4 - Wednesday, Nov. 18, 1992 — North Shore News The adventures of two amigos in Mexico THIS IS the story of Two Amigos in Mexico City, just trying to get a five-part series in the can for a gutsy little independent Canadian television station locked in mortal combat with the big national networks for ratings. At one level, ours is a rea! sim- ple job, the cameraman and me. Fly in. Grab some views of smogs. Maybe get some shots of people coughing. Bang off 2 few inter- views. Try not to get dysentery. Get out. That was it. That was the plan. I'm sorry. This sounds cynical and world-weary, and very mediaesque. The truth is, my attitude towards Mexico, to begin with, was sour. llived for a month ina Volkswagen van in Mexico many years ago, and saw some scary things happen. Tlearned to admire and respect — and, in fact am indebted to — quite a few Mexicans, individuals whom I met in the curse of my adventures. But the police and the federales were something else. Very ham- fisted, at least by my wonderfully milquetoast Canadian standards, I happened to have long hair at the time, you see. A youthful af- fectation somewhat typical of a certain up-yours kind of personal- ity during the era in question. Nothing to brag about, but nothing particularly to hide either. At least surely not at this stage. What it really says is that I was an idiot back then. It was stupid, to say the least, to go down to Mexico in 1967 with long hair ina Voiks van, even if you had your wife and children along to protect you, Yep. Just plain dumb. My appearance — never mind what witty things I might have ut- ered in a crazed attempt to com- municate despite the odds — pro- voked a fairly typical response from police, whether they were in California or Lake Chapala. It was like: ‘‘Oh boy, do I get to stomp him first?" They just didn't like hippies. The subtle detail that ! wasn’t a hippie, | was a published Cana- dian writer on sabbatical (one book out, but hey!), whizzed right by their sun visors and helmets. Still, they didn’t beat me to death, for which | am eternally grateful, I did discover that ! really didn’t like being part of a ‘‘visible minority” in a country where they I an teres 68 MO FOR ANY MAKE OR MODEL PLEASE CALL AMBLESIDE AUTO SALES & LEASE 925-3233 I; OR CELLULAR 351 ~1958 Bob Hunter STRICTLY PERSONAL didn’t all exactly worship gringo pig-dogs, one of which I happen- ed to be. I could have been in big-trouble several times, in fact. It wasn’t that I was doing anything par- ticularly wrong, understand. I just happened to keep stumbling from one wrong place at the wrong time to another wrong place at another wrong time. Bad Mexican travel karma, I guess. But I had this family with me in the van, si? Bring out the bam- binos, dear! Aren’t they cute? Show them to the officer here. Down Mexico way, family is big. It’s also very serious. It's a seriousness brought on by desperate poverty yawning on every side. Everybody knows that if the breadwinner goes, Mom and the kids could well be out on the streets. The backup system counts. There’s not much of a govern- ment-paid welfare net. And the streets are hard and unsentimental. Whatever the precise reasons various armed Mexican authorities kept letting me off the hook back during my scary youthful sojourn there, | am convinced having a wife and two little kids with me was the biggest factor in my favor. OK. Fastforward to recently. 1992. The assignment is to go down to Mexico City and chroni- cle the pollution problem. I will be going down with Big Al MacCormack, one of the sta- tion’s senior cameramen, a veteran of many a hair-raising assignment. I'm six-foot-one, and Al looks down on me, so he comes by his nickname honestly. He has long hair! rantial ; on remaining stock Of 92’ He’s not a hippie either, you comprehend. First of all, there’s no such thing as hippies any more. Everybody knows that. Second, since we are sepre- sentatives with proper documenta- tion of a television station in Canada, just in the middle of the whole North American Free Trade Agreement kerfuffle, what with Mexico Jooking like the big win- ner, and Canada possibly having the last enchilada driven through its heart by Senor Mulroney, we have to be treated differently from some poor long-haired Yanquis- type swine in a Volks van in '67. Besides, we've got plastic. So there we are, Big Al and I, not knowing the meaning of fear (we're a news team, right, and it hardly gets more macho than a news team, for God’s sake!), diving on a jet down into the Valicy of Mexico, where the Aztecs used to be known as Chifdren of the Sun, and now it’s reportedly the most polluted city on Earth. I had been told to arrange to fly in by day so we could get some footage of the pollution cloud that smothers the city. Unfortunately, i’d forgotten to mention this to Al, so naturally the camera was packed away in the baggage com- partment. Oh, well. As it turned out, there was no poilution either. The skies were clear all the way to the mountains. What, no pollution! Oh great! To be continued... Your Professional, Committed, Real Estate Expert OFFICE 984-9711 PAGER: 645-9651 FAX: 984-3350 2893 Lonedale Ave. North Vancouver Savings £uro Vans & Passats Winter is on its Way! 1 FREE OIL CHANGE AND FILTER WITH ANY WINTERIZING TUNE-UP, OR SNOW TIRE AND RIM PURCHASE. SNOW TIRES Ppeaeon gow Pugs (deset Operation of heater vale & adustcontolcabe tested & wniien report provided gasoline °C Lich adj.sied (where appic.) 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