Mexico: I fear you not (but I will be careful)

In the not too distant future, I will be at the boarder of Mexico with my passport and will get another stamp in my little blue book. I haven't been there since July of 2000 when I was in Cancun on a shared Honeymoon with Shannon.

I recommend Cancun as a divine vacation spot. My time there was one of the most relaxing weeks of my life and was also a lot of fun. I wish I could afford to load up my parents, family and friends and throw a week-long relaxation party in one of the all-inclusive hotels there. Ha! Anyway, soon I shall return to the U.S.'s neighbor to the south but on the other side of the country and I will be at a beach house with several other couples and I am really looking forward to it.

This has been planned for perhaps as long as a year.

In that year, Mexico has scared the world.

Mexico to world: "BOO!"

World to Mexico: "AGGGGGGGG!"

There are scares on two fronts at least. The first is that people think Americans are being killed left and right in Mexico when they hear about the hundreds that are dying in a drug war. The truth is, there have been only a few Americans killed but recently four San Diego residents. There are signs that link these four to drugs and they apparently frequented Tijuana to party, as they did the night they were found dead, but nothing has been settled. The State Department issued a warning around spring break to college students because they tend to drink, use drugs and hang out in dangerous places and the warning wasn't to avoid Mexico but to avoid sketchy situations. I can say for sure that my kids wouldn't have been going.

Headlines look really scary but the truth is if you aren't in Mexico looking for or using drugs and you aren't visiting prostitutes, your danger is relatively tiny, comparable say . . . to visiting Detroit!

Still when you read a story like this it certainly is a little chilling. I am not worried about drug lords attacking tourists because if they do kill and scare American's they are literally, killing their cash cow.

I wouldn't wander around Tijuana after dark to be sure, but I will cross the boarder from San Diego and head down the coast for vacation and I feel very secure doing it. I confess that having a gun along wouldn't be the worst thing I can think of but hey, crossing the boarder with a weapon and then heading to a Mexican jailhouse would increase the real danger exponentially. I also wouldn't take a job as a reporter or editor in Mexico as the drug lords or other criminals seem happy to kill journalists and the authorities don't seem to care much. But again, they aren't killing for the sake of killing, they are getting and scaring those who work for Mexican newspapers. In fact, Mexicans working as reporters are heroic to be sure.

The second scare is the dreaded swine flu that grabbed world headlines and sent thousands or millions heading for their bunkers to hole up while the world ended. As I don't plan to stop in any hospitals and lick people, I am feeling okay about this one as well.

My biggest fear is returning to the U.S. and getting grief from police who stop vehicles with the expectation of getting a bribe. This is troubling to me on so many levels, but I will deal with that when and if it happens.

Anyway, imaginary readers, would you travel to Mexico? Am I ignoring obvious signs of real danger? Is my life balanced on the edge of a knife because I am heading south?

Incidentally, here are the countries the U.S. State Department does have warnings about traveling to:

Nepal 05/22/2009
Lebanon 05/13/2009
Yemen 04/24/2009
Georgia 04/09/2009
Sudan 04/08/2009
Central African Republic 04/01/2009
Colombia 03/25/2009
Madagascar 03/17/2009
Saudi Arabia 03/04/2009
Algeria 03/04/2009
Pakistan 02/25/2009
Eritrea 02/18/2009
Syria 02/12/2009
Congo, Democratic Republic of the 02/05/2009
Haiti 01/28/2009
Philippines 01/27/2009
Israel, the West Bank and Gaza 01/15/2009
Burundi 01/08/2009
Sri Lanka 12/22/2008
Cote d'Ivoire 12/15/2008
Nigeria 12/02/2008
Somalia 11/15/2008
Chad 11/14/2008
Kenya 11/14/2008
Iran 09/15/2008
Afghanistan 09/10/2008
Uzbekistan 07/03/2008
Iraq 06/13/2008

Those places are a whole different level of dangerous.