The Ineluctable March of History or How We Clogged a Toilet in Zacatecas

Atotonilco, Zacatecas to Zacatecas, Zacatecas

It is one of the coldest mornings of our trip and my 28th birthday. I am slow getting out of bed as we agreed the night before not to push on to Zacatecas. We vow to move slower, take it easy and enjoy ourselves. We ride hard anyways, the miles clicking by as we glide past the Tropic of Cancer. The toucans and banana trees are strangely absent.

Most of our conversations on the bikes are related to the landscape and signs, but occasionally an exceptional piece of trash or uniquely mangled animal draws our attention. The road stretches out before us, we are flying. Tarantulas lurch across the pavement, Mormon Crickets rape and canabalize one another. Rediculous construction projects abound and astound: a pedestrian walkway in the middle of nowhere, concrete posts line the highway that have all fallen over. All of it constructed by highway crews that impressively appear more indolent than their American counterparts. A truck painting lines on the road drives on the wrong side of the road as it twists and turns through the mountains, without advanced notice. A man slumps behind the wheel of his car looking dead with all of the doors wide open. Deep red blood is smeared across the road for extraordinary distances in places. Animal carcasses are flattened by traffic and baked into the pavement, their teeth and bones made planar with the road surface. A man sits on the side of the highway after an accident, all of the skin missing from his forehead leading to blood cascading down his face. Police and paramedics stand by him talking. Billboards constantly remind us of the money the government has spent on automotive infrastructure improvements so that Mexicans can ‘Vivir Mejor.’

We find ourselves in Fresnillo for lunch, cursing the topes and traffic after the sumptuous country. Over lunch we sit quietly eating until one of us brings up the possibility of making it to Zacatecas today, we speak as if we are two superstitious pitchers trying not to jinx ourselves.

We set out from Fresnillo riding hard, averaging 25-30km/hr for over an hour, drafting and pushing with slow strokes. We take a quick break on the side of the highway to consume food with purpose, not relish. Clouds build to the Southwest, rolling across the plains in a torrent of flashes and columns of rain. It is late and we are exhausted, Zacatecas is still quite a few kilometers out. The rain starts falling on us, a sign says ‘Zacatecas 20km.’ Two kilometers down the road there is another sign saying ‘Zacatecas 20km.’ The mileage markers on the roadside skip down to 20km from 22km, then there are two 21km signs, then another saying 20km.

I think about all that the world has given me and how little I give back. I am not sure how I am still alive nor how I have the fortune to live as I do. I no longer have the option of dying young, of burning out rather than fading away. I tried. Janis Joplin, Kurt Cobain, Jimi Hendrix, Brian Jones, Robert Johnson and Jim Morrison couldn’t hack it.  I live during a time on earth of incredible tranquility and freedom, only by virtue of our own ignorance do we believe otherwise. The world is not perfect, nor is my life, yet if either were devoid of ugliness or suffering they would equally be devoid of beauty and happiness. The strange journey continues. Fuck! A tope!

As we arrive into town the rain starts falling harder, serendipitously timed with our descent down the incredibly steep cobblestone streets of Zacatecas. The city center is marked by colonial buildings of roughly hewn stones and intricately worked iron in a beautiful state of decay. We check into a hotel and I quickly put on a tequila blanket to warm myself and celebrate my birthday. The bottle of tequila is nearly empty as we set out.

The night comes on strange. We are standing on the street drinking beer when a guy pulls up in a pickup and rolls down his window.

‘It is a bad idea to drink in the street.’

‘Oh. That guy over there told us it is fine.’

‘Well he is an idiot. Where are you guys from?’

He invites us to take a ride with him around the city as he throws his empty beer cans into the back of the truck and moves his cold beer to make room for us in true Mexican fashion. He speaks broken English that brings a smile to my face.

‘I hate blacks, they steal and don’t work hard like Latinos.’ He proclaims proudly.

‘But there aren’t any here.’ Brin says, neither of us not touching the subject any further.

‘Good! Let’s keep it that way!’

We toss cans into the bed as we drive along.

