TRAVEL Maya Summer Vacation

After a distinguished procession of exhibitions featuring Renaissance grandeur and impressionist genius, Fort Worth’s Kimbell Museum is presenting something unorthodox for the summer viewing pleasure of the patrons-a breathtaking assembly of artifacts from the ancient Maya culture that flourished until the 16th century, when the Spaniards moved in to conquer the Mayas.

The Kimbell’s Maya show, which runs through August 24, offers a radical departure from the imperially peaceful masterpieces of Rembrandt, Matisse, and those boys. Appar-ently, the organizers of this exhibition decided to appeal to the darker instincts of the aesthete set and, at the same time, attract some business from the clientele that generally arranges its social calendar around what’s playing at the local drive-in. And in my case, the exhibit produced an urge for a hands-on tour of Maya land, of which more later.

That the Mayas were no pacifists is evident from the moment the visitor enters the exhibition. Above an archway leading into the show, in lurid claret letters, a sign says, “The Blood of Kings.” Immediately, you start searching for something in smaller print that reads: “In 3-D!!! Starring Vincent Price and Jamie Lee Curtis. Second Feature. . .Texas Chainsaw Massacre!!!”

I was soon equipped with a cassette that directed me to a series of glass cases containing incredible bowls, jewelry, statues, and ornate carvings. A narrator on the tape explained the meaning of the glyphs inscribed upon the artifacts.

And according to these glyphs, the Mayas, contrary to their image of a culturally advanced race of architects and astronomers, were, in fact, devoted to some cruel and disgusting preoccupations. Primarily, this involved bloodletting rituals. Jade carvings reveal that Maya nobility had an unfortunate proclivity for puncturing their tongues and genital areas with obsidian blades and running ribbons through the wounds while the blood flowed like iced tea at a Sunday school picnic. The female voice on the cassette pleasantly informed me that after enough blood has been shed, the brain excretes a hormone that produces a state somewhat similar to being loaded on heroin.

The lead character throughout the exhibition at the Kimbell is a man whom the glyphs tell us was known as Bird Jaguar. No, he wasn’t one of Frank Zappa’s kids. Bird Jaguar was a Maya king around the eighth century A.D., and even among his cruel competitors, he stood out as a most bloodthirsty ruler.

In a glass case labeled Q is a figurine of a man on Bird Jaguar’s hit list. He has been scalped and disemboweled. The narrator explains cheerfully that the ritual called for taking what was left of the poor guy and burning him alive.

While the brilliance of the Maya art concentrated in a single room has an overpowering effect, the shocking horror stories provided by the glyphs may leave the visitor feeling queasy. One must wonder how the Mayas, if they were so consumed with their bloodletting activities, ever found time to create their great cities and spectacular pyramids, said to rival anything produced by the ancient Egyptians.

Consequently, the Kimbell exhibition provoked a desire to learn more about this great mystery civilization of the Americas. In my case, it rekindled a spirit of adventure that I thought had died at age nineteen, after an ill-fated attempt to hop a freight train.

Fortunately, it is possible to abandon the crane-crowded vistas of modern Dallas and disappear into the primitive jungle domain of the ancient Mayas in about the time required to locate a parking place at Valley View mall on a Saturday afternoon. Simply buy a seat on the next available Mexicana Airlines flight to Cancun ($195 round trip), rent a car upon arrival, and split. Accompanied by my adventurous companion, a lady who shall be known as Rambette, I did just that.

What follows is a brief travelogue, in diary form, that offers some details of what to expect from a quicko get-the-hell-out-of-Dallas package tour to the land of the vanished Mayas, there to plumb the depths of their gory culture, get some sun, and quaff many a mysterious brew.



SUNDAY

The adventure began on a positive note. The 1 p.m. flight to Cancun, via Mexicana, offered free beer and wine.

Amply fortified, I lapsed into romantic fen-tasy, studying the faces of the passengers on the flight. Soon we would be leaving these people behind to indulge themselves on the glistening sands of the resort hotel. “These might be the last white people we’ll ever see again.. .uh.. .another cerveza, please.”

The approach to the Cancun airport jarred me back to reality. The fun-loving pilot went into an elaborate swoop-and-dive routine, supposedly to provide the passengers with a grandiose panorama of the resort area they were about to experience.

Even Rambette appeared unsettled. “When is he gonna get this goddamn thing on the ground?” she whispered, digging her fingernails into my forearm.

Finally, we landed. Mexican customs officials seemed inordinately suspicious of one of the gringo fools on board the flight-namely me-who was carrying a portable typewriter. The typewriter was confiscated and X-rayed, then reluctantly returned. They seemed convinced that this was some laser weapon en route to the contras.

After securing our rental car, a vintage VW beetle as red as the blood of one of King Jaguar’s captives, we made our only concession to the habits of the Yanqui tourist-one night in the Sheraton Hotel on the beach at Cancun.



