Many years ago, my best friend Marge and I went on vacation to Mexico. We decided not to go on an organized tour. We just wanted to do what we could do on our own. We thought we might rent a car, but after an exciting ride to our hotel, we decided to taxi our way around. We asked our taxi driver if they had a lot of accidents because of the amount of banged-up cars on the road. He said they only considered it an accident if someone was killed.
The weekend we got there, they were celebrating Independence Day. The taxi driver told us to stay away from the American Embassy because there was word that there might be an incident there. That evening we went out to dinner, and it was a lovely warm night, so we decided to walk back to our hotel. As we were walking, we knew we would go past the Embassy, but it looked quiet up ahead, so we continued walking. In a few minutes, a car pulled up, and two men in uniform told us to get in the car. We assumed they were the police, so we got in. There were two rifles on the back seat floor, and after asking them some questions, we realized they were leftover soldiers from the Independence parade. Oops! I think they pretended not to understand English, but we finally convinced them to take us back to our hotel.
A few days later, we were out late and decided to sleep in. When we got up, we thought we might go to the marketplace. We went out, and a taxi driver stood out on the sidewalk. We asked him if he could take us to the marketplace, and he suggested we might enjoy going to the Floating Gardens of Xochimilco. We thought it was a great idea.
We got there, and it was so beautiful and peaceful. We needed it after a week of fighting off-street vendors. We got in a little gondola with a man who was navigating and sat back and relaxed.
A few minutes later, a little old lady paddled up with a canoe full of flowers. She looked about 90 years old, and we felt sorry for her, so we bought a dozen roses for about two dollars and a corsage for each of us. Within about two minutes, we had a mariachi band in a canoe serenading us and vendors selling food to clothing. We couldn’t believe our eyes. We were overtired, and this was so unexpected. We started laughing so hard that we had tears rolling down our cheeks, and we had all these people laughing with us.
We finally got to the marketplace, where Marge wanted to buy a ring. We looked at several, and this salesman insisted Marge try one on. She put one on and realized she couldn’t get it off. I had to keep this guy occupied while Marge went to the bathroom to soap up her finger and finally get it off.
Needless to say, trips with my best friend Marge were never dull.