17th February 2016
At 6 o clock I got up to drive to the beach and see the sunrise. It was pitch black. All people in the bus seemed to work in these huge hotels. Thanks to my parents, who had been to Cancun two weeks before, I was able to find one of the few public entrance to the beaches. On the beach I barely met people. The beach was calm, only a few people passed by. The sea was raw. Red flags were hissed all over the beach. Nevertheless, I enjoyed the short sunrise. After a while, it started to rain. I did not care about the warm rain and had breakfast at the Caribean Sea. When the rain increased I flew through a fancy hotel to the bus station. The bus is running every 3 minutes here (ten times more frequently than in St. Louis). Especially when it rains cats and dogs, I really appreciate this.
Everybody seems to be easygoing and friendly. So I was able to find very fast the Maya Museum, after crossing the flooded street. It seems like no drainage for the streets exist in Cancun. By any chance there was no opportunity to cross the street without making my shoes wet.
Not only the exhibition was interesting, also the ruins temple park and the architecture of the Maya Museum. It is one of the few museums, where I really took the time to see and read everything.
Back in my hotel, I took a shower, although I was already wet and checked out. On the airport I was early enough to have lunch, while listening to a saxophone player, who was jamming in the wonderful airport. The time was passing fast. Nevertheless, I did not want to leave this nice music and waited at the boring gate. The gates are announced only 20 minutes prior to boarding. I was already afraid that I had nothing to do or write in the plane, since I nearly finished my book about Judaism. Since I still had 300 Pesos (around 15 Euros) and lost my headset, I decided to buy a new pair. When I arrived at the gate, I was one of the last. Probably they must have started the boarding earlier. There were still 20 minutes until the door of the plane would close. Everything seemed to be alright. I opened my passport in expectation to find my migration paper attached to my boarding pass. Unfortunately, there was no boarding pass and also no migration paper. I told the American Airlines guy, that I have lost my boarding pass, what would not be a big problem, if I not my migration paper would be missing. The guy told me, I have to go to the migration office at the entrance. No clue where the migration office was, I run back to the security check and told my story very fast again. The guy was very relaxed and I was not really sure, if he really got my point. Anyway one minute later another American Airlines guy at the beginning of the security check was waving. The security guy pointed at him and I passed this time with my hand luggage the safety check the other way around. He guided me to an elevator, which was arriving miraculous in a few seconds. In the elevator he told me, that the loss of migration paper costs 30 Dollars. Never was I so happy to have cash and about the decision taking 50 Dollars to Cuba.
When I gave him the money awkwardly my hands started to tremble. We skipped together the line at the migration office. I needed to fill out an immigration paper again, but I could not remember the name of my hotel and my hand was still a little bit shaky for the small letter boxes. Having in mind that I did not completely fill out the migration paper, when I arrived to Mexico, I decided pick Nautilus (or something like this) instead of Rivemar, which sounds similar. Having written the name, he took the pen out of my trembling hand and filled some more boxes out. For my family name he chose Markus instead of Elm. The guy at the migration office, stamped the migration paper, without really looking on it.
This is the true story, why Jan Elm enters Mexico and Jan Markus with the same passport number and birthday, but sleeping in another hotel left the country on the same day. Hopefully this does not bring any trouble, if I travel again to Mexico.
However, we were running back together, where the nice Mexican guy helped me again to skip the line. By scanning my boarding pass the full screen was showing some numbers with a bright red light in the background and a beep sounded. The Mexican guy, whom I never had time to ask for his name had already passed the control. The security guy looked bewildered at me. Finally, he seemed to be convinced by the shouting “Mr. Markus” and waving of my Mexican friend and gave me baffled back my boarding pass and passport without asking questions. After 10 minutes I was back at the gate. Never have I passed any security so fast. Never was I so excited, besides my first kiss.
When I got back, a new boarding pass with a closer seat to the entrance of the plane was printed for me.
Thank you so much to the helpful stuff of American Airlines and Mexican border patrol!
My heart was still running faster than usual, when we took off by sunshine from Cancun Airport.
Later on, I recognized that I never changed my watch back to mid-western time for this day in Cancun.
The flight was faster than I expected. As soon as the doors opened, I learned from my experience and took my bag and headed as fast as possible to the Customers Border Patrol. I made the run so fast, that I was the first one of my plane. I did not have to wait one or two hours. I did not have to wait any second. The officer was quiet but direct. This time he just asked me, which souvenirs I was bringing from Cuba. After two minutes he stamped my passport and I could go. I never thought, that it could work also so fast and without any humiliated interrogation. After a three hours train and car ride, I finally arrived at our venue.
I think, I really can say, that I had a lucky day.
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