MAGICAL CITY

“Magic.” That word entices us to dream. When the Mexican government attaches such a name to a city in Mexico, it is indeed magic. It’s an honor based on the municipality’s beauty, historical importance, or its natural wonders. Accolades befitting royalty are heaped upon it, and the venerable title of Pueblo Magico (Magic Town) is bestowed on the community. It becomes a tourist’s dream destination.

Mexico’s Pueblo Magico program was inaugurated in 2001 as a way to promote tourism in unique sites. That year the first three locations were selected: Huasca de Ocampo in Hidalgo, Real de Catorce in San Luis Potosi, and Tepozlan in Morelos. There are now more than one-hundred thirty such remarkable magic towns in Mexico. To receive and keep the title, a town must meet rigid standards and maintain those standards indefinitely. Annual accreditation is a requirement to keep the title.

I’ve been fortunate to explore one such unique town, Guanajuato. You are about to read the account of my very first visit to this wondrous place. Kord, a six-foot-two slim tower of a man acted as my guide.

*

Shortly after moving to Bakersfield, California, to live near my aging parents, a new acquaintance asked if I’d like to join him on a trip to Guanajuato, Mexico. Being retired allowed him to spend part of each summer visiting friends there. I knew little about Mexico, as a matter of fact--only what I had read in the newspapers or heard in the rumor mill. I knew nothing about Guanajuato. I could hardly pronounce the name!. My first thought was, “Yuck!” I had traveled in Canada, Europe, and the Caribbean without any misgivings, but my thoughts about Mexico were different. I thought about my safety. Most of the stories I’d heard about Mexico mentioned drug crime and murder and getting sick from drinking the water. I had to force myself to tune into what Kord had to say. But that didn't last long. He began to change my mind.

It didn't take long for me to learn that Guanajuato was a four-hundred-year-old Spanish colonial city in the heart of Mexico. It rested in a unique land form at an elevation of almost seven-thousand feet. According to Kord, it was a great place to escape Bakersfield’s scorching summer heat. He was convinced the U.S. news coverage about Mexico was designed to victimize the country in order to sell newspapers. Guanajuato was a place he enjoyed. He felt safe there. Safety and unique beauty had earned it the coveted title of Pueblo Magico.

As far as safe drinking water was concerned, Kord admitted that tap water was not drinking water. Travelers drank bottled water. If I decided to travel with him, he advised me to chew Pepto-Bismol tablets while I was there. The bismuth counteracted unfriendly stomach bacteria. He was about to spend his fifth summer in Guanajuato and had never used the stuff. I was welcome to come along with him if I wished. His friends would welcome me. I could get a room for the summer at the hacienda where he stayed if I wished.

I grew to wish I could have stayed all summer. But I wasn’t retired like Kord. I had a new job that started in a week. However, I decided to give travel to Mexico a go and to spend three days in Guanajuato.

Our flight out of Los Angeles arrived in Leon late in the evening, an hour’s drive from our destination. A taxi took us from there to the hacienda where Kord stayed outside the city of Guanajuato. I had no trouble getting a room. Before retiring to for the night, we spent the remainder of the evening sitting in a rustic lantern-lit dining room enjoying savory food and talking about the wonders we'd see the next day.

At 7:00 am the next morning, an hour after the sun had peaked through the crack in my bedroom curtains, we met for coffee on the terrace overlooking the vast fields of the hacienda. A youthful house maid, responded to Kord's raised hand and bustled toward our balcony table where we were enjoying our first cup of coffee and the sun’s invigorating morning light. We watched her head in our direction with a filled tray in her hands.

An award-winning smile parted her lips as her trim body, decked out in Levi’s and T-shirt with a Mexican flag motif, zig-zagged around the other tables and chairs on her way to us. Upon arrival, she deftly moved the steaming containers from her tiled tray to the starched white table cloth: home-made tortillas, kept warm in an embroidered towel, blessed the air with their savory aroma of toasted flour. An eye and nose-pleasing stew made of yellow onions, ripe tomatoes, green chilis, and rice in red clay bowls decorated with brilliant floral motifs, accompanied the plate of tortillas to the table.

