The Poor Side of Town

The area is called Miramar - a dry, dusty arroyo that just happens to be the home for hundreds of impoverished Mexicans; mostly children. This area is the town dump where vultures fight over discarded fish heads, a perpetual fire burns with noxious fumes, and the stench of rotting garbage assaults your nostrils with each breath. Off in the distance, there is a clear view of the azure blue Sea of Cortez; beaches lined with multimillion dollar haciendas owned by wealthy Americans and Canadians. A Holland America cruise ship can be seen in the distance, discharging elderly passengers for a day of shopping.

Picking through the trash, looking for morsels to eat, you will find barefoot children of all ages. The children live in one of the many, tiny shacks lining the dirt pathway. The shacks are made with found materials, such as automobile hoods, cardboard, old mattresses, sticks, and wooden crates. Many have make-shift fences and stacks of objects found at the dump, that someday, may have a use. There is fine dust everywhere that clogs your nose and lungs.

Most of the children do not attend school. They must have a uniform and shoes in order to be enrolled. A uniform costs $10 and five dollars will buy them a pair of shoes. Transportation is not a problem - people walk everywhere in Loreto.

We chose Miramar as a place to personally distribute the children's clothes that we brought 1500 miles from home. Packed tightly in four suitcases, we were able to bring hundreds of outfits - donated by the families in our medical practice. Among the hundreds of rambling shacks, there were children that desperately needed them.

As we drove down the dusty pathway in our four-wheel drive truck, we were silent; perhaps in shock by what we were seeing. We spotted a few children digging in a trash heap, so we stopped. A woman in her early twenties was collecting items nearby; she had another baby on her back. After exchanging a few words in Spanish, she approached our truck. By this time, we had opened the tailgate and lined up a series of boxes filled with clothing; sorted by size and sex. Quietly and graciously, she accepted dozens of clothing items for her children.

Three teenage women and thirteen children were sharing the next "house" which was not much bigger than an American bathroom. The children squealed with delight as we handed out t-shirts with Thomas the Train and Spiderman. The little girls were easily fitted with shoes and socks, since they were all barefoot. We had a full suitcase with women's clothes and shoes as well. We had no men's clothes, much to the disappointment of the one elderly man that came out with the children.

After making one delivery after another, we came to one of the last cardboard homes before the road became impassible. Standing alone, next to a pile of rubble, was a little blond girl I estimate to be seven or eight years old. Her mother came out shortly carrying a 15-month-old boy. She thought we were selling the clothes and told us she had no money. We told her that all of the clothing was free (gratis). We started piling cute little outfits on her outstretched arms. She and her mother had beautiful smiles; the 15-month-old was whining in Spanish. A local authority said that her blond daughter was most likely fathered by a gringo. She may have been a prostitute at the local brothel at one time - one of the ways that desperate mothers get money to feed their children.

Our friends, who live in Loreto, were looking for the home of a woman with five children. She was able to feed them with the milk of her only goat; that is until someone stole it. They plan on buying her another goat if they can find her. Her place looked abandoned now, so she must have moved on.

It was 5 PM now, and many of the men were walking down the road from day jobs or fishing. Most will earn only $10 a day for hard labor. There are plenty of construction jobs in Loreto for men willing and able to work. The women who work at the brothel earn more; up to $120 per day minus the $20 a day room rental and 10% commission for the brothel owner. We were told that the brothel is owned by the family of a prominent local politician.

My friend's daughter, Kim, visiting Mexico for the first time, was crying from what she had seen. We did not sleep well in our clean bed last night. We were not hungry, either. Those children had no beds and they may not be eating for a different reason. They did not have running water, plumbing, or electricity. The babies do not have diapers...or toys. They do not have milk to drink because they have no way to keep it cold.

I dreamed about Miramar and other ways that we can help the people of Miramar. If I skip lunch...for just one day...I can send $15 to Loreto so that one Miramar child can go to school.

My wife and I plan on skipping a lot of lunches.

• Traveling Baja
• Travel Woes
• News from Baja
• Baja - The Adventure Continues
• Sergio - Bueno Pirro
• My Pescado - Eating from the Sea of Cortez

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• The Science of Good Deeds

Technorati Tags: Loreto, Baja, Mexico, poverty, children, health and wellness

My Pescado - Eating from the Sea of Cortez

The Sea of Cortez is teaming with fish; perhaps not as abundant during Steinbeck's adventures, but they are still here. You can see them under the crystal blue water. They jump into the air to tease the fisherman. Each morning, a fleet of Mexican fishermen in their tiny pangas and American sports fishermen in their fast boats head out toward the rising sun. Later in the afternoon, they return with their catch in time for the dinner hour.

