Week 3 (Day 15)

Day 15

It rains, a lot. Before we came here, Paul promised me that in San Cristobal you see the sun every day. This turns out to be mostly true, but not this week.


Despite the city having a rainy season, which we are just reaching the end of, it seems surprisingly badly geared up for a downpour. The gutters are perfectly positioned to drip water on passers by, and the houses are built in a style that might be more sensible for the Tierra Caliente (hot land) at the bottom of the mountain, but is a little austere here in the rain.


Luckily our apartment is set up for foreigners, and we are able to hole up by the fire and read the local papers. Just like at home, they seem to be mostly about the weather, and politics, but there is the occasional gem that tells you a bit about life here.

A man has been shot for being a witch in Teopisca, according to one rather ghoulish report, which details the exact location of the shot wounds. Then there’s the stunning full page story, with the headline screaming “Children aren’t finishing their homework”. Pope Catholic, then?

In Chamula, the nearest village to here, a man has been arrested for helping one of the political parties that the rest of the village do not approve of, while it has been “Journalists Day” in San Cristobal, and the paper devotes a whole page to photos of men with moustaches looking like they are having a miserable time.

One very boring official who claims that he “charts the weather every day”, warns the country that it might yet rain this year, and the paper also has a page about a “charity” trip to the cinema for some poorer children.

Unfortunately the “charity” that has allowed these children to visit the cinema for the first time is Cinemax, which owns the large out-of-town film complex. The children are given popcorn and their happy smiling faces are photographed for the newspaper. Sounds more like drugpushers offering the first hit for free.


Paul reads La Jornada, the Mexican version of the Guardian, which tells us about Gore’s peace prize, and a campaign for indigenous rights, but I prefer Real Jovel, the weekly local paper full of traffic accidents, fights, and a bizarre social page featuring the sort of very pale Mexicans you never see in the streets of San Cristobal. The words are shorter, too.