The summer before I married my husband, he sent me to Mexico to learn Spanish. Spanish is his first language and we both had visions of this multilingual home where we rattled off to our children as easily in Spanish as we did in English.
I did not learn Spanish.
I was nearly 28 years old the summer of 2002, spent with mostly 19- and 20-year-olds, in Monterrey, Mexico. They were on summer break from colleges in Texas and Mississippi, getting a few extra credits in the summer. I was on break from a dry, as in no alcohol, seminary campus where I was finishing up a Master’s program. The enthusiasm of young adults who could not drink in the States but could in Mexico was a strange dynamic for me. I spent most of the summer alone, going to museums and reading Anna Karenina ….and trying to find vegetarian food, for I was a vegetarian that summer.
Mexico is not really known for its vegetarian fare. That summer I ate my fair share of quesadillas and chilaquiles. I took the bus out to the supermarket to buy vegetables and made vegetarian tacos in the apartment I shared with two other students. The lack of variety was killing me, until I decided I could certainly eat fish. I became a frequent patron at a sushi restaurant down the street which seemed to be set up in someone’s garage. It didn’t seem to bother me that Monterrey is about 350 miles away from the ocean. It is a wonder I did not get sick.
During that summer, the university where I was taking classes, set up a 3-day weekend trip to Veracruz. I wanted to be certain to see as much of the country as possible and signed up. I fell in with two girls from the states, Laura from Miami, whom I am still friends with, and another girl who I’ll call Courtney, because I cannot remember her name, but in my mind she looks like a Courtney.
These women were younger than myself, still part of the 20 year old crowd but they were mature for their age and not interested in being a menace or saying “Wooooooo” a lot.
They were also quite tall. Between the three of us, I was the short one at 5’9”. We went to museums. We spent the evenings sitting at cafes in the zócalo, people watching. When we walked the streets looking for souvenirs, people watched us. We were a good head taller than most of the men. We laughed at the attention we received. People gawked at us. Pointed. Even whispered to each other.
After a long humid day sightseeing, we were hungry. Not just hungry: we were famished. We had been in the country for a month by then and were absolutely tired of Mexican food.
We hunted for a place to eat which would accommodate all our dietary desires when we saw KFC. Courtney would have never eaten at KFC in the States. Not only was I not eating meat, I hadn’t eaten KFC since I was 4 years old. Laura looked at us with a “I’m-game-if-you’re-game” sort of look. There was no discussion. Us three ravenous Amazonian women marched into KFC, nearly pushed customers over to order at the counter. We grabbed our trays as if we were Vikings after a fierce battle. Our teeth tore into our three piece combos even before we plopped ourselves down in a booth.
Later we recalled how the locals stared. Wasn’t this how all Americans acted? Hungry and careless? Pushy and Greedy?
It wasn’t until a lone employee, a small brown teenager with pimples on his face, brave enough to approach the hungry beasts, that the spell was broken.
¿Necesitas una servilleta?
He said cautiously, his arm outstretched holding a stack of napkins.
We each looked at the face of each other, covered in grease and sauce and laughed.
Gracias
We took the stack from his hand. I am not certain if this is true or just my memory, but I think the entire store laughed too. With us —-and then at us. We didn't mind. We understood