Viva Aerobus will become the first carrier to service all four of Quintana Roo's major airports. (Viva Aerobus)
Viva Aerobus has confirmed it will be the first airline to operate flights from the new Tulum International Airport.
Head of Viva Aerobus Juan Carlos Zuazua said that the government has informed the company that the terminal will be ready for operation in April 2024.
An architect’s rendering of the new Tulum Airport. (Tulum Airport)
In the announcement, Zuazua said that the Tulum flight will seek to reinforce its Cancún route, a destination that accounted for five million passengers — 25 % of the total volume of Viva Aerobus’ travelers throughout 2022.
The Tulum flight will turn the low-cost airline into the only Mexican carrier flying to Quintana Roo’s four international airports: Cancún, Chetumal, Cozumel and, once open, Tulum.
Zuazua also said that although they would initially operate domestic routes, Viva Aerobus is negotiating an alliance with U.S. carrier Allegiant Air to connect small and medium-sized cities in the United States with the Mexican Caribbean.
Although the proposed terminal is undergoing an environmental evaluation, construction work, including jungle clearance, has begun.
Tourists' desire for authenticity and locals' need to make a living and remain in their neighborhoods often creates thorny situations. (Martín Zetina/Cuartoscuro)
The ancient cities of Chichén Itzá and Teotihuacán are set for thousands of tourists today, as crowds gather to celebrate the spring equinox — the official start of the new season.
The National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) has launched “Operation Equinox,” to protect and promote the historic sites before one of the busiest days of the year.
The Descent of Kukulkán
Chichén Itzá, in the state of Yucatán, is home to the world-famous Temple of Kukulkan — which appears to come to life during the equinox, as shadows cast by the design of the temple give the effect of a giant plumed snake slithering down the stairs.
Chichén Itzá will be limited to 15,000 visitors in order to protect the ancient city, which dates from around A.D. 800. It was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1988.
The snake god Kukulkan was one of the chief Mayan deities, and his “arrival” from the center of the temple marked the beginning of the maize planting season.
At Teotihuacán, located in México state, thousands are expected to arrive from nearby Mexico City in search of a mystical energy associated with the site. At its height, Teotihuacán was one of the largest cities of the ancient world, with a population of over 125,000.
Visitors to the giant pyramids of Teotihuacán will not be able to climb them. (Ricardo David Sanchéz/Wikimedia)
Operation Equinox specifies that visitors will not be able to climb the enormous pyramids of the sun and the moon, which dominate Teotihuacán. However, this has been the case already in recent years in order to prevent damage to the ancient monuments.
The equinox occurs when the sun is over the equator, and the day and night are almost exactly equal across the globe.
Visitors to the sites are reminded to remain in the designated areas and to not perform religious rites or ceremonies without prior permission from INAH. The measures will last until Mar. 24.
INAH recommends that historians in search of a quieter experience visit the sites at Izamal, Ek’ Balam, Mayapán, Uxmal or Kabah instead.
The skull was discovered near some workshops in Palenque, and is believed to be a woman who came to Palenque for marriage. (Photos by Mauricio Marat/INAH).
A skeleton discovered last May at the archaeological site of Palenque was a foreign woman of around 45–50 years of age, according to a new forensic analysis.
A team from the Palenque Archaeological Project (PAP), coordinated by the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), conducted adetailed study of the skeleton dubbed “Lady SAS,” revealing new data about her diet, physiognomy and health.
Palenque was one of the centers of the vast Mayan empire. (Lousanroj/Wikimedia)
The team — made up of osteoarcheologist Luis Núñez Enríquez and physical anthropologists Miriam Camacho Martínez and Lucía López Mejía — confirmed the skeleton was female through analysis of her pelvic structure and skull features.
They also noted intriguing differences between the skeleton and other human remains found in the Mayan city.
“The human burials of Palenque are usually located inside temples or in living areas, and the space where we found this skeleton — a stone tool workshop, as reported by INAH — is neither,” said Núñez.
“One possibility is that she was associated with this activity, and those who worked in the workshop decided to bury her right there.”
The woman found at Palenque had an intentional skull deformation of the “erect tabular” type, which expanded the skull in width and height., different from the “oblique tabular” modifications typical of city residents. (INAH)
The team also observed that the woman had an intentional skull deformation of the “erect tabular” type, which expanded the skull in width and height. While intentional skull deformations were common among the ancient Mayans, the tribes of Palenque favored “oblique tabular” modifications that lengthened the skull backwards.
This led the team to conclude that “Lady SAS” may have been a foreigner within the kingdom, despite the fact that she was buried close to the site’s urban nucleus. She was found alongside three vessels believed to be burial offerings, which suggests she died between A.D. 800 and 850.
“Thanks to hieroglyphics found at Palenque, we know that women used to arrive at the city… for political relations and for marriage, and that they were women of some importance,” Pablo Alberto Mumary Farto, Doctor of Mesoamerican history at UNAM told Mexico News Daily.
“This find proves that,” he said. “It is confirmation that women did come [to Palenque] from outside the kingdom, or the Maya-Palenque state.”
Another striking feature of “Lady SAS” was a set of green inlays on her teeth, which were also intentionally filed. Núñez Enríquez observed that many societies around the world practice dental filing and skull modifications, “reflecting codes between people who share a symbolic language — who are of the same ethnic group or practice the same trade.”
“She bears the characteristics of someone who had a certain status — the dental decoration and the jade belongings that were found with her… this discovery is important from an archaeological — an osteological — standpoint because it confirms what we have read on the inscriptions: the arrival of foreign women to Palenque to marry men of a certain social status,” said Mumary Farto.
Núñez Enríquez also commented that “Lady SAS” had suffered from several pathologies common in pre-Hispanic women, including dental caries, a bone fracture and signs of scurvy caused by vitamin C deficiency in childhood.
However, these illnesses had healed at the time of her death, leading the team to believe she died of natural causes at 45–50 years old — the maximum normal life expectancy in pre-Hispanic Mexico.