Photo Credit: Rod Moser

The day we arrived in Loreto, my friend Randy brought in two large yellowtails (see picture). He quickly filleted them and took them to a local restaurant for tonight's meal - Mita Gourmet, owned by Juan Carlos Cortes. For about five dollars per person, the chef prepared a gourmet feast for eight people out of those two fish.

The first course of ceviche, a Mexican dish of raw fish marinated in lime juice, chiles, and ? I love ceviche and this was the best that I have ever eaten. The next course was some tuna "fish sticks" to dip in some type of sauce - another winner. The main course was the yellowtail prepared in three different ways, from Veracruz style to grilled with spicy, dried chiles. There was no salad; no rice and beans - just those four types of prepared fish. We left the restaurant stuffed, but still had room for some homemade Mexican ice cream on the plaza.

So far, we have eaten our share of camarones (shrimp), squid, lobster, and clams. We went out fishing once and didn't catch anything. Of course, the people around us were pulling them in right and left. We had originally thought that we would be fishing from our kayak, but once you get a look at the size of some of those fish, I could see us being pulled out to sea by a huge sailfish; never to be seen again. Visions of Hemingway's Old Man and the Sea streamed through my head.

We did kayak a bit, including using an electric trolling motor that I mounted to it. I love paddling a kayak, but I could really get used to the motor. It quietly propelled us about five miles along the coast. Since the motor was blocked by my body and and I steer with my feet, I wonder what the people on shore were thinking as we went zipping by a few miles per hour? I should of put my hands over the side, pretending to paddle.

In the afternoon, there is quite a breeze that blows across the Sea of Cortez. It is good for small craft people - like the two of us - to be on shore when that happens. We wanted to paddle out (or motor!) to out to our favorite seafood restaurant, LaPicazon (means "the feeding frenzy"), located about 8 km north of Loreto. This open palapa-style restaurant is owned by Alejandro and Imelda Igartua and their sons. Alejandro is the host and palapa-builder, and the person in charge of ferrying in the people who arrive by boat. Since Alejandro does not have a boat dock, he wades out and piggy-backs the people into shore to they won't get their feet wet. I have a great picture of him hauling my wife to shore last year. Imelda is the chef and prepares whatever her sons catch that day by spear-fishing. We decided on the house specialty - large shrimp baked in a pineapple. I am sure the boys didn't spear-fish the shrimp, but I can say this is one of the best meals that I have ever eaten. The ambiance is incredible, too - sitting in an open palapa with only the Sea of Cortez as your window.

We are going to LaPicazon today. I suspect my friends are preparing an early birthday celebration for me since they asked me what kind of cake that I liked. I can already taste those pineapple shrimp.

This blog entry is like a restaurant review, but in Loreto, eating seafood is a noble pastime. I was reluctant to even brag about the food and this little town for fear that people would be coming in droves. Loreto is changing, unfortunately. It will not be a sleepy village of 15,000 people for very long. The cruise ships have found it and so have retirees. There are hundreds of Americans and Canadians that own homes here. They are systematically eating all of the fish...MY fish.

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Technorati Tags: Loreto, Baja, Mexico, Sea of Cortez, fish, yellowtail, seafood

Sergio - Bueno Pirro

There was a scratch at our door. It was Sergio, a short-legged, white (sort of) bilingual dog with a hernia that lives here. Unlike the mangy, skinny, street dogs that you see wandering the streets of Loreto, Sergio is quite ample. He is really not my friend's dog; he belongs to neighbor, but for the last few years, he has chosen to live here. My friend, Randy and his wife, pay his vet bills and make sure that he has Advantix flea treatments on a regular basis. People are nice to him; they don't throw rocks at him, and most importantly, he is being fed...often and very well. What more would a dog want?

When we opened the door, Sergio came in, walked over to the foot of the couch, and went to sleep for his afternoon siesta. He stayed for several hours; we put him back out at bedtime. Sergio works the night shift; keeping away other dogs by barking and growling periodically. Sergio is not unlike my new dog, Lexi, who barks with the same alarm and enthusiasm when an axe murderer is sneaking around outside, or a leaf falls from a tree.

There are a lot of dogs in Loreto. Just the way the Flying Samaritans volunteer their time and money caring for some of Mexico's disadvantaged people, there actually veterinarians that fly down from the States do do spay and neuter clinics. Not only does this provide a service to people that could never afford this luxury, it definitely helps keep the dog population in check. Left to their own, dogs would quickly take over this tiny hamlet, run for public office, and get rid of the people that abuse them...and cats, of course. I have not seen ONE cat since I arrived. Sergio, with his mild, laid-back demeanor would be a shoe-in for mayor.

We can judge how civilized a population is by how well they treat their dogs. I once saw a Discovery Channel story about a group in Africa that has many dogs. Each year, during a special ceremony when boys become men, they select and butcher a dog to eat. How cruel, I thought, but one could clearly see that the man crying as he did this mournful task. In Southeast Asia, dogs are part of the menu. Travelers are often horrified to see them hanging in the butcher shop windows. In China, not only are dogs eaten, dog fur is used to adorn the coats that Americans wear in the winter, that is until people were outraged and rose up against this famous "Coat Factory" (I won't say the name, since they no longer accept dog-fur trimmed coats for sale.) In a world that is often sparse in protein, I can understand how poor people may need to eat dogs. It is still sad, since dogs really love and trust people. I have no problem with people eating rats and snakes.

When we were handing out children's clothes in Miramar, there were dozens of dogs. Even people who can barely feed themselves, make room in their hearts for dogs. The dogs seemed to be doing fine with what little food scraps they get. Sadly, dogs learn to pick through the trash for morsels to eat; not unlike the people that live in this very impoverished area -- just a day or so drive from San Diego.

Sergio was once taken by another Loreto resident several years ago; someone that liked him and decided just to take him. He was gone for several months and it was feared he was dead. People actually went out looking for him in various places where dogs hang out. Sergio is not neutered and has been known to wander. He has needs. No one could find him for weeks.

Then, out the of clear blue sky, he showed up at Randy's door, checked out his now empty dog bowl, and went to sleep in his usual location - in front of the door where we are renting. Right now, he is sleeping by my wife's feet. His legs are moving; a common occurrence when dogs are dreaming. I suspect he dreams in Spanish - his native dog language.

I miss my own dogs, back home in Northern California. They are well-cared for by our house-sitter, but I still miss them. Sergio does not replace Lexi and Maggie, but he is a close second -- Sergio is a good dog. There can never be too many good dogs in the World. If you have a dog, please go pet them, scratch them in that sweet spot, and give them something nice to eat. Dogs always appreciate that, and they ask for little.

And, while you are at it. Hug your kids, too.

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Baja - The Adventure Continues

I was pleased that the place we were staying had high-speed, wireless Internet so I could post on the ENT board. After a few hours (or more), I caught up on all of those messages. I stopped when my wife reminded me that I was on vacation.

A few hours after we arrived in Baja, and after a nice shower and change of traveling clothes, we were heading off to dinner with our friends. In less than a block, we spotted what appeared to be a man lying in his driveway. "Old Man Down!"

One my friend's elderly American neighbors - a man not known to be in the best of health - was lying motionless in his driveway in a pool of blood. He had also urinated himself - not a good sign. We thought he was dead. He failed to respond to our yelling.

His compound was locked, so we could not get to him. He was lying about three or four feet from the 15 foot, spike-topped gate. We yelled for his wife, who was about three sheets to the wind (intoxicated). She eventually heard our calls and came out (slowly) to open the gate. It seemed like forever before she could fumble with the lock. By this time, Tony (the guy on the ground) was twitching a bit, so we knew he wasn't dead (yet) . She finally opened the gate and we got to him. He was still unresponsive and bleeding from a huge gash in his head. I unbuttoned his shirt, felt for his heartbeat (it was there), checked his pupils, and tried to get him to respond. My wife went to call 911 (nueva - uno - uno?). They had a difficult time finding the phone. Ten minutes later, while holding a wad of Kleenex on the big gash in Tony's head, he responded with the classic, "Where am I...and who are you?"

During my quick exam of Tony, looking for other injuries, I found a piece of popcorn lodged in his hairy belly-button.

"Tony, Do you know that you have a piece of popcorn in your belly-button? Want to eat it?"

