El Pinche Desierto - Part 3
Except maybe not yet. Our gear is still by the dunes. It shall stay there. It’s approaching noon. We decide to go to another place Davíd has been told about. The borrachos say it’s close by. I’m wearing shorts and a t-shirt. For reasons unknown, I also have an extra pair of shorts which serve to protect my head from the sun. Unfortunately, they’re black. And I can smell urine on them. Mine, presumably. The entrance to town is our first pit stop. One bottle of water each. It’s not far, right? We start walking. Slowly. Nobody else is. Actually, that’s not true. Labourers wearing multiple layers of clothes toil away on a farm. An hour or so in, Davíd and I rest in the shade of some branches reaching out from a tree growing behind a compound wall. A man wearing a gas mask appears and politely tells us to leave. As we continue to stagger through, we stick our thumbs out at the few vehicles that pass by. None stop. It occurs to me that we’re acting like entitled gringos, so we decide to walk until our fatigued bodies signal that we have reached the internationally acknowledged yet unspecified exhaustion threshold for a ride.
And that’s how it transpires. As the truck thrashes and rumbles forward, we observe a rocky serpent-like Sierra to our left that extends for kilometres and kilometres. The end of which is our destination. Está lejos, wey. It's far, dude. David admits. No fucking shit, cabrón. There is a gate. For absolutely no reason since there’s barely a fence. We open it and close it behind us. Again. For no reason. It is hot. Closer to 50 than 40. There are no trees. No nothing. We are here. Los petroglifos. The petroglyphs. Carved into stone by humans over two thousand years ago. What were they doing here? A soft breeze caresses the radiant surface causing the Ocotillo cactus/not actually a cactus to sway ever so gently. We take photos. And explore. One etching shows a figure with a neck disproportionately longer that its body. An alien? Or perhaps just another earth-bound misfit reaching for higher consciousness. It is around two in the afternoon. Davíd says that we should wait. Exploring further or walking back would be a folly. We have to respect the sun. There is no place to hide from it. Only the combination of a crevice and shadow formed by some benevolent rocks offer some respite.
All that wasted time. Chasing childish innocence, youthful exuberance and women. An image of a boy I went to school with pops into my head. Except now as a man. It’s a Facebook profile picture. He has a determined look in his eyes. With red tilak in a thumbed line on his forehead. The kind of look that zealots usually have. Or sharply-dressed men and women striding through Manhattan pretending as if the entire global economy weren’t a giant Ponzi scheme where everyone is in debt to an arbitrary moneylender and their existence weren’t meaningless. Religion and capitalism: neatly executed parlour tricks. Two sides of the same coin. And they got me. Well played. Well played, indeed. But maybe, just maybe, they fucked with the wrong man this time.
In any case, these thoughts are simply a way for my body to inform me that I’m being slowly cooked by the mid-day sun and that it would be wise to do something about it. So I grab a handful of earth and begin to apply it over my face. Either that actually cools me down or I’ve just deceived myself. Doesn’t matter. The effect doesn’t last long. I’m starting to tense up from the heat. A rock serves as my pillow while I place a small stone on the ground and lie down such that my sacrum is pressed against said stone. Madre de Dios. What a release. The best massage I’ve ever had.
In the distance I spot a few ranches with industrial equipment spread across a few acres. The idiotic notion that these might be processing stations for methamphetamine crosses my mind. The obvious consequence of having binge watched Breaking Bad all those years ago, the drunk drifter’s tale about the marijuana farms that purportedly exist here and, of course, the man in the gas mask from earlier. In any case, I am still not as far from humanity as I’d like to be. Must go further next time. (Narrator update: And he does).
Davíd has managed to fall asleep. Chooth. Fucker. Meanwhile, I spend the next few hours alternating between mild heat-induced hallucinations, insomnia, sacrum massages, flatulence, cigarettes, drops of water and face painting. The huevón finally awakens. The sun has barely moved. We’re now out of water. The decision is made to start the long walk back to the highway. Along the hills, we observe that large blocks of rock have been excavated. Barely a few kilometres from this sacred site of human passage, lies the start of Gloria; a soon-to-be opened Copper mine. Those friendly Canadians at it again.
