Mexico is a vast country. This is a fact we knew conceptually before coming here but didn’t really understand prior to traveling through it. While it is geographically smaller than the United States, it is dense in both people and sights, and each region has its own unique character. That being said, there are a number of common threads that we have noticed throughout Mexico that we can’t help but chuckle at. Noticing the idiosyncrasies of an area is one of the best parts of traveling slowly and immersing ourselves in local culture. So here’s an only-slightly-exaggerated list of the top cultural quirks we have noticed throughout Mexico. Enjoy!
1. Service Truck Jingles
In towns large and small throughout Mexico, many of their essential goods are delivered and sold from a pickup truck that slowly drives through the neighborhoods. The time and place of the delivery doesn’t seem very consistent, so in order to alert the local residents to their arrival, they use distinct jingles. Garbage trucks, water trucks, veggie trucks, and bread trucks all make the rounds. They used to drive us crazy as they would frequently wake us up at ungodly hours of the morning. But once we realized their purpose we started paying more attention. So far the most fitting one that we have encountered is the water trucks in San Cristobal, Chiapas, which play the tune of “Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head”. Bravo. Unfortunately these “Jingles” aren’t always musical. Sometimes they are just a recording of the most monotone, robotic voice announcing what they are selling from a speaker so old and blown out that I refuse to believe even a fluent Spanish speaker can decipher what they are saying. It might as well be an alien language listing the 30 types of sweet breads they are selling that day.
2. PDA
Maybe it’s our prudish, puritanical American nature showing, but back home if two people want to get a bit intimate they tend to find a dark corner, backseat of a car, or empty set of bleachers. Not here. Everywhere we have been in Mexico there have been people of all ages making out as if they’re being paid to do it. Of course, anywhere remotely romantic will be full of young couples mackin’, but it doesn’t end there. Middle of a pizza restaurant? Sure, doesn’t matter that we taste like garlic and chorizo. Tapir exhibit at the zoo? The tapir is sleeping, he won’t mind. We have tried it out a couple times but always feel too self conscious to really get into it.
3. Parking Lot Fiesta
AKA a typical Saturday afternoon. This is the phenomenon of massive groups of Mexicans convening on a seemingly random parking lot to drink beer and blast music from their vehicles at maximum volume. On a particularly festive weekend the cacophony can be so intense that you can’t actually pick out a single tune, just a wall of white noise. I will never forget hiking down from a long day of climbing in El Potrero Chico and thinking that it sounded exactly like Burning Man.
4. The Lord’s Day
While the parking lot parties typically happen on Fridays and Saturdays, the real party night for many Mexicans is Sunday. This seems to only be the case outside of major cities, but our theory is that they would rather be hung over for work on Monday than for church on Sunday, thus they wake up for their religious duties on Sunday morning, and as soon as they are free they start barbecuing and draining Tecates one after another. We aren’t on any schedule so it works for us!
5. The Prevalence of Narcoleptic Children
This one is kind of hard to explain. If a child falls asleep while out and about, as childs are wont to do, rather than the parents carrying them like a normal human child (upright, head on mom/dad’s shoulder), they carry them like, for lack of a better word, a fucking sack of potatoes. Under one arm or horizontally in front of them is the standard technique. This is so hilarious to us because it looks as if the child is dead, because how the hell could anyone sleep like that? One thing is for sure, Mexican children are not fussy sleepers.
6. Buen Provecho
Mexicans are an exceedingly polite people. They will never miss a buenos dias/tardes/noches, and one of our favorites is the custom of saying “buen provecho”, or the spanish equivalent of “bon appetit”. EVERYONE says it. If we are sitting in a restaurant and a couple arrives, they will buen-provecho us before sitting down. If they leave before us, they will buen-provecho again. It doesn’t matter if we haven’t ordered yet, are currently eating, or have already finished eating, anyone and everyone will buen-provecho. I’m fairly certain that they don’t even realize that they do it. It is so ubiquitous that we could be sitting at a table on a sidewalk with a couple beers and no food, and a stranger passing by will mutter “buen provecho” under his breath before disappearing into the crowd like a phantom.
7. Toilet Paper Guilt
This is more of an American quirk than a Mexican quirk. In Mexico (as in most of the world) the plumbing generally can’t handle toilet paper, so they throw their TP in a small garbage can next to the toilet. Okay, no big deal. But occasionally a bleary-eyed gringo will stumble into a bathroom to do his morning business and, still not quite aware of where he is, will commit the cardinal sin of dropping his TP into the toilet. Oh god, the guilt, the shame! My parents raised me better than this! What if I ruin their plumbing? What if it clogs up the sewers for the whole town? WHERE WILL THEY POOP?! Oh these poor innocent people, living in peace until a foreign invader leaves their infrastructure in shambles. Future generations will harbor a grudge against Americans that could lead to world war…..nevermind, it flushed just fine.