Mexico City authorities have announced a series of cultural events to take place throughout the year to mark the 500th anniversary of the fall of Tenochtitlán, capital of the Aztec Empire, and the capital city’s founding by the Spanish.
The events will also celebrate the 200th anniversary of Mexico’s independence from Spain.
“According to historians, the foundation of Mexico-Tenochtitlán was in 1523, but that is not a fixed date,” said Mexico City Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum. “Our city has a deeply rooted history of more than seven centuries …”
“Mexico-Tenochtitlán, Seven Centuries of History” will begin on March 21 and feature activities in the zócalo, at archaeological sites, in historic neighborhoods and at other points around the city until December 24.
They range from a celebration of the equinox at the Cuicuilco archaeological site to events marking moments in Mexico City’s history to academic discussions about Mexico’s history involving researchers from a variety of disciplines who, Sheinbaum said, would take a reflective, critical look at prevailing accounts of the city’s history and the myths about the historical record that have arisen over time.
Among the ways the city will mark the anniversary is by changing the name of Puente de Alvarado Avenue to Mexico-Tenochtitlán Boulevard, the mayor announced at an event on Wednesday.
Pedro de Alvarado participated in the conquest of Mexico with Hernán Cortés and is notorious for having ordered the slaughter of several people at the indigenous Templo Mayor while they were celebrating a religious event.
By changing the name of the road, Sheinbaum said, “We rescue our origins and open the discussion” in the historical reconstruction of the city, a process in which original peoples will be participating, she said.
Appearing to be addressing potential concerns about what could be perceived as a celebration of Mexico’s takeover by the Spanish, Sheinbaum said that a goal of the commemoration activities was to reflect on the 500 years of “the so-called Conquest,” as she put it.
“… What we want is to highlight the great diversity and what the Mexica culture represented …”
“If indeed the destruction of Mexico-Tenochtitlán occurred 500 years ago, what is also certain was the resistance of the original people, and we must not forget the violence of those years …” she said.
Renewable energy takes priority once again as a result of judge's ruling.
A federal judge has ordered the provisional suspension of the new Electricity Industry Law, ruling that it could harm free competition and cause irreparable damage to the environment because it favors traditional energy sources over renewable ones.
Judge Juan Pablo Gómez Fierro made the ruling Thursday in response to suspension requests filed by renewable energy companies.
A reform to the law that favors the state-owned Federal Electricity Commission by prioritizing the injection of power it produces into the national grid over that generated by private and renewable companies was approved by Congress last week.
President López Obrador promulgated the law by decree on Tuesday and it took effect Wednesday.
Julio Valle, spokesman for the wind and solar power associations Amdee and Asolmex, said more than two dozen proposed injunctions had been filed as the industry united in opposition to the law.
“We’re happy, but this is just the first battle,” Valle said. The provisional ruling could still be struck down and the law is expected to face further constitutional challenges.
“I think here the big question is what happens when this gets to the Supreme Court,” said Lourdes Melgar, a deputy minister of energy at the time of the landmark energy reforms in 2013-2014.
“Given all the precedents at play here, it’s not really surprising that injunctions were granted less than 48 hours after the ‘reform’ was published,” said Pablo Zárate, managing director at FTI Consulting.
The president’s office did not immediately reply to a request for comment, and companies were treading cautiously, the Financial Times reported. “We don’t want to inflame a confrontation because our president then just gets more obstinate,” said one senior player in the sector who asked not to be named.
The federal judge ordered that the law in force before the publication of Tuesday’s decree be reapplied. That law, which stemmed from the previous government’s energy reform, guaranteed free competition in the electricity sector, sustainable development and protection of the environment whereas its successor does not, Gómez said.
“This district court warns that the modifications made to the Electricity Industry Law could damage free competition in the electricity sector,” he said.
The judge said suspension of the new law would result in more competitive electricity prices for consumers – private companies generate energy at a much lower price than the CFE – and allow Mexico to meet its goals for the generation of clean and sustainable energy.
Gómez said the government’s modifications and additions to the law “move away from the objectives of the energy reform and are thus apparently contrary to articles 25 and 28 of the constitution.” Article 28 states that all monopolies are prohibited in Mexico.
