Clinica del Dolor

Another long one...In 2000, I was down in Tuxtla, Mexico in the state of Chiapas on an important trip to visit some small cooperatives in the Zapatista-ish zone of the Sierra Madre de Chiapas, specifically the town of Jaltenango. I'm not sure how much Zapatista activity was there but since we drove past the known conflict area of San Cristobal on the way I'm taking some liberties. On the night before our journey my colleague Andres and I met with some friends to have dinner at a Spanish restaurant I'd been to a few times in Tuxtla. The Casa Asador...it may still be there if it hasn't killed more than a few dozen locals and visitors and if it is still there it can kiss my asador.

We had some nice queso fundido con chorizo and champignons, great shrimp paella, and a few dozen Modelos and Herraduras. The food was delicious and lived up to all the bragging I had done earlier. We left at about 11:00 p.m. knowing an early start of 5:00 a.m. was required for us to arrive for our mid-day speeches in Jaltenango. When we arrived back at the Camino-Real that Monday evening, my home squad, the Buffalo Bills were on Monday Night Football at the hotel bar. YES!

Following the game Andres and I retired to a long night of agony. I got the hot stomach followed by gastric distress within a few hours while my friend was doubled over with cramping agony most of the evening. Funny enough when we met for our ridiculously early departure we initially had no idea of our respective suffering. I said simply "how are you brother?" which was met with a very green-faced reply "fuck, dude, not good".

Although I also felt pretty bad, I felt that I could power through it during the five hour drive. Andres however had no such pretension. We loaded into the new but extraordinarily crappy Geo Tracker and crossed our fingers. Up until this trip I really had no idea that my friend spoke spoke much Spanish. It turns out he was was pretty familiar with the words he directed at our driver..."senor, alto, emergencia!" This repeated chorus led to numerous rapid evacuations from the Tracker and extreme retching.

On my side, I was meditating/hallucinating in the front seat, and despite waves of nauseous dementia I thought I was cool. Ten or so stops later we arrived in Jaltenango. Andres was pretty exhausted but stable...I on the other had was catatonic. All the holding it in pretension was over. I was going to detonate. I walked into our hosts offices and proceeded to wretch loudly and strongly. I'm not going to lie: It was loud and scary and the indigenous people wrote a couple apocalyptic folk songs about what they heard.

When I emerged, a few people looked at my pale, bald head and screamed. This happens from time to time so wasn't that freaked out. When I saw a mirror a few hours later I realized the cause of the reaction. My eyelids and eyes were black as the force of my vomiting had caused a full rupture of the blood vessels around my eyes. Picture a goth Shrek and you've got the idea.

The Mexicans we were with were clearly freaked out and being a friendly bunch wanted to help out or at least make sure these two lame, sick gringos didn't die on their watch. Andres and I were dispatched to the rooms of our hotel; a pretty decent place with sinks, toilets, air conditioning and cable (OK HBO and 15 channels of static but whatever). We were visited periodically by concerned citizens. These were colleagues, mamas, cooks and delightfully a "doctor".

The doctor in question was an enourmous piece of humanity, he was no more than five feet tall and weighed in at 350 lbs. easily. He asked us how we felt respectively and said we probably needed some rest and antibiotics. Alberto Einstein in the house, pay attention. The kicker was his prescription/credentials which read: Clinica del Dolor. (The Pain Clinic) Like I'm taking advice/meds from a heart attack waiting to happen in the middle of Chiapas. Good times.

Moral of the story: my sickness ran its course and I was eating sopa de tortilla by nightfall. Andres, well he had to suffer a little bit longer...