TexasCHLforum.com

We talk a lot here about maintaining a high Situational Awareness level. AnyGunAnywhere's story was a good example of that. In Mexico, it's also vitally important to maintain the lowest possible "Victimhood level". As many spring breakers have found out, being dead drunk at 3am in a border town is exactly the opposite of what's desirable.

You can lower your victimhood level by not acting/looking like a tourist. You can lower it even farther if you can pass for a Mexican citizen. I've only known two gringo's that can do that.
Guy I've known since the 1980's here on the border is a computer consultant. He did a lot of work south of the border in the 80's and 90's. American father, Mexican mother - his spanish was native level, and he could do a Monterrey, Nuevo Leon accent when he wanted to, along with the body language of a middle class Mexican national. He drove a 6 year old Volkswagon van in the 80's, so he looked like a local on the road down there.
The other guy who can not only pass, but "be more Mexican than a Mexican" is a blond haired blue eyed son of a missionary minister. He spent most of his elementary school years with his parents living in some little town in the interior of Mexico where they had a mission church. He can do that region's rural accent if he wants to (think Mexico's version of Arkansas or Mississippi).

Rotor: if you were referring to the Mark Kilroy/Santeria murders by Sara Aldrete and Adolfo Costanza, that was a couple of deranged serial killers worthy of a "Criminal Minds" episode. It isn't really representative of average risks of opportunistic crime in Mexico, or the risks of spillover Cartel related violence today.

Since about 2000, in the major cities along the border there are now recurring armed clashes between cartel factions (turf wars), and between the cartels and Mexican feds and army. Someone mentioned folks from the US still driving down to Monterrey. The mexican federal police now run regularly scheduled armed escort convoys between Reynosa and Monterey. 130 miles down the federal highway at the speed limit with no stops, armed feds at the front and at the rear. It's sort of like going from the airport to the green zone in Bagdad, but without the ied's.....

Bridge tolls are a big moneymaker for municipalities on this end of the river.

+-$2.50 per car, and I think 60 cents a person for pedestrians. If it was only a dime in the '90's, you must have been on foot......I think I paid about a dollar driving back from Nuevo Progreso about a decade ago.

rotor wrote:Best 10 cents I ever spent was returning from Matamoros to U.S.

1960's?