Davíd is flagging for the first time since we met, but bizarrely I feel energised. Determined. Calm. For the first time since we met, his eyes convey respect for me. I know that I could continue for days. Even weeks. We trudge along for an hour till we reach the periphery of the village. The sun has finally started to set.
We encounter a man standing by a pick-up. Agua. Could we please have some? Davíd is doing all the talking at this point. The only thought on my mind is water. He says there might be a tiendita inside someone’s house. But then he turns into a chicken.
Que hacen p’acá? Fueron p’allá? Cuando llegaron p’aquí? Acamparon p’allí?
Imbecile. Of course, that’s how people around here speak. But still. We just want some water. It’s a beautiful scene though. The pink hue of the sky fills up the hacienda of his home. A dog cools himself off by panting in the shade. A heavily tattooed man walks out having just woken up from his siesta. No agua to be found though. A bit of paranoia seeps out of my unconscious mind into the present moment. There’s no danger, but part of me is signalling thus. It’s probably the thirst. Or all the cash I’ve been carrying around since I sold my car to fund whatever the fuck this is.
Another hour of walking. And then, a ride. Manna. Heaven. We’re dropped off at the entrance to the village and it’s almost nightfall. We walk into a store. David buys a snack. It’s been more than a day since our last meal. I buy way too much water not realising that we’ll have to walk all the way back to the campsite with it. It also doesn’t occur to me that I’m scaring everyone in the store with the ash and mud on my face and general disheveled appearance. A man actually runs back out to his car and pulls the key from the ignition. Fear triggers caution I suppose. When he returns, I let him have his place back in line. He’s surprised by the gesture, which is perhaps why he offers to drive us back to the dunes. He even invites us to work on his farm. We politely decline. I must remember to clean up tomorrow. Best to always dress neutral. Appear neither rich nor poor. Never any jewellery. Nothing too flashy. Nothing too dirty. No tattoos. But maybe just a touch of colour to brighten the day of an observer. Mostly let the glow shine from within. Still, it’s the same dilemma as most modern beings. Wanting not to be seen, yet yearning to be recognised.
Finally, home sweet home. We crawl into the tent with our feet sticking out. An hour or so later I pass out. Almost 48 hours since I last did the same. We wake up early and run back out to the dunes. It’s heaven. On the way back to the highway, we observe a man at work already. An engineer ensuring that the irrigation system is functioning as it should for the cultivation of zucchini.
The drunks have gone. The burrito man is still here though. As he probably is everyday. A cart full of bean and cheese wrapped in large tortillas. Does he make them in the morning or the previous evening? He stands right next to the carretera and wears jeans, steel-toed shoes, a t-shirt with a buttoned shirt on top, a cap, sunglasses resting on the visor of the aforementioned, and has a scarf around his neck. Prepared to stand in the sun till it reaches its most unforgiving position in the sky, at which point he presumably disappears to wherever it is he came from.
And he is not alone. A man is constantly scurrying around. Lifting this. Moving that. The desert saps your energy, but replaces it with even more. He is in his early fifties. With a rapturous look in those piercing blue eyes. His face has wrinkles. His body doesn’t. Toned and muscular. No trace of fat. Unlike those freaks further north, it doesn’t reflect a disproportionate utilisation of natural resources. And isn’t shaped by social media influencers. Also operating at a similar velocity is a man wiping windshields and selling cigaros sueltos. Loose cigarettes. He’s more talkative. Something about having gone to Nigeria decades ago to bring back a malaria-stricken nephew who had been working for an oil company.
Meanwhile, I frantically try to lighten the load of my backpack. David waits patiently. Old electric razor. Not needed. Deodorant. Tampoco. Neither. The temptation to simply leave everything there and walk into the distance flirts with me. As it has done many times before. A sergeant from the military-police squadron taking a break from their patrol watches me curiously. He looks like an Indian uncle on account of his neatly trimmed moustache and slight paunch. I inform him so. Banter is shared. We look each other in the eyes the whole time. But it doesn’t occur to me to ask for a ride to the next town on their armed. convoy. Damn.
A bus finally arrives. We both pass out aisles away from each other. Several hours later our destination in on hand. Well, mine at least. David has another long journey ahead. There is no need for a prolonged farewell. His eyes reveal a slight sadness; he has to return to a job and an empty apartment. We will probably never see each other again.