Eager to get started and take the neighborhood bus into town, We scarfed up our flatbread and stew and downed our home-ground coffee. With a backpack over my white T-shirt, jeans on my legs, and sturdy walking shoes on my feet, I popped a Pepto-Bismol tablet to calm my nervous stomach and scurried out the front door and down the concrete steps behind my tour guide. We backtracked on the cobble-stone lane until we reached the main road.

Kord, speaking in a reassuring tone I assumed he used to ease any apprehension, explained that we had to cross the busy street and hail the first autobús that came along. “Buses going into the city, end up at the same plaza as those leaving,” he said. "At the end of the day, we come back to the same plaza where we begin this morning." He also let me know that taxies and the cheaper public cars were other options.

Then wrinkles creased his face and his lips became drawn, he warned, “It’s almost impossible to flag one of those vehicles going into town. Local residents depend on buses when heading in that direction.” The wrinkles disappeared as quickly as they had come as he added, “Later in the day, when leaving Guanajuato, we’ll have better luck. We can choose bus, taxi, or public cars to return to our Airbnb. Drivers for all types of transportation congregate at the same plaza in the afternoons to wait for outbound passengers.”

Upon hearing that, a flush of relief took the tenseness out of my jaw and calmed my travel jitters. I was so looking forward to walking Guanajuato, but my anxiety level had been tormenting me all morning. Now, as I stood roadside waiting for a bus with my hands in my front pockets, it intensified. Everything seemed so threatening. All those stateside newspaper articles I’d read flushed through my mind. Will I be safe? If I eat the food, will it make me sick?

Shortly, a greenish dust-covered vintage bus swooshed off the road in a swirl of debris. It pinned us along the drop-off edge of the narrow shoulder, daring us not to move. We teetered on the brink. The door slapped open, allowing us to board in a puff of road dust. Kord had already prepared the correct change and dropped it into a waiting contraption that reminded me of a childhood gum-ball machine--clink-rattle, clink-rattle, clink.

All of the seats were taken. We squeezed in among the standing passengers and shared the overhead grab rail, the both of us too tall to see out the windows. Fifteen minutes of steady downhill motion, and our bus rub-a-dub-dubbed along cobblestones and into one of Guanajuato’s underground tunnels. We merged with an inbound stream of bumper-to-bumper traffic and crawled through that portal and into the sunlight on the other side.

Our bus swerved toward a crowded treeless plaza and lunged to a stop at a loading slot where prospective passengers, encrusted with their early-morning purchases, teetered on the curb like crows on a power line and waited to board our bus. Moving in lockstep and gripping our back-packs in front of us, we exited with other occupants and leaned our way through the lines of patrons crowded together like tines on a salad fork in front of outgoing autobuses. The pervasive odor of chewed tobacco, human sweat, and soiled diapers soured my every breath.

In the foreground, hundreds of arriving travelers waded through assertive street vendors and other entrepreneurs. We twisted and turned our way through the throng of busy shoppers and sellers, bags and boxes, piles of vegetables, and the very, very poor who waded through the throng selling sticks of gum and single cigarettes. I let Kord’s tall frame shield me through the pack. My pulse thumped out a four word warning in my neck, Is this is a mistake?

As Kord's imposing frame cleared a path for me through the human traffic jam, my legs remained in lock-step behind him, elbows tucked close to my side, eyes focused on his back. Despite my surging claustrophobia, I couldn’t help but take notice of the clothing being worn. The variety intrigued me. Most common were loose-fitting jeans or slacks with cotton shirts and blouses. Message T- shirts were everywhere: “Hecho en Mexico,” ”El Jefe,” “Viva!” Many older women wore long skirts and U.S. style walking shoes. Huaraches (sandals) were easy to spot. A few women were wearing rebozos (shawls), with or without infants swaddled inside. There was a marked difference in head coverings. Among men, blond or white straw hats were popular.

