I forgot to mention that in the last post we stayed at Teakwood Inn.
On Monday morning I woke up and had breakfast, sat around a acted lazy, packed up, and then we began driving. We drove about 45 minutes into El Paso, Texas and found a hotel. It was advertised in a brocure (sp?) as a Holiday Inn Express, but it was becoming that in 1 week and was still a Travel Lodge. We checked in and grabbed a few things and then walked to a bank a few blocks away. Here we converted some money into Pasos and converted some money into american ones.
We walked back to the hotel and waited like a half and hour in the annoying wind for the hotel shuttle to arrive to carry us to the border. Finally it did come and we were driven and dropped off at the border. We walked through the checkpoint or whatever you call it and only had to pay 35 cents. We didn't even go through checks or anything. As soon as we got over the border I saw lots of kinda run down buildings and tons of people. After just a few minutes I knew I was going to love it here. A man bugged us on the way in asking if we wanted a cab ride because there were gangs further down. My dad knew better and didn't believe him. We stopped at a few shops and walked down a few streets. I can't remember the exact order of everything but we eventually ended up at the plaza or something like that. We shopped around and then ate our pasteries we had bought at a bakery earlier. Very yummy. After eating I went with Clint and Janessa to the upper level. Nearly every shop we passed we were dragged in by the owners. I tried on several bracelets because I was forced to and was shown many beautiful items. I was bugged at each place because I was the oldest and for the most part I resisted. When we were about halfway around the upper loop of shops I was dragged into yet another store. The salesperson was desperate. He had blankets which I really didn't want. The blanket began at $25 and I kept trying to leave. He eventually got all the way down to $5. How can you resist that? (Plus I wanted to leave.) So I just bought the blanket.
We continued on and I was shown many more things. I was bugged by every shop owner as I went along. I was asked to buy a very immodist dress and some very cute baby cowboy boots. :) Near the end I was sucked into this shop and I bought a very pretty small pot for $1.
After that I made it back downstairs. We hung out for a bit more and looked at some of the downstairs shops. A totally ignorant salesperson wanted my mom to buy a bracelet for Crystal. This is of course hard because Crystal wanted it, and vocally said so, but Mom didn't want to buy it. Eventually we had to just walk off.
After a bit more we walked to the back of the store to find the bathrooms. (My whole family.) This of course took along time because we got bothered by quite a few shops. Mom bought Crystal a bracelet and then Crystal didn't want it; she wanted a necelace. It's a never ending battle with five-year-olds.
Out back of the plaza were bathrooms. They were 25 cents per person but Dad got us all in for $1. They were quite nice bathrooms concidering they were in Mexico.
When we came out there was a candy store right there so we went in and bought some candy. This was more like an American store because everything was labelled which was very nice to not be harrassed. I had no idea what anything tasted like and I could understand very little so I bought three very small candies.
When we exited the store there was a young girl and her mother there trying to sell sparkly purses for $2 each. Mom asked her if she made them herself and she said she did. But I am sure she just didn't know what she was saying because they obviously weren't homemade. (Janessa found a plastic tag holder thing around her purse.) Anyway, Crystal, Janessa, and I all got one.
When we were still purchasing from the little girl another man walked up who said he would write something on rice for two dollars or something like that. We had to turn him down.
After that I think we walked back to the main street where we came in on: B. Juarez and went back to a shop that we had been to earlier. Here I bought a purse and a change purse.
After that we began heading out of Mexico and we gave to beggars all along the way.
After we arrived at the border we had to scramble up thirty cents, we paid, and then walked across the long bridge. Back on the US side of the Rio Grande we waited in line and then went through a checkpoint where they asked us what we had and my parents showed their ID. We then went to another building where Dad payed nearly a dollar for his Tequila that the state of Texas had absolutely nothing to do with.
After that we walked to some pay phones and called our shuttle. We waited an agonizing 20 minutes or so before the shuttle came. (Ten minutes, my butt!) When we got in the airconditioned van, it was like heaven.
We rode back to the hotel and once there I showered. After that I basically did random stuff.
In the night when it was time to sleep, our family could just not sleep. We were so loud I have absolutely no idea we didn't have the front desk knocking on our door several times. My siblings put on mini shows, we entertained ourselves with the light coming in from the window creating a projecter on the wall for a shadow show, and did other random stuff. Yeah, it was loud.
No comments:
Post a Comment