Mack and the Mordida by Joe Greco

A young man was being denied passage to the United States of America. If I didn’t take decisive action, he would be detained by Mexican authorities, and, frankly, I didn’t know what would happen to him.

This is not, however, a heart-warming story of me heroically enabling a deserving immigrant to enter our country and pursue the American dream. No, the young man was my 19-year-old friend Mack, a heavyset blond who was as gringo as they come. He was stuck in the Puerto Vallarta airport and, being informed that, because he’d stupidly lost his “tourist card,” he would not be allowed to board his flight home to California.

How did this unfortunate situation come to pass? It started in 1976 when I decided to spend the first term of my sophomore year in college pursuing a “language study abroad” program in Mexico. The program was based in San Luis Potosí, the capital city of the state of the same name, located about 250 miles northwest of Mexico City. Classes were Monday through Thursday. The professors in charge of the program encouraged us to get on buses on the three-day weekends and travel as much as we could to use the language skills we were acquiring in the most pragmatic ways possible. So, we visited many different towns and cities, met and conversed with people in their language, and learned how to bargain in marketplaces where the initially stated price for anything was only for suckers.

We loved our freedom to explore, and our professors trusted us to be sensible and discreet. But there were two points they emphasized: First, carefully guard your “tourist card” and always keep it on you; without it, you’re in the country illegally. Second, if you should get into a scrape with the police or other legal authorities, don’t be shy about offering la mordida—literally “the bite”—a bribe that would be likely to get you out of trouble faster and more efficiently than any attempt to obtain American-style “due process.”

What was this all-important “tourist card”? At a time when Americans didn’t need a passport to travel to Mexico, it was a temporary visa that authorized your entry and travel in the country, and it had to be surrendered when you left. But for all its significance, it certainly didn’t look the part. It was made of a sort of waxy tissue paper, and with a fold or two, could easily fit into a man’s wallet. Nevertheless, not wanting to take the chance of being tossed into a Mexican prison, I rigorously protected the flimsy paper during my travels.

Unfortunately, Mack was not similarly impressed. When my program’s term was ending in December, my mother, who’d always wanted to visit Mexico, planned to fly down to meet me and see some sites. We decided to start in Guadalajara and then go on to Puerto Vallarta, two of the places I’d thoroughly enjoyed during my travels. I met her at the Guadalajara airport, and to my surprise, she’d brought Mack, my close friend from high school. It was a joyous reunion. We gathered our luggage and headed to the hotel to settle in. Once in our room, I saw Mack nonchalantly toss a piece of paper onto a dresser. Yes, it was his tourist card.

“Hey,” I said. “Don’t mess around with that thing. You don’t want to lose it. That’s what allows you to be here legally.”

Mack looked at me, exuding that attitude I’d seen many times before: cocky, defiant, flippant about the need to follow rules promulgated by any authority. “What are they going to do if I lose it?” he scoffed. “Not let me out of the country?”

“You don’t want to find out. Trust me. Just put it in your wallet or someplace safe.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he said, holding it up to the light. “Looks more like a piece of toilet paper than a government document.”

***

The three of us had a lovely time exploring the beautiful architecture of Guadalajara and its sprawling San Juan de Dios market. Then we took a bus to Puerto Vallarta, which was not as touristy as it eventually became. We luxuriated in the warm December surf and ate fresh barbecued fish-on-a-stick sold by vendors on the beach.

When it was time to go home, we took a cab to the Puerto Vallarta airport, still a relatively small, laid-back place. We proceeded to the check-in counter, my mother going first, then I. The female agent, speaking decent English, politely asked us first for our tickets and then for our tourist cards. My mother and I complied. It was Mack’s turn. He handed over his ticket.

“Tourist card, please,” the agent said.

Mack, looking disgusted, flipped through his wallet. No tourist card. He stuck his hands into his pants pockets, then into the pocket of the shirt he was wearing. No tourist card.

Mack shrugged. “I don’t have it.”

“You must have it to go,” she said.

“What? Look, I had one, but I must’ve lost it.”

She shook her head. “Then you cannot leave Mexico.”

Mack’s jaw dropped. He looked at me and then at her. “What the hell? You gotta be kidding.”

“Could it be in your suitcase?” I interjected.

“No, I’m sure it’s not in there,” he said, still not fully comprehending the seriousness of the problem.

I touched his arm. It was time for me to step in. While Mack spoke no Spanish, I’d become quite proficient in the language during the time I’d spent in Mexico. “Por favor, señorita,” I began. I then told her what a wonderful time I’d had in her beautiful country and how I understood very well that as guests, we must obey the law. And I swore that I’d personally seen the valid tourist card my friend had possessed when he entered Mexico. But, I lamented, he’d unfortunately misplaced it.

She smiled as I spoke and said she hoped I would come back and visit again. I smiled back, confident that my charm had established the proper foundation for the next question, phrased in the most supplicative and florid Spanish I could muster: “So, could you please be so kind as to make an exception this one time for my friend?”

Her response was quick and unequivocal, and it was a phrase I’d heard more than once in my Mexican travels after making a bold request: “No se puede”—translation: “It can’t be done.” I’d learned that culturally, it was a polite, but very firm way of saying “no way, gringo.” She explained that she had no authority to check in a passenger without an FT-M, the Spanish acronym for the tourist card, because it had to be surrendered to an immigration official before boarding the plane.

What then were we to do, I inquired, disappointed and deflated. She suggested that we go talk with el jefe, the chief or boss of the airport. She pointed in the direction of his office.

My mother stayed with our luggage, which hadn’t been taken away, as Mack and I headed down the hall. As we walked briskly, I didn’t one time say to Mack, “I told you so.” No, I said it at least three or four times before we located el jefe’s office.

***

The door to the office was open, and it seemed, curiously, that el jefe was expecting us. He rose from his desk, a tall, lithe man dressed in a crisp white shirt and blue tie. “May I help you?” he said in perfect English.

“Yes, sir,” I said, happy to speak in English since this was serious business. “My friend accidentally misplaced his tourist card.”

He invited us in and asked us to sit. He asked Mack to explain what happened. Mack, finally appreciating the gravity of the situation, did his best to sound contrite. El jefe listened politely while nodding slowly, but after Mack had finished, explained that getting a substitute tourist card would require a lot of paperwork and that would mean missing our flight.

We both looked down.

“But listen, gentlemen,” he said. “Don’t tell anyone I suggested this. But why not just offer the immigration official twenty bucks?”

There it was: the mordida. Exactly what my professors had counseled us to offer in times of trouble. Why hadn’t that dawned on me? I suppose I hadn’t thought that “the bite” would be suggested by such a debonair fellow.

“I can’t promise you anything,” el jefe continued, “but that might be the easiest way to solve this. Although again, you didn’t hear it from me.”

“Okay,” I said. “And where would we find the immigration official?”

El jefe directed us. We stood, thanked him, and turned to go. “Good luck, gentlemen,” he said.

***

The immigration official was far from debonair. He was short and heavy with unkempt black hair and a scruffy moustache. Even though his language ability was far from fluent, I addressed him in English because Mack was going to have to make the deal. He invited us to sit, and I briefly explained the situation. The official waited for me to finish, and then slowly and deliberately lamented how much trouble and effort it was going to be for him to solve Mack’s very serious problem.

I turned to Mack and nodded, signaling that it was time to offer the bribe. But, to my surprise, he was gripping the arms of his chair with both hands, as if he were about to tumble headfirst into a dark abyss. His knuckles were white, his eyes were wide, his jaw was clenched, and he was noticeably shaking. I couldn’t believe it: He couldn’t do it.

Really? My rebellious, defiant friend, always contemptuous of the rules of polite society, couldn’t bring himself to offer this sleazy guy a twenty-dollar “bite” in exchange for sweet freedom? It was going to be up to me, the guy who always followed the rules and who was intent on keeping his record clean, to get into law school. I was the one who was going to have to bribe a foreign official and effectively smuggle my undocumented friend out of the country?

I shot Mack a contemptuous look, and he knew exactly the name I would’ve called him in a different venue. It went unsaid there and will remain unwritten here. But since it was my ball game, I decided to do it my way. Sure, el jefe had said twenty dollars, but what had I learned in all those Mexican marketplaces? True, trying to purchase Mack’s deliverance from the clutches of a foreign government wasn’t the same as bartering for the best price on a pair of huaraches in the Yucatan. But, I thought, why not give it a shot?

“Sir,” I said. “We truly appreciate the extra work this is causing you. And for your troubles, we would like to offer you fifteen dollars.”

“Oh,” he said slowly, nodding his head. “Yes, that would be good of you, sir. But I also will have to make a call on the telephone to the state immigration department in Guadalajara. And I must pay for that.”

I bit my tongue so as not to smirk. “I see. And how much will the call cost?”

“Five dollars.” Yep, there was to be no bargaining for the mordida. Twenty bucks—equivalent in value to over $100 today—was the established rate, which almost surely meant that plenty of careless gringos, perhaps when drunk on margaritas or cervezas, also had let the flimsy paper flutter away. And, I suspected, the urbane el jefe was getting his own “bite” of the mordida proceeds, probably a very large one.

“That’s fine, sir,” I said politely, suppressing the guffaw that was threatening to blast its way out of my mouth. “So, if we give you twenty dollars, you’ll be able to let my friend get on the plane?”

He smiled broadly and agreed. I looked at Mack, who unfroze himself, extracted a twenty-dollar bill from his wallet, and handed it over. The officer took it, scribbled something on a slip of paper that I couldn’t decipher, and then provided instructions: Give the paper to the woman at the check-in counter. Proceed toward the gate where you’ll get in line to go through immigration processing. He would be there and let Mack through.

After we successfully checked in and made our way toward the immigration counter, I had my mother go first. The now duly compensated official took her tourist card, stamped it, and put it on a pile of documents. Next was Mack. The official pantomimed taking a paper from Mack, stamping it, and putting it on the pile. I took a deep breath as he took my tourist card, stamped it, and placed it on the pile. A deal was a deal. Nothing to see here. We headed to the plane.

***

Mack was uncharacteristically quiet as we boarded the plane and took our seats. But once the plane took off—and apparently, figuring he was safely out of the clutches of the Mexican government—he began grousing about the stupidity of the tourist card law and the corruption of the Mexican officials.

“I don’t want to hear it, Mack,” I said sternly from my aisle seat.

My mother, sitting between us, told us to let bygones be bygones and to be happy that we were all headed home.

Mack shook his head and stared out the window.

“Okay, Mom,” I said. “But there’s one more thing, Mack. You’re going to buy me three beers on this flight home.”

“What?” he said.

“I pulled your ass out of a crack, and you know it. You’d probably be in some dark dungeon now if it wasn’t for me.”

He frowned. “Whatever. But that’s unreasonable.” He looked back out of the window. “Two. I’ll buy you two beers.”

“Well, okay, two,” I said. Maybe I hadn’t succeeded in getting a discount on the mordida, but I needed a couple of beers after all that stress, and so I was happy that the negotiating skills I’d learned in my Mexican travels could still be effective in the right situation.