He smiled, then laughed and, of course, declined. The sense of humor is really the last thing that goes. When he laughed, I knew he would be fine. The Mexican paramedics hauled him off to the local hospital. I washed off a great deal of Tony's blood from my hands and had to go back and change my shirt. We got back in the car and headed for the restaurant (again).

I had shrimp (camarones). They were good.

UPDATE: Tony insisted on going home after getting about a hundred or so (estimate) sutures on his face and forehead. In the States, he would have been CT scanned and admitted for post-concussion observation. Tony apparently is doing fine; perhaps finishing the rest of his popcorn.

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Technorati Tags: travel, Baja, head wound, health and wellness

News from Baja

If you plan to visit a remote area or a Third World country, you have to expect and tolerate some inconveniences along the way. If you cannot, you should really stay home.

My wife and I made it to Loreto yesterday afternoon...2-1/2 days and 1500 or so miles of military check points, cursory inspections (none, actually), and some very interesting stories.

We made it to Ensenada the first day. We were going to go three more hours south to El Rosario, but we were tired. We sort of zipped through the border crossing; didn't give the Federales any eye contact so we don't know if they want to inspect us or not...we just merged in with the busy Tijuana traffic and headed south.

We stayed at the Joker Motel. That was our first mistake. It just seemed less-tacky than some of the other ones and it had a high, prison-like gate around it so no one would steal our truck. As we pulled on to their property, there were machine gun-welding guards. Hummm...maybe this WAS a prison.

Later that night, we knew why there were police at the hotel. Hundreds of party-goers (mostly drunk teenagers) arrived and went crazy. They were jumping in the pool, drinking, fighting, playing the loudest music you can ever imagine, and cheering on people doing things unimaginable. All night long, the Federales were hauling them into the room next to us. Apparently, this was the "jail"! Occasionally, we would hear them beating the hell out of someone. We left as soon as it was light. We did not get much sleep, but the entertainment was interesting.

Day 2 we made it to San Ignacio, a little Mexican village and oasis in the desert. The entire place is covered with date palms planted by the Jesuits in 1732. The Jesuits were forced out several years later, but the palm trees have stayed. The locals now make some sort of booze from the dates. I did not drink any.

Photo Credit: Rod Moser

We stayed at a unique bed and breakfast. It was a Mongolian yurt, purchased in Oregon by a Canadian couple who owned this unique "Yurt and Breakfast", in the middle of Mexico. This was quieter than the Joker, with the exception of the love-sick bull frogs who called for each other from one end of the yurt to another. A yurt is not your typical tent. It has a bathroom, tiled floors, shower, flush toilet, tiled bedroom, kitchenette with microwave and fridge, a huge skylight to see the full moon, and a hot tub outside. After the Joker, we wanted an upgrade. We went in to town to get dinner; some of the best and most garlicky scallops I have ever had. We wanted some date pie, but they were out of it. We bought a date pie from an elderly woman who lived next door to the restaurant.

While I was eating my scallops, a Mexican man walked by and gave me a friendly nod. He was carrying a pot with four pigs feet in them. He sat the pot down on the table beside us. The then went back to the truck and brought in the rest of the pig (minus those four feet) on his shoulders. He flopped it on the table and begin butchering it. You don't see that in often in the U.S. I don't know if you are supposed to tip the pig-butcherer or not. I asked him if he was making carnitas. "Maybe tomorrow," he replied in Spanish.

We basically had an uneventful trip down Baja. No one even looked in the back of the truck were we stashed our "smuggled" children's clothing (about a hundred outfits). We also brought our kayak and a gasoline power washer I was bringing down for my friend. We like to travel light. We originally had intended to bring about a thousand pounds of children's clothing, but were reluctant to do so because of a ban on used clothing. Millions of illegal Mexicans make it across the border each year. The drug cartels bring in tons of marijuana and cocaine. For some reason they weren't going to tolerate two Americans bringing in kid clothes for the orphans. Where is the logic here?

After milling it around for weeks, we gave the bulk of the clothing to a local church for their community fair clothing give-a-way. The rest we stuffed in three big suitcases for the trip to Baja. No one even searched our bags, so we didn't have to make up any stories to explain those clothes. We won't be so lucky on the way home next week. Northern bound cars are scrutinized a great deal. I will wear my clean shorts for the full body search.

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