Six Days in Hell (Oaxaca)

The very first Shades of Greaves guest post from Melissa [Last Name Redacted]

Jun 07, 2024

I’m back! My wife, Cristina, and I were in Mexico City and Oaxaca, where we swam in mineral hot springs, visited thousand-year-old Mesoamerican archaeological sites, and ate our weight in mole. Visiting Mexico was also a good opportunity to practice our Spanish, since we’re both fluent, but don’t speak to each other in Spanish as often as we should (we mostly use Spanish to talk shit about people in public).

The trip was incredible. Other than the minor sunburn I got (probably for failing to appease the sun god Azularathotep* — or, as the Aztecs knew him, Huītzilōpōchtli) I could not imagine how anyone could have had a bad time doing all the things we did.

*If you’re new to this newsletter and wondering who Azularathotep is, that’s a reference to my story about watching the April solar eclipse. It’s a callback, and these sorts of inside jokes are a fun little thing I get to do with y’all now, which is one of the cool perks of writing a newsletter.

I could write an entire post about the archaeological site where this photo was taken (Monte Alban). Maybe I will?

That is, until we met Melissa.

We’d just arrived at the airport to catch our flight back. As we were about to go through security, we heard, from about a hundred yards away, a woman — holding a suitcase the size of a Fiat 500 — arguing, in English, with the agent at the check-in counter.

You know how, sometimes, when you’re going through security at the airport, you’ll see another traveler and you just know they’re going to be on the same flight as you? Like, maybe you’re going to Hawaii and you can just tell that person is obviously also going to Hawaii? Because you’re flying out of JFK in January and they’re wearing flip flops, shorts, and a floral button-up?

I’m reminded of one time in particular when I saw a guy who I just knew, deep in my bones, was going to be on my same flight. He was wearing a tank top, no doubt to show off his broad, bulging chest, massive biceps, and shoulders that made you go “I didn’t even know humans had muscles there.” He also had, in contrast, the tiniest little chicken legs I have ever seen on a bodybuilder — resulting in a physique that looked, to put it bluntly, very top heavy. As in, he actually looked like a top (the children’s toy, not the sexual role, but, honestly, probably that too).

Anyway, I see his Johnny-Bravo-lookin’-ass, and I’m convinced he’s going to be on my flight. And, I’m convinced he’s going to be in the seat in front of me on the plane. And, I’m convinced he’s going to lean his seat all the way back as soon as he gets the chance. Because OF COURSE he’s the type of guy that would lean his seat all the way back as soon as he gets the chance.

Sure enough, he was on my flight. And in the seat in front of me. And he leaned his seat all the way back the second he got the chance. I’ve learned that the universe will always deliver whichever outcome is cosmically funniest. The only thing you can do is try to anticipate it. That way, you get to laugh with the universe instead of being laughed at by the universe. That’s really the best you can hope for when it comes to the universe.

So, we see this woman trying to convince the check-in agent that she should be allowed to bring a carry-on the size of a Ford F-150 on the plane with her, and I just know she’s going to be on our flight. And she’s going to be in the seat next to me. And she’s going to be a talker (the only type of passenger worse than a seat leaner-backer).

And, folks, that’s exactly what happened.

My Very First Guest

I hadn’t been open to guest posts on this newsletter, mostly because I like the sound of my own voice (the typing of my own writing?) way too much. But, after chatting with Melissa for five hours on the flight home, I knew I had to share her words with y’all (if nothing else to make those five hours of my life worth it). Luckily, she agreed to be featured.

Here is the very first guest post on Shades of Greaves, written by Melissa [Last Name Redacted] about her trip to Mexico (lightly edited based on my notes from our conversation).

Paradise Lost, Or, Six Days in Hell (Oaxaca)

From the second I landed at the Oaxaca airport, I knew visiting Mexico was a mistake.

So many people had told me, You’ve got to go to Oaxaca! It’s so beautiful! And the food is incredible!

