It may not be what you bargained for, but chances are you’re waking up to it every morning (and trying to sleep through it every night, too!)

Melding into Mazatlán’s unique way of life is a continuous process that slowly permeates your being until your cultural comfort zone is achieved. To be comfortable within this culture, one must be more on the existential side of life than the type of person with an obsessively ordered reality. Life in Mazatlán is best lived with an open mind and an open heart, without an excessive amount of preconceived notions. This culture has many things to offer a gringo in paradise, but the experiences that possess the enduring element of spontaneity are the ones that make southern Sinaloa the unique place that it is.

Melding into Mazatlán’s unique way of life is a continuous process that slowly permeates your being until your cultural comfort zone is achieved. To be comfortable within this culture, one must be more on the existential side of life than the type of person with an obsessively ordered reality. Life in Mazatlán is best lived with an open mind and an open heart, without an excessive amount of preconceived notions. This culture has many things to offer a gringo in paradise, but the experiences that possess the enduring element of spontaneity are the ones that make southern Sinaloa the unique place that it is.

No matter how your days slide by, there’s always something within each 24-hour period that shapes one’s cultural transition. With the endless stream of holidays, cultural events, occasional demonstrations, neighborhood parties and spontaneous parades, the streets of Mazatlán can either be endlessly entertaining or the merciless montage of a foreign culture. The difference, of course, is the mindset of the observer.

The spontaneous parades that materialize along the malecón always seem to be unannounced and unexpected. These parades are often led by a traffic cop with lights flashing and siren blaring. Since they crawl by at about 15 kph, the ear-splitting wail of the siren as it slowly passes by is quite, shall we say, prolonged. I’m often enjoying a beer with friends at Puerto Viejo when I hear the approaching siren accompanied by the boisterous blasts of numerous horns.

Even though these slow-moving extravaganzas are staged for a variety of reasons, they all contain common elements. Pick-up trucks and cars festooned with balloons and pretty girls are standard fare, no matter what the occasion. Sometimes the girls are safely ensconced in the back of the trucks, but many times they’re crammed in the cars with one or more sitting on the sloping hood or precariously perched on the roof. So far, I haven’t witnessed anyone sliding off into the street, but past occurrences seem likely.

The other common element in these parades is the ubiquitous sound truck(s). These vehicles carry only the driver, who must be either deaf or willing to sustain severe hearing damage in order to complete his mission. These trucks are filled with enough large speakers to outfit a rock concert and they’re cranked to the max. The 50,000 decibels of distorted music emanating from them make the siren seem like soft jazz.

Another spontaneous cultural occurrence that can damage your ears is the neighborhood party. These high-volume events are not geographically specific, nor seasonally exclusive, and they can materialize on any given night from Cerritos to Centro and go until dawn. One of the cultural passions of every red-blooded Mazatleco is the home-grown sound of Banda. With its multitude of horns and drums, your average Banda band can be heard for the better part of a kilometer. Once you realize - and accept - that this city always celebrates at full volume, you’ll know your cultural transition is progressing.

There’s a certain cultural undercurrent in Mazatlán that shapes the perception of time. This pervades all strata of society. Locals treat time as a minor element in the ebb and flow of life, not as a nagging deity demanding to shape your reality. This is one of the most difficult aspects of life in Mazatlán for the average gringo to truly embrace. The people of this culture seem to spend their waking hours in the present, not distracted by the infinite potentialities of the future. This attitude sometimes comes in conflict with folks that have recently come to Mexico and have not left the god of time swirling in the wake of their departure. If you have brought your daily planner from north of the border and expect to accomplish a lengthy list of sequential activities, you may experience culture shock. To enjoy life in Mazatlán, one needs to shed one’s wristwatch along with expectations borne from the frenetic gringo culture.

There are many unforeseen things in this town that can consume your time as efficiently as a black hole eats matter. Adapting the attitude of the locals really helps to stave off anxiety generated by the notion that time is more important than life. The spontaneous meeting of friends on the street can evolve into a lengthy conversation without the encroachment of time to mar the encounter. When you accomplish this most-difficult aspect of your cultural transition, you’re halfway there. The other half, of course, is trying to get used to all the damn noise.

Bodie Kellogg is an independent researcher presently engaged in a search for the perfect Mexican cantina. He can possibly be found slumped over a table in one of the many cantinas that dot the local landscape; if not try This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .