Ignored By Rest Of Texas, Brownsville Shines Light On Itself...

By DUARDO PAZ-MARTINEZ
The Paz Files

BROWNSVILLE, Texas - Even putting aside all that silly jazz about the Blues coming to town, any observer of the doings here these days would have to say that, yes, business is taking a shine to little Brownsville. Locals are turning their backs on the rest of the indifferent region and state to shine the light on themselves. Bloggers are having a field day with every little new enterprise opening its doors to local patronage.

A coffee shop opened here the other day and bloggers Jerry McHale and Jim Barton flashed onward with breathless stories and an album of color photographs. The same was said and written about a string of bars and lounges that have found a place on the bordertown's dusty entertainment shelf. And word has it that a line of new laundromats and taquerias are on their way here. For the moment, Brownsville is enjoying the courtship of new trade. At City Hall, commissioners are standing before mirrors in their offices, all of them working on speeches claiming responsibility for the new dawning, that jingling of the cash register across the colorful, multi-ethnic downtown district.

"We're all in," said resident Alonso "El Frajo" Contreras, a newcomer whose last home was taken by drug cartels in his native Matamoros, Mexico barely a 9-iron across the Rio Grande. "I have learned English and have said goodbye to Mexico, tierra de mis padres."

Just how many of the entrepreuners are newcomers from the drug-infested country to the south is anybody's guess. But, like McAllen some 60 miles upriver, Brownsville is also welcoming deep-pocket Mexicans who either move here or invest in local businesses. It is being called "The Es Nuestro Tiempo Era" by a sector of the population openly giddy at the prospect of seeing new stores, bars, restaurants, lounges and comedy clubs, as well as the jobs they will bring. And while most of the state has yet to hear of Brownsville's luck, a few locals wonder if the influx of Mexican money is a good thing.

"They could pull up and leave own from one day to the next," said Jaconda "Que Mala" Ayala, a local waitress who has applied for a variety of the new jobs. "Then what? Do we go back to being like what we were before - boring?"

For now, the blogs are buying into the mirage, perhaps hoping that the glowing words thay are expending for these new businesses pan out. City leaders need the sales tax revenue and wish like crazy that the ongoing mess with the city's bidding imbroglio would segue, like a cumbia to a taconazo, into something more excitable and, yeah, fun.

As he walked a downtown sidewalk on his way to a beer at The Crescent Moon, Guayabera-attired blogger Jerry McHale couldn't help but imagine Brownsville completing the picture of the entertainment district he has envisioned for - what? - the past 5,000 brews: cobblestone streets, bars with outdoor patios, cafes with sunlights, streams of sexy women in too much makeup and short shorts, cab drivers honking at everybody, fat cops walking the beat, playboys providing the aroma with their Hai Karate, bartenders whistling traditional Mexican songs, strolling mariachis offering-up the mating soundtrack, that scene.

"I'm living it, vato," he says as he waits on a traffic light at an intersection, munching a hot dog he'd purchased from a Gay street vendor. "It may not be here yet, but I see it, and I feel it. That's all I know."

Mirages tend to evaporate at close review. They get those here daily. It's always something new, or something old thrown out in a new way, but always promoted as new & improved. Most of the city's grand plans, schemes some say, have gone the way of the downtown shoeshine boy.

So, we'll wait and see about this Brownsville...

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