I'm on a Mexican radio Pt. I

My vacation is officially over on Monday so we are back to daily columns on skepticklish since you demanded it.

This past week I made it down to the city of Mexicali, just south of the border. It is the capital of Baja California, Mexico. The city is about a three hours drive through the desert for me. I pulled into a hotel on the US side in Calexico, California and walked across the border. It is not worth the hassle of driving into Mexico what with getting insurance, long waits and such.

I needed to catch a city bus in Mexico to get to the baseball stadium since it is quite a ways from the crossing point. I remembered from a similar trip last year that I needed to catch a yellow and white bus. I wasn't sure of the number, just the color. So after a few minutes when a yellow and white bus showed up I signaled for it and then stepped on and asked the driver if he goes by the stadium. He answered yes, and a passenger who was sitting in the first seat started talking a bunch about the stadium and how he worked there and I could follow him. I only understood about half of his Spanish.

So after a short bus ride we got off together near the stadium. I was a bit suspicious of this guy at first. He seemed a bit too friendly and was talking about how he had worked for the team for 28 years and knew everybody. He had even been honorary manager of the team for a day. With my lousy Spanish we were able to communicate semi-effectively. His name was Chano and if I was a friend of his then I would be in good with everybody at the ballpark. So I slightly reluctantly agreed to go along with him. He took me around the back security gate and told me to tell the guards I was going to shag balls during batting practice. The guards didn't even really give me a second look. I was beginning to believe that as long as I was with Chano I was fine.

Chano kept saying, "Come on!" and yanking on my jacket to get me to follow him around. I went where he went, and the next place he headed was the Mexicali clubhouse. We walked through there pretty quickly and out into the dugout. The thing I noticed straight away was how shabby the clubhouse looked. I suppose I only have the clubhouses at the Kingdome and Safeco Field to compare it with, both of which I have visited in years past. This place looked a bit worse than our school dressing room. I used the bathroom in their later on and found the drain was backed up.

Chano was introducing me to folks as we walked. The only one I remember though was Fernando Valenzuela. I said, "Hola" and shook his hand and Chano dragged me on to somebody else. Fernando was a guy who was playing baseball in the Major Leagues when I was still in Elementary school. I figured he must be the manager of the Mexicali Aguilas or something. I was quite shocked to learn he would be pitching in the game the following night!

We stood behind the batting cage during batting practice and he told me about how he was buddies with all the press who were there, radio and TV. He asked how I would fancy watching the game from the press box.

. . . stay tuned for Part II tomorrow