Crossing Over

It was a humid, sunny day in Mexico when Pepe Burro decided to do something a little dangerous. This something would change his life as he knew it and maybe finally, answer his Mama’s prayers, that her only son would do something better with his life, if the damage he had already done was not too extensive. Pepe always grew up poor in the small house he lived in with his mother and sisters. From an early age, his mother taught him the value of hard work, which meant he had to get up at five every morning to milk the cows, Maria and Ramon, and tend to the small farm, which was the only source of income for his family. For as long as Pepe could remember, he yearned for something better, but was not too ambitious in going about it.

In Mexico, alcohol was readily available and Pepe took full advantage of its availability. He sampled a shot of every drink in the bar and found his preference lay in Tequila. That’s actually what he was doing now; lying under the hot Mexican sun, his sombrero tilted over his eyes and drinking a tankard of Tequila. Pepe had always wanted to cross the border, so to speak. He had always wanted to see the great city of New York or the Big Apple, as he heard some American college students refer to it as, while they sipped Margueritas at the bar in San Lucinda in the spring. That is what I am going to do. He decided silently as he lay under the sun, I am going to go to New York . Pepe had some difficulty getting up from under the tree. It seems Pepe’s love for Tequila had gotten to him as his beer belly hindered the usually limber movements of a twenty-six year old such as himself.

Pepe was going to cross the border to the famed Estados Unidos. This was easy to do in the dead of night, as the border patrols also seemed to favor Tequila. Before he knew it, Pepe was crossing over the border into the United States. A few hours after crossing the border, Pepe was walking on a long stretch of highway in somewhere called Texas. Pepe had no idea how to get to New York and thought walking was best, as he did not bring a donkey. All of a sudden, he saw something very loud coming at him, very quickly. He did not know what to do and just stood there looking at what was coming towards him. The driver of the truck saw Pepe standing there and decided to stop. Pepe was not exactly hard to miss. With his dark curly hair, largeness, tan skin, thick mustache and dressed in a sombrero, and brightly colored poncho he stood out and practically screamed MEXICAN! Come to think of it, he looked more like the Columbian Coffee Guy.

“Where ya goin’, stranger?” the driver asked in a deep Texan accent that sounded strange to Pepe.

“The Big Apple. Do you know where that is?” asked Pepe in broken English and hand gestures.

“You’re a long way, but I think I can get you there in one piece” the driver said as he invited Pepe on his long haul which he usually traveled alone. Judging by the look of Pepe, Pete or “Cowboy Pete”, a Texan trucker, would probably be the only person who would pick up Pepe. So all the way from Texas to New York City, Pepe was given rides by all of Pete’s trucker friends and even picked up some more lingo, including his two favorite words, “y’all” and “yes’m”. By the time Pepe got to New York, he sounded like a Mexican with a Texan accent and dressed just as strange. Pete had tried to offer him some different clothes but Pepe refused to take off that damn poncho and sombrero. If only he knew what a freak he looked like, Pete would often think when he looked at Pepe.

New York was strange and exciting to Pepe. He had no money and nowhere to go, so he would often walk around the city trying to find other Mexicans to talk to and make friends. He did find some people to be a little too friendly though. But one night when he was walking down a dark alley and the only sound were sirens in the distance, he found a duffel bag in a dumpster while tying to find some leftover quesadillas from the El Paso Restaurant. Pepe loved quesadillas. When he opened the dumpster he found wads and wads of green money tied up in little stacks. Pepe did not know how much there was. He only knew that there was a lot and he was now rich in America. With his newfound fortune, Pepe could only think of buying one thing- a quesadilla from the El Paso Restaurant.

Pepe awoke the next morning. Come to think of it, the Mexican friends that he had been staying with were about to move and Pepe would have to find a place to live. Pepe had no intention of finding a place to live at the moment, because he was far too engrossed in thinking about the rest of his day and what he was going to plan to do. Pepe had been thinking about one of the truck drivers that had taken him to New York. The truck driver had told him, upon arriving to New York, to visit Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum because he had said it was definitely a sight to see. Unfortunately, the truck driver never gave him directions. Pepe spent most of the day asking random people for directions. Because of Pepe’s bad English, when people had told him to go right, he had made a left, which led him even further from his destination. He then asked a police officer, who spoke Spanish, for directions and he directed Pepe in the right direction.

Pepe arrived at Madame Tussaud’s Wax museum with delight in his eyes. When Pepe had walked into one of the viewing rooms, he couldn’t understand how each person could be made out of wax. The only thing he could think of when he saw wax was a candle. Pepe decided to take a tour through the museum to get a better idea of how the staues were made and structured. In one part of the museum, he started to favor this one figure. He wanted to be experimental, so he lit the little figure on fire. Strange enough, the figure was actually a real person.

