A couple disclaimers:
1. Although I was only there for 1 month, I say, "lived in Mexico" because I had the option to (and seriously considered) staying for 7 or more. I think the experience I had pretty much represented what it would have been like for me there no matter how long I'd stayed.
2. I don’t want to make it all about me; my two friends and I all had very interesting & attention-filled experiences there, but I can only speak for myself (a black girl) and the interactions I had personally. It’s not to say that if you are some other race that you won’t experience something very similar (& I’m pretty sure my Asian Am. friend did).
3. Some of this may seem extreme or exaggerated but I cannot make any of this up lol! I even have footage of some of the many interactions I had. Bottom line is: if you go and you’re black, especially if you don't appear to be some random beach-goer, you WILL draw some type of attention, & people will want to interact with you very often.
4. I stayed in a touristy area (Puerto Vallarta), so I HIGHLY doubt I was the first Black person anyone had ever seen. But I was living there as if I was… living there… not like a tourist. So I wasn’t trapped on a resort, I was commuting like, grocery shopping like, and interacting with everyday Mexican people. Like 98% of the interactions I had (outside of my class/roommates) were with Mexican people/non-tourists.
Things people asked/ talked about:
my ethnicity/background
my looks
what I was doing in Mexico
my hair
how I know Spanish
my muscles
boyfriends