So I told my travel agent, Tammy, to book the trip. And when Tammy said, “Are you sure you want to go to Oaxaca, Mel?” I said, “Of course, I’m sure. Book the damn flights, Tammy!” I figured Tammy was just concerned about me going to Mexico all by myself.

You see, my husband, Daryll, didn’t want to come to Mexico because, in his words, “you can get tacos anywhere these days.” And my kids still aren’t speaking to me after “the Arby’s incident.” But, I figured, boo hoo to all of them! I wasn’t going to let that stop me from enjoying a nice, relaxing vacation in a place I’d heard so many good things about.

Terrible Location

The state of Oaxaca is (I’d been told) along the coast near the southern end of Mexico. So, obviously, I expected the capital, Oaxaca de Juárez, to be like any other Mexican city Americans visit — on the ocean with beautiful beaches lined with upscale resorts.

Instead, it turns out Oaxaca de Juárez is just a regular, boring, dusty city with a few old buildings in the city center and no beach to speak of for hundreds of miles. If I wanted to visit a regular city, I’d have booked a flight to visit my sister in Indianapolis. Assuming she was still speaking to me.

Language Barriers

I was also disappointed that, other than workers in the hospitality industry, very few people I encountered spoke fluent English. Considering the proximity to the United States, you would think more people would have bothered to learn the language. It made me feel like the locals didn’t really respect or value my culture.

Luckily, my driver spoke good English and was able to help translate, since I speak mucho poquito Español.

Infrastructure

Another challenge of the trip was finding clean drinking water, because the tap water in Mexico is not potable (at least, not to Americans who don’t want to get violently ill). I knew Mexico was not as affluent as the United States, but water is so essential, I’d have thought they would have at least figured out how to provide water clean enough for Americans to drink. I mean, can you imagine if there were cities in the U.S. that didn’t have clean drinking water? If Americans lacked access to such a basic necessity, our government would step in and fix that immediately.

Fellow Travelers

Perhaps the worst part about the trip was how few Americans I met while I was in Mexico. I’m a very chatty and naturally curious person, so I’d been hoping to meet other Americans visiting Oaxaca from different parts of the U.S. to learn more about folks from interesting places.

Sadly, all of the guests at the hotel I was staying in, aside from two Swedes, were Mexican. Hearing about Sweden was kind of interesting, I guess. But I quickly got tired of listening to Mexican tourists explain that they were from some boring part of Mexico I’d never heard of like “Puebla,” or “San Miguel de Allende,” or a place called “Ciudad de México.” The point is, it’s kind of disheartening to travel to another country just to be surrounded by foreigners the entire time.

I am Never Coming Back

The trip was a bust from start to finish. And, to add insult to injury, as I was trying to leave Mexico, the agent at the check-in counter insisted (in pretty good but still broken English) that my totally normal-sized carry-on had to be checked. Needless to say, I’m glad to be leaving this rude hell-hole behind.

My next trip will be to somewhere more developed, with a more similar culture to ours, and where Americans are treated with more respect. I’m thinking France.

Disclaimers

Alright, I have to confess that Melissa [Last Name Redacted] is (thankfully) not a real person. But Melissa is based on a story from a few years ago about a British woman who demanded a refund for her vacation because there were “too many Spanish people” at her hotel. In Spain. So, yeah, Melissa wasn’t exactly a stretch.

The story about tank top Johnny Bravo, on the other hand, is true. The only detail I embellished is that he was actually sitting in front of my sister on the flight, and all I could do was give her sympathetic look as he leaned his seat all the way back five minutes after takeoff.

Sometimes, instead of laughing at you, the universe laughs at the ones you love, and you’re totally helpless to stop it. Which is, in many ways, even worse.

Comments

Have you encountered any Melissa’s while traveling?
Any travel horror stories?
I post a mix of snarky satire and curiosity-driven personal essay. This post could have easily been a curiosity-driven essay about my actual trip, but I went with snarky satire instead. Would y’all want to read the curiosity-driven essay about my trip? Do you have a general preference between snarky satire and curiosity-driven personal essay?

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