Resistance

Mónica sent me an article about two indigenous women who decided to go shopping in Antara, an upscale mall in Mexico City. I have never been there, but I often see the mall featured in magazines, advertising designer clothes by Prada, Versace and the like. One day last week, two indigenous women from Chiapas were touring the ritzy district of Polanco, where Antara is located, and came across the mall. They decided to go inside and take a look around. The story is in Spanish and worth the read if you understand the language: (http://hazmeelchingadofavor.com/index.php/2010/05/13/no-tienes-que-ir-a-arizona-para-ser-discriminado-en-antara-polanco-te-tratan-igual/, http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/sociedad/5791.html). But for those of you who don't read Spanish, here is a summary of events: the women walk into the mall dressed in their traditional skirts and blouses. Naturally, they draw stares--two indigenous women shopping in the ritziest mall in all of Mexico? Apparently security guards were notified and told to keep an eye on the women. They were prohibited from taking a picture in front of a fountain. Later, at a restaurant, waiters made fun of the women a few feet from the table and served them with exaggerated politeness.

The article reminded me of a story Carolina told me the day we went shopping downtown. At one point, we walked by the historic Hotel San Francisco and the adjacent restaurant, Degás. My mom and I stayed in this hotel when we first arrived in Chihuahua and ate at this restaurant several times. There is a Degás in Juárez (or was...who knows if it's still open with all the extortions that are occurring in Juárez these days!), and we used to go every once in a while. It is a very nice restaurant, in a classy old Mexican style: polished wooden tables and booths, cream-colored walls with framed paintings, waiters in bow-ties and black vests over crisp white shirts. Degás is renowned for serving classic norteño dishes, such as enchiladas, flautas, and dressed-up burritos. I really like this restaurant, both in Juárez and in Chihuahua.

As we walked by it that one day, Carolina mentioned that a priest who used to give Mass in Oasis invited a group of students to eat there once, about seven years ago. Carolina was among this group. When they got to the restaurant, the priest held the door open and the rarámuri students walked into the restaurant. I didn't ask Carolina, but I assume the girls were wearing their traditional dresses and blouses. Carolina says that as soon as they walked in, a man in a suit standing by the cash register--I assume it was a manager--said to the group, "no, no, you can't come in here. You have to leave." Then, the priest came to the front of the group and said, "no, they're with me and we're going to eat." Only then did the manager seat the group and serve them.

After she told me this story, Carolina asked me, "why did they treat us like that?" "I don't know," I answered, then added "it's really terrible that they treated you that way, it should never have happened."

What is most shocking about the story is that the manager asked the group to leave the restaurant as soon as they walked in, without asking what they wanted. In Chihuahua, as in many other cities in Mexico and throughout the world, poor children often visit elegant restaurants and approach customers to ask for change or extra food. In Chihuahua, these people are always rarámuri. One of the most awkward experiences I have had in Chihuahua occurred when I visited a Starbucks near my apartment, and as I was sitting at a table drinking coffee and reading a book, a rarámuri mother I know from Oasis and her daughter came in and started making their rounds inside the restaurant, saying "kórima" to every customer seated or ordering coffee at the counter. When they got to me, I smiled and said hi, she smiled and said hi, and didn't say "kórima" to me. We didn't say more; she moved on after saying hi. It is so common to see rarámuri in places like Starbucks and Degás, and I have never seen a manager ask them to leave, but I am sure it happens pretty often. It has to be bad for business, because what customer doesn't feel uncomfortable having a dirty child in tattered clothes approach the table with a serious face and an extended hand? Naturally, restaurant owners and managers try to keep their establishments free of any elements that might discourage customers from coming in, and they view the kórima-seeking rarámuri as one of those elements. It is very, very rare to see a rarámuri enter places that mestizos go for entertainment: restaurants, cafés, shopping malls, movie theaters. For the most part, the rarámuri can't afford to visit these kinds of places, but there's more to it than that. Not every rarámuri in Oasis is extremely poor, and I see some families treat themselves on a pretty regular basis. But there are places that are clearly designated as "mestizo only," and no rarámuri, no matter what their economic status, will enter. The rules are unspoken--segregation is against the law--but racial tensions run deep enough in Chihuahua to create separate spaces for mestizos and rarámuri.

Carolina is not inclined to participate in mestizo politics, and she is not impassioned by the pan-indigenous political movement that started in the South and is trying to reach the North; but she is hurt by stereotypes and unjust treatment like she received in Degás. I like the rarámuri for not being so politically outspoken--they are not a group that typically stages demonstrations or are likely to reach such heights of political passion that they will rebel in a sensational, attention-drawing way (in contrast to other indigenous groups in the South). The rarámuri have often been labeled as passive, lazy, even stupid for their apparent acceptance of bad treatment. But Carolina, like other rarámuri, has her methods for maintaining her dignity as a rarámuri.

She told me she sat at a table with her fellow students and the priest that afternoon and had a lemonade and enchiladas. She had a good time, despite the manager's initial bad treatment. If the waiters were rude, as they were to the indigenous women who visited a restaurant in Polanco, Carolina didn't mention it to me. In the story about the women in Polanco, the indigenous women also seemed to be unaware of the waiter's smirks and exaggerated treatment. The report says they had ice cream, then went into another store to browse. There, a saleswoman asked them if they needed any help as they were looking at a $2,000 purse. "No, thank you; I think it's ugly," the indigenous woman told the saleswoman.

