Commentary : Portrait of a Muppie: Light Beer, Leather, Top-of-the-Line T-Bird

I thought I’d left the Yuppies behind when I moved to Mexico. You know who the Yuppies are: those young, urban, upwardly mobile professionals who drive BMWs, drink white wine and eat Brie cheese. (Though nowadays I suspect they’re drinking wine coolers and eating creole food.) Anyway, I didn’t think there were any in Mexico.

Wrong. There are Yuppies in Mexico, too. I propose that we call these Mexican Yuppies Muppies.

Do you know how to recognize a Muppie? Like Yuppies, they are young doctors, attorneys, brokers, bankers, architects and engineers. Like Yuppies, Muppies cluster in cities. In Baja, you find them in Tijuana and Mexicali.

If you hang around the border, anywhere from San Diego to Ensenada, you are going to see a lot of Muppies. Here’s how you’ll know them:

Unlike Yuppies, Muppies don’t drive BMWs. Well, they might if they are very rich Muppies. That’s because it’s difficult to get European cars into Mexico on a permanent basis. Therefore, your average Muppie drives a Cougar, a Tempo or a top-of-the-line T-Bird with a telephone.

What Muppies drink depends on what side of the border they are on. In Mexico, they drink Don Pedro Campechana, which is Don Pedro brandy mixed with Coca-Cola and Teohuacan mineral water; or they drink the house Scotch, which is significantly cheaper in Mexico than any brand name.

I’ve yet to see a male Muppie order a glass of white wine.

On the U. S. side, Muppies drink light beer. Any brand will do. Muppies aren’t impressed with Corona beer, which is the official Yuppie drink. Muppies also like XO Cognac.

Yuppies and Muppies are electronic name droppers. Yuppies like Sony; Muppies like Motorola.

Yuppies and Muppies like designer clothes. Many Muppies cross into the United States to buy their clothes, and would not be caught dead in a guayabera (those embroidered white shifts favored by Mexican elder statesmen and Ferdinand Marcos). I predict that guayaberas are going to be very popular with Yuppies inside a year.

Only a very few Muppies wear loafers without socks. Casual dress to Muppies means leather jackets and heavy gold-nugget jewelry.

I’m not sure what Yuppies do on Sunday afternoons. Muppies go to the bullfights, but only if they can sit in the first three rows.

Male and female Yuppies are feminists. I can definitively state that there are no Muppie Alan Aldas. There may be female Muppie feminists, but I haven’t met one.

Both Yuppies and Muppies send their children to private schools. But, after school, Yuppie children, boys and girls, play soccer. Muppie children take classes: karate for boys, ballet for girls.

Yuppies and Muppies like to ski in the winter. The only way to tell them apart, since they ski the same areas, is to listen to what language they’re speaking. However, more Muppies speak English than Yuppies speak Spanish.

Tijuana Muppies like to cross into the United States on the weekend. Ocean-loving Muppies patronize Coronado and La Jolla beaches. That’s probably because the parents of these Muppies have a U. S. home in Rancho Santa Fe. Country-loving Muppies go to Bonita.

Mexicali Muppies like San Felipe in the winter and Rosarito in the summer. You’ll never recognize a Mexicali Muppie by his car. They drive station wagons; must be something to do with living in the desert.

I think we need further study on this topic. I propose that the Yuppies of Southern California invite the Muppies of Northern Baja to a meeting to discuss the similarities and differences between them.

I’ll even bring the Corona.