“… On the other hand, it is deemed that the rules that have been challenged could produce imminent and irreparable damage to the environment because they promote the production and use of conventional energies and disincentivize the production of clean energies, ” the judge said.
He also said the new law could prevent Mexico from meeting international environment and climate commitments given that it prioritizes energy produced by the CFE, which mainly uses natural gas, coal and fuel oil to generate power, over private companies’ renewable energy.
The court will rule next Thursday whether the order will become definitive. A constitutional hearing on the case has been set for April 27.
That the government’s electricity reform was challenged so soon after it was approved was not surprising given that private and renewable companies have already challenged other moves by the government to concentrate control of the electricity sector in the hands of the CFE.
But many legal experts say otherwise. Lawyers also say that it violates the new North American free trade agreement and international trade treaties.
The International Chamber of Commerce’s Mexico chapter said Wednesday that it expects the law to trigger a flood of lawsuits, legal appeals and and international investor-dispute arbitration panels. The chamber said that provisions in the law violate the constitution, which enshrines the right to free competition and a healthy environment.
Several analysts have said that the law will scare off foreign and domestic investment because of the privileged position it grants the CFE in the electricity market.
There are 59 main opium poppy-growing municipalities across six states, according to a new project that mapped production of the illicit crop in Mexico, one of the world’s largest heroin producers.
Produced by Noria Research in alliance with Mexico United Against Crime, the Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies at the University of California, San Diego, and the magazine Espejo, the Mexico Opium Project determined through data analysis that the efforts of the National Defense Ministry to eradicate poppies between 2003 and 2019 were concentrated in 59 municipalities in three large regions.
Twenty-nine are located in the northwestern region that includes parts of the states of Chihuahua, Sinaloa, Durango and Nayarit.
Among the municipalities are Ocampo and Guadalupe y Calvo in Chihuahua, Culiacán and Badiraguato – the municipality where convicted drug lord Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán was born – in Sinaloa, Canelas and Topia in Durango and La Yesca and Compostela in Nayarit.
Twenty-three of the municipalities are located in the southwestern region, which encompasses a group of Guerrero municipalities and two in Oaxaca. Among them are Eduardo Neri, Leonardo Bravo, Chilapa and Chilpancingo in Guerrero and Coicoyán de las Flores and San Martín Peras in Oaxaca.
The third region, with seven poppy-growing municipalities, is located in Oaxaca. Its municipalities are Miahuatlán de Porfirio Díaz, Villa Sola de Vega, San Carlos Yautepec, San Juan Lachigalla, San Pedro Quiatoni, Santa María Tepantali and Santiago Xanica.
The report said the mountainous geography of the three regions is similar, with elevations of up to 3,400 meters in the southern and southwestern regions and up to 3,200 meters above sea level in the northwestern region.
It said that on average one hectare of opium poppies was recorded as destroyed in the 59 municipalities for every 38 hectares of legal crops planted between 2003 and 2019.
“This activity is deeply integrated into society. In poppy-growing territories, between 70% and 95% of the population – men, women, and children – work in, or earn their living through, activities directly or indirectly related to opium,” it said.
The report, which is also based on 15 months of fieldwork in opium-producing states, also said that the army reported destroying poppies in 835 of Mexico’s 2,465 municipalities between 2003 and 2019. That means that poppies have been grown in at least one-third of the nation’s municipalities.
The main areas of poppy production in Mexico. noria research
“The U.S. government affirms that in 2016 Mexico had 32,000 hectares of opium production, which increased to 44,100 in 2017,” the report said.
In a “key facts” section, the report also said that heroin produced in Mexico is exported almost in its entirety to the United States and Canada, where it represents around 90% of the consumption market.
While opium gum prices plummeted in recent years partially due to the rise in popularity of the synthetic opioid fentanyl, prices recovered in mid-2020, the report said. The Mexico Opium Project estimated that growers are currently paid up to 21,000 pesos (about US $1,000) for a kilogram of opium paste.
The report said “illicit economies constitute one route for escaping from a subaltern position in a context of chronic economic and social crises in the Mexican countryside.”
However, “in the productive chain of heroin, much of the money generated is captured by legal and illegal intermediaries. This means that the fantastic profitability of the final product has an almost null structural impact on inequalities, discrimination, criminalization, or the lack of state investment.”
