¡Viva la México!

This was our view of the border crossing...click on the pic and you can see both the American and Mexican flags.

As promised, I am writing from Queretaro, in the state of Queretaro, MEXICO! We will go to the Inter Act school in the morning for training and observation. The same for Tuesday and then we’ll head down to Mexico City. We’ll follow our managers back to Mexico City and if you read this whole post you will agree that that’s a good idea…

The border crossing at Laredo, TX was a snap. I am so glad that we got our visa’s, Menaje de Casa (official list of everything we imported into Mexico), and vehicle import sticker BEFORE we crossed. I can’t imagine trying to get those same docs at the border. I think of the many times I crossed into Canada and of course there was never a language barrier so I was surprised that many of the Mexican officials didn’t speak English.

We did, however, manage to find a Mexican cop that spoke English. About 2 minutes after entering Mexico we were stopped and this officer said I had driven down a one-way street (I didn’t see any one-way signs or indications that I couldn’t go down that street) and that he was going to have to give me a $62 (US dollars) ticket and follow him to the police station to pay. Bear in mind that a Mexican youth that was helping other officers directed me down this street so I think something was fishy with the whole thing. I tried to look pathetic and told the officer that I wouldn’t do it again, but he was persistent. Mike asked him if a $20 US dollar bill would help, slipped him the bill, and we were on our way! That, my friends, was our first taste of bribery.

The drive got interesting when we got to Monterrey, in the state of Nuevo León. I don’t know how I did it, but I thought I missed a highway exit so I tried to circle back around. Circle around indeed. For about 2 hours Mike and I “toured” Monterrey and I got a crash course in driving in a large, crowed Mexican city in a truck with 5 gears, towing a trailer, with a cranky husband and a panting dog. I started to cry at one point, but I was afraid I’d lose a contact lense. So I reminded Mike and myself that we are on an adventure, we took deep breaths, I put the pedal to the metal and we found our way back to the correct highway! But I’ll admit – yesterday I could have used a valium or two.

We stayed in a small hotel in Matehuala, in the state of San Luis Potosi, last night and then figured we’d have a short 5 hour drive to Queretaro this morning. We were hoping to get to our hotel early and RELAX after that wacky first day of driving. We made great time (now that I am so good with that truck and trailer!) until we started looking for the hotel our Inter Act managers had set us up with. We managed to take a 3 hour tour of this large city that has not just one, but two highways numbered 57. We drove by our hotel twice, but could not find the access road to actually get to it. I wanted to cry again. But instead Mike and I looked at each other and started laughing. FINALLY we found it and checked in.

A couple of side notes: I had heard about cattle lots and how disgusting they are, but I had never seen one. In Duvall the cows at least get to roam around in grassy fields. But there was a cattle lot in New Mexico next to the freeway that went for about 1 mile and it was a very sad sight to see these beautiful animals in such pathetic conditions. Do a little research and you’ll understand what I mean.

Secondly, I actually saw 2 dead horses in the freeway median in Mexico and 3 dead donkeys on the side of another freeway shoulder, also in Mexico. Mike thinks the owners move the bodies to the freeway so that they can be removed by some sort of dead livestock retrieval companies. I had never heard of such a thing. It was quite upsetting to see these beautiful animals in that condition.

Lastly, we are very happy to be here and look forward to each day and the surprises in store for us. I realize I’ll see other animal stuff that upsets me, but I will remind myself that I am in a new culture with new ways of life.