Eavesdropping on a very good pick-up in Tulum

Dave and I were facing out the window of the coffee shop. He was writing in his journal by hand and I was editing some photos. At the table behind us, I heard a conversation begin.

“Are you from around here?” a man asked someone in a clearly American accent.

“Yes,” a Spanish-speaking female replied.

“That’s amazing,” he said, his voice gentle and friendly.

I listened over the next several minutes as he made small talk with a woman who was clearly not interested in chatting. I had paused my music by this point out of curiosity.

“Is your wifi working?” he asked and I immediately knew where he was going with this. “It looks like your wifi is having trouble connecting.”

By this point, I still hadn’t turned around to look at the pair, so I pictured a sleazy pick-up artist, or jock type, based on the way he talked. I also knew he was getting desperate in his attempts to connect with the woman because my wifi was working fine in the coffee shop.

She was barely making monosyllabic replies, but he pressed on: “I am staying at a place right around the corner and we have fantastic wifi. You’re welcome to come work there and use it.”

She mumbled another monosyllabic response that I could barely make out, but it was clear she was not biting at the yoke to get out of there. She was, in the timeless advice of Jack Donaghy, refusing to go with a hippie to a second location.

Eventually curiosity got the best of me and I glanced over my shoulder and was somewhat surprised by the man’s appearance. Rather than the slick appearance of a pick-up artist I had expected, he had long dreadlocks bunched up behind his head. He wore baggy hippie rags and had a trimmed beard. His face was clean and sharp, almost like he wanted so badly to pull off the hippie look, but wasn’t crunchy enough to be authentic. I also knew this to be true by listening to him talk.

The woman was perhaps more attractive than her quiet responses implied. She was a supermodel-status Mexican with a skimpy knit tank top and perfect skin. It was hard to pull my own eyes away from her and back to my computer screen.

I returned to editing and endured the conversation happening behind me for several more minutes. The man seemed desperate to convince her that her wifi was not working, and that the wifi at his apartment was much better. In retrospect, I don’t know why I didn’t turn around and point out that I was having no problems with the internet whatsoever, thus poking a hole in his very persuasive argument that she should go with him

After saying the same thing about 6 different ways, I heard him slide his chair in and walk out into the blistering heat on the main street of Tulum. I watched out the window as the man with a voice that didn’t match his free-spirited look staggered out into the sunlight and looked for a new target to acquire.

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