Astrophotographers, get ready! The year’s final full moon before the winter solstice is just around the corner — and December opens in Mexico City with a supermoon! (Jesús Toledo/Pexels)
As a child, one of my favorite things about the last months of the year was watching the moon from the segundo piso in Anillo Periférico. “December moons are the most beautiful of the year,” my father used to tell me. And he was right about that.
I remember clearly coming back from dining at my grandma’s and being absolutely taken aback by the moon’s enormous, copper face on a December night. I even thought it was a big light bulb, and was moved when I realized it was actually the moon, peeking from behind skyscrapers and billboards. It was as if we were playing catch with her, racing away across Periférico.
During supermoon season, the full moon tends to be around 14% brighter than on ordinary nights. (Andrea Hinojosa/Pexels)
Little did I know back then that what I was seeing in Mexico City’s night sky was a supermoon. Over 15 years later, capital dwellers will experience the exact same phenomenon this December! Here’s everything you need to know about the 2025 supermoon in Mexico City, and some tips to enjoy your astronomical observation to the fullest this year.
What is a supermoon and is it a rare phenomenon?
A supermoon is not a common occurrence in the night sky. According to NASA, this phenomenon happens “when the moon’s orbit is closest to Earth (known as perigee) at the same time as a full moon.” This explains why these full moons appear larger from Earth’s perspective. It looks that way because it’s closer to us.
Not only does it look bigger, but it’s also more brilliant. The brightness of a supermoon is 14% greater than that of an average full moon, according to NASA’s records. Even during Mexico City’s misty December nights, this is a sight to be seen. The best part is, you don’t need any specialized equipment to get a glimpse of it this month!
When to watch December’s supermoon from Mexico City
Observation platform StarWalk’scalculations estimate that the December supermoon will be visible to the naked eye from anywhere in the country. So save the date! The night of December 4, however, will be a spectacular one for Mexico’s night skies.
The supermoon will begin at 11:14 p.m. GMT, or 5:14 p.m. in Mexico City. It will reach its peak around 9 p.m., the ideal moment to undertake astrophotography endeavors. However, there are some obstacles that observers from the capital might encounter that night.
Clouds and storms are a supermoon’s worst enemy — and light pollution, of course. (Fernando Paleta/Pexels)
Supermoon obstacles
First and foremost, the fact that Mexico City suffers from terrible light pollution is a result of “the inefficient, unnecessary and extreme use of artificial light sources,” per the Institute of Astronomy at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM). This makes it practically impossible to see the Milky Way — or any stars, really — from my chaotic hometown.
Second, the fact that 2025 has been an extremely rainy year. We even had therainiest summer in decades! Given that we have had some heavy clouds in the afternoons recently, it would be a shame — yet, very possible — that a stormy night might interfere with the observation of the supermoon.
If we do get a rainy night on December 4, however, do not worry. There are several alternatives for a clear and safe observation. First, UNAM and NASA usually broadcast supermoons from their official social media accounts. You can join the observation journey online at any time that day.
The other option is to simply wait until the storm ends. Usually, supermoons are most beautiful at dawn the next day.
So, if you’re an early bird like me — and lucky enough to get a clear morning — you’ll get to feast your eyes on the supermoon’s last glows around 5 a.m. on December 5. Nothing beats seeing the full moon with the sky in soft, pink hues in the background.
BAJA CALIFORNIA COASTLINE — From now until April, thousands of adult humans will gather along fluorescent-lit office cubicles, open-plan coworking reefs, and suburban strip-mall habitats of Mexico’s Baja California peninsula, providing bored whales with unparalleled opportunities to observe the strange primates in their natural environment.
Migration and mating habits
Every November, humans return from remote “work-from-home” feeding grounds to congregate in dense herds near printers, coffee machines, and malfunctioning conference-room projectors. They will remain there through the cold months, engaging in complex rituals such as “budget season” and “Q1 strategic alignment,” before fleeing to warmer leisure waters with the first hint of spring PTO.
Marine biologists report that adult humans use this season to perform elaborate mating displays, including “Secret Santa,” “ugly sweater contests,” and loudly explaining cryptocurrency at holiday parties. Dominant males are often identified by their willingness to speak for 47 minutes in meetings that could have been an email, while dominant females can be seen effortlessly managing three projects, two children, and one collapsing civilization at once.
Responsible human-watching guidelines
To protect this fragile, emotionally unstable species, authorities have issued strict guidelines for visiting whales observing humans from offshore glass-bottom boats.
Do not remain in the viewing zone (open-plan office) for more than 30 minutes, as prolonged exposure to corporate jargon may cause disorientation, nausea, or sudden desire to purchase a standing desk.
Avoid surrounding or chasing solitary humans attempting to eat lunch alone; this is a critical “doomscrolling and microwaving leftovers” behavior necessary for the species’ mental health.
Do not attempt to feed humans, especially with unsolicited diet advice, multilevel marketing schemes, or links to their own company’s press releases.
Experts also emphasize respecting the humans’ right to rest, especially new parents and junior staff who have not slept since the last product launch. Under no circumstances should whales tap on office windows, send “quick Slack pings,” or schedule Friday 4:45 p.m. meetings, which are considered forms of harassment under international conservation law.
Human Fest 2025 announced
To celebrate the return of dense human pods to their office habitats, Baja California’s tourism board has announced “Human Fest 2025,” a three-day festival in Los Cabos, featuring live music, workshops, and guided tours titled “Observe the Commuter in the Wild” and “Introduction to the Inbox Panic Response.” The festival’s stated goal is to promote sustainable tourism and economic recovery in regions recently devastated by hurricanes, pandemics, and poorly thought-out rebrandings.