The president indicated earlier this week that the government is prepared to consider legalization of the crop for that purpose.
“With regard to the commercialization of marijuana and poppies, the decision has been taken to initiate a thorough analysis of these crops considering that [the growers] are being left behind and they’re being used for the production of [illicit] drugs,” he said.
Interior Minister Olga Sánchez, who said before the current government took office that López Obrador had given her a “blank check” to explore the possibility of legalizing drugs as well as any other measures that could help restore peace to the country, said in January that legalization of poppy production for medicinal purposes was possible.
“This opiate could be regulated by legislation so that we can obtain all kinds of medicines,” she said.
Guerrero Governor Héctor Astudillo supports legalization of poppy production, which he says could help to reduce violent crime, but an initiative to that end has stalled in the state Congress.
Visitors from abroad will pay a bit extra to visit Quintana Roo.
Starting April 1, foreign visitors to Quintana Roo will have to pay a new tourism tax for the privilege of visiting the state.
The state expects the 224-peso levy (US $11), proposed by Governor Carlos Joaquín González and approved by the state Congress last year, will generate 600 million pesos (US $29.1 million) this year.
But not all visitors will be taxed equally. A subsidy will allow tourists from Belize to pay 10% less due to the large number who regularly cross the border to visit nearby Chetumal for short-term visits, said Rodrigo Díaz, director-general of the state tax administration.
Tourists will be able to pay the new tax electronically when they book their trip, during their stay or upon exiting the state via a new website called Visitax. The payment is obligatory for all foreign visitors over 15. There will be also an option to pay in cash at terminals set up in airports.
“It’s expected to be an agile and simple transaction that won’t complicate visitors’ stay,” Díaz said.
The purpose of the tax is to help fund more tourism industry development in the state.
“The budgetary resources that this [tax] provides will permit the state of Quintana Roo to generate jobs and promote the generation of economic centers which will, in turn, produce mainly tourism jobs, which will make our state a strong visitor attraction,” reads text accompanying the law.
The amount was determined by multiplying the Unidad de Medida y Actualización (UMA), a base reference amount determined by the federal statistics agency Inegi and used to calculate the amount of everything from fines to employee bonuses, by 2.5. The current daily UMA is 89.62 pesos.
When the tax bill was passed, state lawmakers expected that it would generate a “conservative” amount of 900 million pesos (US $43.6 million) based on the expectation that the state would see 4.5 million international visitors in 2021. However, with the delay of the tax’s implementation due to the pandemic, that estimate was reduced to 600 million for this year, Díaz said.
As lawmakers debated inside the Chamber of Deputies, pot smokers toked up outside.
After a marathon 14-hour debate, the lower house of Congress approved a bill early Thursday to legalize recreational marijuana, bringing Mexico one step closer to becoming the world’s largest legal cannabis market.
The Federal Law for the Regulation of Cannabis passed the Chamber of Deputies with 250 votes in favor, 163 against and 14 abstentions.
The legislation, which legalizes possession of up to 28 grams of marijuana for personal use and the cultivation of up to six plants in one’s home, has now been returned to the Senate for ratification of the changes made by the lower house.
The Chamber of Deputies made seven changes to the law after approving it in general terms on Wednesday afternoon.
One proposed by the ruling Morena party makes possession of more than 5.6 kilograms of marijuana punishable by three to seven years imprisonment and fines of up to 26,886 pesos (US $1,300).
Among the other six changes is one that gives the Agriculture Ministry the exclusive power to grant licenses for the industrial use of cannabis and another that makes it illegal to convert forested land into marijuana plantations.
The bill passed by the lower house eliminates the Senate’s proposal to create a Mexican cannabis institute to regulate the legal marijuana market, giving that authority to the National Commission Against Addictions (Conadic).
Among the responsibilities of Conadic will be to issue, and if necessary revoke, licenses for the production, distribution and sale of marijuana for recreational purposes.
The legislation recognizes the right of people aged 18 and over to consume marijuana recreationally as long their use doesn’t affect others, especially children.
