We left Arizona for sun and surf at a quiet Mexican resort. What we found was quite the opposite.

We lounged on the beach for a day and a half, but after awhile, I could feel the melanoma starting to bully my skin cells. I turned to my travel-buddy Alex and told him that we should get off the beach and go check out what Mexico had to offer. “You know… taste the local flavor,” I explained.

So off we went in search of 100% unfiltered Mexican culture. We picked a seafood restaurant that looked out over the ocean. Perhaps if I were with a gorgeous woman at sunset, I would have called it romantic, but unfortunately for me, I was with my sunburned, lobster-skinned friend who was now scraping sand out of his ear with the handle of a fork.

And then it happened. From behind the bar, came a sound like a wild and ferocious animal entering combat: “AIEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!” I spun around to see a man suspended in midair, leg extended in a type of flying kick Chuck Norris would be jealous of.

The flying kick of death, as it would later be referred to, connected squarely with the bartender’s abdomen. He stumbled backwards, grabbed a meat tenderizer off the counter, and began swinging it wildly at his assailant. A few waiters bustled over and tried to break up the melee, but the bar was already a mess of broken glass and bloodstains.

Before we could sneak away from the carnage, a distressed waitress attempted a feeble smile as she asked, “ something to drink?”

“Actually, we were just leaving,” I responded. The whole way back to the car, we roared with laughter at the flying kick of death, and the retaliation by the meat-tenderizer-wielding bartender.

Before we could get to the car, a wrinkled street vendor with a gold front tooth approached us. She looked at Alex’s long hair and said, “I braid your hair… real cheap… what you say, eh?”

Alex smiled at me and said, “Local flavor. Gotta love it.”

Although we set out expecting a serene weekend of peace, it was hard not to look at the pink and orange beads woven into my best friend’s hair and not smile. Eventually, our tans would fade, but the flavor and adventure of Mexico would stay with us forever.