One difference I noticed when I entered México was that EVERYONE speaks Spanish–as opposed to Chicago where only half the people speak Spanish. México is like a totally different country!
I may be Mexican, but I’m not a real Mexican who grew up in México. When I checked into a hotel in Matehuala, I realized that my name, David Diego Rodriguez, even though it sounds Spanish, is really American. My name if I were really, really a Mexican, would be David Diego Rodríguez Martínez. But so far, I’m blending in here in Mexico. Or at least, I’ve convinced myself that most people don’t really notice that I’m from America. I found this Internet Café in Celaya and it has accent marks and ñ just like a real Spanish keyboard!
Well, I must go now. My time is up at the Internet Cafe. Hasta pronto.
Yes, I mean Chi Chi’s as in the restaurant and not chichis in Spanish as in … Well, you know what I’m referring to. That’s right, female breasts. In English, they would be boobs, boobies, etc. So, I always wondered why the Puerto Rican golfer liked to be called Chichi Rodriguez–of course, I had a few unsavory ideas of my own.
As a Mexican, I have to ask: Why would anyone name a restaurant Chi Chi’s if they don’t specialize in dairy products? So, one day, I’m driving down LaGrange Road in Orland Park with my three sons and I notice that I’m rapidly approaching Chi Chi’s restaurant and I instinctively start thinking about chichis (in Spanish) and some of my female grade school classmates who had big chichis. The girls who envied them called the girls with the big chichis, chichonas. Suddenly, I remember that I’m driving in my minivan with my sons and we’re rapidly approaching Chi Chi’s. Since I’ve driven this way many times before, I know the restaurants in the area fairly well. I dread what is soon appearing. As soon as we’re in front of Chi Chi’s, we will be right across from Hooters! I feel so guilty about exposing my sons to this. I tell my sons not to look out the window. I’m embarrassed because I have my sons with me, and I’ve been having impure thoughts about chichis. What kind of father am I? I have brought my sons to this place where we have Chi Chi’s to the left of us and Hooters to the right! Of course, they’re too young to appreciate this cosmic moment.
I just drove through the McDonald’s in Pilsen and was I ever surprised! You can now buy jalapeño peppers for 25 cents each at McDonald’s! Where were those jalapeños when I was little. Whenever we ordered at McDonald’s or Burger King, my father would invariably ask for salsa or jalapeños, depending on his mood. Of course, they would always tell him that they didn’t have salsa or jalapeños. And my father, being my one and only father, would say, “That’s okay! I brought my own!”
I have a confession to make. My sons are Mexican! Why wasn’t I aware of this all along? There are some things that I just never think about until someone points them out to me–like the fact that I’m also a great-uncle. I never felt that old until my brother Jerry pointed out that I was now a great-uncle when his grandson was born. I have two younger brothers who are already grandfathers and I’m not. So maybe I’m not that old.
So, I was at the birthday party for my grandnephew when my brother Rick, the grandfather of the birthday boy, says to me, “You are the only one in our family who has Mexican sons.” I had never thought about this before, but it’s true. My brother Jerry married an Irish girl, Rick married a Polish girl, and Joe married a German girl. So, all their children are only half-Mexican. Yes, I’m the only one with 100% Mexican children. So how did this occur? I’m not sure. I guess just because I love Mexican girls.
After Carlos Mojaro moved back to Mexico, we just didn’t have as much fun as before. Most of the time we just played baseball in the prairie or just sat on somebody’s porch talking about the good old days. Then we saw the Mexico City Olympics on TV, mainly because our parents were so proud of the fact that an international event could take place in Mexico City. So all my friends and I watched the Olympics religiously.
I especially liked the track and field events, but I also liked women’s gymnastics. Whenever we talked about the Olympic events we watched, we couldn’t help but act them out. Soon we started up our own Olympics. For the shotput, we through a brick in my backyard. Luckily, we weren’t strong enough to throw it out of the yard. We had competitions in many events. We even made charts with the athlete and team standings and the “world records” that we had achieved. After watching the Olympic marathon, we were amazed that anyone could run 26 miles. However, as we discussed this amazing feat, we realized that when we were very active on those long summer days, we ran quite a lot distance without realizing it. I even suggested that we could probably run a marathon if we tried. There was some dissension amongst us at first. But then we decided to put ourselves to the test.
There were about fifteen of us and we decided that we would run the Mexico City Olympic Marathon. I felt as if Carlos Mojaro was still with us. Well, we didn’t exactly know how a long marathon was, and since our mothers wouldn’t let us cross the street, we decided to run around the block until we competed the marathon or dropped dead like Phidippides. I didn’t know much about running back then, but I did know that we had to pace ourselves to go the distance.
After the opening ceremony, we toed the line and ran at sound of the exploding firecracker. Douglass sprinted from the start and only made it around the block once. The rest of us ran as a pack as we had observed the Olympic marathoners do. I’m not sure how long our Chicago city blocks are, but I believe our block at 4405 South Wood Street was about one-third of a mile when we ran completely around. As we ran around the block we would shout out the lap number as we passed my house. It was getting dark fast. We were actually having fun running around the block in the Mexico City Olympic Marathon.
My mother came out to see what was going on because a crowd had gathered in front of my house. We didn’t actually expect to have any spectators. This was just like the Olympics! By lap ten, a few runners had dropped out of the race. The spectators shouted out the lap numbers with us. About lap twenty, my mother said it was time to go in the house. My friends’ mothers were also waiting for their sons to go home. My mother insisted that I go inside so my brothers would go home, too.
I knew if I went in, then the marathon would stop and everyone would go home. I begged my mother, without breaking my stride, to let us keep running a little longer. We ran a few more laps and we were still having fun, but we were also getting tired and starting to feel pain in our legs. When we reached lap 27, my mother said that if I didn’t go in right now, she would beat me: ¡Te voy a dar una paliza! That was just the excuse we needed to save face. There were only six of us left running and we all complained to our mothers about interrupting our marathon. But we all went home, secretly thankful to our mothers for saving us from embarrassment.
However, we always felt great about our running accomplishments. We always talked about how much farther we could have run if weren’t for our mothers stopping us. Of course, we never attempted to run another marathon either.
Chicago USA 