OK, I've been really bad at keeping this updated, but I have an excuse. We've had groups here for the last 20 or so days, and I just haven't had a chance to do much writing. Amidst 9 days of concrete mixing.
Anyway, a few days ago, I started coming down with a nice case of Montezuma's Revenge. The first day got pretty crappy in the afternoon, the second day I just felt pretty lousy the entire day, and the third day I still kept getting these waves of nausea.
Today I'm feeling better, but I have the feeling it's not completely out of my system yet.
Before you ask me if I drank the water, I didn't drink the water. I know that you can't do that by now. No, the whole sickness thing comes from the different diet that you have when you're down here. When you eat stuff that's different than what your body is used to, eventually it catches up with you. Some people it takes a couple days, some weeks, some months. For me, I made it through six weeks without getting sick, and I think that's pretty damned good.
I'll spare you the details about the revenge itself. Just suffice it to say that although I haven't thrown up once, I've made many a trip to the bathroom, and my stomach has been giving me plenty of cramps and sweeping waves of nausea.
Hopefully, by the end of the day, I'll be feeling more or less back to normal
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
Wednesday, August 1, 2007
Crossing the Border
When you're living south of the border, one of the things you learn to deal with is the border itself. I cross the border pretty frequently -- usually about once a week or so. And I get a lot of questions about this, so let me explain how it works.
When I want to cross the border, I don't go hop a fence or anything. I cross at the Tijuana-San Ysidro border crossing station, which is about 10 minutes away from my apartment here in Tijuana.
Getting from the United States into Tijuana is pretty easy. If you want to cross by car, you take Interstate 5 all the way to its southern terminus, at the Mexican border. You get all sorts of signs on the road, like "International Border / Frontera Internacional", with the distances both in miles and kilometers (since we're metric here in Mexico). Then, as long as you have nothing to declare, you get into the proper lane, go through a set of booths like a toll plaza, and you're in. If a little red light flashes going through the booths, you have to pull over and get asked a couple questions, but otherwise you don't even have to stop. I-5 turns into Mexican Highway 1, which I believe takes you all the way to Cabo at the southern tip of the Baja California peninsula. And yes, there is a yellow line on the road at the actual border line.
Crossing on foot is a little more interesting. San Diego's trolley has a Blue Line which takes you directly to the border. The station is named "San Ysidro / Tijuana", and it's the end of the line, so it's hard to miss. Once you're out of the trolley, you simply walk to the entrance of the border crossing station. Once you're in, you walk up a series of ramps to a bridge that crosses the street. You cross the bridge, go down another series of ramps, and make a right, and walk through a set of turnstiles. These turnstiles are noisy. You hear them clacking as soon as you cross the bridge. Anyway, once you're through them, the line is right there -- complete with a marker that denotes the limit of Mexico and the limit of the United States.
Incidentally, once you cross that line, there's a little gate off to the side. Sometimes, you'll see a bus parked outside the gate, dropping off people deported from the United States.
And that's it. Once you cross that line, you're in Mexico. Simple as that. You needn't have identification, or anything at all.
It's not so simple to cross back into the United States. You need two things: identification, and lots of time on your hands. Like coming into Mexico, you can cross either by car or on foot, although it's usually faster to cross on foot. If you're crossing by car, you follow the signs for San Diego, and then get in line. The huge traffic jam is pretty hard to miss. Likewise, walking, you follow the signs for the USA, and get in line.
Once you're in line, you wait. And wait. And wait some more. Usually there are street vendors selling all sorts of weird stuff, from bottled water to churros to huge ceramic turtles. Yes, huge ceramic turtles -- there is evidently a demand for them among people crossing the border. On an average day, you'll wait an hour or so, maybe an hour and a half. My fastest crossing time so far was a Monday morning in the foot line -- I got through in under 5 minutes. My slowest time was on a Sunday night in the car line, when it took four and a half hours, and that was unpleasant.
Once you get to the front of the car line (there are usually 10 or so lanes open) you show your passports or identification to the officer. You sometimes get asked questions, but I've only gotten asked anything once. Usually they'll just look at your passport and be like, OK, go ahead. The walking line is pretty much the same deal -- you get to the front, choose a line, and show your ID. Then you're in.
You can get in with a number of forms of identification. Driver's license, passport, birth certificate -- for now. In next January, supposedly they're going to make you use your passport. But whether that'll actually happen or not -- it's already been pushed back, due to the huge passport demand -- remains to be seen.
Really, after waiting so much time, it's pretty anticlimactic when you get to the front of the line and the guy looks at your passport and says, OK, you can go. Border wait times have been longer too, more recently, because of heightened terror alerts -- ironic, considering the 9/11 attackers got in legally. But that's pretty much what you have to do. The return trip isn't nearly as scenic as the trip in. There is a marker and line on the Mexico side leading back into the United States, but it's been crossed so often that the line is worn away, and it's easy to miss.
