The pilgrimage of a lifetime…that was what my trip to Mexico City back in 1997 was supposed to have been. I was to walk the Avenue of the Dead in Teotihuacan with the spirits of my ancestors and contemplate the precious knowledge of the Mexica people. I was familiar with Mexico having spent most of my summers in Cd. Juarez (back when it was relatively safe) and in Durango where my mother was originally from. In fact I had lived in Cd. Juarez for a year while I worked and attended school in El Paso. So going to Mexico City to explore the museums and all of the historical and archaeological sites did not faze me, it had in fact reinvigorated me. It had been one year since I had returned from Texas to Arizona, and I was already getting the itch to travel, to get back on the road and experience life in the megalopolis of DF (Mexico city being the national capital is often referred to DF much like Washington DC is referred to as DC).
At the time I had reconnected with a good friend of mine, Ben. He had been one of the students I had mentored in a local youth leadership program that I had volunteered for as a college student in 1993. Upon my return to Tucson, he was running the same program I was a part of and doing a great job of mentoring high school students as well as teaching them the ropes of being an agent of social change in the Chicano community. We made great plans to visit DF and since he had family there, it seemed natural to take on this venture and tour the motherland.
In 1997, I was working side by side with Ben at Chicanos Por La Causa (a statewide Community Development Corporation), I was the Special Events coordinator and he was the Youth Programs Coordinator. I was working part time and going to school, so I didn’t have much money. We looked into how much flights were running back then and it was out of our reach. We decided to rough it and take the bus from Nogales all the way to Mexico DF. That was fine with us, we were young bachelors with no commitments and it would give us the opportunity to view the landscape with the salt of the earth, our Mexican brothers and sisters.
Our day of departure came and as usual when it comes to traveling days, everything was chaotic… We had just been paid and I had no time to deposit the check, I’m telling you this trip was financially spontaneous, despite our grand schemes and designs. So on the way out of town we stopped at his bank and deposited at the ATM. Back to this later…
His brother drove us to the bus depot in Nogales, Sonora and we bought tickets for the Elite bus line, First class, destination La Ciudad de Mexico, Tenochtitlan, Mexico city, DF. And off we went, it was around 6pm and things were looking good, there was a scheduled stop in Hermosillo, Sonora around 10pm. Time to settle in and take in the landscape were the only items on my agenda. We arrived in Hermosillo and after a half hour break we were off again.
I’m the kind of traveler who stares out the window, I look at the mountains noticing any geographical anomalies, I observe the trees and try to discern if what type they are, deciduous or not. Hmmmm…It was night time so I was looking at the silhouettes of the mountain peaks as the moon presided over the night time sky holding court with the millions of stars that were luminous in the heavens.
Midnight came and went and I was still entranced with the landscape illuminated by the moonlight, soon I would be in Tenochtitlan marveling at the sculptures created by the hands of the Toltecatl, the people who create beauty. Soon I would be walking down the causeways that were now main thoroughfares that Cortes and Moctezuma had both greeted each other upon the arrival of the so called conquistador. My imagination ran wild anticipating the future itinerary I was about to embark on.
We had just passed Navajoa, Sonora not too far from the Sinaloa – Sonora state border when I noticed the bus slowing down. I was in the front row seat by myself and Ben was across the aisle from me and he had fallen asleep. Thinking that it might have been a toll booth, I didn’t think much of it until I looked again and saw shadowy figures running near what appeared to be a concrete barrier. Upon further observation my eyes had deceived me! It was not a concrete barrier but a pair of sawhorses with grey blankets drape over them. Out of the corner of my eye I saw two men remove the blankets and another man approached the bus from the median simultaneously waving a pistol in the air, motioning the bus driver to get off the freeway onto the sandy shoulder and pulling a ski mask over his face…
Great, I thought…this is going to delay us. Then I started thinking about the possibility that we may not make it out of there alive…at all. At the same time Ben was starting to stir as did most of the bus. Parents were trying to calm their children and themselves down. Ben leaned over and asked what was going on and I told him that we were getting pulled over by some bandits. Luckily the bus could not make it past the sandy shoulder so at least we were within visibility of any nearby traffic that would be passing by any minute. So we held on for the inevitable, I had some extra cash that I stuffed into my sock and as I looked back towards the rear of the bus I noticed many others trying to do the same.
So there we were…on a bus that was precariously leaning to the right and waiting for the perpetrators to climb onto the bus. The guy with the ski mask and the gun was the first to climb aboard, he barked out that he was passing a cap and we were to place any valuables into it, like some sort of demented church collection basket. As the cap went around he started taking wrist watches off men and women and to one woman in particular, he ripped a pair of ear rings off her ears since she did not want to part with them. He exited quickly because one of his henchmen called him outside and it was at that moment that Ben leaned over and proposed an action plan.
