Roadside Rest

Roadside Rest Talking Turkey in Mexico Isn't What You May Think

For many years I have cherished a friend, Vidal “Vic” Rivera, who once held a mid-level position in the Mexico Tourist Bureau. At the same time I was active in the Phoenix Chamber of Commerce, dedicated, then as now, to nurturing relationships between Arizona and Mexico. Arizona annually exports almost $2 billion in goods to Mexico, and today our state is home to about 700,000 Hispanics. When Vic was my host below the border, neighborly sentiments colored our conversation. “Welcome to the proud land of my parentage,” Vic might say. “Usted mi hermano,” my response might be, “My brother.” I remember one day we were on a tour bus careening through a rolling countryside of ejidos, farmlets that checker-boarded about half of the nation's agricultural areas. I felt compelled to utter something — anything — to foster international goodwill.

“How arrogant of us, Vic,” said I, “that more North Americans do not speak Spanish. The language is part of our Southwestern heritage, and it is spoken in the big cities of the Midwest and East. Yet most of us non-Hispanics can talk only to the animals of Mexico.” As I reflected upon my brilliance, Vic smiled blandly.

“Is that so?” he wondered.

“And exactly what would you say, for example, to a Mexican chicken?”

“Cluck, cluck, of course.”

Vic rolled his eyes. “A Mexican chicken goes clo, clo. I tutor Spanish, and I have made a study of this thing.” Still, I argued, “Everybody knows that a chicken clucks. All over the world dogs go bow-wow, except for Annie's Sandy, which barks arf.” An edge of patronizing patience sharpened Vic's voice. “Never in all the glorious history of Mexico has a self-respect-ing dog uttered bowwow. No patriotic Mexican dog would wake up his pueblo with such an inanity. Mexican dogs go guauguau. Or maybe giauo.” Inanity, indeed! I scarcely masked my suspicion that what's-his-name had lost his marbles. “It's simple phonetics,” I lectured. “North or south, horses are horses. To any ear, they neigh, neigh. Watch some reruns of “Mr. Ed,” man.” “Ree-dick-you-luss,” hissed Vic. “To a Mexican ear, horses go i-i-i-i-i, i-i-i-i-i. Neigh is not even close, hombre.” I retorted testily, “And now you're going to tell me that don-keys do not say hee-haw.”

“Burros bray ji jau.”

We were closer on cows, goats, and sheep. But as to roosters, Vic allowed, “In Mexico, if a male fowl should say cock-a-doodle-do, the hens would peck him to death. A Mexican rooster cries ki-ki-ri-kiiiii. And chicks don't peep. They say pio, pio.” It was too much. I exclaimed, “Donald Duck talks through a Kleenex in his cheek. All other ducks quack.” “Cua, cua, cua,” Vic taunted.

“In the world's leading country, turkeys also are known as gobblers because they call gobble, gobble. The turkey is so American, Benjamin Franklin nominated it as the na-

tional bird.”

Hi, Chihuahua!” yelled Vic. “Wild turkeys are as Mexican as salsa verde, and they say gurdu, gurdu, except around Mexico City, where the di-alect is gordo, gordo.” Which brought us to owls. Grasping for comic relief, I said, “Did you hear about the adoring mama owl that bragged about her baby, 'Color-wise, feather-wise, and vision-wise, he is perfect.' And another owl asked, 'Yeah, but how is he wise-wise?'” On the subject of pigeons, I informed Vic that Phoenix City Hall daily was insulted by hundreds of these winged vandals, each enunciating coo, coo. Vic said the defacement of the mu-nicipal building in Hermosillo was no less, but there the pi-geons plainly speak cu, curu, curu.

Pigs. Ours oink. Theirs oink. Again, we seemed to be clos-ing the linguistic gap. En-couraged, I told Vic that back home we called pigs like so:

By Don Dedera

“Sooooooeeee! Sooooooeee! Pig! Pig! Pig!” Vic shook his head. “Mexican pigs would head for Guatemala. Down here you have to shout: Ahhhhhhhhhhh! Ahhhhhhhhh! Cochi! Cochi! Cochi!” We fell into sullen silence until our bus rolled into an inspection station. Little boy car-watchers were extracting tribute from U.S. motorists.

“Rivera,” I demanded, bitterly, “when is this country going to crack down on these little bandidos?” “When your stores accept the peso, as the dollar is accepted down here, that's when.” “Cluck, cluck,” I teased.

“Clo, clo,” countered Vic.

“Still buddies?” I asked.

“Amigos forever,” he answered, and we laughed all the way to the cantina.