I might as well have stepped through a Star Trek-style wormhole connecting Mexico to the Czech Republic. Every piece of wood in the two-story pub (with a capacity of 300) was purchased in and shipped from the Czech Republic. González wanted to recreate a Czech brewpub in TJ -- importing Czech materials and artists did the trick. Czech artists were brought in to paint larger-than-life murals on two-story walls and within small, receded panels. Torches hung everywhere, unlit and not needed at this hour, for the sun was shining through Norse-style stained glass.
I would have questioned Iturrios about the "magical door" had I not seen piñatas hanging from the ceiling. These were enough to convince me that despite the appearance of this place we remained in TJ. Glass windows in one wall gave patrons a view of the brewery. Each night musicians perform on the stage in the corner of the second floor. I was tempted to stay at Cervecería for lunch (the chef, Claudio Pérez, from Argentina, had an extensive menu, from burgers and fries to elaborate South American dishes I didn't recognize), but we had a movie to make. Through the veil of a light buzz, Eddie and I bid Iturrios rozchod and headed outside to catch a cab. We waited ten minutes before the first taxi drove by.
Cinépolis,
VIP
"Plaza Rio," Eddie called out as we got in the car. It was almost 2:00 p.m. I was skeptical about visiting a movie theater in another country and grilled Eddie for information. "Is it clean? Are people allowed to smoke in there?" He assured me I was in for a lovely experience and told me to shut up for the rest of the ride.
Plaza Rio is the main Tijuana shopping mall, located on Paseo de los Héroes between the hotel at which we had breakfast and the museum at which we were dropped earlier in the day. There are two theaters at the mall -- Cinépolis and Cinépolis VIP. Fourteen movies were playing at Cinépolis, but only three were advertised at Cinépolis VIP. We walked past clothing shops, jewelry stores, department stores, and beautifully landscaped common areas. Atop each bushlike tree that lined the walkway were animal shapes that had been sculpted from the hedge.
The shoppers, merchandise, and layout of stores reminded me of the Chula Vista Mall. The only thing missing were the retail chains I'm so used to seeing. Instead of a Gap, there was an Italian clothing store for men. Rather than Nordstrom, there was Sara's -- empty except for the fashionable employees at the makeup counters.
Out of curiosity, I dragged Eddie in with me to find out how much this "Sara" would charge for my favorite Lancôme eyeliner. An English-speaking man rushed to fetch the product for me.
"That's two bucks more than I paid at Nordstrom," I whispered to Eddie. I left without purchasing anything, and once outdoors, Eddie explained that American brands are imports in TJ and therefore more expensive than if they were purchased in an American city (funny, I could have sworn that Lancôme products were made in France).
We continued on to the VIP movie theater, at the opposite end of the mall from the peon's theater (I was already beginning to feel "very important"). Sugary smells like maple syrup and chocolate wafted out from the entrance as we purchased tickets. There was no glass around the ticket booth. If I'd wanted to, I could have reached over the shallow standing desk and poked the ticket-selling girl in the face. Lucky for her, I suppressed the urge when I handed her a five spot -- half the price of a standard ticket in San Diego. My ticket read, "El Hombre Araña Dos" -- Spider Man 2. To the left of the ticket booth, we handed our tickets to a teenager -- his uniform pressed, his smile inviting.
Once inside, I paused to marvel at the lobby. Large silver columns rose to meet sweeping curves and lines of the ceiling -- a modern, contemporary design, backlit with soft blue lighting. Theaters were marked by squares of etched glass lit from within the sliver of metal holding them in place from above.
We stopped for a moment to sample the black leather couches and chairs, which were placed so that we could sit anywhere in the room and still be able to reach one of the smooth wooden tables with industrial metal legs. The same metal uniformly encased posters of movies -- faces of movie stars were illuminated from lights embedded in the sides of the metal cases. On each table were ashtrays, but to my asthmatic relief, no one was smoking. Past the lobby and to the left was a little café; before it, several wooden tables. Coffee and baked goods, like fresh cakes and cookies, were offered on signs in Spanish -- a monolingual like me could peer through the glass display case or at pictures above in order to select a treat.
"Don't get anything here. There're better counters," Eddie said.
"Better than coffee and cake in a movie theater?" I asked.
"Yeah, look over there." He pointed across the way to a sushi bar. That's right, a sushi bar, with an Asian chef behind the counter, which was surrounded by Japanese decor. Impressive -- but I'm not one for sushi, so I pushed Eddie on to check what the rest had to offer.
A full bar gleamed near the sushi counter. "Full" meaning "any liquor you'd like." I ordered a piña colada and kept on walking.
"Are you kidding me?" I asked when we approached the next counter after the bar. "You can order crepes here?" I was overwhelmed, and we hadn't even gotten to the "regular" snack bars, the kind I was familiar with where they sell common items like popcorn and old hot dogs. Here, popcorn was served in star-shaped containers, and other items, like hot dogs or nachos, were placed on sturdy plastic trays with indents for any conceivable item one might place in them.
The condiments were extensive -- in addition to relish, ketchup, and mustard, there were three kinds of salsa, mayonnaise, and four other items of the vegetable variety that I didn't even recognize. But the one thing that struck me about all of these lobby areas was that they were so clean. Not one popcorn kernel on the carpet, not one straw wrapper by the trash -- immaculate.
"Order me a crepe, will you? I'll go get our seats," I said to Eddie. I walked into the theater and stopped inside the entrance. Are you kidding me? I thought. The theater was huge. The screen was bigger than any I'd ever seen, and the seats seemed to go on forever. I went about halfway up (a tiring trip) and sat down in a wide, black leather chair that reclined. Eddie found me in the dark and set down the crepes on the table between us. Each pair of chairs shared a table with cup holders. He set down a ceramic plate and handed me silverware to eat with!
I thought about the last time I'd been to see a movie at Fashion Valley. Before the show started, I had gone to the counter to ask for a large cup of ice water.
"We can't do that," said the pimply-faced teenager behind the counter after I'd made my request.
"Why not? I'll buy the bottle of water, and you can give me a large cup of ice with it."
"I can give you this," she said, holding up an itsy-bitsy paper cup that would hold, at most, two sips of water.
"How about I buy a soda, and you fill the cup with ice, and instead of soda, put water in it? If you don't have any water back there, I can fill it up at the drinking fountain," I said.
"We can only give you the small cups to fill up at the fountain," this uneducated dimwit told me.
"Just fill a soda cup with ice, charge me for it, and charge me for the water, I don't care, I just want a large cup of ice water! I'll pay whatever I have to! I want to give you money!" I didn't ask her to name the capital of Djibouti, but the look she gave me would have been the perfect response to such a question.
I gave up. "Fine. You know?... Fuck it. Just sell me a bottle of water and give me whatever ice you can." I walked away with a three-dollar bottle of water, two cubes of ice sticking out of a tiny cup, and a searing hatred for all movie theater employees.
And here I was in Mexico -- for less than ten dollars -- sipping my piña colada from a shapely glass, reclining in a leather seat, and occasionally pausing to slice for myself, with a silver knife, a bite of caramel crepe. Eddie and I delighted in our situation. Waiting for the movie to begin, he translated for me the ads on the big screen. Then the room went dark and Spider Man 2 was before me. In English.
