Nathaniel

Shockey

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April 24, 2008

Mexico Vacation: I Left My Dignity (And My Money) at Senor Frog's

Without reliable information, checking out the local scene at any foreign location is hit or miss at best. Last week, I did worse than miss. As they say in Cozumel, Mexico, I got “bent over.”

My wife and I had heard quite a lot about a restaurant called Senor Frog’s, which has several locations throughout Mexico. For whatever reason, we were initially under the impression that it reflected authentic Mexican culture. Even all the native Mexicans who worked at the resort in which we stayed said they loved going to Senor Frog’s.

“Where’s your favorite place to party around here?” we asked frequently.

At least 75 percent of the time, “Saynyor Froges,” was the response. So we put two and two together, and it made four hundred pesos (about $40 U.S.) to rent a scooter for the day in order to get to this fabled hot spot.

Getting there was no less than an exercise in cheating death. I’ve never ridden a motorcycle, or for that matter, any motorized vehicle with less than four wheels. My instinct when nervous was to clutch the handlebars more tightly. Evidently, this is how you accelerate.

I’m a traditional sort of guy so, asserting my masculinity, I had to drive the thing at least once. By the time we arrived, my masculine biceps were deeply engraved with feminine nail-marks, and I’m not sure if my wife will ever let me drive a moped again “no matter how great you think you look in your helmet.” But as I reminded her, we did find the place without the help of a map.

The scene that greeted us was a bit short of what we had anticipated.

We walked in and there were about 10 employees lined up singing “YMCA,” doing all the choreography and wearing balloon hats that a Mexican clown was running around making for tips. Of course, while the employees got to wear dumb-looking hats, the clown had different ideas for the tourists. For them, he made balloons strongly resembling the male genitalia, which, naturally, could be warn around the pelvis. The Americans loved these – seriously.

It didn’t take long to realize that the Mexicans have a less-than-dignified opinion of what entertains their American compadres from the north.

We each ordered a margarita, even though we couldn’t find it on the menu – an error that cost us about 160 pesos. Granted, it was about the size of a Big Gulp. This is obviously good strategy for them, because it left us with a shade less than our full wits about us when the shot girl came around.

Let me tell you about the shot girl. She runs around the restaurant blowing a whistle permanently attached to her lips, carrying a green mystery liquid I’m pretty sure had alcohol in it. So she approached us, whistle blowing, and asked us, “Shots?” (I don’t know how she blew the whistle and spoke simultaneously, but I swear on that $16 margarita she did.) We couldn’t see how things could get substantially worse, so we acquiesced. After sustaining the financial blows of the moped ride and the elephant-sized drinks, we were ready to try anything offered to us free of charge.

After getting our drunken nod, she proceeded to blow her whistle even more vociferously, grab my wife’s chest, pour some mystery liquid directly into her mouth, stick a shot glass under her tank top, pour the mystery liquid into it and have me grab the shot glass and drink it myself. Then she poured some of the mystery liquid into my mouth, grabbed my chest, stuck a shot glass down my pants and had my wife grab the shot glass with her mouth and drink it without the use of her hands. Apparently, I wasn’t supposed to use my hands when I drank the one she stuck under my wife’s shirt, but I didn’t realize this because I was in a state of extreme shock.

“Fourteen dollars!” she yelled, the whistle still blowing.

“Excuse me?”

“Fourteen dollars!”

“For what?” I was getting heated.

“Three fifty a shot!” This is the part, specifically, they call getting “bent over” on the island of Cozumel. Actually, that’s just what I called it. It’s the part where they tell you to stand up, spread your legs, and put your chest down on the bar while they steal your money and dignity at the same time. I reached for my wallet, very reluctantly grabbed a ten and four ones, and handed them to the ecstatic shot girl.

I was not happy. Our funds were nearly depleted, and my wife and I had just been seriously violated.

All I wanted to do was go back to the resort and mope by the pool, but it would have been quite foolish to try driving the death-cycle after all the liquids we had just consumed. So we watched the shot girl violate a few more people, angrily ate our chips and guacamole, complained to a guy wearing a balloon hat and giant sunglasses and eventually left when it was “safe” to drive.

The moral? Mexico is great as long as you don’t leave your resort. I was nervous about getting robbed in downtown Cozumel, but had no idea it would happen with my consent. But the more I think about it, things could have been worse. I could have been wearing a penis-shaped balloon around my waist.

© 2008 North Star Writers Group. May not be republished without permission.

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