But natural disasters like poisonous air and earthquakes weren’t the worst dangers I’d face in Mexico. The biggest danger came courtesy of another human being.
One of my favorite restaurants in the country was VIP’s, a diner similar to Denny’s that served tremendous American-style food. I was eating my favorite dinner of a steak sandwich with a fruit plate, when I noticed a really cute girl staring at me from across the crowded room. I waved at her and she beckoned me to come over to the table she was sitting at with another guy. She spoke decent English and admitted that she and her brother (bonus!) were fans of mine. We spoke for a few minutes and she asked me if I wanted to go to a party with them. Did I? She was a knockout and I wanted to rock with her big time, so I accepted immediately. I played big shot and paid for their meals, then got into their car and left.
Her brother was driving and I was in the back seat with Ingrid and we were getting to know each other’s tonsils. The scenery began to get darker and more desolate the farther we went, so I asked Ingrid’s brother where the party was. He simply replied, “Está bien,” (it’s okay) as Ingrid poked her tongue into my mouth again. Even though she was a great kisser, I started to get the bad feeling that maybe there was no party. My suspicions were confirmed when we pulled over on the side of the barren road. When Ingrid’s brother got out of the car, came around to my window, and calmly pulled a gun on me, I literally almost pissed my pants.
Ever had a gun pulled on you? Trust me when I say that it’s the coldest, most helpless feeling you could ever have. Your life lies completely in another person’s hands and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it.
“Get out of the car,” he said in perfectly clear English.
I slowly got out, cursing my stupidity for putting myself in that position. He switched back to Spanish and said, “Take your money and put it on the roof of the car.”
I never carried around much money in case I got robbed, but I gave him what I had. He put the few hundred pesos into his pocket and pointed the gun directly into my face. It was going to end for me on a darkened road in a foreign country. It was an embarrassing way to die and the worst part of it was that nobody even knew where I was. All I could think of was my poor mom.
He stared directly into my eyes and I stared directly into the barrel of his gun. It was so close that I could see the grooves inside, like at the beginning of a James Bond movie. The seconds seemed like hours, his stare never wavering, until he lowered the gun with a smirk, got back into the car, and drove away. I saw Ingrid laughing at me as they sped past on the dirt road and my only thought was, “That bitch robbed me and I just bought her dinner.”
With the taste of her lipstick still in my mouth, I breathed a sigh of relief that my brains weren’t spattered all over the countryside. But I was still on the darkened outskirts of one of the most dangerous cities in the world; a gringo who had no money and couldn’t speak Spanish. I also had no clue where I was. It might’ve been easier if the guy had shot me.
A pair of scrawny dogs joined me as I walked toward the faint glow in the sky that I assumed came from the lights of the city. After about an hour of hoofing it, I waved down a passing taxi. When the driver slowed down enough to see me, he sped up and left me hanging. A gringo walking down a deserted road in the dead of night? I wouldn’t have picked me up either.
I walked for another hour until finally another taxi driver risked his life to pick me up. When we finally got to the Plaza, I had to borrow money from the doorman to pay for my ride.
The moral of the story is twofold:
1. Don’t pick up strange women at restaurants.
2. Don’t pay for their dinners if you do.
I learned another lesson the hard way when I drank Mexican tap water. I was constantly careful to only drink sealed bottled water, but I made the mistake of drinking a bottle of unsealed water in the dressing room in Guadalajara. It was common for the vendors to refill empty bottles with tap water and resell them unsealed. A few minutes after I drank it, there was a knock on the door.
“Mr. Jericho, meet Monty Zuma.”
It was the shits.
I began to feel the effects as soon as I boarded the plane back to Mexico City: The moment I sat down, I felt some gurgling. We got stuck behind another plane waiting to take off so I wasn’t allowed to get up to go to the bathroom. Then as we sped up for the takeoff, the pilot slammed on the brakes at about 100 miles an hour. I flew forward, snapped back into the seat, and promptly filled my pants.