But, in a nutshell, that's how it works. Bottom line: easy getting into Mexico, hard getting into the United States.
When I want to cross the border, I don't go hop a fence or anything. I cross at the Tijuana-San Ysidro border crossing station, which is about 10 minutes away from my apartment here in Tijuana.
Getting from the United States into Tijuana is pretty easy. If you want to cross by car, you take Interstate 5 all the way to its southern terminus, at the Mexican border. You get all sorts of signs on the road, like "International Border / Frontera Internacional", with the distances both in miles and kilometers (since we're metric here in Mexico). Then, as long as you have nothing to declare, you get into the proper lane, go through a set of booths like a toll plaza, and you're in. If a little red light flashes going through the booths, you have to pull over and get asked a couple questions, but otherwise you don't even have to stop. I-5 turns into Mexican Highway 1, which I believe takes you all the way to Cabo at the southern tip of the Baja California peninsula. And yes, there is a yellow line on the road at the actual border line.
Crossing on foot is a little more interesting. San Diego's trolley has a Blue Line which takes you directly to the border. The station is named "San Ysidro / Tijuana", and it's the end of the line, so it's hard to miss. Once you're out of the trolley, you simply walk to the entrance of the border crossing station. Once you're in, you walk up a series of ramps to a bridge that crosses the street. You cross the bridge, go down another series of ramps, and make a right, and walk through a set of turnstiles. These turnstiles are noisy. You hear them clacking as soon as you cross the bridge. Anyway, once you're through them, the line is right there -- complete with a marker that denotes the limit of Mexico and the limit of the United States.
Incidentally, once you cross that line, there's a little gate off to the side. Sometimes, you'll see a bus parked outside the gate, dropping off people deported from the United States.
And that's it. Once you cross that line, you're in Mexico. Simple as that. You needn't have identification, or anything at all.
It's not so simple to cross back into the United States. You need two things: identification, and lots of time on your hands. Like coming into Mexico, you can cross either by car or on foot, although it's usually faster to cross on foot. If you're crossing by car, you follow the signs for San Diego, and then get in line. The huge traffic jam is pretty hard to miss. Likewise, walking, you follow the signs for the USA, and get in line.
Once you're in line, you wait. And wait. And wait some more. Usually there are street vendors selling all sorts of weird stuff, from bottled water to churros to huge ceramic turtles. Yes, huge ceramic turtles -- there is evidently a demand for them among people crossing the border. On an average day, you'll wait an hour or so, maybe an hour and a half. My fastest crossing time so far was a Monday morning in the foot line -- I got through in under 5 minutes. My slowest time was on a Sunday night in the car line, when it took four and a half hours, and that was unpleasant.
Once you get to the front of the car line (there are usually 10 or so lanes open) you show your passports or identification to the officer. You sometimes get asked questions, but I've only gotten asked anything once. Usually they'll just look at your passport and be like, OK, go ahead. The walking line is pretty much the same deal -- you get to the front, choose a line, and show your ID. Then you're in.
You can get in with a number of forms of identification. Driver's license, passport, birth certificate -- for now. In next January, supposedly they're going to make you use your passport. But whether that'll actually happen or not -- it's already been pushed back, due to the huge passport demand -- remains to be seen.
Really, after waiting so much time, it's pretty anticlimactic when you get to the front of the line and the guy looks at your passport and says, OK, you can go. Border wait times have been longer too, more recently, because of heightened terror alerts -- ironic, considering the 9/11 attackers got in legally. But that's pretty much what you have to do. The return trip isn't nearly as scenic as the trip in. There is a marker and line on the Mexico side leading back into the United States, but it's been crossed so often that the line is worn away, and it's easy to miss.
But, in a nutshell, that's how it works. Bottom line: easy getting into Mexico, hard getting into the United States.
Skype
If you're wondering how to get in touch with me -- because face it, you miss me -- it's pretty easy. The usual methods still apply: I have AIM, my email address, and my cell phone. Yes, my cell phone actually works down here, but it only picks up AT&T;'s network in my apartment, so if I'm out, odds are that I don't have it on me.
Really, the easy way to get in touch with me is Skype. What's that, you ask? I'll spare you the computer engineer's explanation of how it works, and give you the simple version: it's a way to do free voice and video chatting over the Internet. You download the program, and make calls. Simple as that, really. You can optionally pay to use it to call landlines, but I don't bother with that -- the Internet calling works well enough for me.
If you want to give it a try, my username is dcipjr. You can also search for me by name or by email address. I've been using it these past few weeks, and it really is pretty cool. I do have a video camera, since it's built-in for MacBooks, but all you really need is a microphone (which many computers include or have built-in).
