Part 6: A to B, Si?

£5 and a face. This, we were told, is all you need to secure a driving license in Mexico. An exaggeration, surely? Even on the notoriously complex streets of Egypt, you need to demonstrate an ability to drive forward and reverse a car one hundred yards. But no. Here you turn up at your local supermarket, you pay your five pounds, have your photo taken and that’s it. You have a driving license.

‘Are you nervous about driving in Mexico City?’ I was asked,

‘Nah,’ I sipped my drink, ‘I pretty much learned to drive in Italy. If you can drive there you can drive anywhere’

Not quite. In Italy they have a lane system. In Italy, the slip roads to get on and off the motorways are on the outside of the road and in Italy, you still need more than five pounds and a face. Still, the road system kind of works. It relies on instinct more than any kind of highway code but if you’ve got your wits about you, who needs traffic lights?

We’d got a taste of driving the City almost as soon as we arrived. Annemarie’s company had provided us with a driver, Joaquin, a cuddly, jovial guy who drove us around town the first week. Officially, he was helping us look for apartments but like all the great people in Mexico, he’s immensely proud of his home and took us to restaurants, local beauty spots, ancient ruins and even the network of caves that run under Mexico City.
’There’s no sounds down here,’ our guide told us, ‘no smell…’ Annemarie and I had failed to de-vein some shrimp the night before. We blew that myth dead away.

Joaquin, like all drivers in Mexico, fought with speed. You wanna get on a main road? Put your foot down! Worried about that weaving, eighteen-wheeler? Get some lead in your boots! Speed bumps? Speed bumps are for suckers.

A reki healing hippy, who believes oils can solve all ails, he was constantly telling us of his wife’s health, ‘Oh she’s bad. Bad stomach. We don’t know what it is. She had a bottle of tequila last night and if anything, it’s even worse this morning. Same every day, she wakes up feeling awful, tired, sick, she gets better during the day, takes some tequilas in the night and it starts all over the next day. It’s a mystery. A real mystery.’

I listen to a podcast about cars. There. I said it. I like cars, okay? And I always have. I know that admitting this in polite society is akin to doing war reenactments or being in an indy band but it’s true. I go to the world’s largest and geekiest car show in Las Vegas every year. I have never owned a car with four doors. Giving up my Ford Mustang to move to Mexico was harder for me than giving up the dog. I like old American pick-ups from the thirties and sixties Lincoln Continentals. I dream about the nineteen-seventy Ford Galaxy. I’m a car guy. I can’t keep it secret any longer. Especially since my wife found out I listen to a car podcast and now takes exceptional glee in telling people about it. So you can imagine how thrilled I was when we finally picked an auto of our own. After we found the new flat, Joaquin sped off in a cloud of pollution for the last time and we were left with our own two feet and a brace of bicycles. Our local area is tremendous but now we had freedom to see more of our adopted home.

‘Where shall we go? What shall we do?’ we excitedly asked each other. A friend who’d come to visit us in the city had told us about Tepoztlán, a country spot in a mountain valley. Staggering beauty, great food and as far away as Twickenham from Tottenham. Could we go to the country? We’d never been to the country before and not just as a couple, as people. As a couple, we’d only ever gone to cities; Miami, Panama, Turin, New York etc. Work had only ever taken us to cities; Shanghai, Paris, Mumbai, Stockholm etc. and growing up, our families weren’t country folk either, usually opting for beach resorts in France or Spain. Growing up, the closest I got were a handful of Easter trips to Dolgellau, in Wales, which I hated. The six-hour drive was torture, literally at one point when my mother severed the tip of my finger in an car window. Once there my parents got steaming drunk with old friends and thought I, a strapping young lad of eight (who was actually a chubby shut-in, frightened of his own shadow) would fare well sleeping outside, alone, in a caravan. I don’t remember what I felt more, the cold or the fear but in the middle of freezing nights in Wales, sheep scream. Blood-curdling screams that sound like every horror movie you were ever too young to watch. I hated the country.

