“I’m Getting Out Of Here!”

I’m feeling so good, I’m going to tell you a story.

Before I start, let’s get the update out of the way.  I really am feeling so normal.  The last chemotherapy session was June 7th and all that chemo is out of my system.  I’m sleeping well, eating well, and exercising.  I’ve gained some of my weight back and I’m getting stronger for the July 15th surgery.  Thank you all for the prayers, support and encouragement on this journey.

The theme of this story is Determination.  Diane and I have become so determined to “Beat The Odds” of this cancer that I racked my mind to think of another time in my life I’ve been similarly determined.  My Mexican prison story comes to mind.  I apologize in advance for the length of the story.  I wouldn’t blame anyone if they can’t make it to the end.  

Many of you have heard me tell this story around the campfire or whenever we had an hour to kill with nothing else to talk about.  I’ve been threatening to write the story for 47 years!  This appears to be the time to put the story on paper.

This is what Wayne and I looked like in those days!

The Trip

In 1975 my oldest friend in the world, Wayne and I decided to spend Spring Break in Mazatlan, Mexico.  In those days, many west coast colleges headed to Mazatlan for their spring break, lasting several weeks as schools had different break schedules.  Wayne and I were a little unconventional and we started our break in Nogales where we boarded a party train that took 22 hours to get to Mazatlan.  

We also couldn’t afford a fancy hotel so we checked into a small motel with about 20 rooms near the beach in the neighborhood of the fancy resort hotels.  We soon learned that each college hosted a happy hour at different resort hotels on different days of the week.  So, we started the evenings at whichever hotel was hosting that evening.  

Our first stop was at a Forgotten Named Hotel.  As the sun went down and the evening progressed I met a coed from the University of Southern Cal.  She was half Japanese and half Mexican…very exotic looking.  After many drinks we hit it off pretty good and I soon found myself saying goodbye to Wayne for the evening.  

The Crime

We walked to the Playa Mazatlan Hotel where she was staying.  The hotel was several stories tall and U-shaped with the opening of the U open to the beach and the bottom of the U was the main entrance right along the beach boulevard.  We entered through the main doors and within minutes we were accosted by several young Mexican men who spoke as much English as I did Spanish.  They separated us and forced me back out the front door!  Being a little drunk, I was not having any of that.  So, a few minutes later I went back in to see why they did that and they ran me out again!

They were not going to outsmart me.  I knew her room number so I went around the outside of the hotel and found a slump block wall (bricks with large holes in them) that I could climb up to access the stairway.  Important side note here: I was wearing flip flops and put them in my back pocket to scale the wall and they both fell out during the climb.  The reason that matters is because the rest of this story I am barefoot!

I went up to her room and she wasn’t there.  But, since I was so clever in those days I snuck down to the open corridor garden area hiding behind bushes to get a look into the lobby.  I could see her at the front desk crying and then she just walked out the same front door we had entered.  I thought, “what the heck, I’ll just run right through the lobby and go rescue her.”  Turns out that I was not as clever as I thought.

The angry young men grabbed me again and this time one of them had a pistol that he began jamming into my kidneys.  Lacking handcuffs or zip ties (if those were even a thing back then) one of them grabbed my boxer shorts and yanked them into the most intense wedgie I’d ever experienced.  Turns out clever people can effectively control another by using the wedgie as a steering wheel!  They took me to a storage closet under a staircase with no windows and one door.  

“I’m getting out of here,” I told myself.  After a few minutes I tried to open the unlocked door but a sentry at the door immediately slammed it shut.  My plan was as soon as they opened the door I was going to bolt, hoping they wouldn’t shoot me.  That plan was set aside when the door finally opened and a uniformed police officer was standing there to escort me to his patrol car.  Shit was starting to get real!

The Local Police

He took me to the local police station.  That building was also a U-shape, two stories tall.  He dropped me off in a large room full of people, tourists and locals alike.  Everyone was sitting on benches around the perimeter of the room.  At the head of the room were more officers and, what looked like the guy in charge, was sitting at a giant wooden desk, not unlike Sheriff Andy Taylor in The Andy Griffith Show.  Meanwhile, people from the room were being called to the front according to incident.  When I arrived there were three young college kids were up front, henceforth to be referred to as the Frat Rats.  They were being inspected by other officers and they had their suitcases with them.  The officers were pulling stuff out and setting valuable things aside, hair dryers, electric razors, and such.  One officer pulled out some aviator sunglasses and handed them over to Sheriff Taylor.  The Frat Rats, were very cooperative and one said, “yeah, take those, they look good on you!”  When they were done, the sheriff told a Radar O’Reilly type officer to put their names on a list.  I figured that’s the list I needed to get on because, “I’m getting out of here!”  More on the Frat Rats later.

On the bench I sat next to a young American married couple whose wife was clearly pregnant.  I told them, I have no idea what I did wrong and asked them why they were there.  They explained that they were also staying at the Playa Mazatlan.  They had an argument and she was walking away with him following her.  For some reason they picked both of them up and brought them to the station.

