continuing the tale of last night...

almost there

we got to the border and parked the car at 6pm something, closer to 7pm. then we walked across. simple as pie. no questions asked. i didn't notice, but apparently we walked through a gigantic metal detector. there was a table with 1 border patrol guy sitting there. there were a lot of cameras and i saw one other patrol man but that was it for security. i don't think they don't really care about people going into mexico and what they may bring, but watch out when you come back cabrón!

there was a money exchange booth just before you cross into mexico, still within the border compound. i didn't think it was necessary to change any of our money into nuevo pesos but twiddle thumbs insisted. each of us changed $20. then we walked out of the compound and took a taxi to the venue, $5. "llevame al jai alai."

we got there and there was a huge line and police in front of the venue. nopalita had a bad craving for tacos. she says she pigs out on them every time she goes to tijuana. we went to eat at a place called the tequila house, directly across the street from the venue. the waitress talked the girls into getting the house special: 6 tacos, guacamole, and 2 drinks for $100 pesos. i wasn't very hungry but thought i should try at least 1 taco if nopalita thinks they're so good in tijuana. we got 3 beef tacos for nopalita and 2 with just guacamole for twiddle thumbs and i to share. nopalita and twiddle thumbs ordered margaritas and i had a limonada. i thought i would have just 1 taco but when the food came though, twiddle thumbs said she wasn't hungry and only ate 1 so i had 2. the tacos weren't very good. nopalita said they sucked and hers didn't taste like beef. she made jokes that they might be dog or cat meat. there wasn't even any guacamole on the side like as indicated on the menu.

when it was time to pay, the total was $120 pesos. nopalita started taking out money from her purse. i thought i saw her put out 4 $50 peso bills and then she kept taking out money. she put $20 pesos in coins and $2 dollars. i thought maybe i don't know mexican money very well and she didn't put down $50 peso bills. then i thought, maybe she's just taking out her money and will separate it. next thing you know, i think both nopalita was pushing the money towards the waitress and the waitress was taking it. i asked nopalita what the total was and why did she give so much money. she didn't realize she put out twice what she should have. as the waitress was walking away, she was all excited and jumping up and down or something. nopalita said it was ok that she overpaid; twiddle thumbs and i both insisted that she get her money back. they called over the waitress who swore she only received 2 $50 peso bills. then she brought back the $2 american bills and said that's all she got except for the 2 $50 peso bills. twiddle thumbs and nopalita thought it was very curious that she didn't bring back any pesos but they didn't put up a fight and even did the smile-wave-goodbye thing as we walked out. what the fuck? if i knew spanish i would've put up a fight. that's just not right. i have never been treated that way when i've been in a foreign country. my experience has always been that people are very nice. that waitress didn't do anything to help the image of the mexican people.

the horde outside the venue

time for the show! we line up. i was worried about the security check. nopalita had said that when she previously went to a concert in tijuana, security was very lax. so i brought both a camera and mini disc recorder. when i saw that they were patting, checking purses, and police were standing right there, i got nervous. i gave the camera and recorder to nopalita to put in her purse in a pocket she thought they wouldn't check. we got through the security check like it was nothing. i think they were just looking for weapons. during the show, i saw other cameras and even someone video taping the show.

when we got inside and saw the merchandise table, our jaws dropped. there were 3-4 tables full of t-shirts. so many different cafe tacuba shirts. it was like heaven. it's been so hard to find shirts at cafe tacuba concerts in america, in fact i think i've only seen merchandise for sale at 1 show. here there were even mugs. unfortunately, no joselo solo album cds. the shirts were cheap too, $12 bucks. i got 2 shirts, twiddle thumbs got 1, nopalita got 1.

cafe tacuba t-shirts as far as the eye could see

when we got to our seats, there was a couple sitting in them. nopalita talked to them. they wouldn't move. the girlfriend would never pull out her ticket. she pretended to search for it but always came up empty-handed. we showed our tickets. she said that this is where they sat her so she's not moving. fuck her. nopalita went to get a staff member. the boy she got didn't help her. we saw one woman staff member who looked tough but she had a long line of people waiting for assistance. nopalita waited for her turn and twiddle thumbs went to get someone. when i saw that she was coming with someone, i told nopalita to get out of line. what we didn't realize was that twiddle thumbs was coming back with the same boy. the boy talked to the couple and they just wouldn't budge. after a long talk, we ended up sitting in the row directly behind them. twiddle thumbs translated for me what transpired. eventually, the boy caved in and said that we just paid to sit in this section, not for individual seats, so we could sit anywhere we like. twiddle thumbs said fine, then we will sit closer to the stage and he said that we didn't pay for that section. she said that she didn't pay to sit in the very back of the venue and if someone comes to move us, she's gonna find that boy because he said it's ok to sit anywhere in this section. he said that's fine. again, this "lady" did nothing to help the image of the mexican people. i think it must be border towns. i had a wonderful time in mexico city. when i was at teotihuacan, something fell out of my pocket and this little boy handed it to me. i didn't even realize it fell. i think it was money too. fuck these tijuana bitches.

shortly after we were sitting there, a group of girls came, looked at us, pointed, and walked away. i think we were in their seats. i was really hoping that they would bring back someone to make us move, so that we could make that couple move. i kept practicing in my head a messed up sentence in spanish to explain that my ticket is for the seats in front of me but the bitch won't move! no one ever came to tell us to get out of the seats. we wanted to spit gum into the bitch's hair, vomit all over them, etc. but we did nothing. we sure as hell didn't want to get into a fight and land in jail in mexico!

cafe tacuba: they're gonna rock your tacos

we were sitting pretty far back, but we knew that when we bought our tickets. the inside of the venue wasn't as big as i feared it would be. we had perfect seats for videorecording. if i ever go to this venue again, i will definitely bring my video camera. cafe tacuba played with a drummer, but they still used drum machines because i heard hi-hats when the drummer wasn't even hitting any cymbals. it was kind of lame because cafe tacuba was cool for being the band that rocked hard despite the lack of a live drummer. after the show, i saw a person with the setlist and asked to take a picture.

then we took a taxi back to the border, $3 but we gave him $5. then we walked across. this time, border patrol questioned us. we had to line up like at an airport. they looked at my driver's license and asked what my citizenship was. that was it. i walked through. i could've transported things, contra band. from small things like seeds to bigger things like drugs or weapons. who would've known? unless we walked through another metal detector that i didn't notice or had police dogs close by to sniff out suspicious characters. we walked to the car, paid $6 for parking, and drove home.

the girls in tijuana

american side of the border: good-bye mexico

setlist:
reves
cero y uno
no controles
eo
mediodía
eres
la ingrata
esa noche
tírate
tortolita
ojalá que llueva café
las flores
las persianas
la chica banda
déjate caer

encore:
el baile y el salón
como te extraño
pinche juan