Life Behind the Walmart

On tortilla goodness and self-delusions.

It’s a Friday night and I’m waiting at a bus stop in the Versalles neighborhood of Puerto Vallarta. The road is busy, a main thoroughfare that roughly bifurcates the city. On the western side is the gringo Puerto Vallarta - the marina with the fancy yachts, resorts, high rise condos-turned-Airbnbs, beaches, and of course the Señor Frogs. To the east is the not-so-gringo Puerto Vallarta - neighborhoods, like Pitillal, where many Mexicans still live, at least if the Airbnbs haven’t priced them out yet.

As I stand there, a few buses roll by, each headed towards different locations. I'm looking for the one with "Walmart" scribbled in marker on the front window. Eventually, I see one in the distance that looks promising, so a few of us edge closer to the street. There are some folks with reusable bags who look like they are, in fact, headed for shopping. Not me though, I have it on good authority that behind the Walmart are a few taqueros that make some of the best food in the city.

After a rickety 15 minutes, a few of us file out of the bus. I saunter past the big corporate neon sign, and sure enough, I start to hear, and smell, something good. Behind Walmart and amidst a few apartment complexes is a small enclave of food stands selling various Mexican eats. Each purveyor dishes out their own perspective: tacos, tortas ahogadas, pozole, and birria. The area is alive and buzzing.

I walk around the different vendors, looking to see if anything catches my eye. At one stand, I spot a plate getting handed to a man with what looks like an enormous tortilla piled high with various meats, still steaming hot. There's a lone stool available, so I quickly take a seat.

A man comes over to take my order, so I point and ask what that guy over there is eating. He said it's an arriero, and explains it's a corn tortilla with cheese, chorizo, asada, pastor, and beans. I order one of those and an agua fresca.

Two women are at the helm of this joint. One is on tortilla duty, grabbing a chunk of masa from the large plastic bin next to her and shaping it into a ball before it goes into the tortilla press, then onto the comal. The one near me is on protein duty, chopping the pork and cow bits that would send a stomach gurgle through the uninitiated. She looks up and sees me watching and offers a brief smile of acknowledgment. She has kind eyes. They both do.

I watch their symphonic movements for a few minutes, mesmerized by their careful orchestration. I feel a slight nudge as the folks next to me get up to leave, breaking my taco induced trance.

I take a quick scan around the area and find a small vignette of life - two young kids grabbing an early relationship taco, a middle-aged couple dressed up for a date night, families coming together for some weekend grub, and a lone eater looking for a quick bite. They all made up this beautiful moment of a shared life that's so vastly different, and in many ways more beautiful, than mine at home.

I see a big tortilla shaped and plopped on the comal within a few minutes. Hoping it’s mine, I follow it through the assembly, eventually making its way to my eager hands. I dress it with some pickled onions, lime, various salsas. You can call the arriero a relative of the quesadilla, but somehow it’s different. More formidable, maybe? Or perhaps it’s the tortilla, slightly crispy from the comal but wonderfully delicate as you bite into it.

Within minutes, I sit there with my empty plate debating another. But mostly, I watch the people around me.

---

I've returned to that same stand for my arriero fix five times now over the last two years. Each visit, the same two women work their quiet magic, each in the same role as the time before. I remember them so clearly because that first bite into the arriero was an out-of-body experience.

Most ardent travelers know the feeling - that moment when the glass shatters. Whatever causes it delights the soul in such a profound way that we are fundamentally changed. Life, as we know it, is over. The road beckons, and we'll always answer the call. Every now and then you get those moments, the challenge is to not take them for granted.

The arriero is great, but I think what always brings me back is the energy of the area. As a photographer, places like these are a dream, but each time I find it difficult to document. Here, clearly an interloper, my camera feels invasive. In a city that’s so dramatically shaped by tourism, spaces like these feel increasingly rare. Perhaps they’re better off removed from the very gaze that finds them so compelling. And the stakes feel higher these days, of course they are. Hearing the heartbreakingly hateful rhetoric coming out of the country I’m from, my presence feels as looming as the American corporation just a block away.

I can tell myself it’s about intent. I mean well, so I’m one of the good ones, right? As in, “Sorry, I don’t intend for your housing costs to double in 5 years.” I could tell myself that here, with my arriero and greasy fingers, I’m just another hungry soul drawn to good food and the warmth of community. But I can’t help but feel like intent is the foundation of every tourist’s self-delusion. We come, we eat, we document, we leave. And somehow the places we love keep disappearing.