Germans down on the border (bonus funny story)

"EL_ULY" (uly) 08/17/2015 at 12:15 • Filed to: None

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When down to Nuevo Progresso, Tamaulipas, Mexico this weekend just on the other side of the Texas border to visit family for a christening.

To start, I busted my ass all day Friday at work since 6:30am and was pretty beat. I got home Friday around 7:30pm (heavy traffic) and started to do some house work. The plan was to sleep around 9 ish so me and my wife could take off at 5am.....nope. We went to bed around 1:30am and I took off at around 5:10am lol.

6 hours later, we arrive in the Audi to meet up my mom and little sister who took off the day before in the Benzo at my uncle’s house.

My uncle’s little green house, which is the same house my mom lived in when she was a little kid is only 11 feet wide by 25 feet long. Wood frame with a sheet metal roof. Back when my mom was a kid, they didn’t have electricity. They do have a restroom of sorts. It’s like a little annex section in the back with a toilet. For showers, it’s all with buckets of heated water from the stove and a single low pressure water hose. Despite the frogs and spiders inside this dark cube, a shower was super refreshing with the heat index in the 110’s.

We did get my uncle a window A/C unit for the only bed room. We all basically hung out there before we had to go to the church.

Next door used to live the sweetest old lady ever. She had a little convenient store in front of her house I used to buy random snacks as little kids. The house is now abandoned.

The pink room is the shower room and the green room in the back is the toilet which is shared with the other neighbors.

After the christening, we went to a house across the street that belongs to a dentist in town. He doesn’t stay there much (has a hit out on him from the cartels) but he lent his back yard to us so we could use it for a little party.... which ended up lasting until around 3am. Lots and lots of yummy food and dancing all night. My wife was DJing and was on fire with the cumbias, sabaneras, salsa, and all that radness.

At around 2am after being up for 22 hours, me and my wife decided not to spend the night and we took of back to Houston. An insane move but we had so many things to do back home. We said bye to everyone and took off.

Hours upon hours of long dark highway driving. My wife fell asleep and I was slowly going insane. At around 5:30am, I stopped at a suuuuper busy Whataburger in Refugio, TX and purchased a 44oz Coke. I chugged it all quick and I was super awake..... for about an hour lol. It was tough doing 80 mile stints between small Texas towns in the middle of the night after being up for over 24 hours and partying. As the sun came up, I was approaching the far outskirts of Houston. I got home at around 8:30am. We didn’t even get anything down from the wagon. We headed to the bedroom and knocked the fuck out HARD until around. We woke up a little after 6pm lol :]

How was your weekend OPPO? It’s crazy how poor the little town is right? Most houses are basically little sheds next to dirt roads. Almost all don’t have running water. We here can never ever complain of being poor. Despite this though, my family down there is always very happy and the bond between them is suuuper strong. The family unit is truly something incredible with everyone there. Always a blast when I visit :]

TL;DR Drove down to Mexico, partied with family, and drove back within 24 hours or so.

Funny story bonus

After we woke up, me and my wife were extra triple hungry. I took her to Golden Corral. For my non American buddies, this is a buffet style restaurant serving American type food. My wife had obviously never been to one or any buffet for that matter. We chowed down big time. Next to us sat 2 little old ladies. We went for seconds and my wife got fried chicken that was just made. She was eating it with a knife and fork because it was hella hot. She was trying to pull a little burnt piece on the end of a wing with her fork when all of a sudden it let go and she accidentally flung the hot little piece in the air. We just saw it fly right into the desert plate of one of the little old ladies just as she was scooping up a spoon full of vanilla pudding. The piece of burnt chicken skin landed perfect on her spoonful and before I could say anything, she took a bite. We were frozen and she was chowing down clueless. All of a sudden, she just kept going and went for another spoonful lolololol :]

Jcarr > EL_ULY 08/17/2015 at 12:21

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I vacuumed the house and restrung one of my guitars. I’m pretty tired today.

jkm7680 > EL_ULY 08/17/2015 at 12:22

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Hahahahaha, great story at the end.

Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. > EL_ULY 08/17/2015 at 12:25

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My weekend was a lot less eventful and probably much the same as many other opponauts weekends; trying to coax a crappy car to run haha.

It’s awesome when families bond together and find happiness even in some situations many people would hate.

Xyl0c41n3 > EL_ULY 08/17/2015 at 12:27

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Those colonias are crazy places, but you’re right, people always seem joyful and content and are always willing to share what they have. It’s a lesson more than a few Americans could stand to learn from: be content where you are, and to everyone and everything, be kind.

T5Killer > EL_ULY 08/17/2015 at 12:29

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I cleaned the backyard and bathrooms after a outbreak of spiders. Returned a engine hoist to a friend and just watched the rain.