Workshops will train visiting whales to identify key human calls, such as “circle back,” “touch base,” and the endangered “let’s log off early,” while also teaching best practices for minimizing stress on humans, including never asking “So what do you do?” more than five times an hour. Conservationists hope that with proper guidelines, both species can continue peacefully coexisting: humans staring at whale videos to escape work, and whales staring at humans to remind themselves it could be worse.
Hope still remains that Imperial woodpecker has not yet gone extinct in Mexico, but a decades long hunt remains tantalisingly without success. (Audubon Society)
For the dedicated ornithologist, there are a few types of holy grail sightings that would crown any bird-watcher’s career, and one of these is waiting to be found here in Mexico: the imperial woodpecker, or Campephilus imperialis, which we will get to in a moment.
These three types of sightings would get any ornithologist into the history books:
To achieve the holy grail of bird watching, all you have to do is discover a new species, like the ones of Banda Myzomela recently discovered in Indonesia. (James Eaton/Wikimedia Commons)
Sighting a species previously unknown to science. Even in our modern world, there might still be small, isolated populations of a never-before documented bird species in some thick mountain forest or on a remote island. A good example is the Banda Myzomela (Myzomela boiei), a small, beautiful bird with a bright-red head found across Indonesia’s Banda Islands, discovered in 2025 to consist of three separate species.
Finding the fossil of a previously undiscovered bird species. The existence, for example, of the Baminornis zhenghensis — a pigeon-sized bird from the Jurassic Period — was discovered only this year. It might change our whole understanding of bird evolution.
Bringing a bird back from the dead. This means spotting a bird previously thought by science to be extinct. This does very occasionally happen: The night parrot, a brilliantly colored nocturnal bird once common in Australia, was until recently believed extinct — a victim of humans and the feral, predatory animals that hitched a ride with them. The bird’s existence was confirmed, however, in 2013 — after 23 years without a sighting — when a ranger discovered a night parrot egg.
A sighting of Mexico’s imperial woodpecker — which hasn’t been provably documented since 1956 — would fall into this third category.
The imperial woodpecker: A tragic tale of human-driven extinction?
The imperial was — and hopefully still is — a remarkable bird, bright-red and black, and the biggest of all the 241 species of woodpeckers found worldwide.
It is officially listed as “critically endangered (possibly extinct)” by both the IUCN and BirdLife International because there has not been a confirmed sighting of the imperial woodpecker since 1956, and the weight of evidence edges towards extinction. The story of this bird’s discovery — and its demise — is both a fascinating and tragic tale.
Mounted specimens of Imperial woodpeckers, female (left) and male, are displayed in the Wiesbaden Museum in Germany. (Fritz Geller-Grimm/Wikimedia Commons)
The imperial woodpecker was once widespread throughout the Sierra Madre Occidental, that mountain range that runs through much of northern and central Mexico. It fed on the forest region’s insect larvae, which it found under the bark of dead pine trees.
A healthy forest has only a few dead and rotting trees at any one time, so specialist eaters such as the woodpeckers require a large area to search for food. As a result, the imperial woodpecker population was never numerous, and, even in happier times, its mountain home probably only supported a few thousand individuals.
The imperial woodpecker’s discovery
Although obviously known to locals, the bird didn’t come to academic attention until 1832, when John Gould presented some dead specimens to the Zoological Society of London. He had not collected these himself and was vague about where they originated, believing them to come from somewhere near Southern California, and details about the woodpecker species would remain a mystery for several more decades. It was 1892 before Edward Nelson and his young assistant, Edward Goldman, became the first outsiders to see living examples.
Unusually for woodpeckers, the imperial species was often reported flying in small flocks — most likely because they tended to gather on the same dead trees to feed.This fact made them vulnerable to hunters, as the Edwards showed by dropping several out of the sky with a single shotgun blast. Adding to their vulnerability was the fact that — despite being hunted for their plumage, for medical properties and sometimes just because their loud noise upset people — the birds weren’t scared of humans.
In the first half of the 20th century, as loggers opened more paths in the region, more guns arrived in the villages, and the imperial woodpecker’s numbers declined. When ornithologist Arthur Allen and his wife hiked through these forests in 1946, they only found a solitary female. William Rhein, a dentist by trade and a bird-watcher by passion, made three expeditions into the region in the 1950s and saw only a few. The region was still a wild and at times dangerous area, and foreign visitors remained rare. When James Tanner and his son came to Durango in 1964, they sought a bird not spotted by an outsider for a decade.
Tanner was a woodpecker expert who earned his PhD studying the ivory woodpecker in the United States. He interviewed locals — who knew of the bird by its Mexican name, pitoreal — but even they had not seen one for four or five years. Villagers, however, did know of a remote area they said might still be untouched.
If you can get a photo of the Imperial woodpecker shown in this illustration, you’ll be a bird-watching legend. (Public Domain)
Despite warnings that bandits made the area dangerous, theTanners employed a local guideand headed there, but there was no sign of the elusive bird. Tanner did collect new information about the species, however, noting that the young nestlings were considered a local delicacy — probably another reason for their dwindling numbers.
While the ivory woodpecker had suffered primarily from the loss of habitat in the U.S, Tanner noted that, by contrast, forests of the Sierra Madre had not yet been stripped bare. He believed that hunting had taken a higher toll on the imperial woodpecker than had habitat loss.
