Basura Beach
Yucatecans and that strange disassociation with their Trash
(or Merida-White City, My Butt)
What does this have to do with garbage now? Maybe she found the gum stuck under a table somewhere in the Gran Plaza and now can't get it off her hand no matter how hard she pulls...
As a former (I'm back in Merida now) beach house resident and temporada* victim, I have (as usual) a few comments, this time about garbage and the strange lack of any particular conscience on the part of the locals.Running for exercise while living at the beach is great - fresh air, little traffic and less peoplle to saludar as you are sweating away. At least that's the way it was at the beginning of July. As the summer progressed, so did the collection of garbage pile up at the two unofficial but "we've always dumped it here" 'dump sites' along the Chelem-Chuburna tourism corridor. So running became a rather fetid experience, what with the sticky perfume of all sorts of rotting trash infiltrating your nose as well as the occasional fly, you know, those big green garbage flies, getting in your nostrils from time to time.
It got to the point where there was garbage in the street, under the bushes, even hanging from the branches of the local vegetation. So the state government, or the comisario* of Chelem, had signs - big signs - proclaiming that the 'dump site' was now closed, and would people please use the services provided.
No serious garbage collection service was ever provided (a truck passed our house 5 times during all of July and August) and people continued dumping their garbage where they always had, only now it ended up under the big sign that said the site was closed.
But I don't want to complain about the fact that there was no garbage system in place.
I'm just amazed at how lightly Yucatecans take this whole environment thing, thinking somehow that their little Comercial Mexicana bag full of diapers and fried fish skeletons tossed out of the window of a speeding Tsuru* or Cavalier in the vague direction of some more garbage piled alongside the road, really doesn't add up to much in terms of environmental damage.
Well, let's forget about environmental damage. How does it look? Is it pretty or pleasing to the eye? The same Yucatecans who pride themselves on their appearance (watch them dress up to go to the mall) and the cleanliness of their car, will, without the slightest hesitation, toss their garbage at a dump site that obviously is not open (the huge piles of uncollected stinking bags could be a giveaway in case there was any doubt).
It is interesting to note that apparently no one (except for one lonely and neurotic idiot that writes this page) takes their garbage to Merida so Xavier and his multiple collection services can fight over it. To everyone else, it seems, it is simply easier to throw the trash on the side of the road. Out of sight out of mind.
And all of this in an area that is a natural paradise, that everyone returns to year after year, that foreigners would pay good money to visit. When everything is covered in concrete, when the water and beaches and roadways are clogged with trash, who will come?
It reminds me of a comment made to me once, by a Yucatecan, who was complaining about the gringos and the fact that they treated Mexico with no respect and acted as if they were in their own back yard. If anyone is showing a lack of respect for their own back yard, it's the Yucatecans. After spending a lifetime crapping in it, one day (hopefully) they will wake up and start complaining about the stench.
To see how the citizens of Vancouver are informed as far as their garbage and RECYCLING (what a novel idea) goes, take a peek at this site...
* Glossary - some translationsComisario : A kind of mini-mayor or chief of a small boondocks kind of town
Tsuru : The Japanese put this brilliant name on their Sentra for some of the Latin American market
Temporada : Season; in Merida it is used for the summer months when everyone goes to the beach
