before you judge me, consider the facts:
1. mexico has long been known for its sterling reputation of having some of the smoothest, straightest roads on the planet, and is currently undertaking a massive construction project to widen hundreds of kilometers of these roads (my fellow americans: a kilometer is a base-10 unit of measure used by practically every other country in the world - along with centigrade - and is simply 1000 meters. a meter is 100 centimeters or roughly 3feet, 3.5inches) thereby creating vehicular congestion in the very sections they aim to improve.
2. because of the practically air-cushioned quality of these roads, many people are tempted to drive at high speeds, and the most cost-effective way to slow them down is to install topes (speed bumps) every kilometer or so, and raised crosswalks so high that cars would require chains to ascend them if snow and ice visited this region.
3. an intermediate class bus not only means that there is no restroom on board, but also that you will be on a vehicle that serves as a school bus AND a city bus (making frequent stops for drop-off and pick-up, turning a 2-hour ride into a 4.5 hour tour), that the suspension will probably be completely shot, and that there will be an increased chance that your driver has intermediate operating skills (jerky shifting thru all 16 gears, constant and abrupt braking, and mashing the accelerator like a heavy metal drummer uses the foot pedal on a bass drum).
4. it is hot here below the tropic of cancer, i consume copious amounts of water every day, and usually have ample opportunity to burn that water up.
so... a half-hour into this ride (to chichen itza), im regretting not going at the terminal ($5 there, free on the bus - i thought). i see a sign that says "chichen itza 180". a lot of kilometers to travel with a full bladder. i had a 1.5 liter bottle ("liter" is another one of those pesky, unamerican-and-therefore-wrong units of measure; i refuse to transpose the r and e) of cold water that id had a few sips of, and i started to consider my options: go up and tell the bus driver that i need to make an emergency pee stop (embarassing); pee my pants (humiliating. and uncomfortable); find a few empty rows and pee onto a seat cushion (disgusting. tho the cushion would act as a giant diaper); consume almost 1.5 liters of water so i can pee in the bottle. yes, thats the one. but i can hold it a bit longer, maybe there will be a stop. nope. after about 10 more minutes i told myself id wait for the next sign for chichen itza to see what kind of progress we were making; maybe we were almost there. another 10 minutes, a bunch of roadway signs, none of which mentioned our destination, leading me to believe that we were still a long way off. with all of the abrupt stopping, jerky starting, back-and-forth swaying, and up-and-down jolting over topes my pee was sloshing around inside of me like a freshly-purchased goldfish in the bag of water that is supposed to somehow simulate its natural environment. i proceeded to chug all of the water within a couple of minutes - a daunting task even when one does not desperately need to urinate - then tried to look casual as i stood up, grabbed my pack, and changed seats for one farther back in the bus. only one guy behind me, about 3 rows back, all the way in the back row, and he looks like he might be sleeping. 4 rows between me and the people in front of me - perfect! but it got better... as soon as i had settled myself into an appropriate, leak-proof position, we stopped. to take on a couple of passengers. old man first, takes a seat near the front of the bus; middle-aged woman next, coming toward the back, but there are plenty of seats before she comes into range. no. . . the seat directly diagonal to me is undoubtedly the most comfortable of all of them. especially when you recline it all the way back so you are practically in my row. yes, thank you. i quietly got up and silently moved one row back, still too close for comfort, but. . . let it fly. i refilled the bottle quite nicely, as my bladder apparently has a capacity of 1.5 liters. only a few dribbles, but those were the drivers fault for trying to wait until the last minute to slow down before launching over a tope.
oh. . . and dont read this if you think peeing is gross.
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