PhotosIn Tijuana, you ride the rollercoaster that is the city and then you wait in line to leave. The journey out of one of the most chaotic cities in the world culminates in an equally ...
August 3, 2022
Matthew Suárez is a writer, musician and photographer who worked in Los Angeles as paparazzo for Bauer-Griffin and National Photo Group (2007-2011). His celebrity pictures appeared in newspapers and magazines all over the world. For the Reader he covers music, food, border and Baja stories. He also writes in his own blog, Matingas.com. As a musician he holds a BA in classical guitar under the tutelage of O. Nicholas Raths from Saint John's University. He is also the creator of Tijuana Adventure, private tours in TJ.
Articles by Matthew Suárez
The Sentri pass, crossing at Otay, the annoying seagulls
Matthew Suarez combs Ensenada for best seafood carts and breweries
“I always say that Mexicali is hell, Tijuana is purgatory, and Ensenada... well, Ensenada is paradise!” says Jesús “El Chino” Hernández, who runs Trophy Tacos, an experimental seafood tacos cart in a corner of Colonia ...
February 16, 2022
New breweries make Tijuana unrecognizable from 10 years ago
Baja’s beer scene has grown exponentially since I first wrote about it for the Reader six years ago, and I’ve been obsessing over it ever since. Back in October of this year, at the most ...
December 22, 2021
The unintended Baja Med escapade
I met “Border Chef” Andrea Aguari — the title is her own — a decade ago when she was cooking for the short-lived Taberna Etxeverri on Calle Sexta. We hadn’t spoken in years when I ...
August 25, 2021
Three checkpoints, seven hours south of Tecate
We arrived at Punta Final Saturday at dawn after an arduous seven-hour trip. We left Tecate before midnight after packing the green Durango with camping gear and a shit ton of beer. The driver, a ...
January 27, 2021
79 days of Tijuana quarantine
“I don’t think we’ll be opening the bar until September or until there is a vaccine,” says Dany aka ‘Drago,’ founder of Dragon Rojo Rockbar and a hospital worker by trade. “I keep the bar ...
June 19, 2020
118 deaths in Baja due to the virus
“You know my brother and I got it, right?” My friend Mariana texted me a few weeks ago after I posted the story about the coronavirus piñatas. Mariana’s brother, Juan, is my private doctor in ...
April 27, 2020
What to do when they stop making Heineken and Modelo
As soon as the news hit, we received ten orders,” says Carlos Macklis owner of Norte Brewing Co. “We stopped producing but we are still selling our beer. I’m acting as the delivery boy driving ...
April 3, 2020
Tijuana tangos with corona
“It’s a huge mess of disinformation,” says the co-owner of one of the new trendy restaurants in downtown Tijuana (we talked online, she prefers to remain anonymous). “My dad is over at city hall right ...
March 27, 2020