Hopping over the cultural border

I think I pulled off a killer “¿Donde esta el agua?” when I was speaking to the woman making our breakfast.

That, among four other mostly cautionary phrases, is pretty much all the Spanish I speak. And when I was in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, this weekend, I wished I had known more.

I felt that during my interaction with the locals, my lacking lingual skills were sometimes perceived as a lack of interest in the Mexican community, only perpetuating the judgments of the frivolous or ignorant American tourist.

And as part of a generation that exalts a multicultural atmosphere and as part of a student body that cherishes diversity, my inability to relate to and communicate with the people of Mexico, even in the most rudimentary way, depressed me.

In fact, when I told our concierge that I was a college student from the U.S., she looked relieved that I was there with family and wasn’t likely to paint the villa red. But after speaking to her longer, she laughed and spoke of American students in a more practical way: “They do a lot, but they also spend a lot.”

Halfway through the trip, I slowly realized that we carry an external reputation when we travel abroad. The stereotype of the U.S. college student has become somewhat notorious in the world, and if anybody is entitled to it, it is definitely people working in the hospitality industry in Mexico.

Almost everyone by now has had the experience of hopping the border for a night of hedonism in Tijuana or a weekend in Rosarito. Until recently, we drove in with no passport and definitely no visa, but now that the government has started requiring passports, we are not just surprised, but indignant.

We still carry more than a smidgen of that infamous U.S. arrogance we are all prone to.

Add that quality onto being from the U.S., being a college student, being from Los Angeles, and then being in Mexico, and you’ll solicit even more runaway judgment from the locals.

For example, this weekend two families (including mine) were packed into a Stratus and a Focus heading down highway 200 without a sufficient map. Maneuvering Puerto Vallarta’s streets with the residents’ own insane brand of driving and road signs soon had us stuck on a steep, narrow road with a huge, red F-250 truck coming toward us.

The road workers stopped their jobs to help us figure our way to some parking and we patched our English and Spanish enough to follow directions away from that slip of a road, but locals were still shaking their heads.

Driving in the wrong direction on a one-way street while not understanding a word of caution or annoyance being flung at you is disconcerting because it also comes with the looks ““ those silent gazes exposing the perplexed wonder at American idiocy.

The residents actually looked toward us younger ones, hoping that at least we would understand a word or two of Spanish.

Here, I got the feeling that, to these people, the young Americans were supposed to be a part of the solution. They hope that our generation is the one that will eventually get with the program and figure out the issues between the countries and the cultures.

Though I was hopelessly disoriented that day with cobblestone streets winding up and down my mind, I was excited to have found a positive outlook on the American college student.

In two days, I recognized my importance, not only as the traditional cash cow in quintessential American tourism, but also as an integral part of the future of the global community.

I went from having a plastic, silver screen life to realizing my part of the hopeful expectations of the citizens of countries like Mexico.

So before I go to Mexico again, I hope to improve my Spanish language skills to do my part to destroy the preconceived notions of the Southern California college student looking for a good time.

E-mail Joshi at rjoshi@media.ucla.edu. Send general comments to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.

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