With apologies to E.G. Brady, it’s not just Mazatlan; all of Mexico is loud. Brady wrote that since the invention of the amplifier, every local farmacy, taxi, wedding and 15th-birthday party blasts music into the street at a volume high enough to make your eardrums bleed. The public events in Santa Rosalia in late April were no exception. The SquidFest was a pretty nice affair, with live music that by Mexican standards was actually reasonable. Loud, kept you awake until the band knocked off at 2am, but well within the national standard for Party Time. But then, there was the carnival that had set up on the exact same pier.
Oh, lordy.
The carnival had rides and booths that were lit up with pretty colored lights – so far, so good. They were clearly competing for customers with the folks that attended SquidFest, which was the first event people arrived at as they made their way from the street. OK; capitalist competition is good for the soul. Unfortunately the hearing-impaired guy running the carnival sound system did not understand basic public-relations principles of how to attract, rather than repel, paying customers to one’s enterprise. Deaf Dude cranked up his amps so loud, us cruisers 1/8-mile over in Marina Santa Rosalia started losing our fillings. When Deaf Dude saw that nobody was approaching his carnival, he turned the amps all the way up to 11*. Our stanchions started coming unbedded. Masts shook. Our internal organs rearranged themselves.
No, really: how loud was it?
It was so loud, even the locals couldn’t stand it. Nobody could pass through the Wall of Sound to get to the rides. Money was lost – and believe you me, Mexico is a country that has been built on the entrepreneurial spirit. So I’m sure it was a problem for everyone, not just middle-aged, martini-soaked gringos in sailboats. Too bad Deaf Dude didn’t figure out the solution. After three (count ’em! 3!!!) nights of eleventy-skabillion-decibel, badly-mixed, disco/rock/hip-hop-wannabe, canned music…played until three in the freakin’ morning, I’m here to tell ya – the carnival finally left town. GB was so happy, he took this pic of their backside:
And now when we see brightly-colored rides suddenly appear in plazas, we get flashbacks….
* just like Spinal Tap.
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