In the winching game, they call it "recovery," the act of getting a vehicle unstuck. Now, most people I know who drive big wheeled 4x4s have a winch that is glistening with disuse. It sits there on a big bull bar and speaks to potential unfulfilled. All show, no go, as my old wrench used to say, disparagingly. Here in the jungle, a winch is something altogether different. It's a damn useful tool. Even so, I'd gone a long time before using it, mainly because I don't drive like an idiot and I'm not exactly itching to offer assistance to those who do.
The other day (well, several months back), things changed. I was going to a friend's wedding up in the hills/mountains of central Costa, tooling along the crap road that promised to be the last before arriving, when I came upon a group of girls standing beside a Toyota Yaris that was well and truly hung up in a ditch. As the light was fading, I offered the girls a ride (my, how gallant) to the wedding site, and told them we'd deal with it in the morning. After a night of booze and music, I awoke on the ground, covered in leaves, with a dim and grudging memory of the task at hand. After fashioning a tightener from a rather limited list of essential ingredients and firing up a spiritual that one of the stranded girls had brought, I signaled it was time to do the deed: Winch out the wenches.
We drove the half click back to their car, silently, in contemplation of the rigors ahead. We got there and it looked worse than before. They had really got it stuck.
--Why a Yaris? I asked. I mean, it's a city car, a freaking sedan, and here we are in the mountains. Did they not have a 4runner or something?
---We didn't think we'd need it, and it would have been twice the cash!
Good answer. Plus, the groom had lied about the road. Or rather, it was a good road compared to the ones he was used to, so really he wasn't lying, just caught in a bout of relativism. I looked again at the stranded vehicle.
--Please tell me you guys swerved out of the way because some bunny jumped in front of you, because otherwise I can't figure out why the hell you got so far over to the left.
Lots of embarrassed stares at the ground. OK, I'm not going to press the issue. Just get them out of there, and then I can go about making a parrilla to cook the 100lbs of meat I brought up as a wedding present and that I'd been aging for 3 weeks especially for this moment. My first time doing that, and I had a gnawing fear that there might be hell to pay, as in it would taste like ass, or worse, I'd give the crowd food poisoning. I decided I'd be very happy if nobody died on account of my meat/gift.
I got the car into position. Ideally, I would have pulled it out from the front, up the gentle slope of the ditch and back onto the road. That would have been simple. In the recovery game, though, things are rarely simple. To wit: there was no tow point/hook to be found up front. Actually, there was a little hole designed so one could screw in a tow hook and then use that for exactly this situation, but, in their infinite wisdom, the good rent-a-car people had neglected to include the hook with the car. We checked every damn Yaris at the wedding (and there were quite a few) and none of them had hooks. I imagined some desk jockey making that decision: well, we told them not to go offroad, so if they do, fuck 'em. Muy amable, Señor. So, it had to be from behind, and worse, from below as well, with the looming danger being that there was an even deeper ditch, around 3m or so, ready to swallow the car entirely and leave recovery by helicopter as the only viable option. The gauntlet was thrown: get these ladies out and be a hero, or get them into deeper trouble and look like an ass with expensive toys that you clearly didn't know how to use. Tests such as these define the man. Right, here we go.
A winch is a simple thing: a spool of steel cable with a beefy hook at the terminus, powered by (in this case) a 9.5hp motor. It can only do two things, pull in or reel out, a binary relationship mandated by the thankfully very long lead wire and controller attachment. A simple toggle switch that goes up for out, and down for in. I was parked 10m behind and below, and had attached to a bit of frame on the right side of the Yaris that I felt wouldn't peel away under pressure. Slowly, I reeled in the wire until there was some tension. Stood way, way off to the right, appropriately concerned with any possible break in the wire that would send it screaming at my head. With visions of my imminent decapitation looming, I got semi-protected behind a thin tree and started to winch in earnest. The car pulled back and there was the awful sound of stone on metal as it ground over the berm. Still, we were looking good, even though all 4 wheels were now off the ground, a classic high side pin. The only other male around, who we'll call David because that's his name, got in the car and found reverse. The Yaris is a front wheeled little bitch, so the tires were spinning and not much was happening except it tilting more and more to the left, ie. the front end was about to ram the stone embankment they had narrowly missed before. I started calculating damages and wondered at the extent of their insurance. OK, fuck. Start over. Reposition my rig, find a new tow point, build up a purchase for the front tires, stones, boards, branches, and get some people pushing. By now a taxi that was trying to leave the wedding was forced to stop and the diminutive driver rushed over to offer his assistance/opinions. I told him to get behind the wheel and go easy at first on the gas, then hammer it once he got some traction. David was pushing from up front. Another partygoer, a rather intense Israeli probably fresh off some secret commando shit, showed up and immediately decided we had no clue, so he got up on the trunk and started bouncing to push weight to the rear. I winched in the line of fire. The wenches stood off to the side, obviously bummed that this had turned into such a production.