I looked out the window, whilst squirming in my soiled chair and noticed that the cargo door had snapped open and a bunch of bags had fallen out of the hold onto the runway. Of course mine was one of them. My bag had bounced across the runway and settled into a puddle of mud...similar to the one that currently resided in the pants of the mighty Chris Jericho.
At least Hector Guerrero didn’t have a problem hanging out with Poopypants Jericho and wanted to introduce me to his brother Eddy, who had just returned from a tour of Japan. Eddy’s reputation as a great wrestler and a great person preceded him. If he was anything like his brother, I had a feeling we would get along great right off the bat.
We didn’t.
When I walked into Hector’s room, I found Eddy sprawled upon the bed wearing only his underwear. He looked like I thought he would: little mustache, big arms, big shoulders, big back, and big mullet. But he didn’t act like I thought he would. The first words out of his mouth to me were, “Who the fuck do you think you are?”
I wasn’t sure how to answer that.
Then with a sneer, he asked me what my name was. I was confused, as Hector had just introduced me as Chris Jericho, so I thought he was asking me what my wrestling name was.
“I wrestle as Corazón de León. It’s Spanish for Lion Heart.”
He said disgustedly, “I’m Mexican...I know what Corazón de León means.” He followed with, “What are you, some kind of mark? I don’t mean your wrestling name. I mean your real name.”
A mark is a term for a fan or for a wrestler who believes in his own hype and isn’t exactly a term of endearment.
I reiterated to him that my name was Chris (too) and assured him that I was not a mark. He grunted a few more choice words for me under his breath, rolled over, and went to sleep. Eddy Guerrero, supposed sweetheart, had turned out to be a complete ass.
When I saw him at breakfast the next day, he instantly apologized to me. When I asked him what for, he said, “For whatever I said or did last night. I’m not sure exactly what it was, but I figured I should apologize.” I laughed at his honesty and his complete change of character. I accepted his apology and it was the start of a friendship that would last until his death twelve years later.
My link to the Guererro family continued when Paco informed me I was going to be winning the NWA middleweight title. Eddy and Hector’s father, Gory, had been one of the first men to wear the belt some fifty years earlier. Subsequently, the title had been held by some of the biggest names in Mexican wrestling history. Now it was my turn and I wanted to take the title with a brand-new move I’d been working on. My idea was to do a splash from the top rope with a full 360 degree spin in midair. It was both acrobatic and unique and I was ready to debut it that night.
I was warming up in the dressing room before the match with the champion, Mano Negra. I wanted to do the spin a few more times to prepare, so I went into the bathroom for some privacy. I jumped up and spun around on the spot a few times and decided I needed more rotation. But as I jumped again, I slipped on some water on the floor and landed ribs first on the side of a sharp corner of the sink. I fell to the ground with the wind knocked out of me and gasping for air, while my ring music pounded throughout the building. I dragged myself out of the bathroom and down the backstage hallway. I felt like barfing as I lurched to the ring as a knitting needle stabbed me in the side every time I took a breath. However, once the match started, I managed to get through to the finish.
I exe
cuted my brand-new maneuver—which looked like shit—and won the title. But even though I was a babyface, the people began to boo. The patriotic Mexican fans didn’t like the idea of a gringo winning a championship from one of their own, no matter how much they hated Mano Negra. As popular as I was, some fans were never going to fully accept me because I was a foreigner.
Some of the office employees didn’t want to accept me either. The first time I wrestled in Guadalajara, I received an amazing reaction from the fans who’d never seen me before. But the referee, of all people, had an attitude toward me and didn’t seem to want me there. This was proved correct when I got in the ref’s face during the course of the match and instead of backing down as a ref should, he slapped me in the face. I was furious but I finished the match like a professional.
