A pregnant Tamaulipas woman was one victim of stray New Year's bullets.
A man in Querétaro died from a stray bullet during New Year’s celebrations, but he wasn’t without blame: he was the one who fired the gun.
The man, both perpetrator and victim, was firing into the air on his property in San Juan del Río, about 50 kilometers southeast of Querétaro city, when one bullet came back. His girlfriend phoned emergency services but he was pronounced dead by paramedics.
In Querétaro firing a weapon into the air is not a crime, unlike in some other states, but there are sanctions for carrying a weapon, the newspaper El Diario de Querétaro reported.
Injuries from stray bullets are a problem in Mexico, where firing a weapon skyward is a well known gesture of celebration. It caused injury and danger in many parts of the country during New Year’s celebrations.
In Matamoros, Tamaulipas, a three-month pregnant woman’s life was endangered on January 1 after a stray bullet fell through her roof and hit her in the stomach. The 27-year-old was resting in her bed when she was hit.
Families in Culiacán, Sinaloa, had to take refuge in their homes for about 10 minutes to avoid getting hit during celebrations, despite a heavy police presence and pleas from Governor Rubén Rocha Moya to act responsibly, the newspaper El Universal reported.
However, security forces are not always the best antidote to the indiscriminate firing of weapons. In México state, a municipal police officer’s weapon was confiscated after photos spread of him shooting out of a window with his girlfriend to usher in the New Year.
Control Risks' security risk map. The darker the color, the higher the risk.
The security risk for business is high in 16 of Mexico’s 32 states, according to a global risk and strategic consulting firm.
Baja California, Chihuahua, Colima, Guanajuato, Guerrero, Jalisco, México state, Michoacán, Morelos, Quintana Roo, Sinaloa, Sonora, Tamaulipas, Tabasco, Veracruz and Zacatecas are rated as high risk on Control Risks’ RiskMap 2022. The map also shows there is a heightened maritime risk off Mexico’s southeastern coast, where pirates have targeted oil platforms.
The firm’s security risk assessment evaluates threats to the financial, physical and human assets of a business, as well as the willingness and capability of public security forces to protect corporate assets and personnel.
It assesses risk factors including military conflict, insurgency, terrorist attacks, strikes and riots, vandalism, kidnapping, and violent and acquisitive crime. The high risk rating is the second highest on the RiskMap after extreme.
A high risk means “the security environment presents persistent and serious challenges for business,” Control Risks said, adding that routine business activities generally require enhanced or specialized security.
The security risk in five states – Aguascalientes, Baja California Sur, Campeche, Querétaro and Yucatán – is considered “low,” meaning that security conditions do not impede normal business. The risk is medium in Mexico’s 11 other states, including Mexico City.
The 16 high risk states include the six most violent, where 50% of all homicides occurred in the first 11 months of last year. They are, in order, Guanajuato, Baja California, Michoacán, México state, Jalisco and Chihuahua. Organized crime groups have a significant presence in all those states, and many others.
Among other countries considered high risk for security are Venezuela, Nigeria, Iraq, Pakistan and Papua New Guinea.
Control Risks’ RiskMap also includes country assessments for political, terrorism, cyber and operational risks.
Political risk in Mexico is medium, meaning that “the political and policy environments are periodically challenging for business.”
Changes and proposed changes to energy sector rules have particularly upset foreign and private companies, especially those that have invested in the generation of renewable energy in Mexico. The federal government’s proposed electricity reform, which would favor the state-owned Federal Electricity Commission over private companies, is creating uncertainty and halting new investment, the European Union’s ambassador to Mexico said last month.
The risk of terrorism in Mexico is low, while the cyber risk for companies is high, meaning that “cyber threats pose persistent and serious challenges for business,” Control Risks said.
The fifth and final risk assessed by Control Risks is operational. To calculate it, the firm evaluated the influence of societal and structural factors that either facilitate or impede efficient business operations. Factors assessed include infrastructure; ease of establishing and maintaining a functioning business; ease of recruiting and retaining skilled workers; bureaucratic and business culture; and resilience to natural disasters.
Control Risks concluded that the operational risk in Mexico is medium, meaning that business faces regular operational difficulties, which “occasionally may be serious.”
The firm also looked at the state of democracy in Mexico and the region of which it is part.
In a RiskMap 2022 supplementary article entitled “Democracy is being destroyed in Latin America,” Control Risks said the region is experiencing a wave of authoritarianism and populism that is “eroding and, in some cases, destroying democracy.”