“Hey Teso, you know that we have to do something about this,” Ben said trying to convince me that the Aikido lessons we had endured from one of our mentors Luis Angel had prepared us for this very moment. “Teso, did you notice how he climbed aboard?”
I had noticed that as he climbed aboard he had his hands extended with the gun out and not close to his chest and to top it off there was a divider between the steps and the front row of seats behind the divider. Basically he was extending his piece out into a blind spot for him, a big no no.
In those few seconds we hatched a plan to disable the perpetrator relieve him of his gun and save the busload of people. Ben and I retreated to our seats as the assailant approached the bus again. Time seemed to stand still, I was directly behind the bus driver waiting, waiting… he climbed up the stairs but this time he held with both hands close to his chest. I looked at Ben and we knew that our plan wasn’t going to work, the assailant went to the back of the bus and took a lady out of her seat and as he was about to get off the bus he looked back and saw me. I knew that I stood out like a sore thumb, it was written all over me…hey I’m a chicano! Look at me I’m from the US! I looked over at Ben and gave a look that must have said, “Nice knowing you bud.”
So this guy had a gun aimed at us as we stood by the door outside of the bus, he went straight for my wallet but only found my debit card and nothing else. He then started yelling at the lady standing next to me, “ Andale pinche vieja, que tienes en esa bolsa? (c’mon stupid woman, what do you have in that purse?)” The lady began explaining that she had just come from knee surgery and that the only things she had in her purse were make up and other items of no value. The jerk then took his pistol and with the butt of the piece smacked her with the gun against her head. “Callate el hocico, pinche vieja! (shut up! Stupid woman!) Upon seeing that I reached down to my sock and pulled out the 70 pesos (at the time that was about 10 US dollars) and handed it over to the bastard and told him to leave her alone.
He took the money and as he looked up ready to give me the same treatment something caught his eye. Apparently he saw another vehicle coming up, he turned to his buddies and they ran into some nearby bushes. It’s amazing how things work out, and the cosmic timing and the sense of humor it seems to have, well in my life anyways. I helped the lady onto the bus that seemed about to tip over at any second and I told Ben that the guys had taken off and that another bus was fast approaching our bus. During all that time the bus driver was no use, I don’t know about now, but back then the buses didn’t carry radio or CBs, so there was no way to communicate for help. Ben and I decided that it was time to take a risk and flag down the other bus. The bus driver opened the door and we jumped off and began running along the shoulder of the freeway.
As I ran trying to reach the asphalt I tripped and fell. Ben turned around sensing that I wasn’t running behind him and yelled out, “Hey Teso! Are you okay man?” I got up and yelled out I was fine. So there we were two guys running from a bus that was stranded in the sand by the side of a freeway running toward the other bus. Can you picture that? Now imagine you are the driver of the approaching bus, what would you think? Well the driver began to slow down and was in the process of making a u-turn, when all of a sudden our bus driver was running behind us yelling for us to get back to the bus and he was going to flag down the driver.
We returned to the bus and shared with the rest of the passengers what was going on, we let them know that the other bus was coming and help was on the way but that the bus was close to tipping over. We also explained that the assailants may be nearby so if they were to get off there was that risk. Practically all of the passengers chose to get off preferring to run the risk of coming face to face with the bandits then to be in the bus as it teetered on the shoulder. Ben and I got off the bus and began to help the passengers off the bus. It was like straight out of a movie, old ladies where thanking us for doing something about the situation. And I kid you not, there were nuns on the bus who gave us blessings as they got down off the bus.
So there we waited for the bus to come. The assailants never did come back and with the exception of the lady whose earrings were ripped off and the lady who received a blow to the head, we escaped unharmed. But now with hope that many of us would be able to continue on our respective journeys, the driver of the other bus had the gall to say that there wasn’t much room on his bus and that we would not be able to get on. Upon hearing that, all of the ladies damn near kicked his ass, they were about to lynch him. Finally he relented and took the women and children in his bus to Culiacan, Sinaloa, the rest of us would have to wait for the next bus, which wasn’t too far behind. During all of this the other bus driver had been resting in a compartment near the luggage and awoke to mayhem…well at least he said he had just woken up.
And this was the first few hours of my pilgrimage…things couldn’t get any worse, right?
Join me in the next episode, “Tenochtitlan or BUST! Or How We Shook Down Televisa For Some Airplane Tickets!”
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