MONDAY

While Rambette devoted the morning hours to the crystal sands along the waterfront, I remained in the room poring over road maps like Cortez plotting an invasion and trying to figure out why the Mexican travel agent downstairs laughed me out of his office when I mentioned driving as far as Oaxaca during our seven-day journey. When I saw the roads, I knew why he was laughing.

By noon, it was time to bid farewell to the ugly Americans congregated at the Sheraton and disappear into the primeval underbrush, the unending rain forest that produced the riddle known as the Maya culture.

On the outskirts of Cancun, we secured vital supplies-six cases of Corona. Unfortunately, I became lost in a labyrinth of potholes, slum housing, naked kids, and the most concentrated population of dogs I have ever encountered, all to the accompaniment of a litany of ridicule pouring forth from Rambette.

Finally, I located the correct exit street and we advanced into the badlands of Quintana Roo, where culture shock kicked in almost immediately.

Occasionally, villages would materialize at about twenty-kilometer intervals, communities consisting of straw huts, several pigs and roosters, and one cantina. Along the highway, we encountered some conspicuously evil-looking characters riding bicycles, with rifles slung over their shoulders and machetes tucked into their belts.

The jungle was relentless, but we pushed on. Finally, with darkness approaching, I glanced to my left and saw, towering over the treetops of the tangled wilderness, the majestic pyramid of Kukulcan, the showpiece structure of the Maya city of Chichen Itza. Viscerally, the impact of Kukulcan was like encountering the Statue of Liberty in a Mississippi cotton patch.

Upon arriving at the gateway to Chichen Itza, however, we were approached by a weary old security guard who said, “Sorry. The ruins are closed. Come back tomorrow.” Our disappointment turned to anxiety when we returned to the VW and discovered the front left tire was flat. Also, there was no jack. But that didn’t matter because the spare was flat, too.

While pondering the grim prospect of spending the night in the Beetle-among the panthers, marauding banditos, and gigantic lizards-we were rescued by the man who operated the local transit service. This consisted of a ’49 Ford that transported us to the village of Piste and the delightful Mission Inn, an elegant building similar to an old country inn on the Monterrey peninsula. At twenty dollars a night, this is one of the premier bargains in the Western Hemisphere. The place was practically deserted.

Later that night, emboldened by several shots of mescal, I decided to enrich the natives working in the bar with an enthusiastic rendition of “You’re The Reason God Made Oklahoma.” The distant relatives of old Bird Jaguar looked on with expressions of grave concern.

I somehow remember another round of mescal and then, total darkness.



TUESDAY

At 9:39 a.m., in the finest tradition of the American tourist, I scaled the great pyramid of Chichen Itza and promptly blew my beets. A technicolor yawn, for the delicate.

This was Lesson Number One. Never explore ancient ruins with a hangover. Still, the mescal-induced malaise couldn’t dampen my response to the splendid, imposing structures of Chichen Itza, with its great temples with meticulously carved facades. I was startled by the eerie ball court where athletes had played for keeps. The actual rules of the Maya game are lost, but many drawings suggest that the skull of the loser was used as the ball in the next round of the play-offs. I don’t know whether this is the source of the term “sudden-death elimination.”

The landscape of the ancient city is clustered with a variety of edifices that make the most ambitious commercial developments of Dallas seem like slum clearance. Instead of shopping malls, however, the Mayas were intent on erecting temples: the Temple of Warriors, the Jaguar Temple, the Temple of Tables, the Temple of Bearded Man.

The most intriguing aspect of Chichen Itza, though, is the cenote, or sacred well, located down a jungle pathway on the outskirts of the old city. The well brought back chilling recollections of the Kimbell exhibition. It was here that the Maya priests staged their human sacrifices.

Virgins were usually the ones selected to take the dive. They were rewarded for their purity by being loaded down with precious metals and gems and heaved into the pit. Various males were also selected for the old sacrificial heave-ho. The Maya glyphs, which should be R-rated at best, tell us that the victim was painted blue. Then the priest would remove the heart of the living victim.

Subsequent generations of Mayas have proven more benevolent, to the extent that a man in a Mazda pickup truck drove us to a nearby village to have the tire on the VW repaired. The land that time forgot, I was thinking when the old Indian working on the tire said, “You all are from Dallas, huh? You think the Mavericks are gonna trade Aguirre?”

Amazing.



WEDNESDAY

Despite the temptation to spend the remainder of the week blitzed at the cozy inn at Piste, we decided to press on with the exploration. Our next stop would be the principal city-the only city, really-on the Yucatan peninsula: Merida, built by the Spanish to resemble Paris. But now, with a population of maybe a half million, it recalls Addison at rush hour, with most of the locals roaring about on motor bikes without mufflers and others driving trucks. If they ever come north, they could jockey the gravel rigs that run people off the road on Highway 114.