A renewed search
A handful of unconfirmed sightings continued between 1965 and 1995, but nothing definitive enough to convince scientists that the imperial woodpecker was still alive. Then, in 1995, Dutch woodpecker expert Maurits Lammertink was in Cornell University’s archives going through old letters exchanged between Tanner and Rhein. In these letters, he found reference to filmed footage of the bird.
Lammertink visited Rhein in Pennsylvania and viewed the footage shot by Rhein in 1956. A few seconds of the grainy film included distant but clear views of the imperial woodpecker, presenting new information on the bird’s flight pattern: It had, for example, a fast wing flap rate compared to other woodpeckers. Lammertink also documented information on the bird’s favorite perches.
The footage inspired Lammertink to enter Sierra Madre Occidental in 2010 with wildlife photographer and author Tim Gallagher.Gallagher hadbecome a birding legend in 2004 by documenting an ivory-billed woodpecker in Arkansas — a living example of the species had not been seen in the U.S. since 1944. Lammertink and Gallagher retraced Rhein’s route through the Sierra Madre Occidental, heading for the area where Rhein had shot his footage.
Back in the 1950s, this region still consisted of old-growth forest with abundant large and dead trees. Since then, the area had been regularly logged, and locals told the pair that logging firms in the 1950s had encouraged rampant poisoning of woodpeckers. Despite Lammertink and Gallagher’s best efforts — which included trying to attract birds with a small device that mimicked the characteristic double-knock drum of many woodpeckers — no imperials were spotted, and the interviews of locals suggested that the bird had become extinct around 1960.
Imperial Woodpecker 1
Could the imperial woodpecker still be alive?
It seems unlikely — but it’s not impossible — that this bird still survives in the mountains of the Sierra Madre Occidental. While it hasn’t been provably sighted since 1956, the area today is a center of the criminal drug trade, so scientists and ornithologists seldom venture there. As Gallagher wrote, “Why would anyone go looking in such a terrifyingly dangerous place for a bird that might not even exist?”
While logging in Mexico continues to take its toll on the region’s forests, it is possible that enough patches of old forest survive today to form a last refuge for the imperial — or that the birds have been able to adapt to life in a secondary growth habitat. But while rediscovering an extinct bird might bring headlines, it doesn’t guarantee a happy ending: When a bird is spotted after such a long gap, it generally means that too few have survived to maintain a breeding population.
Even if a living example is found one day, it is probably too late at this point to save the imperial woodpecker. But Mexico has nearly 100 other endemic birds considered endangered. Perhaps there is still time to learn from the imperial woodpecker’s story — and to spare other Mexican species from a similar fate.
Bob Patemanis a Mexico-based historian, librarian and a life-term hasher. He is editor of On On Magazine, the international history magazine of hashing.
Mexican artist Pedro Friedeberg in the 1960s. (Paulina Lavista/Pedro Friedeberg)
You may not have heard of Mexican artist Pedro Friedeberg: The 89-year-old artist has kept a relatively low profile compared to many of his art-world colleagues over the last several decades.
Yet Friedeberg’s work is held in the permanent collections of over 50 museums, including the Museum of Modern Art, the Musée du Louvre, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum. He has participated in over 100 exhibitions and continues to collaborate with brands like Montblanc, Jose Cuervo and Corona.
Friedeberg is still active today, creating new art and giving interviews. (Pedro Friedeberg/Facebook)
Born in Florence in 1936 to Jewish parents fleeing Mussolini and escaping the Holocaust, Friedeberg arrived in Mexico City as a 3-year-old. His grandmother, who had settled in Mexico years earlier in 1911, introduced him to art books, featuring works such as Arnold Böcklin’s “The Isle of the Dead.”
These early influences — including Renaissance architecture, Gothic forms and, later, the Aztec codices he discovered in his adopted homeland — would create the visual vocabulary and symbology that permeate his work.
In 1957, Friedeberg enrolled in architecture school at Universidad Iberoamericana but resisted his professors’ insistence on strict symmetry and conventional forms; instead, he leaned toward his imaginative impulses.
He began drawing fantastical, impossible architectural designs: houses with artichoke roofs, and buildings that appeared to twist and fold in on themselves. These sketches caught the attention of Mathias Goeritz, a renowned painter and sculptor who encouraged Friedeberg to leave his architectural studies to pursue art.
Friedberg’s often eye-popping work is a mix of architectural precision, optical illusion and straight-up whimsy. (Pedro Friedeberg)
Through family connections, he met surrealist artists like Remedios Varo and Leonora Carrington, becoming part of Los Hartos (The Fed-Up Ones), an irreverent collective that rejected the political and social realism dominant in postwar Mexican art, in favor of art for art’s sake.
The romantic tumult of his personal life — four marriages, including one to Polish countess Wanda Zamoyska that he described as surreal, as a circus and as crazy, but tiring — eventually melted into a quieter domestic rhythm.
With his last wife, Carmen Gutiérrez, whom he described as “a very serious woman,” he raised two children. Fatherhood changed him, curtailing the nights of drinking and worldwide travel that had characterized his earlier years.
Practical yet absurd
Friedeberg is most famous for his work “Hand Chair” of 1962. The piece is both furniture and sculpture, practical and absurd: a giant wooden hand inviting you to sit in its palm, using the fingers as backrest and armrests.
The chair exemplifies Friedeberg’s philosophy of useless beauty, transforming a functional object into something delightfully impractical. Today, giant Hand Chairs sit atop prominent buildings in Mexico City, while authorized and unauthorized reproductions are carried in design showrooms and flea markets around the world.
