Shanthony Bourdain: Cancun Centro

WARNING. This post is entirely made of stream of consciousness notes I took for the last 9 hours. It's not edited. There's the f word at least a couple times and it might be out of order or even in broken sentences. It's raw. Eso Se que es.

I'm dropping my son at the aeropuerto. Sticking him on an international flight in Mexico alone. I'm not gonna lie, he just walked out of sight and I'm crying. I didn't want him to go but teenage love won and he is going to go stay with my folks for a while so he can see his Cameron. :( I'm a nervous wreck about him flying outta here alone but he's been on ten times as many flights as me. He's probably a lot better at it than I am. I just... I don't want him to go. Why does he have to be so old? 

Ok, paid way too much for a cab from the airport but whatever. I was too sad to negotiate. I have to hang around Cancun and get these appointments done and get back home. I don't care much for cancun. Too big and drunk for my taste.

Well hey there, I got my first Rewards card from a store in Mexico. I'm now a card carrying Liverpool shopper. :) Look it up. You'll understand. 

It's sad when the Mexican police are the people who u trust when u are lost. I almost asked one for directions but then I saw the building I was heading for. They all looked pissed but they are decently helpful. They've got nothing on taxi drivers. Taxi drivers are amazingly helpful. One declined to give me a ride because it was only about 2 blocks away and I'd waste my money. I found it though. It really was close.

If that girl is a "grande" in those shorts, I'm screwed. Out! I'll never come in this store again. Whatever it was called. Wait... crap. Now I don't know what store to never go in again.

So, I walked into the mall, never left the mall, walked out of the mall, and was immediately no longer at the mall and couldn't FIND the mall. So I went back into the door I came out of... which wasn't the mall and then I was in the mall again. THAT WAS WEIRD. There's no way I could properly explain that occurance. Aliens.

You know how people are always saying,  "If you come to this country,  learn the language." I'm THAT person in Mexico.  WHAT do all these people keep asking me??!?

Omg. I FINALLY FOUND SOME SHORTS WITH AN INSEAM LONGER THAN 1 INCH! IT IS A MIRACLE!

Holy dammit, I almost stepped on an iguana... In the median... crossing the highway. City Iquana are some bad ass little gangstas! Thats a freaking 6 lane highway they're chillin in the median of. I'm certain they should, if they don't already, have their own animated movie where they bully some poor Mexican chihuahuas. That's a hard word to spell. Chihuahua. Stream of consciousness.

Exploring cancun alone is an experience. Holy shit. What the f u c k am I doing here.. by myself.. What am I DOING??!? Ok. Calm down. So far you've been flawless in your execution. You got this. Wtf am I DOING right now? There isn't an American face or an English word in a 5 mile radius. WTF AM I DOING RIGHT NOW. Deep breaths. Oh... hey! There's the bus to the bus to the other bus. I got this! I GOT THIS. TIME TO WHISTLE LIKE A REAL MEXICAN! GO SUPER SHANO GO!

Ps. Apparently everyone in the universe psychically knows the bus fare on local bases except me. Maybe the driver told me telepathically and I just didn't understand the language. They never even asked me to pay them. I paid them on the way out instead after I observed how much everyone was paying. FYI.. Most of the bus fares convert to about a nickel.

I can't believe I just did that. I took bus after bus after bus and navigated my way around all over the fucking place in Mexico... ALONE... carrying large sums of cash for most of the day. I left the comfort of my gates and touristy type place at 11am, hopped a bus to Cancun, put a kid on a plane, grabbed a cab to Cancun Centro, somehow found the offices i had to find in the middle of the city of cancun proper and now I'm on a bus back to Playa.. It's been a long day of just going head first into having no idea what I was doing.

First, I was on an episode of House hunters international. Today felt more like locked up abroad...except it was still the part where the idiots who get locked up are exploring the strange foreign city with way too much cash or whatever in their purse (I had to pay for some things while I was in cancun. Totally legit reason to be carrying all that cash. The mail system here appears to be mythical. I'm not carrying it anymore. I gave It to the people I owed it to. Thank Buddha!) Now I feel like what's his face.  I cant think of his name. The awesome dry humored guy who's always drunk and visits the world via its seedy underbelly. Anthony Bourdain. That's it. I'm him. I just mastered the universe! I'm the master of local Mexico. Now I'm practically an expert. Where's the travel channel cameras. Mexico Shano. Shanthony Bourdain. <talks intelligently into into the camera.>

  So, NOW, FINALLY... I'm on the bus to HOME. Or well... Hacienda de Mexico anyway and now I'm sitting on the bus next to some British couples.
Fucking 'ell... it's nice to hear some English! Even if it's proper Queens English. They're making me smile and passing around pictures of the selfies they took last night when they were too drunk to remember doing it and being really pissed at some girl who keeps saying her phone doesn't work and using theirs and then posting on facebook and sending texts to people with her own phone. Dodgy, she is. That bloody bitch. Oh, now they are reading news about terrorism in North London. That got less fun fast!

I can tell they think I'm Mexican. Everyone seems to. Always shocked I don't speak Spanish. They keep saying things to me in Spanish like I've lied to them when I told them no comprende. FYI Republic of Mexico, I don't have a fucking CLUE what you are asking me and I'm not gonna gamble with a yes or no answer. I can sometimes form coherent sentences to you. But when you fire up your Micro-machine-spokesperson-speed tornado of espanol... forget it. All I hear is "I'm asking you an incoherent question as fast as humanly possible just to screw with you." At the lawyers office (don't ask...renting in mexico requires a lawyer..), though, I did have have a very nice exchange of knowledge with someone;  my Spanish for her English. She was on a way higher level of English than I was Spanish so we played rock paper scissors and she taught taught me some Mexican versions of patty cake. It was really a fun way to pass time in the waiting room. They should should stick a 6 year old in every waiting room.

Added Bonus: Iron Man is on the bus TV. Score!!

It's getting dark now, I'm glad I'm on this bus and I'm glad the bus station is 2 blocks from Hacienda de Shan: Season 2: Playa del Carmen.

Off the bus and there's my street dancing midget. I'm HOME.