Mexico Misery

I love Mexico. Since the first time I came to Cabo San Lucas for a week long girls get away to the trips to magical Tulum with M., I always enjoy the time I spend here. Over the years I have been to Cancun, Cozumel, Tulum, Puerto Vallarta and Cabo San Lucas and now Querétero and Cuernavaca. They are all special in their own way.

There is always one downside. It seems inevitable that Montezuma joins the trip at some point. Not that you wanted to know that but there it is. The first time I didn't know whether to laugh or cry as all four of us on the girls get away were struck on the same day while sharing a very small hotel room (2 double beds, 1 small bathroom, no soundproofing). In the end I opted for laughing as each one dashed into the bathroom as soon as the previous could vacate. That trip marked the end of the college student cost cutting approach to vacations. We all have to grow up sometime. I want my own bathroom in countries prone to making travelers sick.

Then there was the time in Cancun when a hurricane was bearing down on us, we needed to try to evacuate a day early but didn't dare to leave ourselves in a situation where we could be more than 1.5 seconds from the nearest toilet. We made it on the last plane to leave the airport. Very Casablanca.

It was also great fun after being out of all contact with the rest of the world for a week when M. and I landed in the chaos of the first day of the new liquids ban in Philadelphia airport from Mexico and the wait at the checkpoints was hours long. Neither of us was up to that at the moment but had to soldier on to Boston.

We will leave out the 'surprise' business trip to India right after returning to Europe from Mexico on that occasion.

This time I am here for work but no exception to the rule. One and a half weeks into the trip and after enjoying mexican food, limonatas galore and maybe some fruit that was not officially on the safe list it was game over. I spent a crampy, miserable long weekend (thankfully alone) in my hotel room two hours south of Mexico City wondering whether I hoped I would or would not just die already.

As my mother said, why didn't you go to the doctor? Actually it was more like, WHY DIDN'T YOU GO TO THE DOCTOR! Simple. Do you want to have an error in translation resulting in a treatment that makes you worse than you started when in Mexico? Me neither. I am sensitive enough to drugs and rarely even take aspirin if I can avoid it. Today, I finally caved in and went to the doctor.

I asked him politely to please not kill me, flashing him my friendliest smile. Not sure he got that. Or maybe I had the expression of a crocodile. Anyhow, he doled out the drugs and let's hope I am on the road to recovery. It is a 21 hour trip door to door on Thursday night to get home. Crossing fingers for no new world crises, screening procedures at the airport, long waits in traffic, and trips to other countries with their own set of special critters in the food and water.

I am more than ready to get home. But would I come back? Yeah.

Posted from Cuernavaca, Mexico