“This will continue in 2022. Companies and investors should plan accordingly,” it said.
“… During the first half of his six-year presidential term, ending in 2024, popular Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) displayed marked authoritarian tendencies. These included concentrating power in the executive (or, more precisely, himself), blatantly disregarding nominally independent regulatory institutions and excessively relying on the military, including beyond its traditional role,” Control Risks said.
“AMLO has hailed his term in office as the ‘Fourth Transformation’. This is his much-vaunted – or much-maligned, depending on whom you ask – transformative project aimed primarily at shaking up the political and business establishment with the laudable if quixotic aim of creating a more equitable society. AMLO will deepen the transformation in 2022 and over the remainder of his term.”
The president's statue in Atlacomulco before it was taken down January 1.
A statue of President López Obrador was destroyed just three days after it was erected in a town in México state.
The 1.8 meter effigy in Atlacomulco, 66 kilometers north of Toluca, was unveiled near the local bus station by outgoing Morena party mayor Roberto Téllez Monroy on December 29.
However, by the early morning of January 1, the statue was on the ground in pieces without its head or legs. It had been fixed on a concrete base with a plaque reading “Lic. Andrés Manuel López Obrador. President of Mexico 2018-2024.”
Téllez said it was placed “to break the stigmas and paradigms and make people recognize what had been done” by the president.
The New Year saw a coalition of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), the National Action Party (PAN) and the Democratic Revolutionary Party (PAN) come to power in the town.
Atlacomulco is a traditional stronghold for the PRI: the outgoing mayor Téllez was the first mayor not from that party, and the new mayor, Marisol Arias, is a PRI party member, the newspaper Reforma reported.
Arias said in a statement that she strongly condemned the removal of the statue.
About 20 people protested its removal on January 2, shouting their support for the president and placing a photo of him on the plaque where the statue had stood.
The effigy cost 58,000 pesos (about US $2,400) to produce and was created by artisans from the neighboring municipality of Tlalpujahua, Michoacán, with pink granite from the region.
The president has said that he is against statues or other tributes to leaders. “About the statues … it is no longer the time to worship personalities … in my case, I have written in my will that I don’t want my name to be used to name any street, I don’t want statues, I don’t want them to use my name to name a school, a hospital, absolutely nothing,” he said at a morning news conference in September.
These children are not only getting education but books, supplies, and meals every day.
It is a given that everyone deserves an education, but the reality in Mexico is that not everyone truly has access to public education. That was the case of a community of people who work and live at the Zihuatanejo city dump, people who live hidden away from the rest of the world.
Families who live at the landfill exist among piles of trash, eking out a living selling things they find there or redeeming recyclable bottles. As a result, education for the children there was nonexistent for years. That might still be the case today if it were not for the intervention of a group of people who decided to improve the children’s lives.
It all began in 2011 when a tourist from Chicago, David Lemon, booked a vacation at the Azul Ixtapa hotel. As many tourists do, he brought along a suitcase of clothes he and his family had outgrown with the idea to donate them to a worthy cause.
Gladys Acosta, who worked at the hotel, took him up a dirt road that led to the dump, where 45 to 50 families lived at the time. Lemon was shocked to find that none of the children there went to school, and he wanted to help.
He started by asking the hotel to pour a concrete slab, which personnel there arranged, and he sent money to construct the first building for the school, which the hotel also agreed to do. However, no students enrolled at first, so Acosta approached an employee’s wife, who was a retired nurse, Olga Sandoval, to help.
A student working hard at Escuela Nueva Manitoba.
Sandoval agreed to donate her time because she knew that the children were a source of income for their families as scavengers and that unless they had an education, in all likelihood, adult life in the landfill would be their destiny if someone didn’t step in.
Sandoval opened the city dump’s first school with books and materials she already had and only five initial enrollees. She quickly realized she might attract more students if she had a lunch program. This decision swelled her numbers to almost 20.
Each day, she hauled food cooked in her kitchen down the long, dusty road between her house and the dump and taught as many students as happened to show up that day. Still, she needed help.
So Sandoval approached the Fort Garry Evangelical Mennonite church in Winnipeg, Manitoba, and asked them to build her a kitchen at the site so that she would no longer have to haul the food every day. The group had finished a project at a senior home outside of El Coacoyul, a community in the municipality of Zihuatanejo, and were looking for another one, so the group’s leader Sid Reimer told Sandoval that they were interested would look at the idea after returning the next year.