It proposes allowing the establishment of cannabis clubs or associations whose members would be permitted to cultivate up to four plants each in a common space or clubhouse as long as total production doesn’t exceed 50 plants. Such spaces would be required to have separate areas for the cultivation and use of marijuana and couldn’t be located in close proximity to schools, cultural institutions, sporting facilities or churches and other places of worship.
Bricks and mortar stores with the appropriate licenses would be permitted to sell marijuana for recreational purposes but the sale via vending machines, over the phone, online, or in any other way that is not face-to-face would be prohibited.
With some restrictions, this will be fully legal after Senate approval and promulgation.
The Chamber of Deputies’ approval of the bill comes two years after the Supreme Court ruled that the ban on recreational marijuana was unconstitutional.
However, an organization that opposes the prohibition of drugs says the legislation doesn’t comply with the Supreme Court’s order to eliminate the ban on recreational marijuana.
Mexico United Against Crime (MUCD) said in a statement that recreational marijuana users could still be criminalized because there is a lack of clarity about what penalties apply to possession of different quantities of the plant.
“[The legislation] maintains a system of tolerance thresholds that generate legal uncertainty for users because it’s difficult to understand when a crime and when an administrative offense is being committed,” MUCD said.
“… The simple increase in the quantities for which criminal sanctions apply doesn’t eliminate the space for extortion nor the possibility of the police arbitrarily detaining people due to suspicious appearance,” the organization said.
MUCD was also critical of the legislation because it doesn’t decriminalize the cultivation of marijuana by people with low levels of education and extreme economic needs – mainly small-plot farmers who have long grown cannabis to support themselves and their families.
“In this way marginalization and the criminal punishment of our campesinos is perpetuated. [Campesinos are] the people most affected by prohibition and they should be integrated into the legal market, not kept in illegality,” the group said.
“… We mustn’t create a legal market that only prioritizes the economic benefit of those who participate in the sale [of marijuana] and excludes other less advantaged actors,” MUCD.
It called on the Senate to “correct” the legislation and comply with the mandate of the Supreme Court.
With a population of almost 130 million, Mexico is set to become the most populous country in the world to legalize the recreational use of marijuana nationwide.
Manlio and Sylvana Beltrones investigated for corruption.
A former Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) chief as well as his wife, daughter and a close associate are under investigation in connection with multi-million-dollar deposits to bank accounts in Andorra, according to a report by the newspaper El País.
Published Wednesday, the report said the Attorney General’s Office (FGR) is investigating Manlio Fabio Beltrones, PRI national president between 2015 and 2016 and a former senator, deputy and governor of Sonora, his wife Sylvia Sánchez, his daughter Senator Sylvana Beltrones Sánchez and Alejandro Capdevielle, a former federal deputy.
El País said they are under investigation for presumed irregularities in relation to hidden accounts held with the Banca Privada d’Andorra (BPA), located in the tiny principality that borders both Spain and France.
The report said that Beltrones Sánchez, daughter of one of the “most influential figures in Mexican politics,” deposited US $10.4 million in BPA accounts between 2009 and 2010.
It noted that Beltrones Sánchez was just 26 at the time and didn’t have a job. Her father was the powerful coordinator of the PRI faction in the Senate, El País said.
The report also said that in 2015 a judge in Sonora placed embargoes on accounts held by the senator and both her parents due to suspicion of money laundering.
“Despite the gravity of the circumstances, the case remained hidden from the public,” El País said.
The newspaper said that a money laundering investigation in Andorra was shelved in 2018 after the PGR, as the Attorney General’s Office was known before President López Obrador took office, said in a report that the time within which a probe must take place had expired.
Under the leadership of Attorney General Alejandro Gertz Manero, the FGR opened a new investigation due to alleged irregularities in its predecessor’s probe.
Capdevielle, who like the Beltrones family is from Sonora, told El País that the new investigation violates “fundamental human rights.”
“The new investigation consists of once again determining the legality of the resources deposited in Andorra. And they’re investigating the same people – the Beltrones family and me, for the same actions. They’re violating fundamental human rights. This is a tried and resolved case. Everything has already been cleared up,” he said.
Capdevielle, a newspaper editor who headed up the Mexican Association of Newspaper and Magazine Editors between 2003 and 2007, said the money deposited in BPA accounts came from a $10-million sale to broadcaster Televisa of Aviso de Ocasión, a classifieds publication.
