Since around mid-April, I have basically been immersed in Mexican culture.
It started off with a trip with Lisa to Puerta Vallarta. Man, I miss that. Beautiful hotel, beautiful pool, and any place with a beach has got to be good. We spent four heavenly days relaxing by the pool and sipping on froo-froo drinks. We only ventured out once and that was to take a guided tour of the city. That was nice. We saw the cathedral of Maria de Guadalupe, had lunch in the mountains at some place near where they filmed Predator, and took a tour of a tequila factory. Mosty, we just sat by the pool and read. We hopped in every once in a while, but it was mostly just sitting next to it. After dinner every night we kicked off shoes and took a walk along the beach, and then we went back up to the room and sat on the balcony and watched the pool and the ocean. We got a fireworks show every night from this returning pirate ship show that’s offered as an excursion through the hotel concierge. I think they serve other hotels in the area and the cruise ships too. I think it would be hard for the pirates to make a living just off of our little hotel.
Speaking of the hotel, it was by far one of the nicest I’ve ever been in. It was definitely the nicest oceanfront hotel I’ve stayed in. One thing they did that I really liked is have tile everywhere. Most hotels you go into have carpeting in the rooms. That’s great if you’re staying in Dallas or some other landlocked city, but when you’ve got people tracking in sand from the beach, the carpets tend to get a little funky. And they always feel wet thanks to the humidity and wet feet. No, tile is the way to go. It was also very open. The rooms were all air conditioned, but the halls were open to the outside. They were still inside, though. I don’t want anyone to get the impression that this was like a Motel 6 or something. It was an enclosed building with a roof and everything, but the ground floor was left open to the outside, and it really added something to the overall atmosphere. That and the fountain and glass elevators. I really miss Puerta Vallarta. The only complaint about the trip that I could possibly make wouldn’t actually be valid since I knew what to expect before I got there. The water in the ocean wasn’t the crystal clear blue that you could get in the Caribbean or even on the other side of the bay. Sadly, it was a muddy brown type water with poor visibility. That was really ok with me though. I’m not really all that keen on going into the ocean, so I was more than content just to swim in the pool. You rarely ever find swimming pool sharks, and with all the chlorine in pool water you can feel safe that no germ can survive too long. My advice: book yourself to the Puerta Vallarta Marriott as soon as possible.
So that was my first visit to Mexico. I’d also say that it’s my best visit to Mexico. I’ve been to other towns before, but that was the best trip.
Since PV I have spent two weeks in Mexico City for work. My report on Mexico City is both good and bad. The good: it’s very pretty. There are a lot of trees there, more than I ever expected to find in a city. Really, I thought all cities pretty much looked like Dallas, New York or London: concrete jungles. Mexico City is most definitely not like that. It looks more like a jungle with concrete growing out of it. There are trees everywhere, and lots of very nice looking parks. Every day when we’re going back from the office to the hotel we pass a group of people, mostly men or boys, playing futbol in the park. They look like they’re having a lot of fun. We’re also staying in a fairly nice part of town, with a Starbucks just about a block away. I’ve decided that the mark of a good hotel is that there is a Starbucks nearby or one actually in the hotel. If the hotel serves Starbucks coffee or effectively has one in the lobby even if it’s called something else, then that works just as well. Now, the bad: Mexico City is more than a little seedy. We’ve been very strongly urged not to venture out exploring much beyond the hotels next door because there is a lot of crime there. I think we may be safe in a group, but even so I try to keep alert to what’s going on around me. I learned two things earlier today: 1. 90% of the population of Mexico City has experienced the thrill of being held up at gun-point, and 2. a lot of the citizens always make sure to carry at least a little cash so that when it is their turn to be mugged they at least have a donation available. Or maybe it’s a “don’t shoot me” fee. Another problem is the smell. We went to a flea market – incidentally, I now understand why it’s called a “flea” market – where they sell a lot of pirated DVDs. I thought there was a chance that they might have either “The DaVinci Code” or “X-Men 3” but those were apparently just a little too new. I wouldn’t have bought either of them, just for the record. I can’t imagine that the quality would be terribly good, and I still feel like buying pirated movies would be like stealing from myself. They did have a lot of fairly new releases though. I also discovered smells – none of them good – that I don’t think I believed could even exist. I imagine it’s what Chewbacca was smelling when he jumped into the trash compactor in Star Wars. Maybe worse than that.
The final week of my trip to Mexico City has come and gone. It was actually a much less stressful week than usual. That’s mostly because I was pretty much done with all of my stuff by the time Monday rolled around. I got a couple of “attaboy’s” for my work, which I have to admit I was very proud of. I finally feel like I might be getting the hang of this thing.
Less stressful than usual, however, does not mean stress-free. The VP came into town on Thursday. As usual, he asked questions that I never even thought to ask. I spent most of the day Thursday trying to track down answers for him. I shouldn’t feel too bad though. It’s not like the one’s who reviewed my work thought of them either. And it’s not just me that he has that effect on, I think. He seems to ask a lot of questions that other people don’t think to ask. Perhaps that’s why he’s the boss and we all work for him.
The pre-exit dinner was fun, although just a bit on the long side. The Finance Director picked us up from the hotel at 6:45 and we didn’t return until after 12:30. Huh, I’ve been thinking that it was a five-hour dinner when it was actually almost six. Funny. We had a good time, and it was one of the best meals we had. I think that when you order something and you’re not surprised by the result you’ve had a good meal. Taste and presentation also go along with that, but some of the worst meals I’ve had have been because I was expecting one thing and got another. We had good food and good company. I spent most of the night talking movies and politics. I’m told politics are one of the things you should never talk about when you’re in a foreign country, but it’s not like I was talking about their politics. I was pretty much talking about US politics and agreeing and disagreeing with them on that basis. We didn’t even touch on the upcoming elections for the Mexican Presidency.
After the dinner portion of the evening was over, we sat around the table until they actually asked us to go to the bar and continue there. So we gathered around a little table next to the piano. It must have been late already because I only remember piano guy playing two songs and then bailing. Tequila flowed freely. There were cigars from a country that I’m not allowed to go to. More conversation, of course. Around 11:15 you could kind of tell that everyone hit the wall. Well, almost everyone. I think the Mexico GM could have gone on all night. Everyone else sort of seemed to slow down and you could tell that the thoughts of the American guests were turning towards bed and the unenviable task of packing to go home.
We finally got back to the hotel and I called home. Instead of making it a quick goodnight and gotten to the packing and sleeping, we stayed on the phone for an hour or so. Then I packed and finally got to bed around 3:00am. I didn’t think that was a brilliant idea, since the exit conference the next day was basically going to be the Larry Show. I guess I managed to get the sections with the most problems, so about 75% of the talking was done by your’s truly. I think I came off fairly well. I’m sure some of it could have been better, but either lack of sleep or actual knowledge of the material (not likely) made me a fairly lucid and intelligent speaker. Who knows, maybe I actually am getting better at this.
So now I’m home. I’ve got about a week before I head out again. The good news is that this next trip is the last I’m scheduled for this year, as the schedule currently stands. The bad news is that it’s three weeks long and no coming home on the weekends. Ok, I guess in all fairness I should say that the other bit of good news is that it’s actually in Italy, which I’ve always wanted to go to. I’ve got some plans for the trip, but it remains to be seen if I can manage to do everything I want to do with the time I have available. I’ll keep you posted.
No comments:
Post a Comment