Rooster Fights in Ajijic, Lake Chapala, Mexico
Rooster Fights in Ajijic, Lake Chapala, Mexico
Roosters… Not just a wake-up call any more
Let me start out by apologizing for the up coming pun….sorry. I recently went to the cock fights in Ajijic. I am a bit “chicken” to write about it because I know for Gringos it is a rather controversial subject.
I am not a vegetarian but I do think of myself as an animal lover. Michael Vick is a right bugger and he deserves to be in jail. Having said that, I need to confess I have no deep affection for poultry. We grow them in a box, kill them and sell them to a military guy from Kentucky in a white suit and bolo tie. That’s pretty much a chicken’s life.
I can’t speak fluent chicken and I only know of a few people who do but I think if we asked them they would want a chance to fight for their lives. I saw an American woman passing around a petition to stop the fights for “humane reasons”.
I can see where she was coming from but never the less I wanted to start a petition to prevent gringos from starting petitions. It really isn’t our place to tell these folks what they should and shouldn’t be doing? Haven’t we changed their lives enough already?
As one of the local chaps pointed out, “roosters fight each other when they run across each other in the wild. It’s part of nature”. He was bigger than me so I didn’t ask where one found chickens in the “wild” but he may be right.
At any rate, it was fun to attend a function in Ajijic where there were no gringos. Not that I have anything against gringos but things seem more genuinely Mexican when they aren’t around. This was truly a national geographic Mexican moment, from the guys taking the bets to the trainers and crowd. Every face had tremendous character and it wasn’t all homogenized and sterile, quite far from it actually.
If you go ( don’t you’ll ruin it) don’t fall for the “bet on the biggest chicken” theory. I fell for that one and got my butt kicked. The winning formula is a simple three step process. 1. Get a face full of beer. This will make you brave and unafraid to bet your hard earned money on a chicken. 2. Look around the crowd and try to spot someone who looks like they might be knowledgeable on the subject and ask their opinion. 3. Do the complete opposite of what the expert says ( no one knows diddely squat about who’s going to win) That works and I came out ahead.
The fights are very fast and it’s all over for the loser pretty quickly. I am not an idiot. I know it’s somewhat cruel ( as most fights to the death are) but I have to admit I had fun. I feel bad about that and I would hate it if it became popular for people listing their house to have competing realtors strap razors to their ankles and go at it but it was fun. What can I say?