But a judge in Andorra claimed that money came from payments to Manlio Beltrones in exchange for the approval in 2006 of the so-called Televisa Law, which allowed the broadcaster – which has long had a very cosy relationship with the once omnipotent PRI – to broaden its activities into areas such as telecommunications, internet and radio.
Manlio Beltrones rejected the accusation, telling El País that it is ridiculous and false.
“We [the PRI] didn’t have a majority in Congress. Besides I’ve had moments of friction with the broadcasters … [because] we reformed the electoral law and we removed their right to sell advertising to [political] parties. That was a reform of great importance that cost us a lot,” he said.
Sylvana Beltrones told El País that she opened an account with BPA in 2009 to in order to receive money that Capdevielle owed her after the closure of a homewares store they operated together in Mexico City.
The senator rejected claims of wrongdoing in a statement posted to Twitter on Wednesday afternoon and said she no longer has any BPA account. She asserted that the accusations against her are politically motivated, noting that elections are drawing near.
Luisa Arroya Vicenta, a Tenango embroiderer, is working with a Mexico City NGO on an internet sales initiative for Otomí and Nahua textile artisans.
If anything good comes from this pandemic, it may be that the Mexican artisan community “discovers” the internet.
Even before Covid-19, traditional artisans’ greatest challenge has been to get fair prices for their creations. Essentially, the problem is that they almost always live in poor, rural areas, far from urban and international markets where the people with the money and desire to support them can be found.
Traditionally there have been two ways for artisans to sell: the first is to middlemen, those who know where to buy crafts and where to sell them. The second is to travel to fairs and cultural events and pay for the right to sell there. Middlemen are often vilified, especially when the price they pay for crafts is compared to the retail price. There certainly are unscrupulous cads (including the government!) who take advantage of the artisans’ desperate need to bring money into the household. But to be fair, it is expensive to travel to the various small villages to buy small quantities of goods, then turn around and sell them to small niche markets.
Over the decades, there have been public and private initiatives with the aim of getting around this problem. Various museums have shops where they sell works on consignment, and the federal government has FONART, an agency to sell fine Mexican handcrafts. However, these have come under fire not only for underpaying artisans but for corruption as well.
Small private initiatives seem to do better. The Feria Maestros de Arte, for example, has operated for 20 years, holding an annual sales event at a yacht club at Lake Chapala in Jalisco. It is a nonprofit run by a group of Mexicans and foreigners that pays artisans’ travel expenses, arranges free sales space and lodges the artists in members’ homes. Selected artisans pay nothing to participate.
Traditional Jalisco burnished vase by Angel Ortiz Gabriel of Tonalá. His work is available on the Feria Maestros de Arte website.
However, one resource that had been seriously ignored was the internet, despite the increasing demand for online purchasing. Then came Covid.
Early in the pandemic, Mexico News Dailyreported on the disaster and the sense of panic that set in among artisans and those dedicated to supporting them. The need was so great and so sudden. Few, if any, artisans or organizations had the technical and marketing knowledge to start online selling from scratch. However, after various fits and starts, several initiatives seem to have hit their stride, and more are coming.
On March 8, 2021, the nonprofit Ayuda Mutua, Psicología y Derechos Humanos (Psydeh) and four indigenous women’s groups in the state of Hidalgo will officially inaugurate Bordamos Juntos (We Embroider Together), to support Otomí and Nahua textile artisans who live in the Tenango region, famous for embroidery of the same name.
Like the Feria, Psydeh is shifting from an event model to an online one. But Bordamos Juntos looks not only to help with immediate economic needs but also “… to disrupt this narrative by fostering a [from the] ground-up, women-led social enterprise project that offers immediate and long-term results…” So it is no coincidence that it launched on International Women’s Day.
Such efforts to give women more political and social power through income have worked in projects such as the Zongolica weaver’s cooperative, but it remains to be seen if the goal of having sales support community organizing work will pan out. However, Psydeh takes donations through several crowdfunding sites and is legally registered with the Mexican government.
“Popotillo” (similar to straw) painting by Roberto Mejía, whose work is available on the Feria Maestros de Arte website.