“Lo siento, lo siento”, Pepe said, putting up his hands in apology.

The person got up from where he was sitting. His name was Barry Jones, he told Pepe, in a half scared voice to this man who had just tried to light him on fire.

“People prefer to call me Mini Me though”, Barry explained to Pepe after the incident.

He had struck up a conversation with Pepe and decided to talk more over some lunch. Over lunch, Pepe found out a lot about Barry that was similar to how Pepe would describe himself. Barry told Pepe to come stay with him because Pepe didn’t have a place to live anymore and Barry could use the company in his lonely apartment.

Barry was best described as a midget. He was four foot two with blond hair and light brown eyes. Barry didn’t know himself very well and hoped that, with having Pepe come live with him, he could find his own identity as an original. Barry felt that because he was famous, he could never be that guy who walks down the street normally and doesn’t have a million people running up to him, screaming his name and giving him various things to sign, including arms, faces, and other various body parts.

Pepe brought his belongings to Barry's place, where he told Barry about his interesting life.

"How in the hell did you get all the way over here from all the way over there”, Barry asked, after he was finished.

Pepe had no idea what Barry was trying to ask him, so Pepe simply nodded his head and smiled. Barry repeated himself slowly thinking that if he pronunced and enunciated his words, that it would make the words understandable to Pepe. Pepe thought that Barry was a very humane and genuine person. He demonstrated that this world was full of famous people that still have a heart and just want to be recognized as normal people. Pepe and Barry decided to go to the El Paso Restaurant to get something to eat;they were both starving and hadn’t eaten since the morning. They finally arrived at the El Paso Restaurant. When they got there, Pepe decided that he wasn’t hungry any more, so he went to stand on the line to get coffee. While on line, he ran into Carlton Bigalow. Carlton was eyeing Pepe’s wardrobe while on line and came up to him to make a comment.

“Are you in a fashion show or something, because your designer is hot”, Carlton exclaimed.

Pepe had told him no. Carlton offered to take him shopping because he figured that Pepe needed all the help he could get. Carlton was a tall guy around five nine or five ten. He was athletic with short blond hair and blue eyes. He had two tattoos, one on his forearm and on his back. He had two piercings and wore a baby blue valore suit.

While in the store, Lacoste, Carlton tried showing Pepe nice shirts that would suit him and tried to be of some assistance. Pepe was starting to show that he was too obsessed with his poncho. Carlton started to tell a little bit about himself to Pepe, in the hopes that Pepe would loosen up a little bit. Carlton lived in the ghetto with his girlfriend. All he wanted to do was be accepted in the ghetto. Because he was white, not many black people accepted that Carlton was living in "their space". They felt the ghetto was where they could have their privacy and not have to deal with white people trying to take over. Carlton and Pepe returned to the restaurant where Barry was waiting. Pepe didn’t look any different from when he left the restaurant, he was the same person and felt there was no reason to change his style of clothing to please someone else.

Pepe started to talk of the ghetto in Mexico and how it was the most terrible place to see. Pepe described the homes that he lived in because they were similar to how the ghetto was in New York. The ghetto in Mexico was very different and was perceived to be the “hell hole”. It was filled with poor people who had no place to stay, except for outside on a cardboard box. They ate nothing but leftovers from the garbage. After talking about the ghetto and Pepe explaining that it wasn’t that bad of a place where Carlton lived, Pepe decided to return to Barry’s, where he was sleeping.

The next day arrived and Pepe decided to go on another adventure. He figured he would stay home during the day and go out during the night. He decided to go to a club in Manhattan that Barry was getting agitated over seeing. As a matter of fact, when Pepe stepped foot in the club, it wasn't the club he'd thought he'd be going to; it was a gay club. While Barry started dancing with someone, Pepe decided to go by the bar and start up a conversation with someone because he was feeling a bit lonesome. Pepe started ordering drinks from someone by the name of Avon. They struck up a conversation about Avon’s life.

Avon was your typical cross dresser. He dressed like a woman. He had long, flowy brown hair, hazel green eyes, faint freckles, and tan skin. Avon was from a family that didn't understand him. They didn’t know that he was a cross dresser and would never accept he was one. Pepe felt his pain and decided to do something to help this man. Pepe told Avon that he was going to go to the club a few more times to hear his problems and give him some much needed advice. Avon was grateful and repaid Pepe by giving him a free Piña Colada.

Credit: Myself and Brit