Nogales, city of the border.

Sundays in Manchester are normally spend: watching a movie at NopalJol, doing nothing at all, surfing the net or now that I have a blog figuring out what to write about. But this Sunday was different from my typical end of the weekend. I went to a concert with a friend. This of course brought lots of memory of my days when I was entering puberty.

My best friend (Briseida) and I, local outcast at the time, entered the underground world of music when we were 15 (it seemed the logical step to take). You could feel the uniqueness of each individuals trying to rebel against a society that considered them social rejects, because of there appearance or preferences. Yeah, the feeling of power it gave you being in an old, humid and abandoned warehouse located outside of town. Well, that’s what I felt, but actually I had my dad’s permission and he would promptly pick us up at midnight to go home. Hehe

We met several bizarre and weird people on those nights. Most of them had really rough lives (we were the good kids trying to fit in with the bad kids). Oaxaca (Lupita, but she was from Oaxaca so we just called her that), whom we met when we started going to “gigs”, had left her parent’s house when she was 13 or 14 years old, she worked as a babysitter for a family. On weekends (her days off), she would normally crash where anyone would let her. She had brought one suitcase with her, but all her important stuff were kept on a hand bag that she always carried. It was like a magician’s hat, she took whatever she needed out of the bag, it seemed bottomless. As time past and we became good friends,Briseida and me used to flips coins to see in which of our houses she would stay (not very nice). The last I heard of her, she had crossed the border (illegally) and was pregnant, but that was when I left home to go to study in Mexico city, 9 years ago. Ohh…How time flies!!!


Then there were the local groups, hahaha…at that time I could tell you the name of all the groups, in what order they were playing and which songs they were going to play (not much variety). What is really funny is some groups would try to create a new sound and ended up combining folk songs with metal-punk-rock. At the time I thought it was amazing what they did, but know I realize it was crap. Some local radio stations trying to encourage new talents would play their songs; they specially played one that had the name of my home town “Nogales, ciudad fronteriza” (Nogales, city of the border). Imagine the faces of those who really knew about music. Looking back at those days, I realize I was quiet naive about the things that surrounded me. Okay, still am, but now I can tell you I'm naive,hihihi...

Well, I’ll leave it here, it’s late and I’m not as young as I used to be.

BTW, the group I went to see on Sunday is called “The Secret Machines” check them out.