Still, we’d moved to Mexico, one of the most beautiful countries on earth and we were trying to get into the habit of trying new things, so el campo it was

‘And if we’re gonna go to the country,’ I told Annemarie, ‘let’s really go for it. Horse riding. Hiking. The whole thing.’

‘Have you ever actually ridden a horse?’

‘Yes. Yes. In Cairo I once bribed a policeman on horseback so I could get into the Pyramids… though that horse was quite old and sick. I could just about drive him forward and reverse him a hundred yards.’

‘Uh-huh’

‘And I think one bolted on me when I went pony trekking in Wales’ I shuddered at the memory. “Old Glue Stick” the stables had put me on decided to do a runner with me on his back. ‘He’s never done that before’ the perplexed guide said to my parents after he’d galloped after me and brought me back. I was white as a sheet, my Dad, possibly still drunk from the night before, was laughing like a drain and calling me “The Little Jockey”.

Still, nil desperandum, we booked ourselves a trek and on our second day in the sticks we rolled up to the most Mexican looking ranch you could possibly imagine. Decorated with skulls and Jesus figures, populated with ostriches and pigs. Real caballeros in spurs and Stetsons doing lasso tricks, saddling up horses for us four city-slickers who’d booked for the day.

Wait a minute. Horses? Wasn’t this supposed to be little ponies? This thing looks like riot control. I mounted the beast, instantly regressing to that scared little boy in Dolgellau, and before you could say clip-clop, we were off. No helmet, no instruction, just on you go. Fear gripped me and I gripped the horse with my feet. Having never really ridden a horse before, I didn’t know that touching the animal with the heels of your feet makes it go. So here I am, on this poor creature, telling it to go with my feet while telling it to stop with the reigns. I could feel her getting stressed underneath me. I couldn’t control her, couldn’t steer her, I needed help. White as a sheet, I looked up and saw Annemarie, possibly still drunk from the night before, laughing like a drain and calling me “The Little Jockey”. The guide was chasing after another inexperienced rider, whose horse had said, ‘fuck this’ and kept trying to go back to the ranch. I was freaking out. The horse was freaking out. Then an old jalopy rattled passed us and that was it, the horse went. It galloped. I was in serious trouble, I knew, because as the horse ran towards the guide, I saw the fear in his eyes. I was six or seven foot off the ground on a stressed-out horse. The galloping wasn’t the real problem. I knew if this horse didn’t want me on her back, she could buck me off and I would break my neck, if I was lucky. Fortunately, the guide was a pro and managed to talk my horse down. ‘She’s never done that before’ he said.

‘I get that a lot,’ I told him.

‘No, no, I mean, the horse is eight months pregnant. You can’t get a pregnant horse to gallop. I literally have no idea why she’s done that!?’

I was ready to quit at this point. Not just the horse but the countryside in general. Pack my bags, get back to the city, where I belong. The only mustangs I want to worry about are the ones made by Ford Motor Company.

‘Isn’t this fun!’ Annemarie piped up, between laughs. It was at this point I noticed she was holding her feet away from her horse. Only touching it to make it go or change direction. I moved my feet from the belly, allowed her to eat some bushes while the guide went to off retrieve the other rider again (who for all I know is still out there, lost in the wilderness) and we both calmed down. After that, we had a great time. Once I figured out how the horse worked, we got on quite well. In fact, I’m now convinced it’s the only way to travel, especially after we tried hiking the next day.

Like horse riding, I’d never been hiking. Never seen the point in it. Just drive! You’ll see more and get further! But Tepoztlán has an Aztec pyramid up a steep mountain, built for Tepozteco, the goddess of alcohol.

‘Well, if we’re going to honour any goddess,’ we figured, ‘it should be goddess of alcohol.’

We read about the climb, which was said to be long, hard and punishing. Hiking up a mountain. In the middle of the day, in Mexican sun, wearing only a pair of Air Jordans. What could go wrong?