“Lady SAS” is one of several archaeological finds to have been discovered during the Program for the Improvement of Archaeological Zones (Promeza). Promeza is being carried out alongside the construction of the Maya Train — a controversial new railroad that will link the archaeological and tourist sites of the Yucatán Peninsula.
The merger is expected to result in significantly increased levels of rail freight. (Canadian Pacific)
A United States federal regulator approved the first major railroad merger in two decades on Wednesday, creating a railroad that would be the first to operate a single-line service linking Mexico, the U.S. and Canada.
Canadian Pacific’s US $31 billion acquisition of Kansas City Southern (KCS) was approved after two years of scrutiny by the U.S. Surface Transportation Board. In approving the deal, the board said that the new single-line service would shift about 64,000 truckloads per year to rails from the road, fostering investment in infrastructure, quality and safety.
The merger between KCS and Canadian Pacific is the largest in two decades. (William Hamlin/Twitter)
The new merged entity will be known as Canadian Pacific Kansas City (CPKC) and will be the parent company to Kansas City Southern México (KCSM), which announced plans to invest US $200 million in Mexico last month.
The new railroad will transport grain from the Midwest to the Gulf Coast and Mexico, as well as intermodal freight goods between Dallas and Chicago. It will facilitate “the trade in automotive parts, finished vehicles and other containerized mixed goods between the United States and Mexico,” the board said.
The U.S. regulator also said that the merger would not reduce competition and will add more than 800 union jobs in the U.S.
“On balance, the merger of these two railroads will benefit the American economy and will be an improvement for all citizens in terms of safety and the environment,” U.S. Surface Transportation Board Chairman Martin J. Oberman told a news conference on Wednesday.
After service problems and economic damage that followed railroad mergers in the 1990s,regulators adopted tougher rules for major mergers in 2001, making the Canadian Pacific and KCS merger the largest since. The merger plan would combine the two smallest of the major railroads in Mexico, the U.S. and Canada into one entity, forming the sixth-largest carrier behind Canadian National.
The new single-service railroad will stretch from Canada to Mexico, providing much-needed infrastructure links between the three countries, according to the U.S. Surface Transportation Board (Canadian Pacific)
When the news of the merger was first announced in 2021, independent railroad analyst Tony Hatch told AP News that the merger should help stabilize the industry overall and should not lead to another round of railroad mergers.
According to Canadian Pacific, it could take control of KCS as soon as April 14. It will take the Alberta-based company about three years to combine the railroads. CPKC will operate around 20,000 miles of track and employ nearly 20,000 people, according to Canadian Pacific.
“This important milestone is the catalyst for realizing the benefits of a North American railroad for all of our stakeholders,” KCS President and CEO Patrick J. Ottensmeyer said in a statement to shareholders.
Acknowledging the political relevance that railroads and safety have acquired in the U.S. after the derailment of a Norfolk Southern train in East Palestine, Ohio, in February, Oberman added that the merger would improve safety by removing the transport of hazardous materials from roads to railways.
According to the companies, CPKC will bring a new safety standard to the North American rail industry as Canadian Pacific has been the safest railroad in North America for more than a decade.
The Surface Transportation Board said that Canadian Pacific has the highest safety record of any Class I railroad over the last 15 years and that combined, both railroads’ record for preventing perilous material releases exceeds, on average, any data related to road freight or any other railroad service.
The only major impact of the deal would be an increase in noise in places where train traffic is expected to significantly increase, the regulator said. Chicago, Illinois and Laredo, Texas, expect to have the biggest traffic increases, while railways across Iowa are predicted to see more than 14 additional trains daily. The tracks between Kansas City, Missouri and Beaumont, Texas, also foresee an increase of about 12 more trains per day.
The victory in Jeddah is Peréz's fifth career win. (@redbullracing/Twitter)
Mexican race car driver Sergio “Checo” Pérez won the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia on Sunday for his fifth career Formula One triumph and his third in the last two seasons.
In 2022, the 33-year-old Guadalajara native won the Monaco Grand Prix in May and the Singapore Grand Prix in October, finishing the season in second place in the points standings behind Red Bull teammate Max Verstappen.
The Mexican pilot pulled off a dominant display throughout the Grand Prix. (@redbullracing/Twitter)
Pérez started Sunday’s race in the pole position after winning the qualifying rounds on Saturday, giving him the top starting spot on the Jeddah street circuit for a second straight year — the only two poles of his career.
At the start of the race, he briefly fell behind Fernando Alonso – who scored his 100th podium finish – at the very first turn, but a five-second penalty to the Spaniard for an incorrect starting grid position (which he served during a pit stop) allowed Pérez to reclaim the lead on the fourth of 50 laps — and never look back.
Alonso was briefly handed a further 10-second time penalty for irregularities during his original pit stop, although this penalty was overturned on appeal from his Aston Martin team, ensuring that he kept his 3rd place.
Red Bull teammate Verstappen, who had mechanical issues during qualifying, fought his way back from 15th place at the start to finish in second place, giving the team a 1-2 finish in what is shaping up to be another runaway for the reigning Formula One champions.
Fernando Alonso scored his 100th career podium, despite a time penalty during the race. (@AstonMartinF1/Twitter)
“Nice job, guys — an excellent result for the team,” said Pérez, who finished about 5 seconds ahead of Verstappen.
In the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix on March 5, Verstappen of the Netherlands was first and Pérez second.
Formula One has a competition structure that involves 10 teams, with two drivers per team. Driver success is often heavily dependent on the quality of their car, which differs from team to team.
Verstappen is chasing a third straight championship and isn’t worried if it comes down to a fight between him and Pérez. Last season, the two men combined to win 17 of 23 races (including a record 15 wins by the Dutchman).
“The best one will finish in front,” he said.
For his part, Pérez feels he has yet to peak.
“I’m not sure it’s my best weekend with the team,” he said. “Melbourne will be even better,” he added, looking ahead to the next race in Australia on April 2.
Red Bull has now finished 1-2 in three consecutive races, including last year’s finale.
“Let’s keep it up,” Pérez said. “Let’s keep pushing.”
Pérez nearly ended the day joint first in the championship, but Verstappen stole the fastest lap – worth 1 point – at the last moment, denying his teammate the chance to lead the title battle for the very first time. Verstappen now has 44 points to Peréz’s 43.
The race was held on a 6.2 kilometer (3.8-mile) circuit beside the Red Sea, the quickest street track in F1, with average speeds exceeding 250 kmh (160 mph).
“It was tougher than expected,” Pérez said about the course. Last year, despite having the pole position, he finished in fourth place. “It’s a great start to the season. The most important thing is that we have the fastest car.”
Last year, Pérez raced in the Mexico City Grand Prix on Oct. 30, with hopes high that he could win on home turf. He qualified for fourth in the starting grid and finished third behind Verstappen and British racer Lewis Hamilton.
Mural by José Clemente Orozco depicting Benito Juárez during the struggles of his era at the National History Museum.
Benito Juárez is the only individual to have a federal holiday in Mexico. But he is not the father of his country like George Washington, so why?
Juárez’s time was a few decades post-Independence, during a century filled with coups d’etat, flamboyant personalities and foreign invasions. His secular sainthood comes from a lifetime of struggle and establishing the ideals that would shape modern Mexico — even if they’re not always followed.
The post-Independence century was about what Mexico would be. Would it continue its monarchistic ways (favored by the Conservatives) or would it embrace Enlightenment ideas (favored by Liberals)?
The question began even before the War of Independence started. Napoleon’s invasion of Spain in 1808 horrified the elites of New Spain but also showed that the mother country was not invincible. Miguel Hidalgo’s career as a rebel began by plotting a return of Ferdinand VII to the throne; only later would he demand the ouster of Mexico’s Spanish government.
The Spanish army’s final exit was engineered not by Hidalgo or the mixed-race mestizos who shed much blood but rather by the opportunistic Spanish general Agustín de Iturbide, who would crown himself emperor in 1822. Liberals were appalled, but Conservatives were not happy either; they wanted someone of royal blood.
Less than a year into Iturbide’s reign, he was ousted by then-Liberal Antonio López de Santa Anna, and the 1824 Constitution was adopted. But over time, Santa Anna became more dictatorial, arguing that Mexico was not ready for democracy.
Map of New Spain in 1819, during the War of Independence, showing the extent of the territory that Mexico City once controlled (Giggette/Wikimedia Commons)
But Santa Anna would remain a force to contend with for 25 years — in and out of power. He even came back after losing ½ of the country’s territory to the U.S. He would not be permanently removed until Liberal forces under Juárez and others forced him to resign in 1854, beginning a period called the Reform.
Juárez, et al. were radicals for their time, determined to break the power of the military and the Catholic Church. Their aims led to the 1857 Constitution, but also civil strife called the Reform War.
The civil war meant two competing governments. When the Conservatives lost, they enlisted foreign help. The French responded, not only because of debts owed them by Juárez but also because it was a chance to take over the country.
The French invaded and installed Maximilian I as Mexico’s second emperor. But his reign would not last long. Despite being of European royal blood, he had Liberal sympathies. In the end, just about everyone hated him.
Juárez and the Liberals retook Mexico City in 1867, restored the 1857 Constitution and executed Maximilian in short order.
Juárez’s remaining years as president would still be strife-ridden. His main opposition was from Porfirio Díaz, with opposition growing after Juárez ran for and won reelection in 1871.
Juárez died of heart issues the following year, and Díaz saw his chance. Like Santa Anna, he was a Liberal who would devolve into a dictator, maintaining his grip on power for over 30 years, shredding Juárez’s constitution in the process.
Unlike Santa Anna, Díaz’s reign lacked major wars and was marked by economic and technological developments that benefited the upper classes and foreign investors. Meanwhile, the lower classes suffered horrible working conditions, political disenfranchisement and economic deprivation.
President Porfirio Díaz’s 30-year dictatorship brought modernizationthat benefitted Mexico’s elites, but not the lower classes. (Bain News Service/U.S. Library of Congress)
All hell would break loose when Díaz reneged on a promise to not run for reelection in 1910, despite being 80 years old. The Revolution was and was not an extension of the turmoil of the past century. Its major contribution would be to replace governments defined by charismatic leaders with a bureaucratic system. The resulting Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) would rule Mexico until 2000.
All this internal turmoil would shrink “Mexico” to the borders we know today, with separatists and foreign powers seeing opportunities. Here are some examples:
In the 1820s, Spain reneged on its recognition of Mexico and tried unsuccessfully to retake it.
In 1823, Central America declared independence from Mexico City, almost taking Chiapas with them.
The first French intervention came in the 1830s, supposedly due to a complaint by a French-born Mexico City baker who lost property.
There were two attempts to establish a Yucatán Republic – one in 1840 and again in 1847, but Mexico City retook the region by force both times.
Mexico’s most painful loss was that of Texas and what is now the U.S. Southwest; Spain never subjugated northern tribes such as the Comanche. Unable to convince enough Mexicans northward, they allowed the immigration of English speakers from the U.S.
View of the monument to the “Children Heros” in Chapultepec Park, Mexico City. It honors six teen military cadets who lost their lives defending their school from invading U.S. troops. (Chivista)
Mexico City hoped that a shared European (as opposed to indigenous) heritage, conversion to Catholicism and Mexican citizenship would produce loyalty, but they were sorely disappointed. In 1836, Anglos and ethnic Mexicans declared themselves Texans and defeated Santa Anna at the Battle of San Jacinto.
Soon afterward, Texas joined the U.S., in part out of concern that Mexican troops would return but also because the Anglos never really changed their identity.
Questions related to the new Texas-Mexico border would give the U.S. the justification to begin the Mexican-American War, which ended with the invasion of Mexico City by U.S. troops, forcing Santa Anna to “sell” almost half of Mexico’s territory. Although some wanted to annex all of Mexico, there were both ideological and practical reasons to not do so.
