THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, August 14, 1996 TAG: 9608140363
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A7 EDITION: FINAL
SERIES: Decision '96
SOURCE: BY ROBERT LITTLE, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: TIJUANA, MEXICO LENGTH: 87 lines
Virginians take note: The governor has journeyed to Mexico and stumbled on a key to the mysteries of international trade, foreign relations and the free-market economy.
It's frogs. Stuffed frogs, dressed like Mexicans and drinking beer. The more revolting, the better.
Time was, Gov. George F. Allen said Tuesday on his informal trade mission (a k a shopping spree) below the border, that the streets of Tijuana were just brimming with stuffed frogs. Back when the roads were dirt, kids urinated in the streets and haggling was regarded as a science on par with nuclear physics back home.
But now, those frogs he grew to love are all but gone. And so is the border-town hullabaloo.
``So much has changed,'' Allen said. ``I liked it when it was more of an adventure. Now it's so . . . so organized.''
After arriving in San Diego for the Republican National Convention, Allen traveled 15 miles south over the Mexican border to give his Virginia underlings a taste of some serious, hard-core commerce. He'd been to the border town four or five times before and always left laden with exotic trinkets, a stuffed reptile or two, and a renewed respect for the shameless capitalism of it all.
He billed the trip as a trade mission but planned to spend no time with Tijuana officials. ``Gosh, I hope not,'' he said. He also called it a ``Virginia expedition.''
But what the trip amounted to, once Allen realized that so-called progress had eroded the stuffed-frog market, was Virginia's top-ranking Republican, tailed by aides, state troopers and about a dozen reporters and photographers, walking the streets of Tijuana and calling, ``Frogs? Stuffed frogs?''
When a guest named Jose told him the Spanish word for frogs, he changed the mantra to ``Sapos, senor?''
What the governor was asking for with ``sapos'' was actually toads.
Allen did have other purchases in mind - like the renowned vanilla extract. At the Plaza Mondero, he negotiated his best price on Mexican jumping beans - 13 for a dollar - but balked at $14 and change for the elaborate ``rain stick'' noise maker.
``Don't you know? This is like wheeling and dealing,'' shouted proprietor Eric Gomez, crestfallen when Allen walked away. ``It's like Monte Hall.''
Minutes later, a block off Avenida Revolucion, he worked poor Miriam Aguiler from 10 bucks each to two for $12 on the ceramic angels he wanted for his wife, Susan.
``What, are you going to tell me you're losing money on this?'' Allen asked.
Then Aguiler whipped out a calculator, punched in some numbers mumbling about pesos and exchange rates, and announced that, yes, she was losing money.
``You ripped me off just now,'' she said. ``You're stingy.''
He kept the political image in mind all the while, of course. He declined the media's urgings that he ride a zebra-painted burro named ``Bimbo.'' He denied the photographers the pleasure of walking under a sign that said ``Topless Show Girls.''
But with each shack and shanty scoured, each corner turned, the disappointment mounted over the glaring sapo drought.
Then he found it. Deep in the bilge of a storefront shop called Kentucky Curios & Coins, which Allen quickly dubbed ``Colonel Sanches,' '' was a whole shelf, head high, jammed with 50 or more frogs of all shapes and sizes.
It was ``sapo heaven,'' he said. ``The Madre load.''
So many choices. Sapos playing bongos. Sapos drinking hot sauce.
``This one is an ugly, sickening color,'' Allen said with a contented grin, grabbing a particularly plump sapo playing a strange Latin instrument. ``This could induce vomiting.''
With that, he made a half-hearted haggle down to six bucks, jammed two stuffed frogs into his bag and walked out the door toward the bus.
Finally, success, he said. But somehow, it just wasn't the same.
``It's gone downhill,'' Allen lamented.
Then he looked over his shoulder and shouted.
``Jose, how do you say disgusting?''
Jose shouted something back.
``Repulsivo?'' asked Allen. Then he settled into his chair again, as if resigning to the changing times.
``Before you could find it all,'' he sighed. ``Mucho repulsivo.'' ILLUSTRATION: Photo by HUY NGUYEN, The Virginian-Pilot
Gov. George F. Allen talks with a vendor during a trip he labeled a
trade mission Monday in Tijuana, Mexico. Allen, who led guests and
media on a search for stuffed frogs, finally found the sopas, as he
called them, at the Kentucky Curios & Coins shop.
KEYWORDS: REPUBLICAN NATIONAL CONVENTION by CNB