Well, they weren’t lying. It was long, hard and punishing. And unlike Prince Andrew, I do sweat. In fact, I sweat like Prince Andrew being asked some pretty tough questions on national TV. The only thing that kept me going, as always, was the Mexican people, who are endlessly fantastic. I don’t know what I expected to see on a mountain hike but I didn’t expect a guy carrying two chihuahuas. Or the fella who was asking his friends to hold up because he was choking on his cocktail, complete with little umbrella. And certainly not a free-style hip-hop crew, dropping flows over ‘90s boom-bap beats and smoking weed halfway up the cliff face.

When we reached the summit, typical of the Goddess of alcohol, she was closed due to Covid.

After all that, I could do with a drink.

We didn’t move halfway round the world to go to English pub and watch Arsenal v Leicester but that’s exactly where we ended up. We’d been introduced to the owner, a guy who’d arrived in Mexico on a graduate scheme and never went home, through a work contact of Annemarie’s. He was only too happy to throw a few beers our way and chat about the lifestyle, the city, and the opportunities therein.

‘Mexico gives you confidence to try things. Like this pub. Not something I’d have ever have dreamed of trying back home but here, why not? Likewise with the band. Playing gigs, cutting a record. I’d never of done that in London’
‘I was in a band,’ I puffed my chest out.
‘Oh yeah?’
‘Yeah,’ I took a nonchalant sip, ‘played a Ronnie Scott’s once…’
I could practically hear Annemarie’s eyes rolling. “I played at Ronnie Scott’s once” is a sentence I use often. If you lined up every time I’ve said it back to back, it would last longer than the actual gig.
‘So, if you’re ever looking for a bass player…’
‘Actually, we are!’ he leapt in, eyes alight ‘My wife’s pregnant and I’d really like to do a bit more before the baby comes. How’d you fancy coming out to my mate’s place and recording some stuff?’

The band had lost an Alex. All three member of the group were named Alex and one Alex had slipped the net. Everyone is Alex. The previous two bass players and the sometimes keyboard player were Alex. The bands siblings are Alex. Their dogs, their kids, their friends and enemies. Alex the lot.  

‘Sure, I’d love that! I’ll even re-brand as “Alex” if it’ll help the artistic process.’
It was agreed that it would and within a day or so, I was being sent indy-rock demos with which to lay down some of my expert grooves.

My only experience of being in a rock group was my teenage years. I spent five years in a band, variously titled “Pongo’s Play House”, “Dr Venkman”, “Optimus Prime” & God knows what else. We diligently practiced every weekend for four or five hours or more. And during that half decade span, we played the sum total of one gig. An all-day “festival” at the Man In The Moon pub. We had the plumb four-thirty in the afternoon spot. The audience numbered two and the feedback was, ‘a shit Rage Against the Machine’.
We were very insulted by this. If anything, we were a shit Primus. Or better yet, a shit Mr. Bungle.
Despite these glowing reviews, we did end up performing on an episode of “The Bill”, the Light Channel’s premier cop drama. The band were cast as hard-nosed, dope smoking rock renegades. The three of us and our mate Del (because apparently the producers of “The Bill” didn’t think we’d look suitably villainous enough without a black guy in the group), arrived on a set in East London and were told we’d stolen our instruments and started a band. What a romantic image! What swarthy cool! Starving artists with a punk attitude towards the system? You can’t buy that kind of back story! This was surely going be our big break. The cameras started rolling, we turned Del’s guitar down, him never having held an instrument before, and kick off with our first number.
‘Cut, cut, cut’. Cut? Had we hit a bum note? ‘Lads, you’re playing too well. Don’t forget, you’re all supposed to be stoned teenagers’
‘We are stoned teenagers’
‘Yeah, well, stoned teenagers who can’t play. Okay? Action!’

We turned Del’s guitar up and tried again.

‘Cut! No, you’re still playing too well. You’re like, in time and stuff’
This went on for four or five more takes until we just started randomly hitting out instruments. ‘Perfect!’ came the reply.

As the scene played out, a theatre kid was hauled out in cuffs by a sardonic DCI, who smirked, ‘Coldplay they ain’t!’
“A shit Rage Against the Machine” and “Coldplay they ain’t.” With these rock credentials under my belt, I packed my bass into the boot of the car and headed to the studio.