Some heads were covered in baseball caps or multi-colored indigenous head wraps. Scattered among the throng were folks wearing regional costumes sewn from vivid hand-made fabrics or festooned with elaborate hand-stitched flowers. Some pedestrians adorned themselves with multi-colored woven scarves and matching caps. I was surprised to see women wearing cold climate blouses made of knitted heat-holding polyester yarns. Sturdy plastic shopping bags with thick handles hung from hands or protruded from under arms. Like grains of rice, white people speckled the fabric of dark-skinned humanity that stretched endlessly before us. Beads of perspiration were the common denominator.

I finally began to relax when we walked away from the jam-packed transportation hub and entered Guanajuato’s main drag, Avenida Juárez. Looking up and around, I found myself at the bottom of a mosaic bowl paved in spine-tingling color. The hillsides encircled me with vibrant concrete homes. There were vivid reds, yellows, and blues. I saw rainbow hues of chartreuse, orange, and violet; tints of hot pink, light-blue, lime-green; and shades that included emerald, Prussian-blue, and cadmium-yellow.

It was as if I had been carried backwards in time and placed at the center of Gauguin’s palate. A sigh of relief made its way from deep inside my lungs and flowed upward through my trachea and out of my mouth in a pleasure-filled gush that powered into the still-crisp morning air, leaving its own tiny cloud.

Kord stopped and turned toward me. He reached out with both hands and held me firmly in place in the middle of the sidewalk. Then he began to turn me in a slow pirouette, around and around in lazy methodical circles. “Look! Soak in this world,” he said. “Breathe in the bouquet. You will never again see anything like it.” He continued to rotate my body hand over hand to show off the panorama of flagrant color and rich decorative tile.

Delightful fragrances from fresh pastries, candied fruits and vegetables, and savory birria meat caressed my every inhale. Passersby gawked as they diverted around us, some with embarrassed smiles, others shook their heads with “dumb tourist” written across their faces. He lured me onward with, “You’ve just begun to see.”

As we walked, cars and small trucks snaked alongside us on hand-hewn cobble. The cloudless pale-blue sky I’d seen at breakfast hung like a decorative scrim behind block-after-block of ancient apartments and shop fronts. As far as I could seek the teeming one-way street and thronged sidewalk continued in a single ribbon until they twisted out of sight. Two and three-story structures with ornate wrought iron balconies, red tile roofs, and thick walls lined the traffic zone like sentinels. Despite the crush of mortal beings, I felt invigorated. My head rotated incessantly from right to left, left to right as I tried in vain to absorb the wealth of creative energy engulfing me.

As we walked, narrow alleyways zig-zagged up the hillsides like panicky blind mice. From those corridors, pedestrian accesses branched up the sides of the bowl. The paths threaded toward the distant rim as do bent spokes on a bicycle wheel. Along these spokes, homes of one, two, and three stories butted together in unplanned discord. At every turn in the pathways, the tallest structures blocked sunlight.

Here and there, neighbors could reach out from their windows and shake hands. Some access paths were just wide enough to permit a single climber to squeeze past. Hand-mixed cement, cobblestone, and chunks of broken concrete paved the narrowest accesses. In all directions, houses rose skyward like stacks of children’s gaudy building blocks.

Posted here and there along the sidewalk, women hot food vendors turned their arms into horizontal fan blades and shooed away the flies. Simultaneously, they called out and invited passersby to purchase tacos, enchiladas, and other spicy creations. Male entrepreneurs stood by their carts of fresh fruit and vegetables, signaling us before we reached their wares with come-hither nods. As we passed, they called out to come, "Mira, ven aquí." Some sang to garner our attention. A display of candied fruit and vegetables drew us into a corner shop where I yielded to my gastronomic desire. I purchased two morsels of candied sweet potato and squash. “This is a fantasy world!” I kept repeating to Kord.