Impressed by what Sandoval had accomplished by the time the group was back in town, it decided to build her the kitchen — and stocked it too.
Each year afterward, they built more: a classroom, four buildings, one kitchen, an administrative office/library, a bathroom for the smaller children and one for the older kids. In appreciation to the Canadian group for making their dream a reality, Sandoval named the school Escuela Nueva Manitoba en México (the New Manitoba School in Mexico).
Eventually, Sandoval was forced to retire due to ill health, brought on by a massive fire at the dump that burned for nearly two years and created toxic fumes affecting her lungs. Over the last nine to 10 years, many others have gotten involved to lighten the load and improve conditions and the quality of education offered.
People like John McKay and his late wife Joan, as well as Gladys Acosta, who represents the Azul Ixtapa, each pay for a teacher’s salary and provide a meal once a month. Others purchase items like school uniforms, socks and shoes for each child. In addition, area church organizations lend their support and raise much-needed funds to keep the school operational as enrollment fluctuates between 80 to 100 students.
According to McKay, Ontoniel Peñaloza López, a new administrator hired this past month, and his wife, Sarai Santana, who teaches around 20 students in pre-kindergarten and kindergarten, have made tremendous improvements. In addition, the staff has acquired two other teachers: Violet for grades 1, 2 and 3 and Bernice with grades 4, 5 and 6.
We toured the dark but extremely well-built wood classrooms for the next half hour or so, and the attentive, orderly behavior of the students impressed me. Each teacher seemed to have their classrooms engaged. And, of course, most were eager to pose for pictures, although we tried to disrupt the class as little as possible.
Next we saw the kitchen, well-stocked and bustling with several cheerfully industrious volunteer moms who made sure food was prepared and ready on time. And then, as we were leaving, two cars pulled up the road and unloaded what appeared to be a group of tourists but was a cohort of dentists and assistants from Olympia, Washington.
The group has volunteered its time for many years, giving free dental care to the children of Ixtapa-Zihuatanejo and in outlying areas. Led by local dentist Dr. Cecelia Villavicencio and John Diviny, the group was a welcome sight for the school. Villavicencio informed me that to date, she and the team had seen over 80 children at the school and more from another.
The school currently only provides schooling to grade six but is taking steps to provide higher education.
One of the biggest hurdles the school has faced, in addition to the constant search for funds, is that it is not accredited by the state and thus receives no financial aid. However, the staff hopes to hire two more fully certified teachers to fill their growing need to achieve accreditation. Without accreditation, they will need to pay the new teachers with only the money they can raise themselves.
Zihuatanejo Mayor Jorge Sánchez’s government has assisted the school, and his family, which owns a cement business, has generously provided materials at a great discount. Also, to lighten the ongoing fundraising burden, some local businesses have been generous in hosting over the years.
The second hurdle is expanding the school to beyond grade six. In the past, very few students attempted to further their education at schools in Ixtapa or Zihuatanejo. For children never exposed to the outside world — even though it is just a few miles away — the transition was difficult, some of it due to bullying and generally the inability to fit in. All of them returned to their community within the year.
Thankfully, another school in La Puerta now has 16 students in higher grades who have graduated from Escuela Nueva Manitoba, but the goal is to have many more.
For that, they need sponsors.
Want to help? Sponsoring a student will cost you around US $350 per year for primary schooling. After that, the price goes to $575 for university tuition. It does not include books, living expenses, transportation, and other things. Often several families will sponsor one child.
If you can’t commit to that? “Financial donations are best,” McKay says, adding that donating books and supplies, while great, can be a burden too.
“Where to put it all is the main issue,” he says. “Sometimes we give things away that we can’t use ourselves. Money allows us to put the [donation] toward our needs at the time — our monthly food bill, for example, [which] is at 8,000 pesos and counting.”
Don't hold your breath waiting for legislation to be approved.
Lighting up a marijuana cigarette for recreational purposes or taking a hit from a bong should be legal in Mexico by now, but the last congressional period of 2021 ended without the Senate passing a cannabis regulation law that was approved by the lower house last March.
Senators didn’t vote on the Federal Law for the Regulation of Cannabis in the sitting period that ended December 15 because a Senate analysis concluded there are at least 17 “inconsistencies” in it.
Among them: an alleged loophole that would allow marijuana to be sold in unlimited quantities and problems related to the National Commission Against Addictions’ regulation of the legal pot market.