As we drove into the mountain-side, gated community, Alex started telling me about Alex. ‘I don’t know which house we’ll be practicing in. Maybe the hacienda. We might just go straight into the studio’

‘Er… okay’ We rolled past mansion after mansion.

‘That’s his cousin Alex’s house… that’s his sister Alex’s…’

Eventually we pulled up to the gates of a palatial bungalow. ‘This is where he grew up. He lives here with his wife, Alex now.

Alex strode waving from his front door, sporting a covid-mullet, a welcoming smile. ‘Okay guys! We ready?’

We made our introductions and after I was given a potted history of the Alex’s past and present it was announced we were heading for the studio. ‘I just need to get a car. There’s something wrong with the electrics in Audi.’

He loaded up a quadbike with bread rolls and veg asked us to follow. We ended up in his hacienda, a jaw droppingly beautiful colonial era farmhouse, square and chapel.

‘A chapel?’

‘Yeah, I got married here’ said Alex

‘Yeah, and we sometime play music here too’ said Alex

‘My Dad lives here, sometimes’ he said pointing to some construction projects to the side of the property. ‘We’re putting in rooms and bathrooms and shit, in case it becomes more of a hotel.’

Parked outside was a row of fifteen or sixteen cars, ranging from your bog-standard hatch back to a nineteen-twenties Rolls Royce.

‘You like old cars, man?’ Alex asked, noting the drool on my chin

‘I do…’ I said, taking in a nineteen-sixties Lincoln Continental.

‘Ah, you’d get on with my Dad. You see that Ford Galaxy? Nineteen-seventy. His father had one, so he bought it. He just sits in it and cries’

‘No kidding?’

‘We restore them for fun,’ Alex said, slapping a thirties pick-up ‘original parts. Takes ages but could be fun for weddings and stuff. Like the train.’

Inside the square was a nineteenth century passenger train, complete with carriages which had been converted into tequila and mezcal bars.

‘Anyway,’ he said, jumping into a pickup, ‘Let’s go play’.

We drive around the corner, pulling into the gates of a modernist, bone-white mansion situated on lush, rolling hills, surrounded by fruit trees overlooking the City.

Inside this labyrinthine house was series of stark contrasts. In one room, you might find plush furniture, sophisticated art and modern appliances. In another, plaster is falling off the walls, there’s bare wires hanging out the ceiling and the only furniture is a cabinet that looks like it was found on the street. In one minute, you go from what I imagine Steve Martin’s house must look like, to a crack-den.
And then a recording studio. Brand new mics, a mixing desk, a rack of guitars, drums and symbols. ‘Pretty cool, huh?’ Alex said. ‘And here, I just installed this!’

He shoved a plug in a socket and a string of cheap, red Christmas lights pinged on. Alex quietly nodded to himself, like a proud father at a kid’s graduation.

‘Shall we eat something before we start?’ asked Alex,

‘Sure!’, answered Alex before turning to me, ‘There’s no kitchen here, so we’ll make do with bread’ and so we did. Dinner of bread, tomatoes and pickled jalapeños out the can, eaten over a rusted sink.

‘Can I use the bathroom?’ I asked after our feast,

‘Sure! Every room has an ensuite but I’m not sure in which ones the plumbing is working. Better to just go out in the grounds, man. Just watch out for the dogs.’

To play music again was great. To put my bass on actually play with people was joy, even if it was indy rock, a genre on which I draw a blank. I know more about Gregorian Chanting or Zappa’s serious stuff than The Libertines or Oasis but we had fun plodding from A to B and we did so until the wee small hours. It was five a.m. before we finally called it a night. ‘Any room around here is fine,’ Alex said of sleeping arrangements. ‘Just take your pick. There’s no hot water in this part of the house but you can get a cold shower in the morning’ I found a room, palatial, with a single mattress on the floor with some old sheets with which to made my hay and there I slept, safe in the knowledge there was Ritz style luxury a hallway away.