Overall, the setting seemed a little too urban for the purposes of our Dallas escape, so we ventured south toward Uxmal, another of the great cities from the Maya kingdom.

En route, we passed through the village of Muna, where a woman invited us to inspect the interior of her straw condo. A kid on a hammock was watching “General Hospital” with a Spanish sound track, on a black and white TV. Upon arriving on the outskirts of Uxmal, we lucked out again, discovering another charming country hacienda at the same rate of twenty dollars.



THURSDAY

What is left of Uxmal turned out to be, if it’s possible, even more fantastic than Chichen Itza.

When Michel Peissel, a world traveler and author, encountered the ruin site, he wrote, “At Uxmal the buildings have a truly artistic greatness which makes them among the most glorious structures in the world. Versailles, medieval cathedrals, the tombs of the moguls of India, the Parthenon itself have little or no edge on the architectural beauty and majesty of Uxmal.”

It is difficult to argue with that assessment. “Next to Knott’s Berry Farm, this is the damnedest place I’ve ever seen,” said Rambette.

The intricate carving on the pyramids and temples is dumbfounding. The tribe that built all of this.. .can they be the same people talked about at the Kimbell Museum, the ones so ardently devoted to self-mutilation and human sacrifice?

Apparently so. That night, at a stunning light show at the ruins, a recorded narrative (in English) explained some of the history of Uxmal. Popular legend has it that a neigh-boring tribe from Chichen came and kidnapped an Uxmal princess on the morning of her wedding, putting a considerable damper on the reception.

In retaliation, Uxmal dispatched an army back to Chichen to regain the bride. This proved unsuccessful, as the invading forces were slaughtered. So it goes.

The prevailing riddle of the Maya civilization is what triggered its decline. Anthropologists present various theories, most of them depending on what the insurance companies now call acts of God. A century-long drought may have wiped out the Mayas’ once-thriving agricultural economy and, eventually, the population itself. There is also the likelihood that the Mayas were devastated by plague. Modern inhabitants of the area are still troubled by frequent outbreaks of scarlet fever, yellow fever, and syphilis. But many historians and scholars seem to have overlooked perhaps the most obvious answer-that the Mayas systematically killed each other off.



FRIDAY

Reluctantly, we checked out of the charming hotel overlooking Uxmal and began retracing our steps back toward the airport and, ultimately, the bleak prospect of 4 p.m. traffic on LBJ. The plan was to spend the last night of this expedition back at the Mission Inn in Piste, in the shadows of Chichen Itza.

On the other side of Merida, I pulled the VW off the main road and rode into the little community of to buy another six-pack. By now it was mid-afternoon and the shops and sidewalks surrounding the square were deserted. But on the grounds behind the cathedral a large crowd had gathered. It appeared that something like a grade school carnival was taking place.

This fiesta turned out to be a small-town bullfight, staged in a rickety arena made out of bamboo and plywood. For a nickel, I purchased two tickets to the luxury skybox, which was accessible via stepladder. The spectacle I saw turned out to be more revolting than any blood rituals the Mayas might have perpetrated.

The brave matador looked like some hollow-eyed refugee from Salvation Army detox and the fierce toro turned out to be about as formidable as a playful collie.

When things got under way, the matador eschewed any pretense of cape work and so forth and simply stabbed the poor creature again and again with his sword, while the animal looked at him with an expression that seemed to say, “Why are you doing this to me?”

Finally, after the courageous matador kicked the fallen creature to make sure it was out of its misery, three men on horses roped the dead beast and galloped down a side street, dragging the animal behind them, chased by a gang of excited children.

Olé! I wished that Ernest Hemorrhoid himself could have been there to explain to us once again what’s so damn great about a bullfight.

The townspeople, to their credit, hissed and jeered at the morbid little pimp in the matador costume and pelted him with oranges and grapefruit.

We drove the last two hours back to Piste in silence.



SATURDAY

From many standpoints, our Maya expedition was a worthwhile venture. The cuisine, however, wasn’t one of them. The menu at the country inns usually consists of chicken salad, chicken broth, chicken Yucatan-style (fried), and a chicken pudding for dessert, followed by a complimentary after-dinner drink of chicken liqueur.

And these are the four-star restaurants.

On the tedious drive back to Cancun, during which I narrowly escaped several head-on collisions with tour buses en route to Chichen Itza, Rambette began developing certain symptoms of digestive distress, which forced me to make some sadistically tasteless commentary on the nature of her discomfort. I remained detached from her plight until about halfway through the flight back to Dallas, when it suddenly seemed as if a cast of thousands was celebrating the Chinese New Year right there in my abdominal area.

By the time we arrived at D/FW, I would have willingly returned to Chichen Itza, located a priest at the sacred well, and volunteered to become a candidate to appease the gods.

The next time I visit an art show at theKimbell, I hope it inspires me to go toLas Vegas.