“We’re concerned about the substitution of the Mexican Cannabis Institute by the National Commission Against Addictions [Conadic],” said Institutional Revolutionary Party Senator Claudia Ruiz Massieu.
“… You can’t give regulation powers to a body that is in charge of combatting addictions because that transgresses the right to [free] development of personality and promotes the stigmatization of cannabis users,” she said.
The Supreme Court (SCJN) ruled in 2019 that prohibition of marijuana was unconstitutional because criminalization violates the right to free development of personality.
The news agency Europa Press reported that Conadic could block people aged between 18 and 25 from purchasing and possessing marijuana as a health protection measure. According to the Senate, such a move would be unconstitutional because it would violate the right to equality and non-discrimination.
Zara Snapp, a pro-pot activist, said it was disappointing that the Senate had failed to act to legalize recreational marijuana.
“Once again we see that political calculations, or a lack of capacity [on the part of senators], are stopping the law from coming out,” she said.
The court’s ruling – a “general declaration of unconstitutionality” with regard to laws banning recreational marijuana – ordered the federal Health Ministry to issue permits to adults who ask to be allowed to use and grow cannabis. However, it remained illegal to possess more than five grams of marijuana and sell the drug.
“There are a lot of young people in jail because they had a little more than five grams,” said Fernando Belaunzarán, a former federal deputy who has long advocated the legalization of marijuana. “I regret the delay and the irresponsibility of the Mexican Congress,” he said.
The Senate won’t sit again until February, meaning that the use of marijuana for recreational purposes by adults without Health Ministry permits will not be legal until the second month of 2022 at the earliest, provided the “inconsistencies” can be ironed out and the proposed law is put to a vote. Given the delays to date, pot smokers would be best advised not to hold their breath.
Nevertheless, the SCJN’s directive for marijuana to be legalized means that the legislation’s eventual passage through Congress is all but assured.
The legislation legalizes possession of up to 28 grams of marijuana for personal use and the cultivation of up to six plants in one’s home. Bricks and mortar stores with the appropriate licenses would be permitted to sell marijuana for recreational purposes, but the sale via vending machines, over the phone, online, or in any other way that is not face-to-face would be prohibited.
Cecilia Flores, founder of the search collective Searching Mothers of Sonora, displays a picture of her missing son.
The leader of a group of mothers searching for their missing children in Sonora has issued a plea to cartels that operate in the northern border state: “Let us continue looking for our kids.”
In a video message posted to the group’s Twitter account on Sunday, the leader and founder of Madres Buscadoras de Sonora (Searching Mothers of Sonora) appealed to the leaders of Los Salazar – a criminal group affiliated with the Sinaloa Cartel, Rafael Caro Quintero – a notorious drug lord who founded the Guadalajara Cartel and now allegedly leads the Caborca Cartel, and other gang leaders.
“Don’t kill us, don’t abduct us, don’t threaten us and let us continue looking for our kids,” said Cecilia Patricia Flores Armenta, who is searching for her two missing sons.
She said the mothers who belong to her group are not looking for those responsible for the disappearance of their children or justice.
“The only thing we want is to bring them home,” said Flores, who revealed that she has been threatened, displaced from Sonora and is currently receiving government protection through a program designed to keep journalists and human rights defenders out of harm’s way.
“We need to bring them home because whether they’re good or bad people, guilty or innocent, for us [our missing children] are our whole life,” she said.
“… Please, in the name of all the mothers, I ask you and I beg you … not to take from us the possibility of finding our missing loved ones, to help us find them by letting us search for them. … We’re only looking for peace [of mind] – peace that … left with them,” Flores said.
Another woman searching for her son and partner was kidnapped in Hermosillo last October and beaten before she was released. The aggressors told her to give up the search for them, but she ignored them.
The bulk of the responsibility for looking for the nation’s desaparecidos falls with family members, search groups and non-governmental organizations.
After a 12-day visit to Mexico in November, the United Nations Committee on Enforced Disappearances said that an inadequate security strategy, poor investigations into missing person cases and impunity were key factors in the persistence of abductions.
Coahuila was one of the states that decided to delay the reopening of schools.
The 2021-22 school year resumes Monday, but students in some states won’t return to the classroom due to the recent rise in coronavirus cases.
The Ministry of Public Education (SEP) published a statement Sunday announcing that it was ready for the return to in-person classes after the winter vacation period. It called on school communities across the country to “be part of this return.”