Afterward, I stormed into the dressing room and confronted the son of a bitch. To my surprise, he slapped me again. I had alls I could takes and I couldn’t takes no more, so I tackled him and paintbrushed him from the mount. He was a small, wiry guy in his mid-fifties and it was like trying to hold down a greased pig. Finally the boys pulled me off him. I was completely embarrassed, but all of my frustrations of being a stranger in a strange land boiled over when this dick had taken advantage of me.
In Canada, I learned how to wrestle. In Mexico, I learned how to be a star. But as big of a star as I was, I was still an outsider.
CHAPTER 18
CORAZON DE POLLO
After my grueling fight with a fifty-year-old man, I needed some R & R. Hector had driven his car to Mexico from Texas, so he, Eddy, and I decided to check out the ancient Mayan Sun and Moon pyramids, a mere three hours’ drive from Mexico City.
It was surreal to stand beside the massive structures (built by aliens I’m sure), and feeling the life-force of countless beings that had stood where I was standing thousands of years earlier. There were still bloodstains on the altar of sacrifice on the Sun Pyramid. But as eerie as it was, there was only so much you could do at the pyramids before you got bored. So when we walked the steps of the Moon Pyramid, we decided that it was only apropos to drop our pants and hang a moon. It’s a wonder why the rest of the world thinks that Americans are idiots, isn’t it?
It was always a relief to return to the Plaza where I could blow off steam with the other outsiders who dwelled there. Our gang had been joined by another gringo that I knew from watching the AWA years before, King Haku.
After the AWA, he’d gone on to become a star in the WWE and had even been a tag team champion with Andre the Giant. Haku was huge, standing 6 foot 3 and weighing over 300 pounds, but he was one of the kindest men I’ve ever met, with a heart of pure gold. We both worked for Paco, so we saw each other almost on a daily basis and bonded quickly.
Haku’s real name was Tonga UliUli Fifita and he was from the isle of Tonga in the South Pacific. When people asked him questions about his background it usually turned into an Abbott and Costello routine.
“What’s your name?”
“Tonga.”
“Where are you from?”
“Tonga.”
“So, what’s your name?”
“Tonga.”
“But where are you from?”
“TONGA! My name is Tonga and I’m from Tonga! Get it?”
Tonga started his career as a sumo wrestler in Japan before making a name for himself in the States. He was the first major WWF star I’d met and I deluged him with countless questions about working for Vince McMahon.
“When you were in the WWF, who made your costumes for you?”
“Do you have to come up with your name or does Vince McMahon?”
“Do you have to pay for your own plane tickets?”
“Do you wear boxers or briefs?”
Tonga finally snapped. “Why do you ask me so many questions? Stop asking so many questions. You’re like a child!”
I started to weep.
The first show we were booked on together was in Acapulco and since we were in the main event, we convinced the promoter to fly us in. That saved us from another of Marlin Perkinez’ Wild Kingdom bus rides.
I arrived at the airport late for my flight, so I checked in quickly and ran through the concourse to security. When the guard asked to see the contents of my bag, I explained that I only had minutes to make my flight. He flashed a gold-toothed grin and slowly unzipped the case. He pulled out a tube of toothpaste and asked me what it was. When I told him it was a tube of toothpaste, he said he didn’t believe me. I looked at my watch and saw my flight was leaving in ten minutes. He examined my deodorant and my gonch (sicko). Then he found my title belt and mockingly placed it around his waist, doing a little jig for his fellow guards. He was obviously fucking with me and I lost my cool.
Maybe it was because I was a luchador, maybe it was because I was a gringo, but it pissed me off that he was going to make me miss my flight, so I grabbed my Right Guard and threw it at the Wrong Guard. I started swearing and throwing a temper tantrum, which was the worst thing to do and I knew it but I couldn’t help it. I was digging my own grave and I’d gone too far to turn back. In mid-tirade I felt a hand on my back, so I turned around and gave its owner a solid push to the chest, causing her to fall down.
