Precerpt from My 20th Language: L3 Spanish - Mexico: Baja California
Mexico: Baja California
I had the opportunity to learn, practice, and use real
Mexican Spanish (not the typical Salinas Spanglish—though that, too, is Mexican
in origin) on our 30th anniversary trip. My husband Carl and I packed up the
car, visited our kids in San Diego, rented a Mexico‑insured car, and crossed
the border at Tijuana.
There I finally got to do some bartering. I didn’t need
anything, and nothing truly excited me, but I wanted the experience of
bartering. I was not very good at it. I ended up paying nearly full price—well,
the full tourist price anyway. I decided the language practice was worth
the extra pesos.
After Tijuana we drove straight down the coast, and that’s
where a bit of marital discord surfaced. I was looking for local color; Carl
wanted American “nice.” And that’s when it hit me how different we were. I like
living abroad at home. Carl prefers living at home abroad. Slight difference in
syntax; immense difference in meaning.
He ultimately won that round. We stopped at a restaurant in
Rosarito Beach—very welcoming, very accustomed to tourists, and not at all the
local color I had hoped for.
Then we spent a lovely week relaxing in Ensenada. Ensenada
is a major port city, a wine‑region gateway, and a university and research hub.
And it had a marvelous resort: palapa‑style huts, airy rooms, a quiet beach,
and all the amenities that make Americans feel comfortably abroad. I used
Spanish whenever I could; Carl used English always. Everyone spoke English.
Everyone catered to Americans. And I wondered how much Mexican culture we were
actually experiencing. Likely little to none. We were, in fact, living at home
abroad.
On the drive back north, we stopped in Puerto Nuevo, a
coastal town famous for its lobster. But by pure chance we ended up in a
Mexican family restaurant rather than one of the tourist places. I was in my
element. No one there spoke English. Poor Carl. The waiter addressed him
first—he was, after all, “the man”—and I kept answering for us.
“Paella, por favor, para los dos. Y dos cervezas… Dos Equis.”
When the bill came, I took it from Carl. It was to be paid
directly to the waiter. I told the waiter how much I was adding for the tip.
The waiter took the money from me and then thanked Carl—in Spanish. I enjoyed
that moment far more than I should have.
Continuing north, we missed the turnoff for Tijuana and
ended up in Tecate. Now that was local color. Impoverished. Sheets for
doors. Adobe houses—solid, but when the doorway had no sheet, you could see
inside: dark rooms, sparse furnishings. Poorly kept streets. I wanted to find
someone to talk to, just to ask directions, just to use Spanish with the
locals. Carl wanted to get out of there—fast. He won again.
And just like that, we were back in Tijuana, then through passport control, and soon enough on the highway to San Diego, to Salinas, and to Spanglish.
For more precerpts from My 20th Language, click HERE.
For more posts about language learning, click HERE.
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