Pedro Friedeberg’s famous “Hand Chair” sculpture sits in Alameda Central park in Mexico City. (Eduardo Ruiz Mondragon/Wikimedia Commons)
But to focus only on “Hand Chair” would be to miss the breadth of Friedeberg’s prolific practice. His work spans a wide variety of ideas and influences: paintings filled with optical illusions and hybrid symbols, intricate prints drawing on everything from the Torah to Einstein’s Theory of Relativity, furniture that appears to sprout human appendages, psychedelic album covers and montages where impossible architecture incorporates symbols from Catholicism, Hinduism and the occult.
Each piece is produced with detailed technical precision. Friedeberg works entirely with traditional media, using rulers, pencils, erasers and protractors, like the craftsmen of another time.
“I admire everything that is useless, frivolous and whimsical,” Friedeberg once said, and this philosophy extends to his opinions on contemporary art. He hates minimalism with a passion, calling it “a hoax,” and insists that art should not be reduced to the abstract.
This stance put him at odds with figures like Luis Barragán, whose colorful, simple modernist architecture Friedeberg has openly disdained.
Friedeberg wouldn’t call himself a surrealist, per se. It’s a typical response from an artist who has spent his career humbly resisting categorization, even as the label “the last living Surrealist” follows him. But perhaps the resistance to classification makes sense: Friedeberg’s work — with its geometric precision, architectural impossibilities and almost psychedelic imagery — feels like the meticulous constructions of a trained architect who simply refuses to acknowledge the laws of physics.
What makes Friedeberg so fascinating is this contradiction: He’s an artist of incredible technical skill who dismisses meaning and symbolism in his own work, a surrealist who rejects the label, a creator of impossible architectures who never completed his architecture degree, a maker of useful objects designed to be useless.
Friedeberg posing with his tequila bottle design for Jose Cuervo. (Jose Cuervo)
In an art world often dominated by conceptual gestures and theoretical abstractions, Friedeberg offers something increasingly rare: pure craft in service of pure whimsy, meticulously rendered worlds where nothing makes sense — and that’s the point.
A 2022 Netflix documentary simply titled “Pedro,” tells the tale of how filmmaker Liora Spilk Bialostozky spent a decade documenting the artist’s life, capturing both his public persona and the more tender, private self. The film offers an intimate portrait of a man who describes his work as “a commentary on other people’s art,” even as his technical genius and originality remain undisputed.
It’s worth watching for anyone interested in one of the last true intellectuals of our time, an artist who consults the I-Ching daily and maintains a collection of saints despite identifying as an atheist, who creates art that references centuries of visual culture while remaining stubbornly, unmistakably his own.
Still building impossible worlds
At 89, Friedeberg shows no signs of slowing down, still granting interviews and maintaining his rigorous studio practice, while his work continues to be displayed in new gallery showings. Friedeberg lives in the same Colonia Roma home where he works in Mexico City, a maximalist sanctuary he once jokingly called “un museo de basura” (a museum of garbage) filled with art by Man Ray, José Luis Cuevas and Rufino Tamayo alongside his own creations and collected curiosities.
A 2022 Friedeberg biography for Netflix told the story of Friedeberg’s life and art. For a decade, filmmaker Liora Spilk Bialostozky captured intimate moments with the Mexican artist. (Calouma Films)
It seems Friedeberg will keep doing what he’s always done: creating his fantastical worlds, one impossible structure, one absurd hybrid creature, one useless beautiful object at a time. For an artist who insists that art is dead and nothing new is being produced, he seems committed to proving himself wrong.
Monica Belot is a writer, researcher, strategist and adjunct professor at Parsons School of Design in New York City, where she teaches in the Strategic Design & Management Program. Splitting her time between NYC and Mexico City, where she resides with her naughty silver labrador puppy Atlas, Monica writes about topics spanning everything from the human experience to travel and design research. Follow her varied scribbles on Medium at medium.com/@monicabelot.
There's no such thing as a bad time to visit Puerto Vallara, and that includes during the holiday season. (Gobierno de Mexico)
December is one of the most energetic times of year to visit Puerto Vallarta — when the city melds longstanding cultural traditions with large-scale public celebrations that bring together residents, seasonal homeowners and travelers from around the world. Equally memorable, New Year’s Eve here is one of the largest and most electric citywide celebrations in Mexico, where the entire waterfront becomes a communal party.
Here is a guide to celebrating the holidays in PV. You won’t get snow here, but you will get blazing red and orange sunsets over Banderas Bay, fireworks over the Pacific and plenty of chances to observe traditional celebrations.
Fiestas Guadalupanas: A major cultural tradition
Fiestas Guadalupanas in honor of the Virgin of Guadalupe are a major seasonal celebration in Puerto Vallarta. (Visit Puerto Vallarta)
For 12 consecutive days, downtown Puerto Vallarta becomes a center of movement and sound: More than 400 processions pass through the historic district toward the Parish of Our Lady of Guadalupe, the city’s most recognizable landmark, with its crown-shaped tower overlooking the bay. The processions feature families, schools, civic groups, businesses and neighborhood organizations, often accompanied by folkloric dancers, mariachi musicians and decorated floats. Fireworks punctuate the nights, and plazas fill with vendors preparing seasonal foods — from tamales and pozole to churros, buñuelos and roasted corn.
The most important event, La Peregrinación de los Favorecidos, takes place December 12, drawing up to 20,000 participants. For observers, it is an opportunity to witness a meaningful public expression of identity and faith grounded in the local community. It offers travelers a rare chance to engage with local tradition directly yet respectfully.
