At least 30 schools in Acapulco will begin their Christmas break early, but not to give students and teachers more time to enjoy the vacation period: it is believed to be too dangerous to remain in school.

Teachers have advised the Guerrero Secretariat of Education stating that the holiday vacation will begin on December 6, two weeks early, due to the current wave of violence in the city.

Teachers said in a letter that the situation is becoming “more dangerous,” calling the violence “a scourge that is becoming more uncontrollable each day.”

The recent wave of violence is part of a rising trend that has been growing over the last decade in the popular tourist destination.

In an analysis published by the newspaper El Universal in October, journalist and native Acapulco resident Arturo de Dios Palma recounted how his hometown has changed during his lifetime.

“I’m from Acapulco and I’ve seen how the port city has gone from being a paradise to a living hell,” he wrote.

“I grew up in an Acapulco very different from the one of today . . . I spent Christmases awake all night looking for posada celebrations, lighting fireworks and drinking cider with my cousins.”

This Christmas promises to be quite different from those of the author’s childhood.

“I’ll admit that Acapulco has never been a place of peaceful tranquility, but nor has it been the hell that it has become in the last decade,” wrote de Dios Palma.

“The violence has brought us many scenes of terror, pain, desolation, many scenes of death, many disappearances.”

Sources: Vanguardia MX (sp), El Universal (sp)