mOOners in Mexico

by Kris

It's Sunday morning - barely at 12:48 - but morning all the same. Ken's asleep; what a gift that is. My sleeping habits have changed over the past (menopausal?) years to the point that I now have a hard time falling asleep much less staying asleep. This night/morning I am having major deja vu.  Thumping loud music somewhere in the darkness is keeping me awake and possibly a tad bit agitated. There is a group of grade school children at some kind of camp-out here in Roca Azul; is it their music? It's like one really long really loud really bad song. My mind flashes back to a similarly really long really loud really bad song on that night not long ago.

Scene: Summer '05 at Las Glorias beach on the Sea of Cortez - site of a lovely pool-side wedding reception - subject of the following letter written to family and friends.

 Why Gringos aren’t allowed to have weapons....

I realized the answer to this question at two o’clock Sunday morning, eight hours into the celebración de matrimonio occurring twenty yards from our RV on the beach at Las Glorias. First of all there are two important facts you should know about the cultura de Mexico…Mexicans love their música and they love it LOUD. The nine-member band hired for the wedding reception arrived in their touring bus and set up a sound system that would do the Greatful Dead proud. Every horn had a microphone and speaker.

That should have been a sign.

The wedding ceremony took place elsewhere and the happy bridal couple arrived and posed for a few beachy photos.

The newlyweds were greeted by their guests pool-side (our pool from which we’d been banished all day) as the reception began and with it the music. We hoped for the more traditional sounds of the Mariachis, but this was a hip 30-ish couple and their musical preference was salsa and, dare I say it, Latino hip hop disco. Did you know there was such a sound? The band (I think they were called the Machismos judging from the on and off stage moves) played for an hour and took a break. No chance to rest our eardrums, the strains of pre-recorded songs filled the air and just as loudly. So went the evening. The volume was cranked to high and the beat of every song (live or recorded) was BOOM BOOM. Every song from 6:00 pm on was a thumping earsplitting BOOM BOOM. Every freaking song.

Chairs in hand we sought relief up wind of the reverberations. It was a glorious evening and the beach was the place to be for the un-invited. The locals and the curious from far away villages arrived on foot, in cars and trucks, and on every type and age of 4-wheeler. There were more of us than the receptionees and I know we could’ve overthrown the band and controlled the volume but, God help me, they all loved it. At the first blip of darkness a huge 4th of July firework exploded next to us and lit the beach -- as did the mondo bonfire revitalized occasionally with blasts of gasoline. We were a bit surprised at the grandeur and scope of the pyrotechnics and Duffie about jumped out of his furries.  These folks know how to party! It was quite a show and we’re pretty sure (and totally surprised) no one was mortally wounded - but we think it’s probably good that Joe Blow USA can’t do this in his backyard.

Around 10:00 we went into the camper. What we thought I’m not sure. The camper actually vibrated. We read for a while then Ken put in earplugs and had the nerve to fall asleep. He abandoned me to snores-ville. I read, I knitted, and I prayed for a comet to crash into the band. At 1:30 I peeked outside and it looked like everyone was gone and I thought, Dear God, they went home and forgot to turn off the music. Shoot me now.
 
I’ve had two weddings and I know at some point the bride and groom go away and consummate their vows. This couple could have flown to a honeymoon in Hawaii and heard the band all the way.

The last song was one I’ll take to my grave….the BOOM BOOM salsa hip hop rant from hell stopped (yippee) then crescendoed (groan) again and again and again. It was like the worst repeater burp. I had wild thoughts; the points of my knitting needles sharpened as did my senses. The bowl of mangoes on the counter became grenades I could lob onto the bandstand. I would crawl in the warm sand toward the noise with my cache of fruity weapons and put an end to this BOOM BOOM madness. Damn the good will between our nations, damn the Federales and their stink-hole prisons, this would be a one-woman war of epic proportions.

As I perused my jammies to see which most closely resembled camouflage wear, the music stopped so abruptly it shocked my system. I was surprised Ken didn’t awaken with a start and ask, “what’s that?”  Just like that, my coup d’música ended before bloodshed or destruction of instruments and gigantic speakers. I was alone in celebration; it didn’t seem quite proper or marital-ly wise to rouse mi esposo from slumber at 4:00 a.m. to say “woohooo!”  

My sleeping sweetie will never know how close we were to the anti BOOM BOOM revolución...

That's my story and I'm sticking to it

mOOners