After a stressful morning Saturday, I was ready for some hardcore pick-me up shopping. It sounds terribly girly I know, but the fact of the matter is this: I love shopping in every aspect of the cliché. What’s better, I was finishing up souvenir shopping for you all, my dearly beloveds, at home in the US. I was able to channel my homesickness into something more productive. Plus, we were shopping in the local market where bargaining’s the name of the game. Now anyone who knows me knows that I can’t haggle at all. Fortunately, in many instances, simply walking away after the first offer significantly lowers the price! My mouth doesn’t even get the chance to sabotage me since most of my bargaining is down through physical signals: the uncertain glance, biting of the lip, checking the quality of the item skeptically, and the deal sealer, the slow walk away. Other times, the group would do the hard haggling, and then I would pop in with my request immediately after, using the same price and after I had clearly witnessed the same transaction, the sellers cannot deny me. We’re going back next weekend as well. Sounds frivolous I know, but this week is holy week so the bargaining was actually a little more difficult since all the stands were trying to rip off the less-informed tourists. They’ll be more lenient in a week’s time or so. I did manage to purchase 3 bracelets for about $3 each with my dearest Rachel. They’re made of the bottle caps of various beers and sodas; I think they’re pretty neat.

But a Saturday night in Mexico wouldn’t be complete without the three D’s: dancing, drinking, and debauchery! We headed out to Makia, a lounge bar on the second story of a building right in centro. At first we crowded onto our little balcony where we watched a short fireworks show and afterwards we retreated inside to enjoy a two for one vodka bottle deal. This action of course led to dancing. It didn’t take long for a large crowd of Mexican men to notice a bunch of gringas dancing. But at this point in the trip, we are skilled in the art of avoiding awkward grinding. I was amazed at how well we avoided their advances or quickly escaped to the willing arms of a fellow American. For the most part, the Mexicans just decided that it was better to watch us dance from afar, occasionally interjecting clapping and “abajos” (which means down, as in, drop it). Any girl who found themselves dancing alone was targeted for “abajo” peer pressure. I at one point found myself in such a situation and the clapping began. Now, at this point, I have been whistled at, barked at, and overall pursued by San Cristobal’s men, and I am feeling less than forgiving. So I started to dance, started to go low as the cheering increased, and then promptly stopped, stood straight up, and shook my finger at them saying, “No no no.” I then rejoined the cluster of my friends and resumed my dancing as they stood silently, staring, at least one mouth opened in a shocked frown. Don’t dwell on their disappointment too long, in a bar full of women, they found a more willing participant within minutes; I was nothing but a passing thought.

As I have mentioned, this is the Holy Week of celebration in San Cristobal, and today (Sunday) there was a big parade. It was a standard parade with floats, marching bands, free candy, and even free shampoo (it’s called Minidrop-X and I’ll get back to you with its evaluation after my shower). But the highlight of the parade and of my weekend was disgruntled stilt clown. One group of dancing girls was passing and a bunch of adjacent, beer drinking men, start to clap and call out to the women. The women accept their challenge and pull the men into the parade, surrounding them and dancing in a cluster in the middle of the street. Enter disgruntled stilt clown, a white-faced clown walking on stilts in a depressing black suit with accents of green and purple. He stops behind the cluster of dirty dancing and just frowns at the sight. After a while of standing and waiting for the group to disband naturally, the frustrated clown took matters into his own hands. Without warning, he pounces forward, grabs one of the men by the head, and starts to hump the back of his neck. Everyone panicked, the girls returned to their positions in the parade, and the molested man literally ran back to his seat. In the immortal, wise words of Patches O’Houlihan, disgruntled stilt clown quite literally, “humped him into submission.” I have never been so entertained much by a parade.