Can't see u
s so well? Join the club. Neither could the Brazilian or Paraguayan border officials.
Al Capone. Jack the Ripper. Ted Bundy. Bonnie and Clyde. And now, proudly introducing your favorite infamous criminals, Beth Sadler and Jason Vickers. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, yours truly now join the ranks amongst the most notorious criminals in history after successfully entering not one, but two countries illegally in the amazing span of only 4 hours. We snuck past Parguayan guards brandishing machine guns and Brazilian border control with the ease of hardened criminals without breaking a sweat (okay, maybe Jason sweat a little.) With a few close encounters, or perhaps we just thought they were close, we eventually made it back into Argentina safely after a great night out breaking the law. To give credit where credit is due, we'd like to get a big South American shout out to our connections: Erica "Zodiac Killer"de la Hora, Lisa "I'll Put One in Your Eye" de la Hora, and "Dumping-Diego," who braved the Paraguayan bathrooms without a whiff of fear, for acting as our accomplices and partners in crime.
It was a crazy night filled with hamburgers, Brazilian Quesadillas (somewhere between Spanish and Portuguese the Brazilians mixed up taco and quesadilla, because this tasted nothing like the deliciousness of a Mexican quesa-dilla), cerveza and Paraguayan gas stations (We like to think of them more as prisons, since they are guarded as such) like we never knew possible.
Foz de Iguasu, our first victim and located in the great country of Brasilia, was full of life and music. Carnival is right around the corner and the nightlife seemed to be bustling. We crossed the border relatively easily as the border guards apparently had better places to be, like drinking, carousing, or possibly celebrating some saints of some sort. We ate some appetizers and imbibed some wonderful beer, although more because they were icey cold then because they were significantly better then, say, Budweiser. Our formerly mentioned, and fully street honed, accomplices knew all the in's-and-out's, and Jason was able to try his first fried chicken Brazilian style...and half an hour later his first hamburguessa, or file (in Portuguese), Brazilian Style--I think he's fully embraced his Choncho nickname (sobrenombre).
After that we headed to the giant bazaar called Ciudad del Este, located in the apparent center of Paraguayan black markets. The trifecta of Foz, Puerto Iguazu and Ciudad del Este (according to the guidebook) is the second biggest border region for the infamous"import/export" businesses in South America, which is to say besides our nerves, there was nothing preventing us from entering into Paraguay illegally from Brazil. We only were able to see the main drag, consisting of about a 1,000 street side vendors, as stores would be too grand of a word for this little shops with pull-down metal doors, seemingly for security purposes. The town, besides the gas station, was relatively dead (Jason compared the hopping gas station to the nightlife in Yucaipa, in which the only place to find out anything going on was at the 76 gas station) and had an aire of dirtiness yet unseen to these travelers. Jason is now more intrigued while I am completely uninterested. (Just for a frame of reference, outside of a McDonald's everything else within the mile and a half (2.4 km) strip were all vendors and the Brazil and Argentina go-to for any electronics, knicknacks, or just plain junk. One of our accomplices claims that more money exchanges hands here than in all but two other places in the world: Hong Kong and Miami--this is as yet unverified by the Internet.)
All in all it was an excellent night and besides a few rather small indiscretions like jaywalking, we are now able to check-off the first of many illegal activities to be had on this trip. (just joking, for me at least.)
Jason "Dickers" joke about being illegal after being called Mexican by my cousin-in-law all night long: How do you smuggle two North Americans across the border? No, not by trunk, nor by little red balloon and ex-lax, or with 300 other North Americans in the back of one 10" Uhaul. Nope, you just have to choose the right North Americans.
South American Mafia (with Beth on the lookout)
Sadler and Vickers on the lamb! Good thing you didn't have anyone named Marshall with you, cause you probably would have ended up in some Brazillian jail where Jason would then have to whore himself out in return for help breakin' out of the pen shawshank style. Which would then of course lead to a chase scene to the Argentinian border with blood thirsty attack dogs on your heels.
ReplyDeleteIn my home town it was the Safeway (Vons if you will) parking lot, I dont know if thats a step up or down from a gas station.
If I was with you, we would have been in a jail right now. I haven't seen anyone darker than your 5 o'clock shadow...
ReplyDeleteI don't think they call it "whoring" yourself out in prison, but if I got arrested with Raman--who probably would have to play the Morgan Freeman of my Shawshank, for lack of anyone dark enough--perhaps we could work out some scheme of providing people with well paid jobs (the new sweat shops of Brazil, thank you Gap) to save our asses, possibly in the literal sense.
ReplyDeleteis it possible to yucaipan, canadian and mexican?
ReplyDeleteCan you please find the chupacubra?