The car moved, tracking a straighter line but still flirting in earnest with the dropoff into sure destruction. I couldn't get a better angle, so if we didn't get those wheels to grip, I'd basically have pulled their car into a total disaster. David groaned, the Israeli bounced, and then the front wheels caught. It was right then that I thought, fuck, David is in the wrong spot, but before I could warn him--ding! a rock we'd placed under the left front wheel spit out and nailed him on the knee. He collapsed in pain as the car surged back, cresting the berm to relative safety and freedom. Car recovered, we checked our fallen compatriot. I'm sure it hurt like hell, but there was nothing broken, other than some skin. The girls comforted him. I'm pretty sure it was worth it.
We were all sweaty and adrenaline charged, and pretty satisfied with our utility and chivalry. The Israeli sort of rolled his eyes at our high fives, like if there wasn't anybody being hauled to safety under sniper fire then really, nothing much was happening, and moved on. We left the car locked and pointed the only way it should ever go, out, and went back to the wedding for a much needed beer or three. How nice the beer tasted after a hard morning of winching! A proper reward.
The rest of the day was a blur of activity. Went to town gathering supplies to make a grill. 100 pounds plus of meat, remember, and even though duly advised of this, there was no grill on premises. Fine. We'd buy one. But, nobody sells that kind of grill in the sticks of Costa. Fine, we'd build one. Rebar and cinderblocks placed around a deep pit filled with wood. Some crazy man, a wiry strip of muscle and hair, surveys the mass of beef and tells me the only way to do it is with an earthen oven. I don't know what the hell that is, but I trust the maniacal gleam in his eye. OK, let's do. We get the fire blazing. Meat goes on top of the makeshift grill and banana leaves cover the meat. On top of that, cardboard boxes torn into flat pieces. On top of that, a mountain of mud, the crazy man tossing it on with his bare hands. One guest, a doughy, big guy from MN, is helping out when his wife comes up to ask what the hell he's doing, exactly. Apparently the wedding is about to start, she's sunburned, and peeved because one of her cousins or sisters or something has fallen ill. "My family is getting sick helping out other people!!" she bleats. He bows his head and follows her to the ceremony. This is sort of an ironic, cautionary tale against marriage and the dangers of emasculation, so we naturally ignore it and keep building our oven. A stick pokes in the holes to allow oxygen to feed the fire. The whole thing smolders satisfactorily. "OK. That's it! Now we just have to wait 4 hours. Maybe more." Alrighty then. Let's watch these guys get hitched! The bride is beautiful and the groom is witty. It's a short, sweet ceremony, among good friends, just as it should be. Then it's dinner time and of course, we're nowhere near done. There's a one legged cook who's got the rest of the meal under control, but shrugs his shoulders occasionally at me like, where's the beef? Of course, the day before he was the one telling me he would be cooking it, but plans change. Evolve or die. Or at least go without some tasty beef. People finish eating and music and dancing begin. I watch a smoking mound. Finally, crazy man sees something I can't see and shouts, it's done and starts tearing into the oven with his hands again. Dude is nothing if not committed. Perhaps he should be committed, but if this beef is edible I owe him big time, so I'm happy to have him free and helpfully unfettered. It seems to have worked; the meat is nicely charred and piping hot. We haul it over to the serving table. What the hell, meat for dessert! If you haven't guessed by now, this was a hippie wedding in the middle of nowhere, and 3/4 of the crowd is vegetarian, or worse, vegan. But a strange thing happens. People start lining up for a taste. People are saying things like, "I haven't eaten meat in 20 years, but I heard the story of you and your cow, and I think it's a noble sacrifice by this animal, so--let me eat some of that meat! No, give me some more!!" I carve meat like I'm one of those guys at a Brazilian churrascaria. It's perfectly cooked, medium rare, juices oozing. People are saying things like, "I'm from Texas, and I love meat, and I have to say, this is the best I've ever tasted! No, gimme me some more, dammit!!" I serve and serve. Vegetarians are staining their shirts and souls. My hands are literally burned from working with the steaming stacks. I snack little pieces here and there and decide that, while not the best I've ever had, it's pretty good. Maybe I'm too close to my work. Some kind soul keeps feeding me beer. David comes over and silently we clink bottles, take a full swig, exhale. A full day. A winching. A marriage. A half a cow cooked in the earth. Blood spilled , blood shared, and blood consumed. A time for latter day Vikings and vegans alike to find common ground.
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