Christmas in Puerto Vallarta
Christmas is observed here with religious and social customs, ranging from church gatherings and posadas to celebratory dining experiences that spill out onto the beaches and waterfront.
Posadas — processions reenacting Mary and Joseph’s search for shelter before the birth of Jesus — are private community events that take place in neighborhoods across the city in the week leading up to Christmas Eve. Your neighborhood might be having one. They often conclude with neighborhood gatherings that feature music, warm fruit punch for everyone and piñatas for the children.
For a more public, commercial experience, many restaurants offer special menus on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, making dining out a central part of the experience for both locals and visitors. Popular options include La Palapa, El Dorado, Mar y Vino, Daiquiri Dick’s, River Café, La Madalena, NOROC, Casa Prime, Cristina Vallarta, Pinocchio, Sapphire Ocean Club, The Blue Shrimp and Le Bistro.
Posadas, or reenactments of Mary and Joseph’s search for shelter to give birth to he baby Jesus, are common during the run-up to Christmas in Puerto Vallarta. (Villa del Palmar)
Reservations fill quickly — particularly for beachfront seating — so planning ahead is essential.
Holiday dining on the Malecón or directly on the sand is especially fun: Vendors sell street snacks, live musicians perform along the waterfront and the boardwalk’s public art installations are illuminated for nighttime strolls.
New Year’s Eve in Puerto Vallarta
Puerto Vallarta is one of the country’s top destinations for New Year’s Eve, drawing large crowds to the waterfront and hosting a range of celebrations, from informal beach gatherings to organized ticketed events.
The Malecón boardwalk is the epicenter of activity, where thousands gather to enjoy street performances, live music, dancing and the large fireworks display at midnight over the bay. The event is public, free and open to all ages.
Another major gathering site is Holi Beach, where festivities take on a more grassroots style. Families arrive early to set up small camp-style areas with tables, grills, coolers, string lights and portable speakers, giving the beach a pop-up festival environment.
The celebration often continues well past sunrise, with people swimming, dancing and watching the first light of the new year over the bay.
Fireworks displays are part of any New Year’s Eve celebration in Puerto Vallarta. (Visit Puerto Vallarta)
Across the city, hotels, villas and private boats offer their own celebrations, ranging from gala dinners to DJ-driven parties. Major events take place throughout Marina, Centro, the Romantic Zone and Cinco de Diciembre. Keep your eye out for website and social media announcements about these events, and for signs at local hotels and on the street to find out where these events will take place.
Local traditions and large public celebrations coexist
What distinguishes Puerto Vallarta from other coastal destinations during December is the coexistence of authentic local traditions and large public celebrations that remain open to everyone. Travelers can participate in the Fiestas Guadalupanas, share a Christmas meal on the beach and then join thousands along the waterfront to welcome the new year in one of the most magnetic atmospheres along the Pacific. If celebrating the winter holidays in short sleeves sounds good to you, there’s no better place to do it than Puerto Vallarta.
Meagan Drillinger is a New York native who has spent the past 15 years traveling around and writing about Mexico. While she’s on the road for assignments most of the time, Puerto Vallarta is her home base. Follow her travels on Instagram at @drillinjourneys or through her blog at drillinjourneys.com.
As part of the national farmer and trucker protests, Zacatecas farmers blocked the entrance to the Calera, Zacatecas, Corona beer factory, a major water-using operation in the region. (Adolfo Vladimir / Cuartoscuro.com)
Truckers and farmers teamed up this week to block highways and ports of entry across Mexico, paralyzing transportation nationwide to protest highway insecurity, crop prices and a proposed water law. Their pressure yielded fruit: By the end of the week, they were able to come to an agreement with the government, but not before costing billions of pesos (hundreds of millions of US dollars) in economic damage.
Rumors of Attorney General Gertz’s resignation flew throughout the day Thursday, leading up to his official exit Thursday night. (Galo Cañas/Cuartoscuro)
Midweek, the central bank cut Mexico’s already meager 2025 growth forecast after a tough third quarter, and construction sector showed continued losses. But not all was doom and gloom: Major business investment announcements continue to roll in, and new data shows growth in cultural tourism.
Mexico continues to prepare for next year’s FIFA World Cup, which is expected to deliver a much-needed economic boost. As part of the preparations, Sheinbaum is considering traveling to Washington next week for the final World Cup draw. With U.S. President Donald Trump and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney planning to attend, it could be the first meeting of the three North American leaders, and Sheinbaum’s first face-to-face with Trump.
Didn’t have time to read this week’s top stories? Here’s what you missed.
‘Mega-blockades’ pressure politicians to act
Truckers and farmers orchestrated major blockades starting Monday, eventually affecting more than 20 states and extending through Thursday, with closures reported at more than 50 locations by Wednesday. The protesting truckers demanded action to improve highway insecurity — with up to 70 truck robberies occurring daily — while farmers opposed proposed National Water Law reforms while seeking higher guaranteed crop prices.
#SEGOBInforma 📢
Productores y transportistas levantaron bloqueos, tras reunión en #Segob
In Ciudad Juárez, farmers occupied the customs facility at the Córdova-Las Americas International Bridge for over 24 hours, stranding approximately 1,500 U.S.-bound tractor-trailers. Business groups estimated accumulated losses between 3 billion and 6 billion pesos, with the transportation confederation reporting daily losses exceeding 100 million pesos from fuel waste and contractual penalties.
At Tuesday’s press conference, President Sheinbaum presented statistics showing a 54% decline in reported violent truck robberies compared to 2018, arguing that ongoing dialogue made the protests unnecessary. On Wednesday, she defended the proposed water legislation, explaining it aims to prevent water hoarding while maintaining farmers’ rights to bequeath concessions to their children, though she acknowledged the government cannot afford farmers’ demand for 7,200 pesos per tonne for corn.
