 TIJUANA
is the Mexican border town - with every virtue and vice
that this implies. More than 36 million people cross
the border every year - the vast majority of them staying
only a few hours - so it can boast with some justification
of being the "World's Most Visited City".
There's no shortage of reasonable hotels, although as
you'd expect, most things are far more expensive than
they are further south. Above all the town is geared
towards dealing with hordes of day-trippers, which means
hundreds of souvenir stands, cheap doctors, dentists
and auto-repair shops, and countless bars and restaurants,
pricey by Mexican standards but cheaper than anything
you'll find in San Diego. One thing you won't find much
of any more - at least not anywhere near the centre
of town - is the prostitution and the sex shows for
which the border towns used to be notorious. Tijuana
does still thrive on gambling though, with greyhound
racing every evening; jai alai from 8pm every night
except Wednesday in the huge downtown Frontón
Palacio; and bullfights throughout the summer (May-Sept)
at two rings, one right on the coast, the other at the
southeast of the centre. The parts of the city most
tourists don't see fit less easily into expectations.
Modern Tijuana is among the wealthiest cities in the
Mexican republic, buoyed up by the region's duty-free
status and by maquiladora assembly plants. Downtown,
beyond the areas where most tourists venture, the modern
concrete and glass wouldn't look amiss in southern California.
The flip side of the boom lies along the border, where
shantytowns sprawl for miles.
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