While a college student here in Mexico in the late 1980s, I went on a weekend trip to Veracruz with a fellow American housemate. Veracruz has since improved, but at the time it was generally a port city and poor beach destination.
Housemate Eric was something of a cross between Garth Algar and Tom Nissen from “Boys Don’t Cry”. Mullet, cross earring, Ronald Colman moustachette, and all. He aspired to be LaGrange, IL’s 7-11 king and spent most of his year in Mexico discovering the enchanting, historical magic of 40-oz. Coronas.
We arrive in Veracruz at night, and find a cheap hotel near the bus station. We immediately head out to find a cab, no particular destination in mind. Eric tells the driver “girls,” which apparently is the internationally recognized word for “girls.” Driver takes us to the Gold Key, which looks like a bar. Except that there are young men lined up to the right, and old women lined up to the left. My suspicions are confirmed when the doorman asks if we’d like company, and immediately ushers from the left-hand line two older women, problably early 40s or so, whose heavy makeup wasn’t so noticeable because of the splendor of Port Whore Cleavage.
After dutiful and regretful compliance with the one-drink minimum and ritual dance, we ran out to find some acetone and a match to cleanse our filthy hands, and caught a cab. Knowing not to ask for girls, we asked for a disco. Again, we found that specificity is the key to happiness, as we were taken to what could have easily been a dance hall but was in fact a transvestite show. A long show. Where you could only order Presidente brandy by the bottle.
Halfway through the bottle I was ready to go home. But Eric would have none of it, since we had already paid for the bottle. His high scores on the Beer SATs notwithstanding, he was not holding his brandy well, stumbling to the bathroom often. On one trip I poured the remaining Presidente into the ice bucket, and when he came back he just stared, wondering how all his brandy disappeared. “Dude, where’s my brandy?” was said more than once. Dude, let’s go back to the hotel.
About a half hour after lights out, the fun starts. First he turns the lights back on, and says “Dude” over and over and over. After he finds his clever Dude calls unattended, this brandied prototypical Beavis, dressed only in his briefs, stands up and throws his pillow at my head. As I remove his pillow, he is suddenly on top of me, straddling me. He then tries to hold my arms down over my head, and I push him off. He walks back to me and I make some vague stay-away-from-me grunt. Then for some reason, he goes back to his bed, stands on it, and does some kind of Clan of the Mullet Bear ritual dance and passes out.
The next morning, his first words are “Dude, why the fuck do you have my pillow?”