Bordamos Juntos is slated to run in March and April, longer if sales are good. Embroiderers will receive a direct payment of 1,000 pesos per piece, with the hope of making it permanent by the fall.
One interesting question to ponder is, what could be the fate of middlemen and events as the pandemic drags on? Feria Maestros de Arte founder Marianne Carlson, whose event is canceled for 2021, says that her organization looks to continue developing online solutions for artisans. As for middlemen, Carlson believes that the effect on them “… depends on the ethics of the middleman. There are costs in online selling that may force them and others to raise prices,” she said, citing the need to update websites and, most importantly, to create high-quality photographs since patrons can’t see a piece live. She recognizes that this is a huge challenge for many artisans so used to a face-to-face model.
These challenges make efforts by all of these organizations extremely important in the short and mid-range time frame. It is more than just setting up a Facebook page; it is changing how the artisans think about their businesses. The Feria, FOFA, Ayuda Mutua, and Psydeh programs recognize this need and are developing more holistic approaches.
Government agencies are way behind, fretting about opening hours on stores. The internet is a cheap way to present crafts to markets, but it does not solve the logistics of shipping. If the government really wants to help, it should focus on revamping its postal service to this end.
Leigh Thelmadatter arrived in Mexico 17 years ago and fell in love with the land and the culture. She publishes a blog called Creative Hands of Mexicoand her first book, Mexican Cartonería: Paper, Paste and Fiesta, was published last year. Her culture blog appears regularly on Mexico News Daily.
The reform would give the Federal Electricity Commission 54% of the market.
The pension costs of the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) more than tripled in 2020 due to the entry into force of a new collective labor agreement that lowered the retirement age for employees.
The state-owned utility reported to the Mexican Stock Exchange that it had pension obligations of just under 120.8 billion pesos (US $5.7 billion) last year, an increase of 236% compared to 35.9 billion pesos (US $1.7 billion) in 2019.
When the deal was struck, several analysts warned it would have a significant negative effect on the company’s bottom line. Rosanety Barrios, an energy sector expert, said the CFE’s pension expenses will only continue to go up as more workers retire at a younger age.
The utility’s bottom line did indeed take a hit in 2020: the company reported a net loss of 78.92 billion pesos (US $3.8 billion) compared to a 25.67-billion-peso profit in 2019.
The CFE had total revenue of 503.63 billion pesos (US $24.1 billion) last year, a 10% decline compared to 2019 due to lower demand for energy amid the coronavirus pandemic. The net loss was the company’s first since 2015.
The company’s costs rose by 4.82 billion pesos to 484.2 billion pesos last year and higher pension expenses was one of the drivers of the increase.
Many women say the choice of Felix Salgado as a gubernatorial candidate despite rape accusations illustrates Mexico’s attitudes toward gender equality.
Not all International Women’s Days in recent years have been memorable to me, but a few stick out.
The first one in which I was aware of the day, back in college as a budding and somewhat radical feminist, was when my “woke” (for 2001 anyway) boyfriend got me flowers. I thought it was the coolest gesture ever.
Last International Women’s Day, I was moving into a new home, having very recently separated from my husband, ready to be truly on my own here in Mexico for the first time ever. That day, women were encouraged not to show up to work or to participate in any laborious activity in order to make both our importance and the absence of so many other women known. I’d scheduled the move a couple of weeks ahead of time and felt that surely the feminist goddesses would forgive me.
This day, I find myself sitting in bed with my laptop, reading story after story about the extent to which Mexico is stillone of the most dangerous countries in the world for women. Authorities in Zapopan, Jalisco, for example, are thrilled because not one of the 500-plus women issued a “panic button” there has been killed in the past year. This is apparently a huge accomplishment.
Yippee?
Another “huge” accomplishment: protesters finally managed to get Félix Salgado off the ballot for governor in Guerrero who’s been accused by multiple women (and is still under investigation) of sexual assault. You’d think that rescinding his candidacy would be simply a matter of someone saying, “Oh, we weren’t aware, how embarrassing,” but no. President López Obrador spent quite some time defending him, insisting that calls to withdraw him from the race and the Senate were politically motivated, in an eerie echo of President Trump’s defense of accused sex-offender senatorial candidate Roy Moore in 2017. But in the end, the right thing (sort of) happened. Another accomplishment.