BReLp7dzHM3ytYsE > EL_ULY 08/17/2015 at 12:29

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Cool man! So did you grow up in Mexico or did your parents move here when you were a kid?

desertdog5051 > EL_ULY 08/17/2015 at 12:31

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Great story. Great pics of your past home.

I feel it deserves some sort of gift. I think this will do just fine.

VincentMalamute-Kim > EL_ULY 08/17/2015 at 12:31

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Like you say, it’s crazy how poor the little town is. That was really interesting because I live a pretty darn well insulated upper middle class lifestyle and don’t get out of my comfort zone/little shell of a life to see any of the things you described. I did visit a college friend in Mexico City but she’s a professora so she lives a nice middle class lifestyle too. I only short glimpses of the really poor in Mexico City and in the countryside, I didn’t get to live the experience like you. And we’ve got the poor in the USA and in Milwaukee but I really don’t see and live those areas either. yeah, I’m coddled, privileged, etc.

R Saldana [|Oo|======|oO|] - BTC/ETH/LTC Prophet > EL_ULY 08/17/2015 at 12:40

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Golden corral, all the entertainment you could ever need after a drunken time period

EL_ULY > VincentMalamute-Kim 08/17/2015 at 14:40

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it’s all good buddy. Where you come from doesn’t matter as long as you are a rad person in my book :]

EL_ULY > desertdog5051 08/17/2015 at 14:40

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lol oh yeah. The wagon needs it as well :]

EL_ULY > Xyl0c41n3 08/17/2015 at 14:40

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awiwi !!!! :]

EL_ULY > Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. 08/17/2015 at 14:42

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it is buddy :] My uppcoming weekend will be more jalop. Gotta do a coolant temp sensor on the wagon

EL_ULY > T5Killer 08/17/2015 at 14:42

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i’m not afraid of spiders, I just don’t like them lol. How long did you have the hoist?

Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. > EL_ULY 08/17/2015 at 14:48

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Snap, coolant temp sensor is my next job on my friends car haha. It’s causing the car to flood by sending the wrong measurements to the ECU (we think).

EL_ULY > BReLp7dzHM3ytYsE 08/17/2015 at 14:50

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my parents are from different places in Mexico but came to the US together in ‘79. My Dad did live in Chicago for a bit from middle school til he graduated college.

I was born in Houston in 86 but was back and forth between this little town and Mexico DF. Here are some vids of Mexico DF

EL_ULY > R Saldana [|Oo|======|oO|] - BTC/ETH/LTC Prophet 08/17/2015 at 14:50

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IHOP and Denny’s as well lol

EL_ULY > Jcarr 08/17/2015 at 14:51

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nice nice. I need to get new strings for my bass guitars

EL_ULY > jkm7680 08/17/2015 at 14:51

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lol we’ll never forget it :]

EL_ULY > Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. 08/17/2015 at 14:52

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that’ll do it sir. It thinks it’s cold and is trying to warm it up

Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. > EL_ULY 08/17/2015 at 14:57

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Yeah. Hopefully it’s the last sensor we need to change, crank position sensor crapped out and cam sensor needed to be cleaned. Sitting still outside for 8 months kills a cars electrics...

EL_ULY > Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. 08/17/2015 at 15:02

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very true. I’d probably replace the oil and coolant while there as well

Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. > EL_ULY 08/17/2015 at 15:03

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Oil has been done pretty recently, but I’ve told him we’ll do the coolant while we’re there. I’m fairly sure it’s the original coolant, which would make it 15 years old...

EL_ULY > Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. 08/17/2015 at 15:04

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oh man! Fresh fuel in it now?

BReLp7dzHM3ytYsE > EL_ULY 08/17/2015 at 15:04

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District Federale I'm guessing? Mexico City?

EL_ULY > BReLp7dzHM3ytYsE 08/17/2015 at 15:09

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yup yup, kind of like Washington DC.

Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. > EL_ULY 08/17/2015 at 15:12

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Yeah drained the tank because it had sat and put some new stuff in. Then he put far too much injector cleaner in so have to keep topping up the tank to dilute it.

T5Killer > EL_ULY 08/17/2015 at 15:33

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Same here I won’t jump or scream but I dislike dealing with them. The hoist was for a year and a half, quite embarrassed it took that long I borrowed it to pull the motor in my DD Subaru to replace a clutch. Total useage time like two days. Luckily the friend was quite patient.

EL_ULY > T5Killer 08/17/2015 at 15:41

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lol I figured, no biggie tho :]

pip bip - choose Corrour > EL_ULY 08/18/2015 at 05:12

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i just couldn’t live in a poor area like that

EL_ULY > pip bip - choose Corrour 08/18/2015 at 09:15

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it’s not too bad. Honestly, there is never a dull moment. I know there are a lot of advantages here in the USA, but there is also a lot of those, “wake up, work, go home, sleep, repeat” moments that just get old quick. As long as you are happy with friends and family, all is good :]