Mexico City: Between Cohetes and Barking Dogs

Reed spotted it first:

"Between Cohetes and Barking Dogs."

The title calls up multiple layers of urban Mexican culture. In reading the article, I found myself caught up in a tangle of cultural associations best summed up as simply:

¡Bienvenido a México!

Let me invite you to take a trip into a multi-dimensional snapshot of Mexican society, one that juxtaposes traditional and modern Mexico.

Getting started, cohetes are rockets, giant firecrackers. Sometime in the thirteenth century, both gunpowder and the recipe for making it arrived in Europe from China via The Silk Road. During their conquest of Mexico's original peoples, Spanish soldiers were armed with muskets. In 1520, one year after Cortés landed on Mexico's shores, two of his soldiers brought back from the crater of Popocatépetl Volcano the sulfur needed to make gunpowder.

The celebrations of Mexico's indigenous peoples were noisy affairs with drums, rattles and war cries, so when the Spanish brought gunpowder, the original people immediately adopted it as their own. Reed's hunch is that cohetes replaced the enormous drums employed by the Aztecs in their religious ceremonies to assure that the gods were paying attention.

Lending credence to Reed's theory is that the Franciscan Friars, brought to Nueva España to evangelize the indigenous peoples, banned percussion instruments for being elements of pagan rituals. To take their place, the Friars introduced stringed instruments, but cohetes also made their way into the mix.

Several years ago, during the fiesta of the Holy Spirit in Pátzcuaro, Michoacán, we attended a High Mass celebrated outdoors in a traditional Purhépecha community near Pátzcuaro. We noticed the cohetero, man who sets off cohetes, standing no more than twenty feet from the priest. At the Elevation of the Host, the cohetero set off a barrage of cohetes.

Startled, we jumped, but neither the priest officiating at the Mass nor the congregants seemed fazed. We were later told that cohetes are set off to get God's attention—almost certainly a legacy of pre-Spanish ritual beliefs.

Cohetero goes in front of the procession, 
stopping to set off cohetes every half block 
or so to announce its arrival.
 (Photo: Reed)

As for barking dogs . . . Before the Spanish arrived, the only domesticated animals in Mexico were dogs, turkeys and the Muscovy duck. Believed to be the guides and companions of souls making their journey through the Underworld, the Xoloitzuintle ("Xolo," Mexican Hairless) breed of dogs was sacred to the Aztec, Toltec, Maya and some other Mesoamerican peoples. The Aztecs also raised Xolos for their meat. Sixteenth-century Spanish accounts tell of large numbers of dogs served at a banquet.

Xoloitzuintles, Xolos or Mexican Hairless Hunting Dog

Keeping dogs as pets is definitely a mark of modern culture. In Pátzcuaro, Michoacán, dogs are used primarily as guard dogs; probably for that reason, they tend to be feared. We got a first-hand glimpse of dogs in modern Mexico when we visited Parque México in the Condesa neighborhood.

Sunday Mobile Dog Grooming Van in Parque México
(Photo: Reed)

So that's the context for Francisco Ortiz Pinchetti's article "Between Cohetes and Barking Dogs." Ortiz Pinchetti is a journalist who founded Proceso magazine, a widely read Mexican weekly.

A forty-year veteran observer and reporter of Mexican society, Pinchetti is also the author of De pueblo en pueblo: crónicas del pequeño México (2000). In Spanish the word pueblo refers both to the people (el pueblo) and the place (pueblo or village) where the people live. Hence, the title might be translated as "From People to Village: Chronicles from Little Mexico."

Here's the article. All emphasis has been added.

SinEmbargo: Francisco Ortiz Pinchetti 

"Many residents in the upper middle class neighborhoods of such Mexico City boroughs as Coyoacán, Benito Juárez, Álvaro Obregón and Miguel Hidalgo get all stirred up by the barrages of cohetes that go off each time there's a fiesta in a church in these districts. This is particularly true where there are indigenous enclaves whose elderly inhabitants and their descendants preserve the tradition. The newcomers say they don't support the tradition, complain they cannot sleep and claim it's illegal to set off cohetes. 

"Last weekend was an ordeal for them, since few fiestas are like that of the Holy Cross celebrated with a scenario comprised of a fireworks display. Moreover, [on International Worker's Day] the noisy celebrations of construction workers at their work sites (which always involve cohetes y cuetes [a play on words: rockets and 'loaded' (drunk) men]), coincides with the religious festivals in many churches dedicated to devotion of the Holy Cross on May 3. 