I don’t know about you all, but I am so ready to raise the bar.
And this year, like every year, I hear at least one man say indignantly, “Well, why don’t we have International Men’s Day?” to which I reply, like I do every year, “Because every day is International Men’s Day.”
This time around as well, pandemic times have also led to some extra layers of meditating on women’s situations. Like many (especially single) women around Mexico right now, I’m struggling to keep my head above water as I navigate a kind of motherhood that is suddenly much more necessarily complicated because of the pandemic and the need to maintain a steady income in a job market that is anything but steady and reliable.
Even before that, motherhood was a fraught topic everywhere, opinions abounding for what combination of very specific requirements make you truly good at it or not. This is a never-ending conversation that takes place while mothers continue to pull much more than their fair weight with housework and childcare even when they also work outside the home, and that’s in non-pandemic times.
Full-time, salaried positions with benefits now seem to be features much more of the rearview mirror than of our present, but it’s just as well; I wouldn’t have time for a full-time job now anyway unless I simply left my 7-year-old to her own devices.
I often circle back around to the truthfulness of a phrase I saw a few months ago: mothers are expected to parent like they don’t have a job and do their job(s) as if they don’t have kids.
The thing that mostly helps me stay afloat is the combination of getting up a few hours early each morning to work and the fact that my daughter is with her father half of the time, which allows me to plow through. It also allows me some precious downtime that I know so many others don’t have and are desperate for.
How on earth are single moms in Mexico without any relief making it through right now? My assumption is that those who are surviving are doing so through extensive family networks and possibly remittances from family members abroad. I’ll be eager to see the numbers on the research that come out a few years from now.
There is some good news, at least. At many levels of government, we’re nearing or are at gender parity, especially in the state and federal legislatures. There’s still quite a large gap in the “big power” positions like mayor, governor, and, of course, president, but at least we seem to be moving in the right direction. I hope we continue to do so.
This week, there will have been marches across Mexico. In the past, these have been greatly criticized because of some property damage caused by a few, (even as Amnesty International decried human rights abuses toward the protesters). But don’t worry! Though we haven’t figured out how to protect women from being raped and murdered — can we give panic buttons to everyone? — we came up with a solution for protecting the National Palace: a 3-meter wall. Well, that’s a relief.
“But what about the destruction? Look at that graffiti on our monuments! It’s a disgrace!” you may feel inclined to shout. I think I speak for many women when I say, “Boo-freaking-hoo.”
Buildings can be fixed or even rebuilt, graffitied walls can be cleaned up, monuments can be repaired and restored. But women can’t be un-raped, un-killed, or un-disappeared.
So make way. We’ve got some issues we want to address.
Sarah DeVries is a writer and translator based in Xalapa, Veracruz. She can be reached through her website, sdevrieswritingandtranslating.com.
The front of Armando Contreras’ workshop is filled with carved marble and onyx figures, including this iguana. All photos by Joseph Sorrentino
The workshop where blocks of marble and onyx are turned into figures, bowls and lamps is layered with dust. Toward the back, Francisco Camargo carefully guides a saw as it cuts through the edge of a piece of marble he’s been shaping into a bowl.
The saw whines as it spins at 3,700 revolutions per minute. Water pouring down from the saw onto the marble keeps it cool and prevents it from cracking. On the floor around him, water has mixed with the dust to form a slurry. Despite the mess, Álvaro Meza Hernández — Camargo’s boss and the owner of Mezher, a store specializing in all things made from marble and onyx — is happy.
“I like to come here and work still,” he said. “One day, two days. I love it.”
Tecali de Herrera, the pueblo where Mezher and dozens of other stores sell items made from marble and onyx, is about 30 miles southeast of Puebla. The word tecali is from Náhuatl, usually translated as “house of stone.” The pueblo was first settled in the 12th century by the indigenous Chichimecas and became known back then for its marble and onyx figures. Their work was so prized that they had to send pieces as tribute to Tenochtitlán, the capital of the Aztec empire.
According to a plaque in front of the zócalo, Franciscan friars arrived in 1540 and built the pueblo’s first convent. A second convent — whose construction was begun in 1569, according to the Mexican government — was built on top of the first, and the ruins of that one still stand. Although it’s one of the pueblo’s main tourist attractions, it’s been closed due to the pandemic. It can still be seen from a distance, although the view is through a fence.