With a century of chaos, it is only natural for a country to look for something positive in it for its national mythos, and Juárez fits the bill. His 1857 Constitution was incorporated almost wholesale into the current 1917 Constitution (with an ambitious social agenda added on).
He represents survival against adversity but also selfless dedication to both country and principle since, unlike Santa Anna and Díaz, he did not abandon Liberal principles once in power.
Leigh Thelmadatter arrived in Mexico over 20 years ago and fell in love with the land and the culture in particular its handcrafts and art. She is the author of Mexican Cartonería: Paper, Paste and Fiesta (Schiffer 2019). Her culture column appears regularly on Mexico News Daily.
Mushrooms and arugula are tumbled together with gooey melted Oaxaca cheese to make these unusual quesadillas.
The longer you live in Mexico, the more things become a part of your life that you’d never heard of before, or that previously had been relegated to the category of “exotic specialties.”
Such is the case for me with Oaxaca cheese. Now I almost always have a ball of it in the fridge, for healthy, high-protein snacking, for cooking, for adding to sandwiches and salads. It’s kind of a mainstay.
Here in Mazatlán, the weekly mercado orgánico has a vendor that makes and sells balls of fresh Oaxaca cheese (plain or with chipotle or garlic). It’s lovely: soft and firm at the same time, with a delicate, almost milky flavor.
But you can find Oaxaca cheese worth buying in grocery stores too — you just have to read the labels and do your own taste tests till you find one that suits your fancy. Avoid any with too many ingredients; that list should be short and leche de vaca (cow’s milk) should be the first one.
Sometimes I’ve found that it can be too salty. Here’s a tip: Pull or cut the ball apart into smaller pieces and let sit, refrigerated, in a bowl of water overnight. The excess salt will leach into the water, and your cheese will be more fresh-tasting.
Queso Oaxaca (waa-haa-kah ) is a simple, unaged cheese, made by double-cooking and curdling milk and then stretching the cheese curds, resulting in the trademark stringiness.
This simple fresh cheese has a delicate, almost milky flavor.
Should you want to make it at home, it’s not difficult, albeit a little time-consuming and exacting. In the state of Oaxaca, where it originated, it’s called quesillo (kay-see-yo), meaning “rope cheese.”
It’s the same process used to make mozzarella, and, yes, it’s what commercial “string cheese” kind of is. I say “kind of” because there are so many added stabilizers, etc. that it bears little resemblance to its purer Mexican cousin.
What to use it for? Anything where you want melty, gooey cheese. It’s a good substitute for mozzarella or Monterey Jack, and, of course, can be eaten for fun just like string cheese (except it tastes better!) Enchiladas, quesadillas, chiles rellenos, grilled cheese sandwiches, lasagna, pizza and other Italian dishes, nachos, migas, molletes — the list goes on and on.
Because Oaxaca cheese is a fresh cheese, you need to eat it quickly. Store in the refrigerator in a covered container of water.It should last seven to 10 days. If need be, you can also freeze it. Just put the unopened package in the freezer and thaw in refrigerator before using.
Choriqueso (“Hangover Helper”)
½ lb. ground pork shoulder
2 tsp. red wine vinegar
¼ tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. paprika
½ tsp. dried oregano
1/8 tsp. ground cumin
1/8 tsp. cayenne
1 tsp. grated garlic
1 tsp. salt
1 Tbsp. vegetable oil
1½-2 cups grated Oaxaca cheese (or pulled into strings)
Tortilla chips for serving
Preheat broiler to high. Using your hands, mix pork, vinegar, cinnamon, paprika, oregano, cumin, cayenne, garlic, and salt in medium bowl. Heat oil in 10-inch broiler-safe skillet over medium-high heat; add chorizo mixture and cook, stirring and breaking up the meat until no longer pink. Season to taste with salt. Remove from heat. Top with cheese.
Place under broiler until melted. Serve immediately with tortilla chips for scooping.
This “hangover helper” cheese dip is just what the doctor ordered!
Carnitas Torta
1 loaf rustic country bread or ciabatta
1½ cups refried beans
About 1½ kilos pork carnitas
1/3 cup salsa verde
12 oz. Oaxaca cheese, shredded or pulled into strings
1½ cups pickled red onions, drained well
2-3 jalapeño peppers, finely sliced
Use a bread knife to make a hollow “bread boat” by slicing off the top 1-1½ inches of the loaf. Then cut around perimeter of the interior of the bigger bottom piece without breaking through the bottom crust and use your fingers to pull out the excess bread from the inside.
Spread beans on bottom of the bread boat, followed by carnitas, salsa, cheese, onions and jalapeños. Close sandwich.
Wrap sandwich tightly in aluminum foil. Place between two stiff cutting boards, and then place a heavy weight on top (about 40 pounds). Press down firmly to flatten sandwich evenly; let rest under the weight for at least 4 hours.
When ready to eat, adjust oven rack to center position and preheat oven to 375 F (177 C). Remove weights; slice sandwich through foil into four to six pieces with a bread knife. Unwrap and transfer to baking sheet, pressing the pieces back together to form a full sandwich shape. Bake in oven until hot and cheese has melted, about 15 minutes. Serve immediately.
Smoky Mushroom Quesadillas
2 Tbsp. olive oil
8 oz. portobello mushrooms, sliced
1 tsp. minced garlic
2 green onions, chopped
½ tsp. coarse salt
½ tsp. smoked paprika
¼ tsp. black pepper
About 2 cups (8 oz.) shredded Oaxaca cheese
½ cup arugula
½ cup chopped cilantro
10 (6-inch) corn or flour tortillas
Salsa for serving
Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat; add mushrooms. Cook 5 minutes, stirring. Add garlic and green onions; cook 3 minutes. Season with salt, pepper and paprika. Set aside. In a separate bowl, toss arugula and cilantro.