"In neighborhoods like Santa Cruz Atoyac, for example, the barrages begin the preceding night, go throughout the night into the pre-dawn hours, persist throughout the day and finish up the next day. The newcomers say, 'What a horror!' Social networks are, of course, deluged with complaints.

"I must confess that I am addicted to pyrotechnics (not as a pyromaniac, mind you). I enjoy fireworks as few other things in life. It fascinates me to watch the night sky fill with bright, multicolored spangles. Sure, I love the now-computerized September 15 [Grito or Shout of Dolores at midnight before Independence Day, September 16] spectacular displays in the Zócalo, but I have a special fondness for 'artesanal' pyrotechnics — let's call them — expressed by means of the traditional "castillos" [castles], the "toritos" [little bulls] and "bombas" [bombs] in small-town fiestas and in our urban neighborhoods that still hold onto that enchantment. 

"An inevitable part of all this are the barrages of the loud cohetes that are a completely indispensable part of any popular celebration in our country. Without them, a celebration just wouldn't be the same. In the neighborhood where I live, the feast of St. Lawrence Martyr is celebrated each August 10 in the sixteenth century Franciscan chapel that still stands in the Saint's namesake park. And I must say that it thrills me to hear the first battery of cohetes announcing the celebration, even if they do waken me at five o'clock in the morning.

"That said, I believe that those protesting the cohetes are acting within their rights. It is valid to complain about the noise and ask that it not be permitted. Ultimately, the newcomers don't have to know, or care, that this is a five hundred year old tradition brought by the Spanish conquistadores along with their muskets, or that it is profoundly, absolutely, rooted in the religious and pagan celebrations of our people. In small rural communities, cohetes are used to sound alarms, send messages, bring rain and announce Mass or a death. 

"It seems fair that the neighbors may ask that their quiet be respected, especially when it comes to babies, the elderly and the infirm. What I find incomprehensible is that in almost all cases, complaints disseminated through social networks about the thunder of the cohetes cite as the main reason for their dissatisfaction the fact that their dogs are scared and stressed! 

"Carlos Olmedo, who lives in the San Ángel Inn section of Álvaro Obregón neighborhood, offers this reflection:

'The problem occurs when one day you return home from work, and it turns out that there were three hours of cohetes being launched every 15 minutes. You have no idea how bad it was, because you weren't there. It turns out that your neighbor has spent that time listening to your frightened dog barking, and he lays into you for disrespecting him. 

'Please note that it isn't the cohetes that bother me very much. What bothers me more is my own dog's frightened barking, and my neighbor recriminating me for the situation. It isn't easy.'

"It happens that almost all who complain about setting off cohetes live in condominium apartments located near churches belonging to communities hundreds of years old. Just in the Borough of Coyoacán, for example, there are eight officially recognized original peoples. There are seven in the Borough of Benito Juárez , and there are also seven in the Borough of Álvaro Obregón. Each one has its own little church and, as the saying goes, every church [has its own saint, and every saint has a day, and on that saint's day that little church] has its little fiesta.

"Interestingly, many of those calling for enforcement of a law they know nothing about, are at one and the same time violators of that very same law. Article 21 Section IX of the Condominium Property Act of the Federal District expressly prohibits:

'owning animals that by their number, size or nature affect conditions of safety, health or comfort of the condo or condominium, in accordance stipulated in the regulations.'

"They are also often the same people who break the Law of Civic Culture of the Federal District daily by walking their pets in the parks without the legally required leash. They do not pick up their pets' feces, and they allow them to destroy plants and take a dip in the fountains, which occurs frequently in the Sunken Park. Of course, it is not the animals who are at fault, but their owners and trainers. 

"For the rest, it must be made clear to the complaining neighbors that although in the Federal District the manufacture and sale of cohetes is prohibited, setting them off is not. The Civic Culture Act itself clearly allows it; Article 25 specifies:

'These are offenses against public safety: (... ) VII. Detonating or igniting cohetes, fireworks, campfires or hoisting balloons without permission of the appropriate authority.'

"Currently, the Secretariat of National Defense (SEDENA) is responsible for issuing permits for the manufacture of products using gunpowder. This manufacture takes place in Tultitlán and Tultepec, towns in the State of Mexico dedicated to this purpose; they are, in fact, the leading suppliers of cohetes across the Valley of Mexico [Mexico City]. Sale there is unrestricted; but in order to get permission to detonate cohetes in the Federal District, one must go to Civil Protection of the appropriate borough. In the case of a religious festival, there are virtually no restrictions, and the process is quite simple. 

