“This is how it is supposed to rain”, I think as I watch the summer storm from the cab window. You might ask yourself why I am glad to see it rain as I enter the depths of Mexico City, after spending seven months in Scotland. The thing is, when it rains in Mexico, it rains; none of that pathetic drizzling falling all day long and moistening everything, including one’s humour. Here, it is dramatic: there’s thunder and lightning, and the clouds make the sky so black it seems like it is night time even if it is early afternoon. Then it passes, and the city’s air becomes pure, and it smells of clean cars and muddy streets. The sun comes out again. This is how it is supposed to rain.
It is strange when I explain my life in Mexico to my fellow St Andreans; those looks of horror when I speak of the danger and the traffic, the restrictions that in Europe aren’t even concepts in people’s heads. When I talk about what it is like for me to go out at night in Mexico, the response I mostly get is, “I couldn’t live like that”. Quite reasonably.
That’s when I ask myself, how does one explain Mexico in another language? Because, despite it all, when I come back to Mexico I feel relief and, no matter what, I have never felt unwelcome here. If I have lived as an outsider in Mexico all my life, and yet I am able to feel more at home here than in the place where I was born, there must be a reason. A reason for which there are no words.
Why do I love Mexico so much? Why do I go into a Mexi-coma every time I leave? For one thing, I miss Mexicans’ ingeniousness. In what other country can one find fruit juice sold in plastic bags with a straw, or candles in the shape of Disney characters, or 1.5 lt. glasses with beer containing jelly babies, chilli pepper and Worchester sauce (de-licious, in case you’re wondering)? Where else do soap operas have names such as Abyss of Passion, Fire in the Heavens or The Flames of Love? And why does everyone take things so lightly here? Only here would I let a nickname as ugly as Paca belong to my person—although thanks to that I am always able to laugh at myself and my clumsy existence. That’s a Mexican lesson I take with me everywhere.
It is just that everything is different here, and I don’t know how to put it into words. The blue of the sky is not the same as everywhere else, neither are the clouds which are always far and big, full of air, storing all the sighs of the people they dwell over. You never feel alone here; it is normal to smile at each other in the street, and to say good morning to strangers, even more so to people you encounter on a daily basis (even if you don’t really know them). It is perfectly fine to talk to someone you’ve never met before at a bar—with decent levels of soberness—and to have a conversation with the girl in front you in the bathroom line—again, without the need of being drunk. I love the genuine politeness of people. I like that the vendors in open-air markets greet their regular customers with a handshake…maybe it’s a little awkward when they start calling you ‘princess’, ‘queen’ and ‘blondie’ even if your hair is brown. There’s no scent I can compare to that of tortillas being heated on a grill with some delicious content in them, nor the sweetness of tamarindo or water flavoured with hibiscus flowers. I miss the hills I spent my infancy in, and the city I gave my adolescence to—neither have changed much since I left. I liked when I could measure myself against the maize plants growing in the fields, and that I know the flavour of the fruits that grow on cacti.
What language can convey Mexico’s essence, I ask myself? And am I doing it justice by attempting to describe it here, in the only way I can?
I am fully aware that Mexi-coma is not a St Andrews syndrome—in fact, only about twenty St Andreans or so suffer from it, I think. Yet, if anything, being in St Andrews has made me re-appreciate many things about my home country, and somehow has made me fond of the very things I was escaping from in Mexico. Undoubtedly, wherever I end up next might have a similar effect on my view of St Andrews. For now, I am happy to have realised where it is that I truly feel like I have a home; I am still in the dark about what I will do here if I am able to come back permanently, but at least I know Mexico is waiting for me with open arms.
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