Vamos a la Playa

Sunrise at Playa del Carmen, Quintana Roo, Mexico

We walked the beach this morning before the sun came out. Out of our hotel room by a quarter after 5:00 we pass through quiet, empty, mostly dark streets until we get to the dock, where yesterday we watched streams of tourists return to their cruise boat. As we walk the beach and look out across the horizon, we can see the soft glow of Cozumel lights. Pockets of sky light up as lightning falls in the distance. There is no thunder, but we can hear the thud of dance music farther down the beach. We keep walking, letting the warm, dark water lap against our toes. As we draw closer to the music and the light, we pass three entangled couples on the sand. The warm, moist air carries the soft scent of booze and stale cigarettes. A few people are standing talking in the light from the club. They ignore us as we pass, huddle around each other, and occasionally glance toward the horizon. We turn around and walk back to the dock, then decide to explore whatever is on the other side of it.

Theater of the Sea

Past the dock there are more hotels, each with rows of empty lounge chairs facing the ocean as if it were a giant movie screen; nobody is here for the show.  The first light is here, but the horizon is still a dull gray, as are the buildings of Cozumel.  The water keeps lapping up on shore, bringing with it the scratchy fronds of seaweed that Sugata and I kept throwing at each other while we were swimming in the ocean. As we keep walking we notice that a number of people in uniforms have begun digging in the sand. The seaweed has been arranged in neat piles. Sugata stops to ask one young man what he is doing. He points to the seaweed and the hole he has dug as if it should be obvious.  He tells us he does this every day. Every day he digs holes and buries the seaweed in front of the hotel, every day the seaweed comes again. To me this seems both as pointless and as tedious as the task of Sisyphus. But it must be what the tourists want. A few gulls have gathered on the beach looking around for food, but the seaweed which harbors small beasts for them to nibble has been buried.

Seaweed that graces the beach, unless buried by hotel workers

Now that the dawn has come, a few more people have emerged. A darkly-tanned sixty-year-old woman throws a rubber champagne bottle toy for her dog. A shirtless muscled man jogs the shoreline. We decide to rest on some of the lounge chairs and watch the sunrise.  Another man stoops to take a picture of the gulls I suddenly wonder what it would be like here without these gulls, these sand-pipers, the gray pelican that floated past.  In this age where many species are going extinct, I like the visual reminder that humans aren’t the only species that seem to be making it.

Sand Piper with beach chairs

When I was a kid I wanted to be a wildlife photographer. I used to take my camera out in the woods to try to shoot pictures of squirrels. My camera had no zoom, so the pictures came out poorly—dark blobs with tails in a haze yellow aspen leaves.

Most wildlife photographers take pictures of things we could never dream of seeing.  We either have to go to zoos to watch animals pace unnaturally, or we have to go “away” to find real animals. I think of the photographers who set out to save the Great Bear Rain Forest through photography.

http://www.discoverwildlife.com/animals/canada%E2%80%99s-great-bear-rainforest-photo-spectacular

Or of people who photograph Polar Bears to remind us that their habitat is disappearing and that we may have something to do with it.

http://www.earthtimes.org/green-blogs/green-living/earth-watch-melting-ice-shrinking-polar-bears-hot-potatoes-21-Oct-11/

As I’m sitting in this theater chair watching gulls and observing the fact that other people like to see them too, I suddenly feel really sorry for all of us. It is hard being in a tourist hotspot. It is painful to be reminded of what people think they want. The sports fishing boats. The jet skis. The beach volleyball courts. The rows of palm trees planted in straight rows. The swimming pools right next to the ocean which are right next to the beach houses. These rows of theater seats looking out to the ocean. When it gets hot there will be more bodies in those seats, soaking up the sun. This, many suppose is the epitome of luxury. These bodies can open their eyes if they want to, look out to the bright sand and the aqua-blue sea and believe whatever they want about themselves. It seems we are thirsty for the sea, that we can’t get enough of it, yet even here, as we come right next to it, what does the sea mean to us? Is it there merely to reflect back to us that we are living a good life?

It is the off-season here in Playa del Carmen, but I’d hate to see what it is like here when it’s the tourist season.  A walk down Quinta Avenida: “Hey guys you want jet skis?” (The “hey guys” is a nice touch). “Ya wanna snorkel? Massage only $18.” Swimsuits in shops, swimsuits worn on hot or not-so-hot bodies, T-shirts displayed outside the shops that read: “I’m shy, but I have a big dick,” or “I’m in Playa del Carmen, Bitch.” Yes, the smell of tourism is in the air.

Yesterday we watched a thin, peroxide blond model posing right at sunrise. First she wore a bathing suit, then held a fishing spear while wearing a surprisingly revealing (deep v-neck) wetsuit. Of course she looked good. Of course the beach looks best--almost virgin as the dawn breaks over the water. At sunrise there is nobody around to mess up your own little piece of sand and sun. Everyone is still hung over from partying last night.

In parting, I’d like to leave you with a song.

I first heard this song in Guatemala when I was listening to the radio and trying to learn Spanish. The tune is catchy; the chorus will easily get stuck in your head.  It wasn’t until just a couple of days ago that I listened more closely to the rest of the song.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qCVQpcY1au4