Another race story

On Thursday, I walked into Oasis and found piles of dresses on the pavement. I have come to recognize piles of dresses as a clear signal of what is going to happen that day: a race. I immediately asked who was going to race, and I was told that it was going to be a 17-year-old girl from Oasis running against another girl of the same age from the colonia Unidad. "uh oh," I thought. The last time Oasis raced against Unidad, there was an injury and a forfeit, a huge fight over who should be declared winner and therefore get to keep the dresses, and a cop intervention. I jokingly asked, "Do you think the police will come this time?" The women smiled and one of them answered, "No, I don't think so."

The day progressed and I spent the early afternoon chatting with women and watching them hurry to finish sewing dresses that they wanted to bet. Women kept asking me if I wanted to place a bet on this race, but I didn't have enough money on me that day, just enough for a snack and the bus ride home. I thought to myself that it was a good thing I wasn't betting anything this time, because the last time they raced against Unidad and fought, someone ended up losing my money and I never got it back!

When the race got underway, in the late afternoon, I was surprised to see 15 pebbles lined up on the curb. The rarámuri women always use this method as a way of keeping track of how many laps the runners have completed; every rock signifies one lap, and as the girls complete them, the woman in charge of keeping track removes a pebble. Each lap equals about one kilometer. Usually, the runners program 10 laps for each race, which is why I was surprised to see that these girls were planning on running 15 laps (15 km!)

It was the most exciting race I have ever seen. The girls were running evenly for about five laps, and then the runner from Unidad began to pull ahead. She was ahead by 3 blocks for the next eight laps. It looked like Oasis was definitely going to lose this one, and some of the women lost hope by lap ten, but then another group of girls and women started running alongside their girl, to encourage her. The girl from Unidad was running basically alone, with just one companion urging her on. She amazed me with her speed--for thirteen laps she ran without stopping, without drinking anything, just maintaining her speed. Then, during the final two laps, the Oasis runner began to catch up to her and the race got interesting again. Oasis women were in a frenzy, cheering on their runner. During the last lap, it looked like the Oasis runner might just overtake the Unidad runner, but as they disappeared over the hill, we couldn't see anymore. We would have to wait until they came back down the hill to see what the outcome of the race was going to be.

Suddenly, one of the girls that was running with the Oasis girl came running back down the hill, yelling "we won, we won!" The Oasis women wasted no time digging into their winnings, choosing who would get to keep what skirt. I thought it was strange that the girl called the race when it was so close. A couple minutes later, four women came down the hill carrying the Unidad runner in their arms. She had fainted. They lay her down on the pavement and it was clear the girl was passed out. We called an ambulance and did what we could for the girl in the meantime.

Meanwhile, a neighbor named Chita came out of her store, which is half a block away from Oasis, to see what was going on. Luckily, the runner came to after a few seconds, and after several more minutes she was able to sit up and drink something. The attention then turned to the outcome of the race. The Oasis women obviously wanted to call the race in their favor, but the Unidad women reminded them that the last time they raced, an Oasis girl had got hurt, and they had called the race a draw. The fight reached such heights that some of the Oasis women were accusing the Unidad runner of having faked passing out, in order to get out of the race.

The neighbor, Chita, is undoubtedly the moral authority of Oasis. How she came to hold such power in Oasis, I will discuss in a later post--she is a fascinating woman. But on this occasion, she exercised her power over the women by scolding them for not having a written contract with the rules of the race. "If you know you fight about the outcome when someone gets injured, why don't you come to me and have me write out a contract with the rules? This is what I told you to do next time you raced." She asked the women if they wanted a police officer to intervene, and some of them said yes, so Chita called the patrol.

This time, only one officer (one of the same ones who intervened in the last race) came to Oasis. It's not worth repeating what he said to the women word-by-word this time. Basically, he backed Chita up, saying that the women should have written contracts before races. But they always underlined this statement by saying that it would be best not to have any races at all. In the end, the women settled that Oasis could keep the dresses (which I don't think was fair! I think it should have been called a draw, like last time). The girl who had fainted was fine and went home with her friend.

It's always uncomfortable for me to watch how outsiders intervene and tell the women what they should and should not do. Invariably, they take on a paternalistic tone and I feel embarrassed for the women when they are subjected to scoldings as if they were children. I understand that those who intervene, especially the neighbors, have the best intentions in mind, but they always advise the women as if they were children, not equals. Clearly, they think their judgement is better than the rarámuri womens'. In Chihuahua, two general attitudes exist toward the rarámuri: either you are openly discriminatory towards them, or you pity them. In the end, I think it amounts to about the same, because in both cases the rarámuri are never viewed as equals in Chihuahuan society. I don't think they should be treated as equals in the sense that Chihuahuan society should ignore the fact that they live under the poverty line or deny them government help. But as it happens with most poor people, discrimination and pity tend to reduce the rarámuri to one single definition: poor. Any opportunity to connect in a meaningful way with the rarámuri becomes lost when outsiders allow these attitudes to overtake them.

Pity and its dangers is a theme I'm exploring in my writing now. Witnessing this last race allowed me to see how well-meaning neighbors who constantly patronize and pity the Oasis rarámuri actually create a rift between themselves and the rarámuri, even though if you talk to these neighbors they will boast about what a close relationship they have with the Oasis rarámuri.