The Pajaritos channel

Location : Off Houston

I like this picture. To go from the Tanker terminal to the city, you have to
take a boat ride for about 10 minutes which takes you across the ship
channel. The boat ride costs five dollars if you are alone, and ten dollars
if you are any number greater then one. It is a calculation that I have
never been able to understand.

And its great to argue over this with the boat man because neither of you
understand each other. Ofcourse that doesn't make a difference because I
guess its the same with any person you argue with even at home. During this
boat ride, the argument we even fiercer because the boat chap was insisting
on charging me ten dollars for the solo trip. In his baseball cap and two
day old stubble, he looked like a character in "Desperado" - the kind that
gets shot in the first two seconds - while he bemoaned the rising gas prices
and the effect of carbon emmission cuts on the Mexican fiscal deficit.

As the couple of Modello beers buzzed around in my head and the cool breeze
whizzed around my ears, I squinted my eyes against the sun and took the
picture of this buoy as it whizzed past. The sun had pretty much blinded me
and in the glare I couldn't even see what the iPhone had clicked. So I put
the phone back in my pocket and gave his great diatribe with the only
sensible retort that came to mind. The first words of Spanish I had picked
up - "Uno cerveza Porfavor!" - " One beer please!". He still charged me ten
dollars.

I like this picture.