El Globero

Of more interest to me than over-sized grime-covered canvases hanging in gloomy hallways were the the rubbery tarantulas, miniature toys and wire puzzles hanging from the stick trees carried by the street vendors on Insurgentes Avenue. Some of the vendors also carried helium filled balloons of different colors that bounced off one another whenever a truck or bus passed by.

It’s difficult to keep track of one’s toys, and so I don’t remember whether I got the dangling tarantula or the plastic motorcycle or a rubber monkey or something else. Whatever it was, I put it on the night stand, next to the water decanter, and remember possessing it -- my first Mexican toy.

Some vendors specialized in balloons alone, blowing up and twisting sausage-like latex into the shape of a hat, or an airplane or a donkey or boat. Sometimes the hat itself was in the shape of a swan. As much as the shapes themselves I was fascinated by the balloon masters’ technique.

Que desea el jovencito?

One would point to the hat or the donkey or the airplane or boat.

The balloon master would nod and pull out a yellow or red strip or green strip of latex which he would put to his lips and blow up faster than any pneumatic pump or so it seemed. Thwooluhp! The balloon would be blown up and with a seamless gesture tied shut. But no sooner had this been done than another balloon would be taken out and ---thwooluhp! -- blown up, tied shut and now twisted around the other one in some fashion, their skins making squeaky sounds as they rubbed together. And again, thwooluhp - squeak - twist -- squeak .... and before you knew it you had a hat you could wear or a donkey you could stand on the table. As far as I was concerned actually getting the balloon was just the reward for the performance.

Maybe for this reason, I don’t remember getting one of these balloons much less whether it was a hat or donkey or boat. The only balloon I remember from this period in my life was an ordinary red one that stuck to the ceiling of the dank, dark rectangular dining room, which eventually lost its helium and died slowly in the concrete court yard.

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