Thursday, January 15, 2004
Copyright © Las Vegas Mercury

Backstory: North and south of the border

By Michael Green

I began this column looking over a laptop at a hillside in Puerto Vallarta. My wife and I wanted to see all the jobs George W. Bush has created, so we went to Mexico.

What a columnist does while traveling may not interest you, unless it's Knappster or Brother Smith, who have a way of telling a tale. But sometimes what goes on elsewhere relates to us here. Please allow me a few random observations on, from and due to Puerto Vallarta:

¥ Dogs and cats roam the streets more than they do at home. Mexico seems less interested in spaying or neutering its pets than you, me and Bob Barker. It's a useful reminder of what we can do for our favorite animals and ourselves. Of course, every now and then, one of our cats gives me a look suggesting hatred for the human race, and that I should know why.

¥ I saw a burro adorned with an array of serapes and giving children rides, braying regularly. It looked unhappy, but we who worship Eeyore know burros and their cousins rarely look happy. Still, even Eeyore would agree it must be better than grinding through the hills carrying someone's belongings all day in the sun.

¥ Near the condo where we stayed are the one-time homes of Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. Buses often come with tourists, almost all Americans, to see the bridge that Burton built to Taylor's place. They used to get more paparazzi than even my fellow Mercury columnist Mort could imagine. The next time you hear we are too caught up today in what celebrities do, remember that times haven't changed that much. Or to put it another way, only after I returned home did I find out that Britney Spears broke the land speed record for marrying and divorcing. I didn't care when I didn't know, and I didn't care after I did.

¥ Abject poverty and great wealth mingle in close quarters. Vendors stay open late and walk the beaches and streets weighed down with shirts and hats to serve tourists and snowbirds spending some of the winter months here, and try to entice you to come in off the street to sample their wares. Homeless sit on the sidewalks and plead for help. A strong sense of history mingles with tacky curios. For a minute, I thought I was home.

¥ We wanted to snorkel. We bought a boat ride. We spent about 15 minutes snorkeling and the rest of the time riding a powerboat to and from the beach wherever the boat stopped, or sitting on the boat while the crew ferried other passengers on the powerboat.

¥ Puerto Vallarta is at the same latitude as Hawaii, so it's tropical. Yet you can walk a few blocks from wherever you happen to be staying and find great food, great shops--not just chains, but different places with different approaches to food and fashion. We visited art galleries, small restaurants and small shops, all different and in proximity to one another. What makes an area unique is not its similarities to everywhere else, but its uniqueness. Las Vegas isn't exactly a place for walkers, but more people might hang out downtown if it emphasized that it's different from other places.

¥ Many of the streets are old cobblestones. They are narrow and so are the sidewalks. They still are easier to navigate than the Spaghetti Bowl or U.S. 95.

¥ Mexico is a Third World country. In some places, it shows. In others...the left-turn lane is on the right side of the street and works well. In Las Vegas, which right-wing legislators would turn into a Fourth World country, we aren't even trusted to use the left-turn yield and making a right turn is nerve-jangling.

¥ Many of the streets are one-way. At times, cars head for one another. The drivers stop and get out of the way--even the cab drivers.

¥ Along the beach are new resorts and malls. Many visitors just stay there, and the beach is great. But they miss the older part of town and its fascinations. It's reminiscent of tourists who stay on the Strip.

¥ I brought along a bunch of books and my computer to work on several book projects. Why am I working on vacation? Because I am an overpaid state employee, and college professors just teach their classes and then play golf. That, literary experts, is called sarcasm.

¥ While I brought plenty of reading, our hosts, Sara and Ralph Denton, have a book on their counter that is enormous fun: Al Franken's Lies (And the Lying Liars Who Tell Them). Anyone who reads that book and still believes anything said by Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter or Bush the Rug (all he does is lie) should consult me--Kirk Kerkorian just gave my wife and me the Bellagio for our anniversary and we want to sell it to you.

¥ Which brings me to the point of the trip: our third wedding anniversary. Staying with the Dentons, who are 51 years ahead of us on anniversaries, provided a reminder of how to live and how to love.
Many of the streets are old cobblestones. They are narrow and so are the sidewalks. They still are easier to navigate than the Spaghetti Bowl or U.S. 95.