Soon enough I had to go to the bathroom again.  I approached the officer at the door and he pointed down the hall and let me go by myself!  Once there I made mental notes and looked for an escape route.  When I got back to my seat I told that young couple, “They don’t even know my name yet, I’m getting out of here.”  But, when I made my second trip to the bathroom, the guard must have suspected me and this time he followed me to the bathroom.   

Before I was called up front I wandered closer to Radar O’Reilly and made eye contact.  I sort of motioned to his list and I flashed a few Pesos from my pocket to see if I could get him to put my name on the list.  He seemed interested and gave me a look that said, “give me a minute, don’t let the Sheriff see you.”

When it was my turn in front of the sheriff, I had no idea what he said to me.  I tried to explain that I did nothing wrong and he had no idea what I said to him.  The only thing he did understand was when I gave him my name, Marcos Diario (which was my Mexican name in those days, Diario is daily in Spanish).  Radar however, said something to the sheriff and eventually my name went on the list.  I looked at Radar and he seemed to say, “no problem, keep your money.”  I felt pretty good about then.  Later, they started calling names from the list and they left out the front door.

Imagine my surprise when the people on the list were being loaded into a Paddy wagon!  The Paddy wagon was like a large panel van that had bars for windows instead of glass. It turns out that some of the people in that room were not in trouble but followed friends who were taken to the police station.  They were gathered outside of the van’s windows and us criminals were asking them to contact someone to help them.  So, I asked someone to contact Wayne at our hotel to come bail me out.  

This is from an internet search on Mexico prisons.  It is very possible this is my exact petty criminal holding cell!

The Calabozo

We weren’t sure where they were taking us but we all agreed it probably wasn’t for ice cream.  Along the way I told the other criminals, mostly the Americans, “I’m getting out of here, when they open that door I am running!”  That was my plan until the Paddy wagon door opened in front of the state prison and our greeters were all carrying automatic weapons over their shoulders.  I didn’t run.  

The building was encompassed by a 20 foot tall brick wall with razor wire and guard tower turrets on the corners. I followed the others through the massive iron gate and felt a sense of doom as the gate echoed shut behind me.  My “I’m getting out of here plan” began to lose some steam.  

I did have the advantage of being toward the back of the check in line at the “reception desk”.  I noticed the people in front of me taking off jewelry and putting the contents of their pockets in an envelope for pickup upon release.  Most of you know that I’ve been wearing my father’s pink Lindy Star Safire ring since I was 19 years old.  To this day, I rarely take it off.   I was not about to put it  in a Mexican prison envelope so I stuck it under my tongue.  I was also fortunate that I wasn’t carrying a wallet and only had a few hundred pesos and a comb in my pocket. I signed my possessions envelope, Marcos Diario.

As they led us through the dark, dingy prison corridors we passed cells where it was obvious inmates had been there for a while.  Remember, this was in the mid-70s when Mexican drug smuggling was often conducted by young Americans.  It was about that time that I actually thought about television reports like 60 Minutes doing features on Americans stuck in Mexican prisons.  

By now it was around 4:00 am and we reached the end of a corridor where were led through a blue metal door to an outside courtyard with a large covered patio.  Under the patio were no less than 50-60 prisoners sleeping and snoring on the ground. Myself and the other Americans had pretty much bonded by now and we quietly crossed the sparse grass to huddle along the back wall to discuss our predicament.  

With me were the three Frat Rats and a fourth guy named Matthew.  It turns out the Frat Rats were staying in the Playa Mazatlan and were partying in their room with the door open, which explains why the police also had their luggage.  Matthew didn’t know them but he was also staying there and happened to stop by their room and went in to party.  Also with me was Manual, a young Mexican about our age and he was trying to explain the mess we were in but also did not speak much English.  

As soon as we sat down a teenager named Harry Hurst came right over and told us his story.  He and his friend were riding motorcycles through Mexico.  I remembered having seen them earlier in the week.  Harry had been in there for a few days and had already been able to reach the U.S. Consulate to work on his case.  He also had is friend working to get him out.  He was very frightened and was glad to see some Americans arrive.  He had marijuana in his hotel room and was afraid he and his buddy would get their own cell if it was discovered. 

The Prison Lifestyle

When the sun came up, prison life began.  The guys under the patio began to wake up and laugh, tease and argue with each other.  We camped out in the back and watched the action.  There was one outdoor water spigot that they fought over to rinse off.  The “bathroom” was a two hole outhouse, without the house.  After about an hour they suddenly started scrambling all around and getting in line.  Hidden in the rafters of the patio the long timers had their own cup or mug.  Breakfast was served!  Through the blue metal door several trustee inmates brought in a large galvanized tub, the kind you might have used to wash your dog.  In the tub was a soupy concoction with a few veggies and some unidentified meat floating.  Another trustee was carrying several large stacks of flour tortillas.  The inmates were pushing and shoving in line like it was a buffet about to close.  Needless to say, we were not that hungry.

Later in the morning, a guard came to the blue door with a slip of paper and called out a name.  It was for the main Frat Rat.  He was a cocky bastard who’s father was a doctor, also staying at the Playa Mazatlan.  He had been so confident his dad would get him out.  He was right.  As he was leaving, us other Americans again gave him our contacts and asked him to let them know where we were.  He promised he would.  