Cutting through marble can be dangerous. The saw can slip.
Mezher was founded by Meza’s father. With two locations, it is one of the largest retailers in Tecali.
“I started working here 50 years ago,” said Meza. His children are the third generation to learn the craft of shaping marble and onyx. “It is complicated to learn,” he said. “It depends on a person’s ability. Out of 10,000 people, maybe 20 have the ability to do good work. Fortunately, the family has this ability.”
Anyone interested in working with marble and onyx must first learn how to polish and sand the stones and then how to clean them with muriatic acid. “One needs to make perfect movements to polish,” said Meza. “All of the work must be detailed.”
With time and practice, if they’re one of the few with talent for this kind of work, a person moves on to making small pieces.
“It takes at least four years of training to start making pieces of medium quality,” Meza said. “It takes at least 10 years to make a good artisan. To make a fine sculpture takes 15 years of training. To become a master, one needs good hands and a good mind and, more than anything, creativity.”
The bowl that Camargo is working on started out as a block of onyx.
Álvaro Meza Hernández, the owner of the Mezher artisan workshop, rinses clean his finished bowl.
“One needs to know the stone beforehand because there are many imperfections,” he explained.
When Camargo, who has worked for Meza for a decade, spots an imperfection, he marks it and then fills it in with epoxy to strengthen the stone. Although the imperfections, when pointed out, are clear, it takes years of training to tell a stone’s quality. “I can tell a good or bad rock with touch,” said Meza, “not with the eyes.”
When the stone is judged to be of high enough quality and the imperfections are adequately prepared, Camargo uses the saw to make the initial cuts and then chips out the thin pieces with a hammer and chisel. “The strokes are made as the craftsman creates something artistically,” Meza said. “He will make deep and gentle cuts, adding creative touches.”
Close attention must be paid when using the saw because the piece can be quickly pulled forward, cutting a person’s arm or hand. “It is very dangerous at first.”
A fine white powder covers the finished pieces, and this is removed by washing them with muriatic acid, a step which brings out the stone’s colors. Meza washed a bowl without using gloves. “It does not hurt,” he assured me.
The acid bubbles as it works, and when it stops bubbling, the bowl is dipped into water. After several washings, it had a lustrous shine.
Meza applies muriatic acid onto a piece to bring out the stone’s colors.
In addition to the workshop where smaller items are made, Meza has another much larger workshop where huge blocks of marble and onyx — some weighing as much as 30 tonnes — are turned into tables and counters. His is the only shop in Tecali that can cut blocks that large, and he often cuts them for other stores in the pueblo. Tables and countertops are made by first cutting the blocks into slabs using very large, frightening-looking saws. Slabs are then cut to size by another smaller but still frightening-looking saw, then polished to bring out the colors.
Meza’s store sells mostly small to medium-sized figures, but anyone interested in finding a figure large enough to place on a front lawn will find plenty of options along the main road in Tecali. The front of Armando Contreras’s workshop is filled with figures that measure three or four feet. There are figures of the Virgin of Guadalupe, a Buddha or two and a striking rendition of an iguana.
“That took two weeks to make,” said Contreras, “and at least six to eight years to learn how to make it.”
Mezher and other stores in Tecali sell all sorts of items made from marble and onyx. “There are different types … that are used for sculptures and for decorative figures,” Meza said. The onyx used in Tecali is sometimes referred to as Mexican onyx and can be distinguished from marble by the beautiful bands of color that run through it.
“The colors come from sediments, water, minerals and contaminants,” he said. “Where there are no contaminants, there are no colors, and light can pass through. Onyx is used for lamps because it is translucent.”
For the uninitiated, it can still be difficult at times to tell marble and onyx apart. “I can tell … because of my experience,” Meza said. “Onyx is more crystalline.”
Francisco Camargo works on a marble slab.
He paused a moment while he searched for other words.
“It is really impossible to explain.”
Joseph Sorrentino, a writer and photographer, is a regular contributor to Mexico News Daily. More examples of his photographs and links to other articles may be found at www.sorrentinophotography.com He currently lives in Chipilo, Puebla.
