Franz's "Peoples Guide to Mexico" Long on Cultural Insight and Humor
Dec 28 '99
Arguably the most popular and insightful guidebook to Mexico, "The Peoples Guide to Mexico" by Carl Franz (John Muir Publications, Santa Fe, New Mexico) provides no listings of hotels, no recommendations for restaurants, and no descriptions of sights to see. It's also one of the few guidebooks in the world that is entertaining to read in its own right. You could easily pick the book up and read it by the fire one evening, enjoying it every bit as much as the latest John Grisham novel -- maybe more!
Franz manages to avoid all of the formulas of travel guide writing through more than 590 pages. He fills those pages with personal anecdotes and insightful jokes that reflect his own experiences traveling through Mexico over almost four decades. Much of the book conveys an attitude of a '60s hippie who just bums his way around Mexico, crashing out on the beach and eating fish when he runs out of money for hotels or rent. By traveling this way, Franz and his friends managed to meet and befriend Mexicans everywhere they went, and to gain an insight into their culture and customs that no wealthy tourist heading to a beach resort could ever witness or appreciate. Franz describes these encounters with great insight, understanding, affection, and humor.
Every conceivable aspect of travel on the cheap is covered. Traffic stops, bullfights, border crossings, market days, tequila, hitchhikers, whorehouses, motel rooms, mariachis, drinking, bartering, heating water, machismo, children, colectivos, surviving second-class buses, car repairs, house cleaning, average rainfall, child labor, curanderas... All these (and more) are discussed in livid technicolor detail, and most are explained by way of humorous tales of personal experience. Some of the stuff Franz talks about just amazes me. He has an incredible eye for detail. For years I've seen these men selling paletas (fruit popsicles) from carts just about everywhere and never thought twice about it. So when I read Franz's account of a truck unloading a paleta cart and an old man, who promptly started pushing his cart out into the middle of the desert, I just started rolling on the floor laughing, not just because the idea was so absurd, but because in Mexico, such a thing is not absurd!
The book is laced with hilarious stories. In one example, the federales come crashing into Franz's campsite on the beach. Suspecting that Franz and his hippie friends are drug smugglers, they search the entire camp, finding nothing suspicious but a tin of snuff. A few linguistic misunderstandings occur, but finally everything is worked out. When Franz insists that he and his friends use no drugs, the police captain tells them they should, and he and his men leave amid waving and greetings.
Every topic is riddled with humor among the nuggets of spot-on insight. When he talks about riding the buses, Franz claims (quite accurately, believe it or not) that whereever you may be in Mexico, and whereever you may want to go, a bus will come along in a few minutes to take you there -- you just need to wave it down. He claims that while a driver of a crowded bus might claim to have not seen you if you just wave, if you are waving a hat, he must stop. I've never tried the hat trick myself, but I've seen lots of things on buses that I don't think you'd find in the U.S. or Europe, including dogs sitting on the seats while women stand, and buses that stop for beggars, who can walk through the bus for a stop asking for handouts.
Travel on the cheap is really the overriding rule of travel with Franz. There are no stories about big luxury hotels or fancy restaurants. He stays in campgrounds. Sleeps in his van. Sleeps on the ground. Sleeps in hammocks. Eats in markets. Eats foods given to him as barter for services. Sometimes runs out of money. Never pays much for anything. In short, Franz lives like a typical Mexican. Because of this, he is welcomed into towns and villages and accepted as a member of the community.
Admittedly, this book won't be of much use to you if you're planning a whirlwind tour of Mexico and just want to know what are the "must-see" tourist pits. On the other hand, if you want a little bit of insight into what happens when you spend a lot of time in a country, getting close to the local people, and when you travel with a sense of adventure and a little bit of love and respect, then "The Peoples Guide to Mexico" should be on the top of your short list of "must-read" books. A true classic of travel writing!
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