Harry explained to us that was how people were released.  So, every time the door opened we hoped it was for us.  A few hours later the blue door opened with two more release slips, this time for the other two Frat Rats.  Again we pleaded with these guys to contact our friends.  Throughout the day one or two Mexicans were also released.  Before long lunch was served.  No need to describe lunch because the routine was exactly the same, same fights, same menu.  I think I ate a few tortillas for lunch.  

After lunch they came down the hall with a slip and called out “Harry Hurst”  You’ve never seen a happier young man.  When we arrived, he cried when he told us his story.  He had been doing laundry during the week and grabbed his lunch which was in a paper bag.  When he got to his hotel, he put the bag in the refrigerator.  An American couple who had traveled in their motor home to the tip of South America and back had been keeping a manuscript of the journey.  They were also at the laundry and accused Harry of stealing their manuscript, which was also in a paper bag.  

So now, about 4:00 pm the only people left, who I cared about were myself, Matthew and Manual.  Manual was very nice even though it was hard to communicate.  He seemed to imply the area we were in was for petty criminals, of which he was one.  He knew to keep a few pesos in his pocket to bribe the trustee at the blue door to bring you a coke.  Manual even bought me one.  Matthew and I however made a pact.  Whoever was released first would absolutely help the other get out.  With the help of Manual we then convinced the blue door trustee to let one of us leave the patio area to make 2 phone calls, one for each of us.  Matthew was selected.  I never saw Matthew again.

At that point, I was the last American left.  Except, and most people think this is where the story turns to bullshit, the four Jesus Freaks who had been in there for around a month.  Give me some slack here, it’s the mid-70s I remind you again.  These guys had long hair and long beards wearing robes and sandals.  They mostly kept to themselves but, with no one to talk to, I took some time to learn their story.  They had walked into Mexico with no passport, no visa.  They made it all the way to Mazatlan preaching their own message (not actually Jesus’ message).  The message they wanted to share with Mexico was 1. No material possessions; 2. No meat; and 3. No sex.  They were teased unmercifully by the prison population.  But, they seemed happy.  They told me the villagers threw fruit over the wall on the weekends and they had learned to dry banana peels to smoke.  

As the sun went down I was beginning to plan on spending a second night in the Calabozo.  But then…hope.  Another slip at the blue door.  “I’m getting out of here.”  My heart sunk as they called Manual and Harry Hurst.  I had to think fast.  Harry was already gone.  I got all excited and yelled, “I’m Harry Hurst.”  But then, I was nervous as Manual and I were led back through the dark corridors and into the main body of the prison.  Manual picked up his possession envelope and I told them I didn’t have one.  It worked!  Manual and I were let our the front gate and it closed behind me.

I had so much adrenaline I didn’t know what to do next.  I could see the ocean and the lights of the resort hotels way off in the distance and figured I would just start walking that way….barefoot!  Manual had been greeted by, what I recall, were his brothers.  He saw me looking around and took me under his wing. They took me to a nearby bus stop and bought me a boarding pass.  I struggled to explain to them that I had just escaped using the name of a prisoner who had already left.  I could tell the moment they comprehended because they all started laughing and cheering at the same time.  

They also tried to get me to get off the bus at their stop downtown because their grandma was making dinner.  Of course I was starving but I was actually scared that by now SOMEONE must have contacted Wayne and what if he was at the prison trying to get me out.  Would they discover that I wasn’t there and hold him until they found me?  

So, I stayed on the bus but it didn’t turn toward the tourist hotels and I had no money.  I got off the bus and began to run the last mile to the hotel….barefoot.  At the hotel Wayne and I had a system.  We never carried the key because the lobby had old fashioned cubby holes to leave your key in.  Seeing no key in the cubby meant Wayne was in the room.  I knocked on the door and my heart sunk again as a young guy I’d never met answered the door.  My mind concluded Wayne was in jail and they had re-rented the room.  Then, he said, “Daly?”  I looked closer and recognized him as one of our high school friends. I looked in the room and saw Wayne, sitting on the bed holding a beer on his sunburned chest.  

No one had contacted Wayne all day and he did not believe my story until I showed him the bruises in my kidneys from the lame security guards, my stretched out boxer shorts and the bottom of my thrashed feet.  And, more importantly, my prison release slip with Harry’s name.

I did find some of my cell mates later in the week.  The Frat Rats only took care of themselves.  Harry concluded that since he had two avenues working on his case two release slips were generated.  Matthew claimed that when he went to make the phone call his friends were there with his release.  His excuse was they had to go back and get some more money to get me out.  Harry told me they discovered the manuscript in his fridge and the people dropped the charges  

And, the girl?  I knew her room number and called her.  She was so mad at me!  She said they accused her of being a prostitute and wanted to kick her out of the hotel.  She said, ‘never call me again!’

“I’m Getting Out Of Here”

It’s a long story to illustrate determination. In reality, writing down this story was more for me than you.  Maybe I should come up with a story about procrastination.

Oh, maybe later…