Wipe out skillet or use a comal; warm over medium heat. Heat a tortilla, flip and layer cheese, mushroom mixture, greens and cheese again on half of one side. Fold tortilla over so melting cheese seals it shut. When tortilla is golden brown on the bottom, flip and cook the other side for another 30 seconds. Repeat with remaining tortillas and ingredients.
Serve with salsa.
Beans and tomato combine with Oaxaca cheese to make a hearty, satisfying side dish.
About 1⅓ cups Oaxaca cheese, grated or pulled into strings
Heat oven to 475 F (245 C). In 10-inch ovenproof skillet, heat oil over medium-high. Quickly fry garlic until lightly golden, then stir in tomato paste (being careful of splattering). Stir and fry 30 seconds, reducing heat as needed to prevent garlic from burning. Stir in beans, water and generous pinches of salt and pepper. Sprinkle cheese evenly over top. Bake until cheese has melted and browned in spots, 5–10 minutes. Serve with crusty bread for dipping.
Since coming to Mexico two decades ago, the writer has fallen for Mexico's often vibrant palette of colors. (Sarah DeVries)
“Wow, your house looks so… Mexican!”
This is the phrase my friends — Mexican and immigrant alike — often say when they come to my home for the first time. Always self-conscious about not wanting to copy someone else’s style, it makes me feel a bit sheepish.
Few people here recreate “Mexican décor” (well, a specific type of brightly colored folkloric Mexican décor) as enthusiastically as immigrants, after all! And in this particular case, I’ll always insist that imitation truly is the highest form of flattery. After all, there’s pretty much nothing not to love about this kind of “typical” décor.
Also present here is a marked taste for clean, smooth neutrals and concrete. It has its merits, but if you ask me, they’re missing out on some major opportunities for getting everyone really happy with a coat of carefully-chosen paint.
I know this is only my opinion, but nothing personally depresses me visually more than cinder block color everywhere you turn (I’ll concede, though, that it can look quite striking in what’s otherwise a sea of color).
The use of vibrant color has a long history in Mexico, and I think is one of the main features that makes Mexico so recognizable and distinct. Anyone who’s taken a tour of some of Mexico’s large archeological sites and museums has surely glimpsed traces of the original hues. If you’re lucky, there will be a display somewhere explaining what those colors were, how they actually looked and how they were made.
The Aztecs, for example, used a basic palette of five colors for their murals and sculptures — red, ocher, blue, black and white — and an expanded palette of mostly organic paints for their codices. The Maya are famous for their “Maya blue,” made with indigo, a color they considered sacred.
For their time — before the advent of modern chemistry, I mean — both cultures had quite a wide range of colors at their disposal. One of my favorite daydreams is to imagine what it might have been like to have walked the streets of those ancient cities, taking all those colors in.
Things have changed a lot since then, but the love for and acceptance of vibrant color in public spaces has not. During Mexico’s more recent mestizo history, plenty of new colors have come on the scene and gotten strong, beloved footholds in the Mexican aesthetic, giving way to what I call the “folkloric color palette”: exuberant, saturated hues that simply demand to be looked at.
As far as I’m concerned, color might as well be witchcraft.
That intense blue, for example: saturated, deep, and somehow also bright, commonly called azul rey, is one of my favorites. It’s about the color of a male peacock’s breast, and it just blows me away when I see it painted pretty much anywhere (which is a lot of places in Mexico; I believe I first really fell in love with it, though, on Frida Kahlo’s patio). I have a shirt that color, but I almost never wear it — the color is just too big for me.
I also use it quite sparingly for decorating my own home because it has a way of just 100% stealing my attention, holding me in rapture. I don’t paint it everywhere for the same reason humans don’t walk around naked, even when the weather permits: we’d be too distracted to get anything done.
Another gorgeous color that Mexico is well known for is rosa mexicana. Inspired by the vibrant bougainvillea plant, it was created and made famous by an artist and fashion designer from Veracruz by the name of Ramón Valdiosera. At a New York fashion show, a critic asked him about his unique shades of pink. He responded that they were already well-embedded in Mexican culture, and in its subsequent write-up, the critic described it as “Mexican pink.”
While I’m a big fan of this color, it’s another one that I use sparingly but admire when I see it in other places. I do love pink, though, and currently have a nice pink-orange salmon color in my bedroom. Mostly, I’ve surprised myself to discover, I tend to stick to three of the Aztec’s five basics for most spaces, with some dark teal thrown in generously to give it some extra heart and depth.
Nowadays, of course, I’ve got many more choices than Mexicans 600 years ago could have imagined being able to recreate. While the Mexican paint store Comex, I’ll admit, is not the supplier of my favorite brand here, I have one across the street, so I usually buy from them anyway.
I go there enough that the people who work there recognize me and ask about how previous colors have turned out. And they never, of course, raise their eyebrows when I ask for a gallon of something so eye-catching and saturated that it might cause jaw drops in someone who grew up in a sea of greige. This is Mexico, after all: the land of color.
So that’s what I’ve been doing in my free time for about the past eight months: spending all my money at Comex, and all my free time slapping that paint up on the walls. I have the Balanza color in my TV room, and Cobá in the long, wide hallway downstairs with some murals of dubious quality (it had been painted all white, and it gets no sunlight, giving it the creepy look of a 19th-century hospital passageway; but don’t worry, you guys: it’s fixed now!).
I also go to Comex — I promise they haven’t paid me to write this, though now I think maybe I should have looked into it! — because I love the way they actively help to keep Mexican communities colorful through their initiative Mexico Bien Hecho (“Mexico Done Right” would be my personal translation, though “Mexico Done Well” is the literal one) in which they donate paint for colorfully renovating places that need it.
My daughter sometimes likes to ask me “would you rather” questions in the style of this YouTube Kids video she watches sometimes. Her favorite one currently is this: “Would you rather be blind or deaf?” (I’ve been sternly corrected several times that “neither” is not actually one of the options).