After marathon negotiations lasting 13 hours Thursday, Interior Minister Rosa Icela Rodríguez announced agreements establishing permanent working groups on security, water and agricultural issues. The government committed to modifying the water law to differentiate agricultural use from industrial purposes, installing highway security cameras, creating specialized prosecutors’ offices for highway crimes, and releasing outstanding wheat and corn payments. Truckers and farmers began lifting blockades, though leaders warned they would resume protests if commitments aren’t fulfilled.
Amid the blockades, another set of protesters took to the streets in cities around the country on Nov. 25, International Day for the Elimination of violence against Women. In honor of the day, the Sheinbaum administration launched a “16 Days of Activism Against Violence Toward Women” campaign as female victimization rates climbed 7.5% in 2025.
Attorney general exits under the shadow of leaks, corruption allegations
The week ended with a bombshell as 86-year-old Attorney General Alejandro Gertz Manero resigned Thursday evening after nearly seven scandal-filled years. The Senate approved his resignation 74-22 despite opposition senators arguing accepting an ambassadorship to Germany doesn’t constitute the “serious cause” required by the Constitution. Critics accused Sheinbaum of orchestrating a power grab, while Morena senators claimed Gertz violated constitutional reporting requirements.
At Friday’s press conference, Sheinbaum called for the Federal Attorney General’s Office to undergo “a transformation for the good of Mexico,” emphasizing the need for greater transparency and coordination. Ernestina Godoy, Sheinbaum’s former legal adviser and Mexico City attorney general, was appointed interim prosecutor and is considered the favorite for permanent appointment. Sheinbaum praised Godoy as “an extraordinary woman” of “principles” and “many convictions,” noting her proven results in Mexico City.
Investment continues despite economic headwinds
Mexico’s economic picture darkened as the Bank of Mexico slashed its 2025 growth forecast from 0.6% to just 0.3%, citing a third-quarter contraction greater than anticipated. Governor Victoria Rodríguez Ceja attributed the weakness to deterioration in the secondary sector and international trade uncertainty. However, Banxico projects recovery in 2026 with 1.1% growth and 2% in 2027, assuming the USMCA remains intact through its formal review.
Inflation accelerated to 3.61% in early November, with electricity prices surging 20.7% after subsidy eliminations. The construction industry’s 17-month decline intensified, with September output falling 15.4% year-over-year. Industry leaders pleaded for doubled public investment ahead of the 2026 World Cup. However, nine states are bucking the trend, with Baja California Sur leading at 26.9% growth from tourism and real estate. World Cup hosts Mexico City, Monterrey and Guadalajara showed positive growth from stadium renovations and infrastructure upgrades.
Several major investments signaled continued confidence. Chinese truck manufacturer Foton announced Us $65 million across three facilities, including a $40 million Jalisco plant opening January 2026 to produce 1,000 pickup trucks monthly with 60-70% local content. Microsoft partnered with Powertrust to develop 270 megawatts of distributed solar projects across Mexico and Brazil, addressing concerns about its Querétaro data center’s reliance on gas generators.
On a positive note, Mexico experienced historic cultural tourism growth, with 15.9 million visitors to museums and archaeological sites in the first nine months — a banner year positioning Mexico as a dynamic global destination. Chichén Itzá topped the list with 1.7 million visitors, followed by Teotihuacán with 1.2 million and Tulum with 809,000. Overall, Mexico received 71 million visitors through September, a 13.9% increase year-over-year.
Whale-watching season, another tourism draw, began along Mexico’s southwestern coast, with humpbacks arriving in Oaxaca’s waters through April. Oaxaca announced Ballena Fest 2025 for Dec. 5-7 to promote sustainable tourism.
Political developments and international diplomacy
President Sheinbaum traveled to Oaxaca early this week to announce continued investment under the Lázaro Cárdenas Plan, pledging 6.2 billion pesos for infrastructure in one of Mexico’s poorest regions. The initiative has delivered 1,100 kilometers of highway construction and micro-loans to more than 3,800 women artisans. However, teachers disrupted the visit, demanding pension reform fulfillment.
The same day, Sheinbaum revealed that she had met with actress Salma Hayek for nearly two hours in Veracruz the day before, discussing film production incentives.
At Thursday’s press conference, Sheinbaum indicated she’s considering attending the 2026 World Cup draw in Washington D.C. on Dec. 5, potentially meeting President Trump alongside Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney. She stressed she hasn’t decided but would explore meeting possibilities if she attends. The president also confirmed two federal agents had disappeared in Jalisco while conducting intelligence work, with their vehicle found abandoned in Zapopan.
The newly opened U.S. Embassy in Mexico City officially began operations Nov. 24. Built at nearly $1 billion, the world’s largest U.S. government building outside American territory houses 1,550 employees across 40 agencies and can process 4,000 daily visa applications.
Water tensions escalated as the U.S. blamed Mexico’s missed deliveries for contributing to hundreds of millions in Texas crop losses. Mexico concluded the 2020-25 cycle owing over 865,000 acre-feet, having delivered barely 50% of its obligation. The Trump administration pressed for maximum deliveries during meetings this week. Positively, Mexico’s National Autonomous University and a U.S. water organization agreed to create a joint bilingual geoportal for managing shared water resources.