Schools will reopen safely in accordance with the health guidelines outlined in the Guide for the Responsible and Orderly Return to School, the SEP said.
However, authorities in several states announced that neither in-person nor virtual classes would resume on Monday due to the heightened risk of coronavirus infection.
In Nuevo León, Tamaulipas, Querétaro and Guanajuato, students won’t return to the classroom until next Monday, while in San Luis Potosí, Baja California and Baja California Sur – currently the country’s coronavirus epicenter – schools won’t reopen until January 17.
In five other states – Chihuahua, Coahuila, Jalisco, Yucatán and Quintana Roo – authorities announced that only virtual classes would be offered this week. Authorities in some other states said that students could choose between in-person and virtual classes.
Classes were slated to resume in Hidalgo on Monday but the SNTE teachers union said Saturday that its members won’t return to work until the middle of the month. Teachers and other school employees have not yet been offered booster shots but the SEP said they will receive them in the first weeks of 2022.
The resumption of the 2021-22 school year comes as Mexico enters what appears to be an omicron-fueled fourth wave of coronavirus infections.
The Health Ministry reported 10,037 new cases on Friday and 10,864 on Sunday. It didn’t publish any coronavirus data on New Year’s Day.
Mexico’s accumulated case tally rose to 3.99 million on Sunday while the official COVID-19 death toll increased to 299,544. Estimated active cases number 48,801, a figure that has more than doubled in less than a week.
In other COVID-19 news:
• The State Workers Social Security Institute (ISSTE) has asked its health care facilities to prepare for an increase in hospitalizations of COVID patients.
Alejandro Macías warned against holding large gatherings.
“The number of cases expected [in the fourth wave] is very high and due to this increase … it’s expected that the number of hospitalizations will increase exponentially,” it said in an internal memorandum.
Signed by ISSSTE health regulations director Ramiro López Elizalde, the memo directs health care facilities to be ready to reconfigure their wards and add beds for COVID patients if they are required. It also warns that omicron spreads more rapidly than other variants.
“It will lead to an increase in walk-in consultations … and therefore attention in triage areas will need to be strengthened,” the memo said. It predicted that a lot of cases will be mild, with patients suffering bronchial rather than pulmonary symptoms.
• In an interview before Christmas, infectious disease specialist Alejandro Macías said events that attract large numbers of people should be canceled due to the emergence of omicron, as the World Health Organization recommended. However, many large events, such as a Christmas fair in Mexico City’s central square, went ahead in the final days of 2021.
Experts have warned that large gatherings over the Christmas-New Year period will inevitably lead to an increase in case numbers this month.
Macías warned that hospitals could be overwhelmed by admissions of COVID patients, even though evidence suggests omicron tends to cause milder disease.
Federal data shows there are currently 2,196 hospitalized COVID patients, with general care wards for such patients at 100% capacity in 66 hospitals.
• The risk of coronavirus infection has increased in Colima, authorities said. The small Pacific coast state remains low risk green on the federal stoplight map but the Colima Health Ministry announced Sunday that, based on its own calculations, it would switch to medium risk yellow. The state will remain yellow until at least January 16.
There are 167 active cases in Colima, authorities said Monday, with the highest number – 73– in Colima city. Most of the other active cases are in Villa de Álvarez (48) and Manzanillo (29).
Occupancy rates for both general care hospital beds and beds with ventilators have recently risen in Colima. Just over one-third of the former are in use while 22% of the latter are occupied.
• Baja California Sur remains Mexico’s coronavirus epicenter with about 500 active cases per 100,000 people. As of Sunday, it had just under 4,200 active cases, the second highest among Mexico’s 32 states after Mexico City, where there are over 13,000 people who currently have symptoms.
Mexico City and Quintana Roo are the only other states with more than 100 active cases per 100,000 residents. The capital has about 140 current infections per 100,000 people, official data shows, while Quintana Roo has approximately 130.
The Sierra Cartel published a video in October threatening the mayor of Iguala.
Facing little resistance from authorities, the Sierra Cartel consolidated and expanded its sphere of influence in Guerrero in 2021.
Based in Tlacotepec, the municipal seat of Heliodoro Castillo, the cartel forcibly took control of dozens of communities in Guerrero’s Sierra region in 2018, displacing thousands of people who are still too afraid to return home.
Since then, the Sierra Cartel – involved in the drug trade and a range of other illicit activities – has operated with impunity in the region, the newspaper El Universal reported, noting that authorities have not attempted to wrest back control of the communities they seized.
