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Vice Blog

Mexican girls on four-wheelers

My mom was born in a small town in western Mexico called Cotija, Michoacán. Although few people know about it, everyone owes this town a debt for giving the world the delicious Cotija cheese, some chubby Catholic saint, and one of Mexico's most infamous paedophiles, the founder of the Legionaries of Christ and John Paul II's protégé, Marcial Maciel. For 11 months out of the year, Cotija, like most small burgs in Mexico, is a ghost town. All you see are old people and children because everyone else—all the young guys and most of the girls—is working in the US, mostly as grape pickers in the Napa Valley. But every December, the town changes completely when all the people come back from "the other side" and the population temporarily triples. Suddenly, the church has to extend its hours because there are weddings every hour. The priests have to marry more than one couple at a time. The bars overflow and the main square is packed. Although this happens all over Mexico, Cotijences have their own unique way of saying, "I crossed the border and I made it," and that is by driving huge ATVs. This year's most fashionable rides are the Yamaha Grizzly 660 4x4 and the Polaris Sportsman 500. These things are fucking huge and beautiful, and they look even better when las chicas guapas of my mom's hometown are riding them around the main square, all made up in their tank tops and tight jeans.

WORDS AND PHOTOS BY BERNARDO LOYOLA