So, give it a shot and see what you think.
Really, the easy way to get in touch with me is Skype. What's that, you ask? I'll spare you the computer engineer's explanation of how it works, and give you the simple version: it's a way to do free voice and video chatting over the Internet. You download the program, and make calls. Simple as that, really. You can optionally pay to use it to call landlines, but I don't bother with that -- the Internet calling works well enough for me.
If you want to give it a try, my username is dcipjr. You can also search for me by name or by email address. I've been using it these past few weeks, and it really is pretty cool. I do have a video camera, since it's built-in for MacBooks, but all you really need is a microphone (which many computers include or have built-in).
So, give it a shot and see what you think.
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
City of Car Alarms
If you like things quiet, you aren't going to last long in Tijuana, because this is a city of a lot of different noises.
Case in point: car alarms. Everyone's got 'em. And they're the kind that goes through all the different sounds. There are variations on a theme, too: some of the cars honk while going through the different sounds, some of the cars have the sounds at a higher or lower pitch, or do them in a different order. But they all essentially sound the same. How this helps stop car thieves, I don't know – it obviously didn't stop the guys who stole our truck a couple weeks ago (but that's subject matter for another post).
People are constantly setting these alarms off, too. An hour rarely goes by here where I don't hear at least one car alarm. But after almost four weeks of hearing them, I've pretty much been able to tune them out -- I guess it's like the train going by.
Case in point: car alarms. Everyone's got 'em. And they're the kind that goes through all the different sounds. There are variations on a theme, too: some of the cars honk while going through the different sounds, some of the cars have the sounds at a higher or lower pitch, or do them in a different order. But they all essentially sound the same. How this helps stop car thieves, I don't know – it obviously didn't stop the guys who stole our truck a couple weeks ago (but that's subject matter for another post).
People are constantly setting these alarms off, too. An hour rarely goes by here where I don't hear at least one car alarm. But after almost four weeks of hearing them, I've pretty much been able to tune them out -- I guess it's like the train going by.
The Bane of my Existence
Someone once told me that it wasn't buggy down here. This person was a liar.
The fact is, there are mosquitos down here, and there are lots of them. They also happen to like biting me. I'll be amazed if I don't contract West Nile by the end of the summer.
I've gotten good at keeping them at bay, but they usually get in when I'm doing the laundry, and it takes a couple days to get rid of them all. Usually, just when I think I've purged them my apartment, one will fly past my face. I can practically hear it laughing.
Just seeing one of these little bastards makes me itch. I've gotten better at killing them, but occasionally I'll find one that's more elusive. I bring my hands together to smite it, clap as hard as I can, open them up, and lo, and behold -- they're empty. How that damned thing escaped, I have no idea.
Right now, there's one in here, but I can't find it, and I'm getting tired. And if I don't find it, I know this thing is gonna eat me alive during the night.
A-ha! Got it. Now I can rest, if the dogs don't howl all night. More on that later.
The fact is, there are mosquitos down here, and there are lots of them. They also happen to like biting me. I'll be amazed if I don't contract West Nile by the end of the summer.
I've gotten good at keeping them at bay, but they usually get in when I'm doing the laundry, and it takes a couple days to get rid of them all. Usually, just when I think I've purged them my apartment, one will fly past my face. I can practically hear it laughing.
Just seeing one of these little bastards makes me itch. I've gotten better at killing them, but occasionally I'll find one that's more elusive. I bring my hands together to smite it, clap as hard as I can, open them up, and lo, and behold -- they're empty. How that damned thing escaped, I have no idea.
Right now, there's one in here, but I can't find it, and I'm getting tired. And if I don't find it, I know this thing is gonna eat me alive during the night.
A-ha! Got it. Now I can rest, if the dogs don't howl all night. More on that later.
Back in Business
Here I am, spending a year in Tijuana, Mexico. It occurred to me tonight that I probably should be writing all this stuff down, since I'm never going to remember it all, and since people are probably wondering what I'm up to down here.
So this blog is now back in action.
I'm going to do my best to keep it updated -- really, this time. In the past, whenever I've tried to keep a blog, I've never seemed to have anything to write about. I'd sit down, stare at the text entry field, and think....OK, I got nothing here. But this time, seriously, I'm going give you something to read. You're about to get a taste of what life south of the border is really like.
Enjoy.
So this blog is now back in action.
I'm going to do my best to keep it updated -- really, this time. In the past, whenever I've tried to keep a blog, I've never seemed to have anything to write about. I'd sit down, stare at the text entry field, and think....OK, I got nothing here. But this time, seriously, I'm going give you something to read. You're about to get a taste of what life south of the border is really like.
Enjoy.
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