That’s right...HER.
I’d shoved a female guard and she’d fallen hard to the floor. “Oh shit...here we go,” I thought.
The guards surrounded me, shouting in Spanish. It was like something out of a bad Van Damme movie (was there ever a good Van Damme movie?) as the platoon advanced toward me. I had no idea what I was going to do, when suddenly in the distance I heard a deep voice yelling, “HEY! WHAT’S GOING ON DERE?”
I turned to look and I’ve never in my life been so happy to see a 300-pound Tongan. Tonga entered the fray and immediately pawed two of the cops out of his way. When another guard got in his face, he lifted the guy off the ground by his jacket. Pancho’s feet were kicking in midair just like Darth Vader’s first victim in the beginning of Star Wars. Moments later Tonga and I were back to back like gunfighters in the O.K. Corral. Then for the second time in my life I had a gun pulled on me, this time by an airport policeman.
The guards marched us through the concourse while travelers stared at us like we were a pair of criminals, which at that point we were. They left us in a little room with no chairs or windows so we sat on the floor and discussed how things got out of control so quickly. After about an hour, an official-looking guy in a suit came in and spoke to us in perfect English.
“I want you to tell me what happened.”
I told him step by step what went down and how sorry I was. I also told him that Tonga was only trying to help and was not at fault. I explained that we were stressed out but loved living and working in Mexico and felt blessed that we were able to support our families from the money we made in his beautiful country. It was a desperate ass kissing, but I was a desperate (yet still sexy) man.
He told us that he was the manager of the airport and noted that besides my overreacting and a little pushing and shoving, nothing that terrible had happened.
“I could have you charged with assault, but that won’t be necessary as long as you tip the security guards,” he explained very seriously.
Tonga and I looked at each other and read between the lines. When you’re facing the threat of being charged with a felony, the difference between a tip and a bribe blurs considerably. We pooled our resources and gave the guy about 1,000 pesos (350 bucks). He pocketed the cash and assured us that the guards would be quite happy, although I’ll bet you a Gerardo record that those guards never saw one peso of our tip. Then he opened the door but before we could leave he asked us for autographs for his kids.
The comedy never ends.
Tonga and I hung out a lot afterward and I found it frustrating that whenever we went anywhere, he always paid the bill. Tonga had trained to wrestle in Japan, and it was a tradition that the veteran paid for the rookie. When Tonga was a young boy (kohai), his mentor (sempai
) paid for him and now he was carrying on the tradition. I respected Tonga for his accomplishments, his demeanor, and his treatment of others and I would have taken a bullet for him. I learned from him to respect those who came into the business before me and to teach that same respect to those who came into the business after me.
Tonga also taught me that a Canadian could never out-drink a Tongan, no matter how hard I tried. One night after drinking mescal (which tastes like a dirty ashtray) until five in the morning, I stumbled into my room and passed out on the floor. I was awakened two hours later by Tonga hammering on my door, wanting to go do aerobics. I ignored him for as long as I could but when he didn’t go away I was forced to get physical. When we arrived at the gym, Tonga stopped aerobicising after five minutes but encouraged/threatened me to continue for the rest of the session. He was too loaded to argue with...come to think of it, so was I. When the class ended we were the only two people left in the studio. We stank so bad as the stench of day-old booze emanated out of our pores that everyone else had left, including the teacher.
While I needed work on my jazzercising, my in-ring persona was developing nicely. It was fun being a técnico but I enjoyed it when crowds turned on me from time to time. I found it easier being a rudo because it’s a lot harder to make people like you than it is to make them hate you. A simple scowl or a cocky walk to the ring was all you needed to be rewarded with a chorus of boos and a pelting of garbage.
I learned this from watching Negro Casas, the best heel in Mexico. He taught me that a heel should always cheat and take the easy way out of a situation. His theory was that a rudo was a coward at heart.
A Lion's Tale: Around the World in Spandex Page 13