I tell her that I’d rather be deaf — besides, I already kind of am with only one ear working — and that I would be heartbroken to miss out on all the color and beauty around me. At this point, she proceeds to tell me that my answer is wrong; how could I even consider living without music?
“I can sing songs to myself in my head,” is also not an acceptable answer. But that’s okay. She’s 9: opinionated and inflexible in the way that all 9-year-olds are. But on this front, I know myself well.
One of the greatest gifts that the world and especially Mexico has given me, is the chance to be 100% dazzled by the beautiful colors surrounding me on every side.
Sarah DeVries is a writer and translator based in Xalapa, Veracruz. She can be reached through her website, sarahedevries.substack.com
The president discussed safety in Mexico vs the U.S., political "literacy", fentanyl seizures and more at the week's press conferences. (Gob MX)
After spending the weekend on the Yucatán Peninsula to inspect progress on the construction of the Maya Train railroad project, President López Obrador returned to Mexico City to begin a new working week, which, as always, included another five-day run of 7 a.m. press conferences.
Baseball, traditional medicine, fentanyl seizures, the “rescue” of the oil industry and the political literacy of the Mexican people were just some of the topics discussed at this week’s mañaneras, as the early bird pressers are known.
Monday
At the top of his mañanera, AMLO noted that it was a good Sunday for director Guillermo del Toro, whose film Pinocchio won Best Animated Feature at the Oscars, and the Mexican baseball team, which defeated the United States in the World Baseball Classic.
“Our congratulations to this exceptional Mexican, filmmaker Guillermo del Toro, he’s a source of pride for Mexico,” he said.
“… It’s also very good news that our baseball team won, they beat the United States, … it’s quite an event,” López Obrador said.
The president is an ardent baseball fan. (Gob MX)
During the customary Monday update on the Maya Train project, the head of the National Institute of Anthropology and History reported that the archaeological “prospecting work” along all seven sections of the railroad had been completed.
“We have now covered … more than 1,600 kilometers along the rights of way,” Diego Prieto said, adding that the work carried out constituted “the largest archaeological investigation” ever carried out in the Maya region.
Over 46,000 “immovable assets” including pre-Hispanic roads, temples and residential structures were examined and some 832,000 ceramic fragments were collected, he said.
After offering a more detailed analysis of Sunday’s match during which he asserted that success in baseball, like “good politics, needs “the three Cs – cabeza, corazón y carácter” (head, heart and character), AMLO opened the floor to questions.
“Lawyers use these legal tactics to buy time, they’re delaying tactics – they’re legitimate because that’s what lawyers do, that’s their job,” he said. “But of course it’s Ovidio,” AMLO added.
In response to a subsequent question about whether it is safe for United States citizens and Mexican migrants in that country to travel to Mexico, López Obrador gave an emphatic answer.
“Mexico is safer than the United States,” he said. “There is no problem with traveling around Mexico safely. United States citizens know that and of course our compatriots [in the U.S.] know that. They’re well informed.”
After once again acknowledging – and condemning – calls from Republican Party lawmakers for the U.S. military to be used to combat Mexican drug cartels, AMLO noted that he had received a letter from President Joe Biden reaffirming his “respect toward the people of Mexico” and “our sovereignty.”
“… The relationship in general [with the United States] is good but all of a sudden things come up and we have [to work] to maintain our relationship. Cooperation with the United States is very important, but without subordination,” he said.
Tuesday
During the fortnightly health update, the director of the Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS), a major public health care provider, announced that retired IMSS doctors will have the opportunity to return to work while maintaining their retirement benefits.
The government, Zoé Robledo explained, will next week launch a recruitment process to hire such doctors for the IMSS-Bienestar universal health care scheme.
“We’re sure that a lot will put their knowledge and all their experience from an entire professional career at the service of IMSS-Bienestar hospitals, where we need it most,” he said.
Health Minister Jorge Alcocer relieved his colleague and proceeded to wax lyrical about traditional medicine.
Health Minister Jorge Alcocer at the Tuesday morning press conference. (Gob MX)
“I would like to remind all of you that thanks to traditional medicine humanity has managed to survive and fight against what has always threatened the physical, emotional and spiritual integrity of human beings: sickness and death,” he said.
“… Why am I reporting this. Well, the government of Mexico through the National Institute of Indigenous Peoples (INPI) is carrying out a series of actions aimed at the promotion of community health and traditional medicine in indigenous and Afro-Mexican communities,” Alcocer said.
The legislation that allowed the creation of INPI “recognizes and includes traditional medicine in the public health system,” he added.
Retaking his place at the mañanera lectern, Robledo reported that 753 médicos tradicionales who “base their practice on ancestral knowledge” are employed in the IMSS-Bienestar system.
“They’re part of the local and community health systems and they direct patients to health units when they identify an ailment,” he said.
With his supporting cast having concluded their contributions, Mexico’s preeminent political protagonist resumed his place at center stage and put himself at the disposal of the patient press corps.
One reporter broached the subject of polarization in Mexico and wondered whether it was time for a presidential call for unity.
“We have an alliance with the people, we have no problem, no differences with the people,” AMLO responded.
“There is a sector [of society], an elite that defends the old regime of corruption, of injustices, of privileges. They’re the ones who aren’t happy, but this is normal. Why would we want everyone to think the same way? That’s not democracy,” he said.
President Benito Juárez (1858-72), whose reforms were part of what AMLO considers the second “transformation” of Mexico and whose birthday (Mar. 21) is commemorated as a public holiday. (INAH)
In a typically long response, López Obrador gave an overview of the three transformations of Mexican society – independence from Spain, 19th-century liberal reforms and the Mexican revolution – and declared that it was “natural” that there is resistance to his government’s “peaceful … fourth transformation.”
The president, a self-styled champion of the poor who has made welfare distribution a central tenet of his governance, also compared his administration to its “corrupt” predecessors.
“What assistance reached the people? None – only when there were elections; they handed out bits and pieces, gifts, groceries, construction materials, chickens, ducks, goats, sheep, pigs … beans with weevils [in them] and cash to buy votes, to get into positions [of power] and keep stealing,” he said.
