenous rebels with a world view that inspires to the ends of the earth. Things like getting a street named after a scientist's balls.

How about Stephen J. Gould's Sesamoid Groin Processes Road? Speaking of sesamoid processes, the zoo in Mexico City had a giant panda in an enclosure that seemed to intentionally obscure our view. I think it was animatronic and theyre trying to pull the wool... no wait... panda fur over our eyes. But i digress. Dont be surprised if i suggest more streets with Gould. I like him. He deserves this. Read Ontogeny, Ontogeny and Phylogeny and there will be no end to the amount of letters you'll be motivated to write to Obama to make this happen for Mr. Gould, God rest his soul.