‘Do the cops ever stop you here for drinking and driving?’

‘As long as the car is moving you are fine, if you are standing somewhere or your car is stopped they will hassle you.’

We blare Paradise City and You Could be Mine by Guns and Roses before he aggressively switches gears to Avril Lavigne. I do most of my laughing in my head, just three drunk men riding around in a pickup blaring teenbop pop. We learn how to piss in public with minimal risk of a police confrontation: we pull the truck over, lift the hood and stand contemplating a nonexistant problem as urine splashes onto the pavement.

We arrive at a karaoke bar where I promptly sign myself up for several songs in a row. I sing the first song with the Dj, one that I stumble through as I have never   heard it before. Afterwards I scream and shout myself through I Feel Good by James Brown. I wait for the shepard’s crook that never comes, the audience reverently maintains their quiet. After the song ends I refuse to relinquish control of the microphone, instead giving a riviting and eloquent speech introducing myself, explaining the circumstances of the day and expounding upon my travels in Mexico. Everyone is so engrossed, hanging on my every word as they wish for my oration to continue without end, that they forget to clap.

Brin and I step up to the stage together, I can feel the Mexican crowd’s demand for something nostalgic and heartwarming. A piece of the old America. I choose You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling by The Righteous Brothers. Our velvety vocals lead to swooning and frustrated boyfriends. I deliver a final monologue so prolix that its contents are lost to me forever. I decide to leave on this high note, Brin stays for a bit longer.

I am awoken toBrin spraying me with water and dumping peanut shells upon me. I obstinately refuse to go on the hunt for streetfood with him. I wake fifteen minutes later as a cheeseburger slaps the side of my face from the other side of the room. I eat it and go back to sleep.

Zacatecas, Zacatecas

I prematurely leave breakfast in spine tingling, sweating horror. I cannot run or I will have the runs. As I sit on the toilet looking at the map, which I am wont to do, I take stock of Mexican town names: Pie de Gallo, KM 59, Delicias, Poblado 1, Poblado 14, Santa Rosa Matagallinas, Nombre de Dios, Agua de Puerco, Ojo de Puerco, Cantuna, Los Mexicanos, 6 de Enero, 15 de Septiembre, Nuevo Casas Grandes, towns with the same name only a few kilometers apart…towns named after individuals like General Rodrigo M. Quevedo, Oscar Soto Maynes. I see Comitan de Dominguez and am reminded of what is still referred to as the Comitan de Dominguez Incident by everyone involved. The memories clog my mind as I sit on my bed and hear a second incomplete flush as Brin uses the bathroom.

‘Remember what happened in Comitan?’ Brin asks as he exits the bathroom with a look of worry on his face.

‘I have never forgotten compadre, will never forget.’

An event seared into both our memory, the worrying and guilt never having left us. After a similar night of drinking last year, we awoke to stirring and churning at the same time, leading to a rapid assault on the toilet. No flush would dislodge the heavy dike constructed of tacos, burritos and low grade meat left to ferment overnight in a mix of mescal and several liters of beer hemorraged out in an inhuman form that resembled none of its constituents. The room was befouled with a permeating miasma of shit. We descended the stairs to the front desk with our bags packed, moving quickly with the hope of being well clear before the discovery was made. Images run through our heads as we walked away from the hotel looking over our shoulders: The maid entering the room before the appointed time, alerted by the scent. Something is wrong, very wrong. Screams echo through the courtyard as she gazes in transfixed horror at the brimming brown bowl. A mob armed with broken plungers and mops rendered into trash combing the streets in search of two conspicuous gringos guilty of a crime so heinous the women are at a loss as they try to explain to the media.

As we are walking out the door to change hotels, after the dike has remained in place for over four hours, we hear the sucking sound of the bowl vacating. We change hotels anyways, the bathroom has run its course. Our new hotel still has a flapper flush valve, not a flushometer or pressure assist, but a larger sized drainage pipe and higher capacity water tank with a more forceful flush increase the stool capacity of the toilet. There is a balcony overlooking one of the main streets of the city; an elderly female musician serenades me from below, playing one cord on her broken guitar incessantly for over an hour.