Last year, the crime group waged a war against rivals in Iguala, Guerrero’s third largest city, and moved into Huitzuico, a municipality in the state’s northern region that borders both Morelos and Puebla.
In Iguala, where there were 176 homicides in the first 11 months of last year, the Sierra Cartel’s main rival is a criminal organization called La Bandera (The Flag), according to the Guerrero Attorney General’s Office. That group is an offshoot of the Guerreros Unidos, a gang implicated in the disappearance and presumed murder of 43 students who were abducted in Iguala in 2014.
A Sierra Cartel poster blames the Familia Michoacana for crime in Iguala and declares its members are narcos, not terrorists.
While other criminal groups operate in Iguala, the Sierra Cartel is now the dominant one. Its sway is such that it controls tortilla, meat and soft drink prices in the city, El Universal said. The cartel has also attacked newspaper offices in Iguala and threatened local journalists, forcing at least nine to flee.
The group has boasted of its increased influence in the city known as the birthplace of the Mexican flag, and recently issued a threat to new Mayor David Gama Pérez, warning him there would be consequences if he didn’t collaborate with its members.
Although the Sierra Cartel is considered the principal instigator of violence in Iguala, “almost nothing has been done to stop it,” El Universal said.
In late 2021, the cartel also made its presence felt in Huitzuico. El Universal reported that the group moved into that city in October and imposed their rule with murders and abductions. In November, the cartel established a 6:00 p.m. curfew and warned that anyone who failed to abide by it would be killed.
The organization kept its word: the day after the curfew took effect three men were shot and killed as they looked for somewhere to buy dinner at 9:00 p.m. Huitzuico residents subsequently complied with the curfew to the letter, going home before sundown and staying there until morning. All businesses closed by 6:00 p.m. and public transit services ended at the same time, El Universal said.
The newspaper reported that the Sierra Cartel also controls the prices of tortillas, meat, beer and soft drinks in Huitzuico, a city of approximately 20,000 people. Guerrero Governor Evelyn Salgado, who took office last October, visited the municipality late last year to announce a joint police/military operation against crime, but residents’ fear of the cartel remains and most continue to abide by the curfew.
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The Sierra Cartel is also considering moving into Juan R. Escudero, a municipality about 60 kilometers inland from Acapulco.
After the recent murder of the founder of a self defense umbrella group called the United Front for the Security and Development of Guerrero, the cartel said it could dispatch 1,000 of its men to “pacify” the municipality. The cartel’s presence in that municipality could facilitate its movement of drugs between Guerrero’s Sierra region and the state’s Pacific coast.
The Sierra Cartel’s successes in 2021 appears to have emboldened it. On December 22, about 100 of its members confronted state police on the Chichihualco-Chilpancingo highway and forced them to release two Sierra Cartel gangsters they had arrested. The state government has “remained silent” on the incident, El Universal said.
The Sierra Cartel is one of numerous criminal groups that operate in Guerrero. Among the others are Los Rojos and Los Ardillos, which have been engaged in a turf war for years.
Criminal groups are largely responsible for the high levels of violence in Guerrero, where there were 1,130 homicides in the first 11 months of last year. That made the state Mexico’s ninth most violent after Guanajuato, Baja California, Michoacán, México state, Jalisco, Chihuahua, Sonora and Zacatecas.
Ellen Sharp's JM Butterfly B&B is the main promoter of the Cerro Pelón Butterfly Sanctuary, located in Macheros, México state. photos courtesy of JM Butterfly B&B
About a decade ago, American Ellen Sharp tagged along with a writer friend to central Mexico. Little did she know that this would change her life.
When she could not accompany her friend on an interview, she decided to take one of the tours available in eastern Michoacán during the monarch butterfly season. As she says, she “hit it off” with the guide, who today is her husband, Joel Moreno Rojas.
Now, she didn’t decide to stay in Mexico right then and there. She returned to her PhD classes in Los Angeles, but she and Moreno kept in touch.
When it came time to do her dissertation, she took advantage of 21st-century technology and decided to move in with Moreno in town of Macheros, México state, during the butterfly season of 2013–2014.
But finishing her dissertation became a chore. She was studying violence, which contrasted deeply with the peaceful mountains surrounding a village that had far more farm animals than people. She found herself relieved when job opportunities in the States did not pan out.
