Prostitutes outside Mexico City bike shops at 11am on a Thursday

There are whole blocks full of bicycle shops on Calle San Pablo, about 15 minutes walk from my hostal in the Zocalo, Mexico City Centro. I went to see if any of these shops could rent me a bike, because there´s a weekly 25-mile night ride I want to go on, and I might need a bike for that. No luck with the renting, but I did see a bunch of women on the street outside and between just about every one of the stores, dressed like sex workers. I never heard any of them advertise their services. Nor for that matter, did I hear any of them advertise the services of the bike shops where they loitered. So I wasn´t sure if they actually were or weren´t ladies of the night, or of the, uh, mid-to-late morning in this case.

And as I thought about it more, my self-centered reptilian brain became concerned with their not pursuing me and my wallet, and what that might mean. Did I actually pass for Mexicano? True, my Spanish is less rusty than I´d feared, especially in this situation, since I wasn´t talking. I wasn´t wearing typical backpackers clothing, except for the shoes and perhaps my $2 trucker hat that says ´´The Wu Tang Manual: The RZA´´. And, yeah, let´s break out the stereotype, I´m about 5 foot 6. But the beard, with the Jewish scraggle and my mom´s red hair, screams gringo pretty unequivically...

The point isn´t that they might think I´m not an extranjero, it´s that they might think I´m not rich. Which of course I am and I´m not, depending on whose standards we´re using. Since we´re using Mexico City hooker standards, and more specifically 11am Mexico City hooker standards, then yeah, I´d like to think I look prosperous enough to be propositioned. I guarantee I didn´t have a look on my face or body language saying ¨¨soy bien, gracias, no necisito mas sexo, ya tengo demasiado´´.

Later on, speaking to a Chilango local, he said these chicass were indeed prostitutas, among the cheaper in the city (for the record, they also have the reputacion of being actual women, unlike the travestidos you might unwittingly buy in other areas). He posited that they didn´t advertise because they didn´t need to. That´s true in the sense that any passerby can guess their occupation by their fashion sense. But it also speaks to a lack of belief in their own persuasiveness, which might serve them well, as pre-lunch sex on a weekday strikes me as something of an impulse purchase. Or it might just speak to them not being interested in me, because they think I´m not rich. Or because I clearly have a healthy, fulfilling sex life, and would never need to resort to coger-ing them.