At one point in our walk, he put his hand on my shoulder and turned me toward a structure partially hidden behind a line of light-blocking laurel trees and pushed me slowly towards its shaded flight of entrance steps. There, a host of waving, sales-pitching vendors attempted to lure us to their goods.

Like welcoming arms, two iron gates gave us access to the three-story cavernous interior space of Mercado Hidalgo. “This is like the great steel and glass train stations of the late 1800’s,” I said to anyone who was listening. Massive arched glass windows on each end of the building permitted beams of sunlight to pour down onto the rivers of shoppers streaming through the city’s open market.

Dangling on lengths of sisal cord from the crossbeams between corner posts of vending stalls, woven baskets and cages for parakeets and other small birds swayed in currents of passing air. Men’s shirts and women’s dresses hung on wire shapes from horizontal poles attached to makeshift canopies. Colorful smiling plaster suns and moons blanketed the walls above doorways. Higher up, in the mid-reaches of the cavern, fanciful crepe-paper piñatas in the forms of animals and children, dangled on white cotton cords among patriotic and religious motifs.

Beribboned with red, white, and green streamers, perforated-tin stars twisted on wires and cast slashes of mirrored sunlight across the vastness of the vault. One area, the size of a supermarket, was an oasis of produce: bananas, cabbages, chilis, broccoli, onions, and root crops of every size and color rose in columns like condominiums. Piles and crates of oranges, melons, and cucumbers concealed the tables.

The sharp odor of cinnamon-laced coffee permeated the air. It blended with the sugary fragrance of freshly-squeezed orange juice

Shoppers scrunched together on small benches to drink and rest. High above us, in the uppermost reaches of the ceiling, gray and white pigeons strutted on ledges and cooed and fed their nestlings. They looked down on us with calm indifference.

Kord tried to show me everything. When I tired, he found a resting place in an alcove between stacks of men’s dark-colored polyester dress pants and piles of creamy-yellow hand-woven sombreros. Even though I couldn’t see all of the interior from where we were sequestered, I had seen enough to know the main floor hosted vast displays of food and home goods. Passages between the displays were packed with people. The main aisles were freeways on which the masses traveled. I was out of my comfort zone, torn between wanting to explore and not wanting to negotiate the crowd. Kord read my reluctance to enter the fray and spoke out to comfort me, “You’ll be okay. Follow me. I’ll show you how its done.”

I shadowed him into the pack. We zigzagged through the sweating humanity until we came to a spot at point zero, mid-floor of the building. He stopped, faced me and said, “Watch. This is how you do it!” He planted his walking shoes on the concrete floor... spread his elbows like outstretched chicken wings... set his jaw to mark his territory...and never made eye contact. He waited for me to do the same.

Passersby simply walked around us or diverted to other aisles. “You can relax now,” he said. "You've just learned how to claim your space."

He resumed his tour-guide presentation and pointed out two iron staircases on opposing walls of the cavern. Looking like creations from a giant Erector Set, each metal stairway reached upward to a second level. I imagined seeing a steady stream of bodies traveling up and down the metal steps. I could hear their shod feet scrape, scrape, scrape against the perforated metal planks. I envisioned fragments of litter from their footwear raining down as motes in the sunlight and pitied the sellers ensconced in the shadows underneath.

Again the instruction came, “Follow me.” Without looking back, Kord pushed aside a hanger of dark-blue Levi's and headed for the closest flight of stairs. I followed. Upward we trudged on the iron steps, scrape, scrape, scraping our way onto a crowd-packed upper balcony where we faced a line of open-fronted vender stalls.

Products of all sizes and shapes filled the tables and the spaces under tables. Garish souvenirs packed the balcony. No spot was left unused. There were mountains of terra cotta pottery; woeful plaster religious icons; and pastel plastic dishpans containing tubes of toothpaste, bars of soap, and plastic combs. Children’s pants and dresses framed other stalls. On the walls, women’s full-skirted embroidered dresses, in colors of the rainbow, spread out fan-like in an array of traditional colors: red, green, and white. Kord tapped my shoulder, “Let’s go.”

