Highway 101 Revisited: Get your rocks off

It’s all fun and games until someone blows a mind fuse. The thing is what trips it. In this case let’s call it the scenario.

In the second day of a national strike called upon for the purpose of protesting the administration’s education policy, the students are ready for the their favorite pastime, the juego con pacos. It is an inevitability that everyone knows. It would be surprising if it didn’t happen because after every march it happens. The encapuchados run to Plaza Peru and the University to give the call and send out the beacon, usually in the form of blocking traffic on all sides and then warming the asphalt with some sort of toxic assortment set aflame, they wait. Some yell insults, others amass armaments, but this young punk crowd knows it’s all for the game. Many may truly believe in the original intention of the day’s movements but once the greens appear, it’s all to shit.

Normally a few lookouts may come sprinting full tilt, arms a flappin to warn the masses it’s coming. De-glorified real-humanized Paul Reveres. And the hoard retreats to the U, because what can they do against a metal, chemical-laced-water spraying bull barreling down upon them motor roaring saying “I’ve got the cock n’ balls when it comes to the asphalt you little shits”.

Let the games begin!

The bull makes a pass, óle conchetumadre! Then BAM, CLAK, WHIK, CHANK, BONK the toreadores hurl their estoques of stone, concrete, and glass at the animal. This emboldens the masses and they storm out of the U, hooting and hollering like the stereotypical image of the Cheyenne tribe besting the forces of George Custer.

But please, a bit of water is not the only thing the evil green suppressors have at their disposal. A baritone thump is heard and soon shouts ring out of incoming objects leaving a trail of beige smoke in their wake. A retreat to the U is in order, but the damned smoke of the devil is everywhere! Disperse! Retreat further into the bowels of the fort! The nurses, bless their souls. Their beauty cannot be hidden by the scarves that cover their faces. An application of a lemon and salt underneath the eyes and nose mitigate the sting. The infantry are soon back on the front lines, for they too have some fiendish aces up their sleeves.

The bull makes another pass on the street, already filled with debris and puddles of acid-water. This time the natives are more resolute in their mission and a phalanx moves forward. Bursting out of the attack group is the hooded- kamikaze and in his right hand a burning wick with a bottle at the end. Thrown with all it’s might, the ex-Cabernet Sauvignon turned Octane 93 hits its mark, the eye of the beast, and explodes in a spectacular ball of flame. Another whoop comes from the banshees but it’s silenced quickly as another round of burning clouds descend upon them. But there is help on the way, for some tribesman has acquired a mask that is resistant to the sinister substance. He runs around feverously picking up the canister culprits and dousing them in his bucket. Onward comrades!

And so the game is played late into the night until it’s time for the parents to call the children to bed.