A rude welcoming to Belize

Altun Ha Ruins in Belize

Check out this cactus Mom!!!!

Tuesday, March 20 2012

This morning we got thru the Belizean boarder with no problems.  There were a lot of hoops to jump thru but all of the boarder agents on both sides were friendly and accommodating.  Heading south thru Belize we stopped to top ‘er off.  I got a slap in the face when I saw the price at the pump was 11.55 Belize dollars ($6 US) per gallon, Dang!  But had a choice we did not. 

After the fuel injection I pulled the truck under the shade of a tree on the side of the gas station lot to get our liquor out of hiding and put it back in the box in the cab where it usually rides.  To avoid customs detection I had put the bottles in a bag that otherwise holds a rolled up tent and put it way up near the front of the bed with all of our gear packed in behind it.  As I was moving gear this guy rode up on his bike and started to make conversation.  Lots of people do this with us.  It’s because they want us to give them money.  This guy’s shtick was that he could get black market gas, smuggled in from Mexico for $3.00 a gallon.  In fact he’s got some in jugs at his house right now.  I don’t think that I’m ok with getting renegade gas unless I’m in a pinch.  Plus the guy had a prison quality pistol tattoo on his chest. 

So on the road we went.  We thought about taking a boat ride down a river to visit some Mayan ruins but the price of 90 Belize each was a little steep.  So we drove down an incredibly bad road to the ruins of Atun Ha instead and paid 10 Belize each.  From what I’ve seen so far the roads in Belize are much worse than in Mexico.  There are potholes all over the place, lots of speed bumps and for whole stretches of pavement the width is so narrow that two cars passing each other at 60 mph have the inside 2 tires on the pavement and the outside to on the dirt. 

We got to Belize City, the largest city in the country and the former capital, in the early afternoon and thought that we would park the truck and walk around to check the place out.  But the city is kind of dumpy and full of hustlers.  Almost everyone here is black.  This was a surprise to us after driving thru Mexico and seeing hardly any black people but as soon as we drove over the boarder the predominant race changed from Latino to Black.  Walking around Belize City so many rough looking dudes came up to me offering all kinds of sleazy services.  There was a lot going down in town but we did not want to poke around.  So instead we took care of some business and found a refrigerator repair place to look at our busted one, we talked to the water taxi terminal about getting a ride out to Caye Caulker tomorrow and got the board of tourism to let us park for free in their lot while we are out on the island. 

We went into a casino to try to catch a movie.  They have the only big screen in town.  But the theater was closed and we had no other business in the casino.  So now we’re parked down on the waterfront sleeping in the truck for the night.  There was an insane lunatic behind our truck standing on the rocks at the water’s edge yelling to an invisible being (we think Poseidon) for a while.  But now He’s Gone.

Later on that night around 1 am Marcie and I were sleeping in the back of the truck when we both woke up to someone trying to open up the back of our truck, apparently not knowing that we were sleeping in there.  Luckily I had decided to sleep with my pants on that night so I was able to quickly kick open the back gate and confront the intruder.  It was this black guy not surprisingly trying to steal stuff (he was wearing a Lebron James Miami Heat shirt).  I yelled at him to “Get the fuck out of here”.  He pulled out a knife.  It was nighttime but I could see the flash of the blade in his hand reflected in the streetlight overhead.  He started yelling, “All I want is some money to get something to eat.  Isn’t that reasonable?” I told him to get away from the car and I would give him some money.   I opened up the back and asked Marcie for the truck keys, opened the truck, scooped a handful of change out of the cup holder, handed it to the guy and jumped into the truck and pulled away with Marcie still in the back. 

I guess we got out of that situation fairly cheap, losing only a couple of dollars.  But I kind of regretted not getting out my machete from under the front seat and hacking the thief to pieces.  Then again I really don’t want to have to kill somebody, especially in such a gory way, so I guess paying $2 not to have blood on my hands is a good deal.

We drove down the road and parked in a spot where I thought we would be safer and the rest of the night went by peaceably.  That was the first time that anything like that had happened to us on this trip, except for the police bribe in Acapulco.  We spent 45 days in Mexico and never once did anything happen where we were even close to being threatened or robbed.  Almost all of the Hispanic Mexicans that we met were nice and non-intimidating but as soon as we got into Belize today that changed.  The black people here seem to be really aggressive and violent.  They are really poor but no one seems inclined to do much work of the legitimate kind.  In Mexico it seemed like if a Mexican was poor and he had a knife he would find a piece of wood and carve it into something to sell to you.  But here in Belize, if a Black guy is poor and he had a knife he would try to rob you with it.  That's not cool.