“If there was persecution, we would have already filed a [criminal] complaint against the ex-president,” he said, adding that the government hasn’t done so because the turnout for a 2021 referendum that asked citizens whether past presidents should be investigated for crimes they might have committed in office was below the threshold required for the vote to be binding.
Wednesday
Baseball was once again at the front and center of the president’s mind because Mexico defeated Great Britain the previous night in its third match of the World Baseball Classic.
“I stayed up late because what do you know? Mexico won again, 2-1 against England. … Congratulations to all the members of the Mexican team,” he said.
AMLO later directed his attention to the government’s efforts to confiscate drugs, especially fentanyl.
AMLO discussing fentanyl seizures at the Wednesday press conference. (Cuartoscuro)
“When we took office … the Communications Ministry was in charge of ports but to establish order, to avoid the entry of contraband, of drugs, it was decided that the Ministry of the Navy would manage ports because there were ports like Manzanillo and Lázaro Cárdenas that were were practically taken over by crime,” he said.
“… The decision was a good one because we’ve been able to seize a lot of drugs at ports,” López Obrador said before pointing out, once again, that six tonnes of fentanyl have been confiscated in Mexico since he became president.
He then claimed that Mexico is doing more than the United States to get illicit fentanyl off the streets.
“This drug is distributed there but nothing is known about seizures and arrests of those who dedicate themselves to its distribution,” AMLO said, overlooking frequent announcements of confiscations by U.S. authorities at the border.
Turning to another issue that affects both Mexico and the United States – gun violence – López Obrador acknowledged that President Biden had signed an executive order that aims to reduce the scourge via a range of measures including by increasing the number of background checks completed before a firearm can be sold.
“President Biden yesterday issued a resolution, a decree, for improved control in the sale of weapons, something that I’m happy about. It’s a good thing that he carried out this action,” he said.
“Where do the weapons that the drug traffickers in Mexico use come from? From the United States and they’re bought there without any control, it’s a big business,” López Obrador said.
“… Eighty per cent of the weapons that criminal organizations use here – the high-powered ones – come from the United States and there’s no control. You can buy a machine gun in a supermarket, in a gun store,” said AMLO, who governs a country where firearms can only be legally bought in a single army-run gun store located in Mexico City.
Near the end of his presser, the president pounced on an opportunity to sing the praises of the Maya Train railroad, which is slated to begin operations in December.
“I guarantee that it’s the most important project [currently] being built in the world. There’s no project like this in the world because it’s 1,554 kilometers long; it’s like Cancún to Mexico City in a straight line,” he said.
The Maya Train speeds through the jungle, in an illustrative rendering by federal authorities. (Fonatur)
“… This is the future of the southeast, it’s what will give residents of five states their income in the future, the new generations, because 30 million tourists are arriving [in Mexico annually] and with the the train … they’ll go inland [from destinations such as Cancún],” López Obrador said, referring to a part of the country where there are numerous archaeological sites
“If we get 10% of those 30 million to use the train we’ll give it life,” he added.
Thursday
“We want to report on the progress made in the rescue of the oil industry, it’s very important,” López Obrador announced at the beginning of his presser.
“It was in clear decline because [past governments] wanted to destroy it. …. They left the six [Pemex] refineries … in a deplorable situation. … And in oil production, the same thing,” he said.
Energy Minister Rocío Nahle reported that the government has invested just under 62.9 billion pesos (US $3.36 billion) to carry out major and minor repair projects at the refineries in Ciudad Madero, Tamaulipas; Cadereyta, Nuevo León; Salamanca, Guanajuato; Tula, Hidalgo; Minatitlán, Veraruz; and Salina Cruz, Oaxaca.
“This is a historic figure to rehabilitate Mexico’s refineries and put them in optimal conditions once again,” she said.
With regard to refinery output, Pemex CEO Octavio Romero said that the state oil company’s goal is to get to 2 million barrels of fuel per day by the end of 2023, when the new refinery on the Tabasco coast should be operational.
Pemex CEO Octavio Romero discussing refining capacity at Thursday press conference. (Gob MX)
“That’s the goal the president has indicated we must get to,” Romero said after noting that production has gradually increased since the current government took office in late 2018.
“With these two million [barrels per day] we’ll practically be guaranteeing self-sufficiency [for fuel] in our country,” he said.
The government’s “self-sufficiency” policy, López Obrador said when he returned to center stage, “has helped us avoid fuel price increases.”
AMLO reminded reporters that when he was campaigning to become president he committed to increasing fuel production in Mexico and keeping prices down.
“We said, ‘we going to stop buying fuel abroad’ because among other things it’s absurd that we sell the raw material [crude oil] and buy gasoline. … It’s like selling oranges and buying orange juice – that’s what the neoliberal policy was,” he said.
The president’s first question of the day came from a young man in a wheelchair.
“My name is Daniel Robles Haro and what you’re hearing is a synthesized voice that helps me express my ideas. My disability is known as severe cerebral palsy,” he said before asking AMLO whether he knew anything about communication boards, visual resources that can help nonverbal people communicate.
Robles pressed for the inclusion of communication boards in school textbooks and advocated making public places, and especially public bathrooms, more accessible for people with disabilities.
“With regard to the special books, we’re going to ask the Education Minister Leticia Ramírez to provide an answer today. And with regard to the special bathrooms, … it would be very good to start here in Mexico City and we’re going to ask the mayor to speak with you,” López Obrador said.
“… It’s important that it’s known that we’re attending to people with disabilities in a way that has never been done before. In this country all girls and boys with disabilities have a scholarship, all of them, … more than a million girls and boys,” AMLO said, adding that disabled adults up to the age of 29 also qualify.
“… And now we’re reaching agreements with state governments so that disabled adults aged 30 to 65 also receive a pension,” he said.
In a press conference that lasted over three hours, López Obrador also touted the health of the Mexican economy, asserting that the country no longer gets “pneumonia” when the United States catches a cold.