One of the 14 rooms that the B&B now has, decorated in a rustic style of central Mexico.
She wondered why she could not simply find a way to stay here in the high mountains of the México state-Michoacán border, until she simply decided she had to.
Although Moreno spoke English well, his work with a regional hotel had long hours and little pay. He and his family owned land just outside the entrance to the Cerro Pelón Butterfly Sanctuary in Macheros.
Sharp wondered if they could somehow take advantage of this unknown reserve that still does not still appear on Google Maps. She imagined building a viable business.
The couple combined their complementary abilities — his construction skills and her ability to promote on the internet — and began by building a couple of rooms onto their house that they could rent, and even a cell phone tower to get more reliable internet access.
Sharp calls Moreno’s handyman skills “artistry.” Meanwhile, she built a bilingual website to promote the new business and take reservations.
They quickly found that their idea appealed mostly to a certain kind of tourist. They had exactly one Mexican guest. The rest were from the United States and Canada — with more than a passing interest in butterflies.
Ellen Sharp and Joel Moreno Rojas.
Sharp found that starting and running a business had an ease to it that academic work did not.
“People started coming, and people came happy and left happier. It’s just a really nice vibe to take people to see this incredibly beautiful thing in our sanctuary, which is super remote.”
Today, JM Butterfly B&B is the main promoter of the Cerro Pelón Butterfly Sanctuary and the main employer in Macheros. With a quieter and more intimate environment, it contrasts with larger sanctuaries. About 85% of Cerro Pelón’s visitors stay at the B&B. This differs from the more typical reserves, where most visitors are day-trippers or prefer to stay in more luxurious accommodations.
The bed-and-breakfast now has 14 rooms and even a pool and a yoga studio, but it has kept its classic rural Mexican home construction appeal. Cerro Pelón is an undiscovered gem, high enough to be above the tree line (hence the name “Bald Mountain”) with thick forests below. The butterflies winter at the lowest levels.
Other activities to be enjoyed here year-round include guided hikes, bird-watching, horseback riding and more. The couple receives guests from all over the world, but the base still remains those working with butterflies from publicly and privately funded researchers along with teachers in related fields.
It is a very loyal clientele. Last year, when the reserve closed because of the pandemic, so did the B&B. To survive, the business started an online magazine, selling subscriptions to former guests. Butterfly season returns this year, but the magazine remains active and is on their website.
JM Butterfly B&B’s exterior.
The business has a social side as well. The Cerro Pelón Sanctuary was established in the 1970s. Locals knew of the butterflies but tried to keep them secret, fearing the loss of access to resources on the mountains. Their fears were justified, and that is exactly what happened when the land was expropriated.
This kind of conservation results in local opposition as well as activities such as illegal logging, a major problem in the México state-Michoacán border area. It is not that people here want to destroy the butterflies or the forest, Sharp says, but rather poverty drives them to do it.
The creation of jobs related to tourism helps this, although it is not enough. The couple began their own nonprofit organization, Butterflies and Their People in part because they became frustrated discovering every butterfly season seeing how many trees had been cut down during the rest of the year.
The organization pays for six full-time “forest guardians” whose salaries are covered by individual donations, mostly from former guests. With tourism down due to the pandemic, they have also organized webinars and meetings with conservation groups to share “what is happening on the ground,” something important because there is little accurate information of this kind.
Both the business and the nonprofit have made this spot an “international hub” for the butterflies of Cerro Pelón. But they are not content to sit on their laurels. They still want to reach out to more Mexicans and more foreigners who live in Mexico who care about butterflies and forests.
Leigh Thelmadatter arrived in Mexico 18 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.
Cinnamon-vanilla atole makes for a warm and inviting start to the day.
The first time I encountered atole was in the days between Christmas and New Year’s, at a stand outside a busy department store in Mazatlán where I’d gone with a local friend to exchange a gift. She was in a hurry; I lingered by the door, watching the vendor ladle the steaming hot something into cups and hand them to appreciative customers. “What is that? I want some!” I wailed as she bundled me into the store and onto the elevator.
Good friend that she is, on the way out, we stopped and she explained about the delicious beverage we were about to try. I’ve never forgotten that first, wonderful taste of atole and what a satisfying drink it is for a chilly winter’s evening.
Since then, I’ve learned much about this ancient pre-Hispanic beverage. The simplest description is that it’s a thick, hot, corn-based drink, sweetened and flavored with everything from cinnamon or vanilla to guava, almonds or citrus zest. (Chocolate atole has its own name: champurrado.) “Corn” as in masa harina, nixtamalized ground dried field corn that’s the basis of tortillas, gorditas, etc.
