Quick Trip to Mexico

You may remember that I mentioned that I was going to Mexico City for a reception for the chairman of the Air France Groupe, who was making his first visit to this region. Let me tell you about it.

For the first time in years, it is possible to fly from Belize to Mexico City at reasonable cost. Aerocaribe (a subsidiary of Mexicana) flies between Belize and Cancun daily in a 20-seat prop-jet. It was a pleasant flight of just over an hour.

 

We were ushered into the Immigration area at Cancun to find ourselves at the back of some 200 people in three lines. Desks for another ten Immigration officers stretched emptily off to the right. New groups of passengers piled into the room behind us faster than Immigration could process people in the lines.

It was agonizing. Suddenly a large group of very large, loud young men pushed their way between our line and the next one, trying to shove into the head of that line. Naturally, the young people who had been in line for almost an hour objected at the top of their lungs. I was terrified that there would be a fight. Fortunately, security officers came fairly quickly and politely ushered the intruders to the back of the line. Unfortunately, more officers marched off with a perfectly nice young black man who had been in line longer than we had and who did nothing more than protest the pushers-and-shovers. Everyone in our line was most upset about his being “arrested.”

When I finally got through, it was past one o’clock. I retired to the restaurant for a revivifying beer and enchiladas. Later in the boarding area, I wrote the story of the Immigration mess in my little trip notebook. I got mad all over again.

I marched myself back out through the security gate, and after three attempts, finally located the Terminal Administrator. I told him my tale. He could not have been more pleasant. I warned him that I intended to report the situation to the International Airline Passengers’ Association and to the major travel magazines, but felt that I owed it to him to tell him first.

The poor dear admitted that he had only been in the job for three weeks. A new company just had taken over management of the terminal. I assured him that I knew Immigration was a law unto itself and not under his control. I took back my threats and offered to put my complaint into a fax and send it to him so that he would have something in writing to help force Immigration to use more officers. I made a point of saying that Mexico has spent millions developing Cancun, yet the reception tourists receive says “Get out; we don’t want you; you are too much of a bother.”

You can imagine the comments I overheard in the line: people saying that they never would come back. One man said that he was going right to a ticket counter and taking the first plane out. It really was a disgraceful reception for a country that lives on tourism.

The Terminal Administrator was pathetically grateful to me for going to him. He said most people would grumble but not do anything about it. Of course, I felt vastly relieved and disgustingly smug with myself.

It was well after dark before I reached Mexico City. To my surprise, I found that 8:00 pm was the middle of the rush hour—on a Friday night, in the rain. It was another hour before I got to my hotel.

 

The next day was worth it. I spent the morning at Air France, talking over all sorts of things with the people responsible. It was fun seeing old friends and I accomplished a great deal.

As for the reception, it was a beautiful party but something of a bust. I arrived at 6:30 as invited. No one there but the two agents from Costa Rica. They said someone had told them that planes were late, guests had not arrived on time, and the party was delayed an hour. We went off to a nearby bar to kill time.

When we got back, the party was in full swing but the guests of honor had not yet arrived. When they did, there were some short speeches, then the Regional Director brought M. Spinetta and his group of about six French aides around to meet people. The Central American agents happened to be more or less together near the front, so they came to our group first. Everyone said a few polite words, then the honorees moved on. And that was the end of that.

We enjoyed better-than-average wine and elegant goodies. Friends from Guatemala and Honduras collected me and we all went back to the hotel to finish the night in the piano bar.

The next day was a full day of travel returning to Belize.

 

And the worst of it was that we learned at the party that Air France had cancelled its plans to have their agents’ meeting in Atlanta this year and that, instead, it would be in Mexico City in two weeks. Everyone was furious. All the agents’ wives were looking forward to a trip to Atlanta. And I had built my visit to Becky around the meeting.

By the next morning, I had made up my mind that there was no way I would go through two days of exhausting travel for one day of listening to speeches in Spanish. I accomplished more in my morning at the Air France offices than I would at the meeting anyway. When I received official details of the meeting, I sent back my regrets, “for personal reasons.”