Mexico City Scirocco Sighting

[scirocco16vr32 at gmail.com (Chris Bennett)]

Hey all,
     Spent a week in Mexico City living la vida loca, er I mean man on
fire...

Depressing place.  There were signs everywhere about kidnappings and missing
persons.  One sign said in spanish, " I am desperate, my son now three has
been missing more than a year.  I could not pay the kidnapper's demands but
I did sell my house and everything in it to raise 350,000 pesos... (about
$35,000 us dollars I think) I am offering this money to anyone that can lead
me to my son so I may bury him decently."  That was on a large billboard in
the same square as the 14k gold angel statue.

I did not have internet when I was down there, but I managed to get a
message in a bottle via text message to Daun.  I saw alot of "VW
Pointers" there, and like a million and one beetles, that were produced
there until a couple years ago.  The newer ones are pretty sweet.  I saw a
1990 Beetle with plastic paint matching bumpers.  Most of the cabs are
beetles.  Not too many oval windowed ones though... in fact I don't think I
saw one come to think of it.  The Pointers on the other hand seemed to
be more of a direct decendent of the original golf/rabbit, I see alot more
golf in them than I do a Mk4 or 5 Golf/GTI.  Also they had ALOT of
the "bunny truck" Pointer models.

Saw a few Jetta's, this is a new name for them my amigo told
me... traditionally they have had BORA's and "DERBY's", which both for all
intents and purposes appeared to be standard Jetta's.

 The entire week I was there I saw one Scirocco.  It appeared to be a Mk2
with an 8v.  It had a chrome grill emblem and no 16v body parts--also had
the small bottle cap rims.  I stopped for a second and looked at it, there
was someone in it, I waved at him and kept going.  Apparently the owner was
rather offended that I was checking out his car, but waited until we were a
block away to yell something or another in spanish.  He apparently wanted to
kick my ass but when we turned and started to go back to "discuss" the
situation, he turned and ran.  I am not intimidating by any means and
neither is my friend... but I guess he figured descretion was the
better part of not getting one's ass handed to him or something along those
lines.

I was telling my friend to simply tell him that I have a car like that
(or three) and I meant no harm and he was like shut up and quit being such a
damn gringo.

Oh well.  I ended up with a horrible stomach bug, and had to go to the ER
when I got back to the states.  They are pumping me full of antibiotics, and
I ended up losing a crown so my return trip to Mexico City has been
postponed a few days.

And oh yea the other thing to worry about there is the organ thieves.
Pretty girl buys you a drink, you wake up minus a kidney...  I  thought
those were only urban legends but apparently it's a large problem in
mexico.  Which is disturbing that if you can't drink the water... but some
amatuer quack is going to operate on you and then leave you freshly incised
in a tub full of ice water-- the same water you can't drink... (shuddder)
Imagine that infection that follows.  It would be better not to wake up I
would almost say.

Also I read "Pattern Recognition" by William Gibson in one day there... good
book I like the line about the soul being drawn out behind the
traveler. (Jet Lag) and the whole "mirror world" concept.  Not that I was
bored or anything.

Take care all.
Chris