Popular in many Central American countries, in Mexico you’ll find atole in different flavors specific to different regions, running the gamut from sweet to savory. For example, in Oaxaca, Veracruz and Michoacán, chileatole, a spicy-savory version made with chile and epazote, is common. In northern Mexico, the famed Tarahumara — known all over the world for amazing long-distance runners — have used masa-based, energy-filled pinole as a staple in their diet for thousands of years.
We’re lucky that nowadays we don’t have to grind dried corn; using masa harinapara tortillas will yield a fine atole. Do avoid recipes with cornstarch; the result, while admittedly delicious, will not have the same thick consistency that’s part of atole’s charm. (That said, there’s nothing wrong with keeping a few packets of Maizena corn starch in your cupboard for a quick atole-like fix!)
A molinillo can be found in most local mercados.
Another fun part of atole is using a traditional wooden molinillo to froth the drink just before serving. My guess is you’ve seen these in your local mercado and didn’t quite know what they were for; or if you did, I bet you’ve never used one.
They come in all sorts of interesting sizes and designs, and while a wire whisk works just as well, a molinillo is a lot more fun!
Champurrado (Chocolate Atole)
Usually a breakfast drink, but equally inviting in late afternoon with a shot of mezcal.
½ cup masa harina
3 cups water, plus more as needed (see note)
1 cup milk
3½ oz. dark chocolate, broken into pieces, or chocolate chips
3 Tbsp. dark brown sugar/grated piloncillo
1 cinnamon stick or ¼ tsp. ground cinnamon
Salt
Place masa into large saucepan; set over medium heat. Immediately add water in a slow, thin stream, whisking constantly to avoid lumps. Bring to simmer. Whisk in milk, chocolate, sugar and a generous pinch of salt until chocolate is melted, about 1 minute. Add cinnamon.
Return to simmer; lower heat to low. Continue simmering, whisking constantly, about 5 minutes. Discard cinnamon stick. Thin with additional water, as needed, to create a thick yet drinkable beverage.
Add more sugar or salt if desired. Froth with whisk or molinillo.
Atole de Cacahuate (Peanut Atole)
½ cup natural smooth peanut butter
1 cup milk
½ cup masa harina
3¼ cups water, plus more as needed
3 Tbsp. brown sugar/grated piloncillo
Salt
Using a blender, combine peanut butter and milk; blend until thoroughly combined. In large saucepan, add masa; set over medium heat. Immediately add water in a slow, thin stream while whisking constantly to avoid lumps. Bring to a simmer; whisk in peanut-milk, brown sugar and generous pinch of salt.
Return to simmer; lower heat to low, then simmer for 3 minutes, whisking constantly. Thin with additional water as needed to create a thick yet drinkable beverage. Add more sugar or salt if desired. Froth with a whisk or molinillo. Serve hot.
Thick, creamy champurrado is also nice with a shot of mezcal.
Orange Atole
Feel free to use lemon or lime instead of orange.
½ cup masa harina
3 cups water, plus more as needed, divided (see note)
1 cup milk
3 (1-inch) strips orange zest from 1 large orange
3 Tbsp. grated piloncillo/brown sugar
Salt
Finely grated orange zest, for garnish
Optional: 2 star anise pods
Pour masa in large saucepan; set over medium heat. Immediately add water in a slow, thin stream, whisking constantly to avoid lumps. Bring to a simmer.
Whisk in milk, zest strips, star anise (if using), sugar and generous pinch of salt. Return to a simmer; lower heat to low. Continue simmering about 5 minutes, whisking constantly, until drink is infused with orange aroma.
Discard zest and star anise. Thin with additional water as needed to create a thick yet drinkable beverage. Add more sugar or salt if desired. Froth with whisk or molinillo. Garnish with grated orange zest.
Cinnamon-Vanilla Atole
This is a simpler recipe; use the method above if it feels more comfortable.
½ cup masa harina
3 cups milk
¼ cup water
1/3 cup grated piloncillo/brown sugar
1 tsp. cinnamon + more for garnish
1 tsp. vanilla
Combine masa, water, milk, sugar and cinnamon, whisking constantly over low heat to prevent lumps. After 5–10 minutes, remove from heat; whisk in vanilla. Garnish each cup with cinnamon.
