My Trip to Mexico

Popular opinion holds that Mexico is a more dangerous country to the US than Canada is. Mexico is filled with dangerous illegal immigrantes and drug lords, while Canada doesn't really have much of anything except a beer that comes in a black bottle and is 30% alcohol (I kid you not) and an amazing brand of orange juice I termed "the Club."� The Club comes in a big orange bottle that has a shape that could be best described as "club-like,"� and a single drop in a mixed drink totally eliminates any taste of alcohol. I've had many a dream to import copious amounts of Club into the U.S. and sell it at ridiculous markups, but that's a scheme for a later day.

Anyway, the point is that we might expect border guards to be tougher on the Mexican border than on the Canadian one. I know I thought this, but my recent experience shows that nothing could be more incorrect. Having just come back from a trip to Montreal and a trip to Mexico, I can testify that the Canadian border crossing is infinitely more difficult.

The trouble started when we entered Canada. The Frenchman at the border asked us in an accusatory voice, no doubt blaming us for the failure of the Maginot line, if we had any drugs or firearms in the car. This question always amazes me. I wonder if there has ever been anyone who has cheerfully answered yes, and if so, if the stunned border guard simply let them pass in deference to their sheer bravado. Either way, we told him that we didn't and were allowed to pass.

Coming back into the States, we were asked the usual drug questions, and the woman questioning us didn't seem too convinced. She asked for our IDs, and one of my roommates, worried that his driver's license had expired the previous day, decided giving her a college ID was a good idea. Of course, this led to us being sent into the special back lot where a team of commandos started searching our car. It was cold and my hands were in my pockets, and one motioned aggressively for me to keep them where he could see them. Undoubtably he was aware of the oldest drug-smuggler trick in the book, which is obviously waiting until you've been pulled over, taken out of your car, and are surrounded by armed guards before trying to pull a pistol from your jeans pocket.

The final insult was when a brash rookie cop named Trevor looking to make a name for himself as a big-time border patroller offered to "go get a crowbar to pry the glove compartment open,"� since it was jammed shut. I doubt it! A grizzled veteran who had undoubtedly seen many a locked glove compartment in his day called off the hound-like Trevor by saying, "Trevor, enough. These guys are clean."� We took off in victory, only to be pulled over a few miles later and slapped with a $200 ticket when we couldn't get the glove compartment open to get out the registration.

Meanwhile, if you've ever tried to cross the border into Mexico, you know it's no big deal. There aren't even any guards; if you're driving, you just go right down the road like you're entering a new state, and if you're walking, you walk through some big swinging metal gate like you're entering an amusement park. And Mexico is sort of like an amusement park, except that the rides have been replaced with "banditos"� and corrupt cops looking to plan drugs on you. So I guess in the end, Mexico isn't too much like an amusement park, and that whole gate analogy is a stretched one.

Leaving Mexico is also not nearly as terrifying as you might have been led to believe, unless you're an illegal immigrant hiding in the trunk, in which case it's a very fearful experience, or so I've been told. My friend Nate is one of the most terrified-of-cops people around, and even he negotiated the Mexican border without difficulty. He pulls up to the booth and the card asks whose car it is. It's a rental, and Nate's not old enough to be driving it (nor is it under his name), but he confidently replies, "Mine."� So far so good. He checks our IDs and then asks one more time whose car it is. Nate is now flustered, and in one of the most guilty moments in human history, he turns around and looks at each one of us in the back, imploring us with his eyes to tell him what to say. We're terrified, cause there's been about 10 seconds of silence and Nate is turned entirely away from the guard. Nate then turns back around and says, "It's a rental."� The guard, despite having been lied to, simply says, "Well, that wasn't so hard,"� and lets us pass without so much as a search, and as a consequence, Pedro and Juan are now realizing the American dream.