The investigation into Uruapan Mayor Carlos Manzo’s assassination, a crime that put a global spotlight on Mexico’s security challenges, progressed. Seven of his eight bodyguards — all municipal police officers — were arrested for negligence. The eighth officer remains a fugitive.
Looking ahead
Next week could be an important one for President Sheinbaum as she considers taking her first presidential trip to the United States to attend the 2026 FIFA World Cup draw — and possibly meet with the U.S. president whose policies have been a constant subject of discussion in Mexico during her first year as president. The potential meeting comes at a key moment, as Mexico prepares for next year’s USMCA trade review. Greater trade certainty would be a boon to struggling industries as Mexico faces sluggish economic growth.
Ernestina Godoy, a close ally of the president, will step into the role of interim attorney general as politicians haggle over the future of the autonomous office. The Senate has already begun proceedings to confirm one of Sheinbaum’s three proposed candidates for the role. Whether the transparency and “transformation” that the president has called materializes remains to be seen.
With the 2026 World Cup approaching and cultural tourism breaking records, Mexico must balance infrastructure development, security improvements and economic pressures while maintaining international partnerships that will define the administration’s trajectory in crucial months ahead.
This story contains summaries of original Mexico News Daily articles. The summaries were generated by Claude, then revised and fact-checked by a Mexico News Daily staff editor.
MND Merch started with a single shirt, ordered for the recording of MND's Confidently Wrong podcast. (Travis Bembenek)
If you’ve ever felt a deep connection to a cause, a song, or a story that made you say, “These are my people,” then you will already understand what MND Merch is really about.
I will be the first to admit that I have never been a big fan of corporate merch. A previous employer of mine had an unspoken rule that leadership HAD TO wear a company pin on our sports coats. Despite working there for years and getting scorned by many, I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I felt like doing so would make me a lemming. I joked that I would rather leave than wear that damn pin. I strongly believe that there’s a big difference between being forced to wear a logo and choosing to wear something representing a mission you believe in.
When I left the corporate world, my thinking changed a bit. It first happened when a friend of mine gave me a T-shirt from his company with the company logo along with the phrase “Outwork Everyone.” I liked that saying — it resonated with me. I have been asked many times in my career for advice and I always end up saying something along the lines of “just work damn hard and good things will happen to you.” Perhaps it is old fashioned advice, but it has always served me well. My wife follows a similar mantra, and that is an important part of the MND culture. Work hard. Keep improving. Never be satisfied.
But over time, an additional important element of our culture began to emerge. As my wife and I reflected on our working lives and what kind of culture we wanted to build at MND, we realized that we also wanted to “do cool sh*t with great people.” We both felt that at different times of our career, we had done really cool stuff. And at other times of our career, we were working with great people. But to be able to do both at the same time — now that really resonated with us as something we wanted to foster and build. We had already worked so hard for so many years that now, we wanted to build a culture that had great people doing cool stuff. We realized that — when that is achieved — work becomes fun and the impact you can have becomes greater.
In other words, MND isn’t just a news site focused on elevating the profile of Mexico; it’s also a community of people who work hard and are passionate about Mexico. “Do cool sh*t with great people” has truly become our mantra in this chapter of our lives — very much like how certain artists have built movements around belonging and shared values versus just products.
Getting back to merch, we had never made anything until recently. When we first started our “Confidently Wrong” podcast, my wife said to me, “You have to wear an MND T-shirt,” and so we had a few printed up. It wasn’t until after we aired that first podcast — and had many subscribers reaching out asking where to get their own MND T-shirt — that we even thought of creating an MND Merch line. That’s when it clicked: Our readers weren’t just asking for merch — they were asking for a way to wear the mission, to signal that they’re part of this slightly crazy, deeply optimistic crowd that believes Mexico matters and that good journalism still matters too.
When MND decided to print up more shirts, Digital Marketing Director María Ruiz, left, and Operations Manager Guadalupe Rodríguez, right, were first in line to try them on.
And so we bring you our first few products of the MND Merch line. We are proud of the content we produce day in and day out, proud of our team, and extremely flattered that some of you expressed interest in MND Merch. We have zero interest in making any money on this initiative (and might actually lose a little depending on the exchange rate and shipping rates) but we wanted to start small with a limited line of options and have some fun with this initiative. As you know, our mission to raise the profile of Mexico isn’t just for adults. Our recent launch of MND Kids proves that we are just as committed to inspiring the next generation to be curious, informed and proud of their heritage — helping them move beyond stereotypes through better news and information about Mexico.
You will see that shipping is includedin the pricing if shipping within Mexico (we don’t want to overcomplicate this yet by shipping internationally). And if you want to just pick up your items in our office in Centro San Miguel de Allende, we will obviously waive the shipping costs of about US $10. So when you throw on an MND shirt or hoodie, it’s not just about fashion — it’s saying “I stand with this mission, and with helping shape the narrative of Mexico,” and joining a group of people who feel the same way.
The holidays are coming, so why not give your loved one (or dog!) the gift of some MND Merch! You can see the options and find ordering information at this link.
Mexico News Daily has printed up several merch options so readers, kids and even pets can now rep MND in style and comfort.
Welcome to the MND tribe. Rest assured that we are doing the MND Merch initiative purely for fun, not for profit. Thank you for supporting our team and our work by being a subscriber!
Travis Bembenek is the CEO of Mexico News Daily and has been living, working or playing in Mexico for nearly 30 years.
Guadalajara is a global city and has been for nearly 500 years. (Unsplash/Sergio Rodríguez)
The opening gong for the age of international trade was struck in 1522 when Juan Sebastián Elcano succeeded in sailing around the world. Elcano’s coat of arms bears a talking globe which says, in Latin, “you were the first to encircle me.”