In addition, he noted that he would meet virtually with 11 leaders of Latin American and Caribbean countries in early April to discuss ways to combat inflation and announced that the federal government would “rehabilitate” Mérida’s baseball stadium, Parque Kukulcan Alamo, which he diagnosed as being in poor health.
Friday
After speaking at the Association of Mexican Banks’ Banking Convention in Mérida, Yucatán, on Thursday, López Obrador held his last press conference of the week in Tabasco, the state where he was born in 1953.
The president with Yucatán governor Mauricio Vila at the Mexican banks’ banking convention on Thursday. (Gob MX)
“We’re here in Tabasco, in our land, our water, here beneath a ceiba, in front of this sacred tree for the Mayans, which represented the fertility of the soil and support for the sky. We are very happy to be in Tabasco,” he told reporters in the state capital of Villahermosa.
Governor Carlos Merino Campos subsequently welcomed the president back to his home state and noted that he would accompany him to the new Olmeca Refinery on the Tabasco coast later in the day.
“It will produce at its full capacity this year, first 170,000 barrels [per day] and later at the maximum capacity of 340,000 barrels,” said Merino, who became governor in 2021 when Adán Augusto López accepted the powerful interior minister role in the federal government.
Continuing the focus on Tabasco, National Defense Minister Luis Cresencio Sandoval provided a report on crime in the Gulf coast state, noting that it ranks 22nd for homicides among the 32 federal entities for the period since the current government took office in December 2018.
There were 1,816 homicides in Tabasco between that month and January 2023, he said, noting that the average across all 32 entities in the same period was 3,673, or 102% higher.
“In homicides per 100,000 residents, Tabasco occupies 15th place … with 76, the national average being 102,” Sandoval added.
Citing United Nations recommendations, the army chief also reported that Tabasco has a “surplus” of security force members.
Counting the deployment of members of the military and National Guard as well as Tabasco police officers, there are 13,755 “operational elements” carrying out public security tasks in the state, Sandoval said.
Back in front of reporters, AMLO offered a lesson on government austerity when he was asked about a large payout outgoing National Electoral Institute chief Lorenzo Córdova is set to get.
“Austerity is not an administrative matter, it’s a matter of principles. A person who earns 300, 400 or 600 thousand pesos a month in a country with so much poverty is … immoral, a dehumanized person. … Obtaining profits and accumulating money is legal and legitimate, but not in the public service,” he said.
“[Public service] is to attend to others, support others, serve others. It’s to serve, not serve oneself,” López Obrador said.
The president said that the government attempted to reduce the “extremely high” salaries and “onerous” benefits of high-ranking officials “but in the judicial power and the supposedly autonomous bodies they maintained these elevated salaries and benefits” because they obtained injunctions against the cuts.
The president’s last press conference of the week was held in Tabasco, his home state. (Gob MX)
Returning his focus to Tabasco and Mexico’s southeast more broadly, the Gulf state’s most famous son said that the government – despite pouring money into rehabilitating, buying and building refineries – was planning for a post-oil future.
“We’re thinking about the substitution of economic activities, … moving from the extraction of oil to activities like ecological and cultural tourism. There are countries in Europe that live from tourism,” López Obrador said after once again touting the benefits the Maya Train project will bring to Chiapas, Campeche, Quintana Roo, Yucatán and Tabasco.
“We have something exceptional – nature,” the president continued. “The creator, just as he gave us oil, also gave us water.”
In his final remarks of the mañanera, AMLO took the opportunity to praise the people of Mexico – among whom he retains majority support, according to a recent poll – for their political acumen.
“The people aren’t stupid. With all respect, he who thinks the people are stupid is stupid. … There is no longer political illiteracy in Mexico, we have one of the most [politically] aware populations in the world,” he said.
“If you ask me what is the biggest achievement in recent times I would respond the change of mentality, the revolution of consciences, the politicization of the people,” AMLO said before bidding his fellow tabasqueños adiós.
The U.S. company Rapiscan already supplies U.S. customs officials with tech that takes x-ray images of the inside of vehicles. This image shows a truck smuggling bottles of liquor into the U.S. (Rapiscan)
The Ministry of National Defense (Sedena) has awarded a US $612 million customs equipment contract to United States company Rapiscan Systems, the Reforma newspaper reported Friday.
The California-based company beat out a consortium led by Chinese firm Nuctech even though it submitted a higher bid.
The machines would be installed at Mexico’s 19 northern border stations, designated here by the orange circles as well as a few at Mexico’s southern border. (Google)
Rapiscan and Nuctech were the only companies that met all the requirements outlined by Sedena, which held a public tender to find a contractor to supply inspection machines at 21 border customs stations, 19 of which are in the north and 2 of which are in the south.
Rapiscan will provide and install 54 screening systems for the nonintrusive inspection of loaded cargo vehicles, 70 systems to inspect light vehicles, 18 systems to inspect empty cargo vehicles and four systems to inspect passenger buses.
Reforma described Sedena’s purchase as the most significant acquisition in the recent history of Mexico’s customs system.
The screening equipment on the Mexican side of the northern border has to be interoperable with equipment used by United States Custom and Border Protection.
An example of the “portals” Mexico will be buying. Different portals allow for nonintrusive scanning of vehicles of all sizes, with or without cargo. (Rapiscan)
Sedena took full control of Mexico’s customs procedures in May of last year, and has since started updating its inspection systems. Sedena emphasized that the new scanning systems will strengthen its ability to detect contraband, including drugs and weapons.
Mexico is especially interested in stemming the southward flow of firearms, many of which end up in the hands of powerful – and violent – criminal organizations.
Foreign Affairs Minister Marcelo Ebrard said late last year that Mexico was in the grip of a “firearms pandemic” and urged the U.S. to do more to stop weapons being smuggled across its southern border.
The United States is particular concerned about the entry of illicit fentanyl, which causes tens of thousands of overdose deaths per year in that country.