Zacatecas, Zacatecas to 8km outside Loreto, Aguascalientes

As we sip fruit juice blended with raw quail’s eggs, Brin disappears in search of a public restroom. I sit idly sippling my drink and pondering the 30m Christmas tree sprayed with fake snow and covered in Coca Cola ornaments.

‘That was a disaster.’ Brin informs me upon his return. I ask no further questions as I assume that the outcome was therefore normal. He starts giggling as he sips his drink.

‘What is it?’

‘I forgot toilet paper.’ He grins.

‘Uhm.. so what did you do?’

‘I wiped with my hand.’

‘Ugh.. did you wash it?’

‘Not exactly.’

‘What the hell do you mean?’

‘First I looked in the used toilet paper basket for something reasonably clean, but there was nothing, then I thought about the nice sinks I saw on entry, all Sloan stainless. I couldn’t button or zip up my pants with just one hand so I came out with my pants undone to realize that none of the sinks were connected. I suddenly understood all of the shit smeared on the wall. I did the same. I managed to get my pants part way zipped up and then washed my hand in the fountain over there by the Coke tree.’

‘That is rock bottom.’

We ride a treacherous highway to Guadalupe engorged with traffic. As we ride a rural highway and make a few stops we are refreshed by the friendly and gregarious people that joke around with us and toss us fruit. Outside of Luis Moya we hit 1610km or 1000 miles, we take some pointless photos. Loreto appears to be a rough town as it is patrolled by a multitude of police, military wearing black balaklavas in humvees and an armored personnel carrier. A tatooed drunk tests my patience by stroking our bikes while telling us to go fuck ourselves as we eat tacos.

As the sun sets we ride quickly out of town, a full chicken stuffed in my pannier. The concrete rectilinear sprawl of the city stretches further than expected. We keep pushing at our limits until an open pasture appears to our right. Two men are working in the adjacent field, a fire dances and colors their figures. Fireworks irregularly explode above us, more sound than noise. Ancient ruins lie within a few hundred meters of us as an outcropping in what is otherwise farmland.

We play cards in the dark. The men in the nearby field continue slashing corn stalks with their machetes for cattle feed. We hear a man spit nearby and we both freeze and turn our lights out. We get up and shine our lights in the direction of the sound, but see nothing. We go back to our cards before the sound of a machete chinking through corn or brush approaches us. We hear footsteps. I see a silhouette under the full moon coming our way with a machete dangling by its side and a sombrero on top.

I have been in this situation several times in my life, twice with Brin. The air is pregnant with tension. Who is this? What does he want? Why? These are probably the same questions he is asking himself. The only option is to quickly defuse the situation, to exude tranquility.

‘Buenas noches.’ (Good night.) I announce as we slowly walk towards one another, measuring each other up. The moonlit man with the machete stops dead in his tracks as we near, his face is cloaked in moonshadow from his hat.

‘……Buenas noches.’  He replies with weariness in his voice.

‘¿Todo bien? ¿Todo esta bien?’  (Everything good? Everything is good?) I venture, trying to keep my voice from shaking.

‘¿Quienes son?’ (Who are you?)

‘Somos viajeros…….’ (We are travelers……) I give our whole story rapidly, my adrenaline spewing it out. I tell him that darkness overtook us and we needed to rest somewhere.

‘You are just here to camp?’ I can hear a change in his voice, he has relaxed.

‘Yes, nothing more.’

‘I needed to come see who you are after seeing your lights. Many people steal animals here, so we stay late to guard them.’

‘We are good people. Is it safe here?’

‘Yes.’

‘As long as we aren’t animals, right?’ I try to inject some humor, only I laugh.

‘You will be safe here. I hope you rest well.’

I introduce myself and almost forcibly shake his hand, something that I see as indespensible in self preservation: being seen as a person. We bid him goodnight.

Brin falls asleep quickly, his breathing slowing. I lie awake as the random explosions continue. Thumping basslines layered in horns resound from at least two different locales. I am still slightly worried about being hacked to death with a machete, but not overly.

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