Elcano’s achievement encouraged Spanish navigators to try to reach the Far East starting from Mexico’s Pacific coast.
“You were the first to encircle me,” reads the Latin inscription onJuan Sebastián Elcano’s coat of arms. (Public Domain)
The birth of the Far East trade
On November 21, 1564, a convoy of boats sailed from the port of Barra de Navidad, Jalisco, with the aim of reaching the Philippines, and then somehow finding their way back, a serious challenge due to unfavorable winds.
“Five boats started out from Barra de Navidad,” says Guadalajara’s award-winning historian, Padre Tomás de Hijar Ornelas, “but the first one of them to make it to the Philippines and back was a patache, a little sailboat named the San Lucas, piloted by Alonso de Arrellano. The San Lucas got separated from the convoy but made it to the Philippines, discovered several islands and then sailed back to Mexico, following a route plotted by Andrés de Urdaneta, which involved sailing northeast from Manila to Japan to catch the favorable Westerlies that brought the San Lucas to the shores of northern California, after which it followed the coast back down to Barra de Navidad.
The grueling voyage
For the next 250 years, the Manila galleon followed this route, making a round trip from Acapulco once a year. The grueling return typically lasted five or six months, and dozens of crew members would succumb to scurvy, dehydration, starvation or heat stroke.
Despite all this, the tornaviaje, as it was soon called, proved very profitable.
America was now linked, by trade, both to Europe and to the Far East. Globalization had become a reality.
Silver, vanilla and cacao for China
“The Manila Galleon was more popularly known as the Nao de China,” de Hijar told me. “From the new world it carried silver coins minted in Mexico City — it was the first dollar in the world! Then there was vanilla, cacao, tobacco and cochineal (carmine dye), which is made from insects found on the pads of prickly pear cacti.
In the 18th Century, Mexico was the center of a vast and powerful global trade network. (Elephango)
“One more important item was henequen. In seawater, the fibers would last ten times longer than hemp. So, henequen rope was invaluable for marine use. Believe me, if you were a Malay pirate, you had to have rigging made of henequen!”
Silk and spices to Mexico
To Mexico, the Nao de China brought the most prized goods of the Far East: silk, spices, porcelain, carved ivory and Asian lacquerware.
As far as spices go, a cursory examination of dishes popular in Guadalajara shows how radically Mexican cuisine was influenced by contact with the Far East.
Birria, mole and ponche
Birria, for example, is a rich, spiced meat stew that originated in Jalisco. While its base is Mexican, it includes:
Cinnamon – From Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), it adds a sweet-spicy undertone.
Cloves – Native to Indonesia and used in the marinade for their pungency.
Black Pepper – Now ubiquitous, it originated in India and is common in the spice rub.
Cumin – Though often associated with Middle Eastern cuisine, it was traded through Asia and adds earthy warmth.
Mole is a very Mexican sauce made with several spices that trace their origins to Asia. Like birria, it contains cloves, black pepper and cinnamon. Some regional variations also use star anise (from South China), which adds licorice-like sweetness.
Mole belongs to Mexico, but some of its ingredients come from places very far away. (Shutterstock)
Ponche, Christmas punch, is as Mexican as can be, but again borrows from Asian spice traditions. In it, you’ll find cloves, which give it spicy warmth, and Ceylon cinnamon sticks. For tang, ponche has tamarind, now very popular in Mexico, but originally from tropical Africa and widely cultivated in India and Southeast Asia. Sometimes Mexicans add ginger to their ponche to give it a zesty kick. Ginger started out in Southern China and eventually spread all over Asia.
Guadalajara, the cultural sponge
The galleon created a culinary mestizaje — a fusion of Asian, indigenous and Spanish traditions that still flavors Mexican cuisine today.
Guadalajara became a cultural sponge, absorbing Asian aesthetics and flavors and blending them into its own vibrant identity. The great galleon — which could carry up to 2,000 tons of cargo plus a crew of over 400 — brought not only goods, but ideas and technology. It brought new techniques for weaving, for making lacquer and ceramics, for navigation, and for printing with woodblocks.
From coconut spirit to tequila
One example of a technique that revolutionized Mexico was the introduction of the Filipino alambique (still) to the Pacific coast of Colima to turn the fermented sweet sap of the coconut palm (tubâ) into a liquor known as lambanóg (palm spirit). This was so successful that the Spanish crown ordered all the coconut palms cut down.
Instead of buying Spanish brandy, the Colima Filipinos applied their alambiques to distilling the sweet juice of cooked agave fibers, giving birth to mezcal and tequila.
Note that neither Filipinos nor coconuts are native to Mexico, and probably reached Colima when the Manila galleon stopped off in Manzanillo.
Guadalajara, the global city as it looks today. (Unsplash/Roman Lopez)
“In a word: contraband,” replied the padre. “Most of the cargo was bought and paid for in advance and ended up in Mexico City, but before reaching Acapulco, the Nao de China would stop off in San Blas and Manzanillo, where the crew did wonderful business. And from both of these ports there was a Camino Real, leading, of course, to the capital of New Galicia, Guadalajara.”
So, when you are next in Guadalajara and are served a very Mexican café con canela for breakfast, please note that the café came from Ethiopia and the canela from Ceylon. Welcome to the global city!
John Pint has lived near Guadalajara, Jalisco, for more than 30 years and is the author of “A Guide to West Mexico’s Guachimontones and Surrounding Area” and co-author of “Outdoors in Western Mexico.” More of his writing can be found on his website.