We clomped our way down the opposite staircase, meshing our body movements like clock gears with the pack of preoccupied shoppers squeezing past us from below. Their brown skins glistened with perspiration and smelled of salt, lemon oil, and cologne. They grasped the metal hand rail and pulled themselves upward toward the walkway of venders we had left behind.

At the landing, I took a deep breath and turned for a last glimpse of “Wonderland.” We emerged at the exit and squeezed our way through the gauntlet of buyers, sellers, scavenger dogs, and hawkers that waited on the steps to demand our attention. I watched my feet, being careful not to slip or trip on the accumulated throw-aways: cups and napkins and plastic zip-bags from eat-and-drink-as-you-go tamales, horchata, and mazorca. Kord warned, “Watch out for the dog shit.”

As we exited, I gulped the fresh air and watched where I stepped. We continued on our way along the sidewalk, headed toward the yellow basilica that crouched near the Plaza de la Paz. Vehicle traffic had been permanently diverted to side streets to open Avenida Juárez to pedestrian traffic. Dozens of pleasure seekers relaxed at nearby wood tables in the shade of tall buildings and drank chilled beer, bottled water, or sparkling beverages. Others draped casually in hammock chairs or sat businesslike on benches and smoked.

Under a welcoming umbrella, Kord ordered for us: bottled water and bowls of taco soup. Surprisingly, the hot soup tasted great. It had a welcome flavor that reminded me of taco salads back home. The bottled water slid back and cooled and refreshed my parched throat. I flashed him a thank you smile and settled back in my chair under the shade of our umbrella. Relief from the mid-day sun slowed my heart beat and closed my eyes. My hands eased off the table and settled in my lap. He let me doze for a few minutes then rapped on the wood and said, “Hey, Guy, It’s time to move along.”

As soon as my head cleared of sleep, my guide pointed to a dense planting of Laurel trees coming into view a mini-block ahead. We crossed over the cobbled roadway to be on the same side as the greenery and headed for a new pleasure, El Jardin de la Union, a densely-shaded plaza. It lay in the embrace of a cluster of inviting restaurants and artisan shops. Its lush manicured canopy of laurel leaves blocked the sun’s heat. Air roots dangled aimlessly from its gray branches.

The garden’s cool air welcomed visitors who strolled nearby on the bold promenade and the inner stone pathways. A stream of mid-day pedestrians flowed steadily over the garden’s horseshoe-shaped paseo and under the lush sun-blocking umbrella of laurel trees. In the midst of the garden, two ancient structures dominated: an ornate iron-laced bandstand and a sun-lit three-tiered fountain.

I love to people-watch. I can sit for hours observing the things people do.

Mid-day-crowds chatted leisurely as they meandered the round-a-bout. Nearby, closed-eyed men and women lounged on iron benches, their faces lifted toward the sun. Regulars to the park occupied themselves reading newspapers purchased at a nearby kiosk.

We took our time and strolled the concourse around the plaza ending up at the Casa Valdez restaurant. I was drawn there by my enjoyment of people-watching. We were fortunate to find a table that afforded a panoramic view of El Jardin and its unending current of compelling people. The anticipation of what I might see played on my skin like tiny fingers on a keyboard. We gazed through the window opening alongside our table as a constant flow of passersby provided entertainment.

Joyous laughter drew my attention first to a spot near the news kiosk where several children played with doweling sticks and decorated wood balls the size of oranges. Each stick was attached to a globe by a white cotton cord. Drilled into the base of each orb was a small hole, a bit larger in diameter than the free end of the stick. The object of the game was to toss the ball into the air and insert the stick into the hole as the ball fell. The length of string could be shortened to make the challenge more difficult.

Behaviors of people making their way to and from the news stand caught my attention next. Some stopped and gazed at the headlines. Others stuffed their purchase into a shopping bag or carried it under an arm as they walked away.

