The taxista asked me if I wanted to go to a different hotel. To drive into the centro was impossible, he said. There was a manifestación de maestros—a demonstration march by schoolteachers. He threw up his hands, emitted theatrical sighs. "¡Imposible!" In a heroic effort to get me as close as possible to my hotel, he backed his cab up several blocks of Eje Central Lazaro Cardenas, threading through the police roadblocks. Finally a tránsito made him stop. He unloaded my luggage and set it on the pavement. He told me that my hotel was straight ahead. He pointed south. I picked everything up and began walking.
I never did see any sign of the manifestación de maestros, but as I passed the National Art Museum I came upon a group of angry electricians.
These guys weren't pulling their punches. "Hunger Strike! We demand those who run the government [get] out. Out with the bastard Calderon!
After checking in to the Gillow Hotel, I walked down to the Zócalo. More electricians were there. The world's largest plaza was covered by a tent city.
Camp-ins like this wouldn't work in Chicago's harsh climate, even if the police allowed them.
Makeshift kitchens were set up here and there. Nobody goes hungry in Mexico (unless there's a hunger strike of course). Chicharrones de la Resistencia: they reminded me of freedom fries. The sticker on the payment can exhorted me to support the movement by not paying my electric bill.
Enterprising vendors sold handcrafts and snacks. This woman sold cigarettes by the piece.
If I had taken every flyer, handbill, or pamphlet I was offered, I would have had to leave early to carry it all home. This man wanted me to take his newspaper. I wasn't going to tell him no.
From what I could tell, the electicians have mounted a serious campaign to ask for President Calderon's ouster. Groups huddled under tents or stood around in groups discussing the issues. These women represent a group called Families Standing Up for the Struggle Against Calderon's Treason, or something like that.
In case anyone is missing that this event has a leftist slant, note that the Mexican Communist Party is here in support of the electricians.
A young man holds a bullhorn, essential gear for a protest demonstration, but his mind is on the girl in the pink sweater. Seconds after this photo was taken, his girlfriend caught him gawking and smacked him.
Danzantes seem to pop up more and more these days. I don't know what they have to do with the Sindicato Mexicano de Electristas or the politics of that traitor, Calderon. But they've got the drum sounding and the copal smoking and they're dancing in the hopes of drawing a crowd.
Other entertainers worked the crowds of demonstrators: jugglers, clowns, evangelists.
I found it hard to gauge the event: angry protest or vacation holiday?
I left the Zócalo around six o'clock. Overhead, scores of helicopters ferried the high and mighty to their estates and elegant dinners in Las Lomas. Meanwhile, electricistas sitting in their tents and munching chicharrones de la resistencia, looked up and resented them.
If these electricians are the union that once supplied power to DF (Luz y Fuerza), I hope they all go on hunger strikes. With luck, they´ll all pass out and can be carted off and dumped somewhere.
Posted by: Felipe Zapata | 06/21/2010 at 10:52 AM