It wasn’t long before a war cry came from beyond the laurel trees. Immediately, we ceased our conversation. Our heads snapped around in that direction. I leaned on the window sill. Kord stood and braced himself on the table and stared out just as a burst of adolescent boys exploded into the garden. They chased each other as though driven by the wind, throwing orange peelings and screaming joyously. Their frenetic play reminded me of the fun I had when I was their age.

How I missed that! I remembered how red my cheeks became as I raced across green alfalfa fields and screamed into the wind. They roughhoused near an elderly shawl-draped street vender wearing heavy stockings and a shabby dark-green dress. As they dashed about near her, she glanced up from her tray of penny candies. The youths circled her, then darted away spewing insults at each other. A scowl pursed her lips.

As the boys fled, a parade of “models” began to walk the runway past our restaurant window: polyester office suits, blue and orange service uniforms, social-message tee shirts, and torn jeans. There were children in cotton shorts, mothers holding their babies in fringed rebozos, and bundled-up ancient folk with canes and walking sticks. All crossed our view. Seemingly preoccupied with parading, they ignored our stares and entertained us with their strut around the plaza.

While we enjoyed our end-of-meal flan, salsa tones rose from the bandstand in the center of the garden. A standing crowd of spectators slapped hands together and moved their bodies in sync with the music during each tune. I watched the oldsters seated on iron benches use the soles of their shoes to tap time with the musicians. I thought about my parents and imagined them holding hands as they joined this grand procession.

My attention was then drawn to meandering young men coming together in the shade of one of the laurel trees. They carried various instruments: guitar, tambourine, and mandolin. Shoulder to shoulder they formed a curve and waited, facing our direction. Kord identified them as a university singing group called La Tuna. He suspected they would be singing serenades in preparation for an upcoming competition with tunas from other universities.

When the salsa group finished, the young men remained on the sidewalk and began to sing songs about love and passion. Unlike the foot-tapping response to salsa music, the audience in the garden paused in silence. Some swayed back and forth to the tempo with doe-eyed looks on their faces. Others sang along softly. Many were lost in reverie.

As the tuna strolled away from El Jardin, Kord talked about his plan to return to the bus loading area via a transito street (one way), one that undulated on the hillside a block above us and parallel to where we were. He described the street as being a winding ribbon of hand-laid paving stones that twisted its way through a crush of apartment buildings, family businesses, and fountain-blessed pedestrian plazas. He wanted to show me the entrance to the hillside University of Guanajuato and its breath-taking eighty-three step “Stairway to the Stars,” as he called it.

We pushed back our chairs and began our return to the bus-staging area. As planned, we took the secondary route past the university. The narrow sidewalk kept me stepping down onto the cobblestones each time I negotiated an oncoming walker--left foot down, right foot up; left foot down, right foot up. Short pedestrians zigzagged on the sidewalk without having to drop a foot onto the cobble and bunny hop their way along the curb as I did. We hobbled along for about ten minutes before coming to the multi-storied façade of the university.

The university was unmistakable. While Kord and I stood in the shade of a student bar across the street to rest, students flowed up the steps like a reverse waterfall. They lugged backpacks and book bags without stopping to catch a breath.

We made our way past the university and back onto traffic-clogged Avenida Juárez. Within a few blocks, we joined the outgoing crowd milling about the loading zone and waited for the green autobús that would take us through the hillside tunnel back to the hacienda.

Twenty minutes later, Kord gave my sleeve a yank to follow him. We threaded our way among the lines of burdened-down commuters forming at the curb and merged into the semblance of a queue. We waited for the bus. When my turn came to board, I took that first step, looked back over my shoulder, and gazed at the sea of emotionless faces, wind-dried black hair, sweat-stained sombreros, and faded umbrellas. I wondered, Who gets left behind?

To my pleasant surprise the answer was "no one." Without speaking, those boarding condensed into the smallest possible space and allowed everyone to find a seat.

As we headed back to the hacienda, I thought about my previous resistance to travel in Mexico. How ignorant I had been. I was so fortunate to have had this day--and so pleased to still have two more days in Guanajuato.