"Be that as it may, everyone can put up many reasons for or against this practice, which is as traditional as the questions raised about it. Personally, it seems to me that the matter has an irretrievable class bias that was, I believe, summed up, perhaps unwittingly, by one Karen (surely she lives in a luxury condominium) on her Twitter account. Last Sunday between barrages, Karen tweeted:

'Unfortunately, we are mixed in with closed-minded pueblo (village) and neighborhood people. It's all a matter of education.'

"God help us!" Spanish original

Some Reflections

Time to 'fess up. Reed and I live in a condominium in Coyoacán two blocks from the original pueblo of San Mateo. We enjoy the cohetes, which is a good thing because we are treated fairly regularly to their barrages. Not only is the parish church just three blocks away, but we seem to be centrally located to hear the thunder from several other churches as well. We've come to accept the cohetes announcing Mass and heaven only knows what else as yet another part of Mexico.

As a practical matter, Mexico's indigenous and Spanish heritage peoples have struggled to find ways to live together. Through conversion and education the Franciscan Friars hoped to acculturate the indigenous peoples to Spanish ways, which involved learning to speak Spanish and follow la cortesía ("the courtesy")—the elaborate code of manners governing personal behavior. Those who made the transition were called ladinos.

One of our only reservations about moving to Mexico City was that we would lose touch with indigenous elements of Mexican culture. We've been surprised to discover that we needn't have been concerned—as Ortiz Pinchetti makes clear in his description of the Fiesta de la Santa Cruz held in the neighborhood of Santa Cruz Atoyac. The convention for naming neighborhoods illustrates the Spanish-Indigenous synchronicity: Santa Cruz [Holy Cross] is the parish's Catholic patron saint; Atoyac is the indigenous place name.

The last paragraph of the article is so loaded with cultural references that it almost deserves its own post, but for the sake of convenience, if not brevity, let me take a shot at it. Residents of New York City for twenty years, Reed and I are urbanites. We thrive on the energy and cultural diversity of city life, but we're also very comfortable in rural settings. We've lived not just in New York City, but in rural and semi-rural communities as well. Maybe our experience has made us more aware of regional differences: Northern California (where I grew up) versus Southern California; New York City versus Upstate New York (where Reed grew up); Fairfield County versus the rest of Connecticut, etc.

It's very similar here. People outside Mexico City speak of "México," when they refer to their country's capital. People born in Mexico City call themselves capitalinos [people of the capital]. Like city people the world over, they tend to speak with a certain condescension about las provincias, the provinces, by which they mean everywhere outside Mexico City.

Many in Mexico's middle and professional classes have lost touch with the indigenous elements of their culture. Almost like foreign tourists, they visit places like Pátzcuaro, Michoacán, to gain experience with this unfamiliar way of life.

Like peoples the world over, Mexico today faces the increasing Americanization of its culture, a phenomenon accelerated and strengthened by the Internet with its social media. A vivid example is provided in the evolving role of dogs in traditional culture (first sacred, later protective) and today in modern Mexico (as pampered pets).

So here we are:

modern Mexico versus traditional, indigenous Mexico.

After the Mexican Revolution (1910-1920), Secretary of Public Education José Vasconcelos (1921-1924) espoused a new, "modern" mestizo (mixed blood, Spanish-Indigenous) and called for the cultural assimilation of all ethnic groups. In recent times, this philosophy has been attacked by Native (North, Central, South) Americans because of its negative implications for indigenous peoples.

In Mexico, the Zapatista movement in Chiapas and the defense of natural resources (minerals, oil, wind, corn, timber—all sought by transnational companies) on the ancestral lands of indigenous peoples across Mexico has stoked a fierce pride in indigenous culture. Part of the battle over the so-called Reform of Public Education [undertaken during the administration of Enrique Peña Nieto, 2012-2018] hinges on this very issue:

acculturation to modernity versus adherence to indigenous culture and values.

With this context firmly in mind, we now return to the concluding lines of Ortiz Pinchetti's article, where he cites the "irretrievable class bias" epitomized in "Karen's" Tweet:

'Unfortunately, we are mixed in with closed-minded pueblo (village) and neighborhood people. It's all a matter of education.'

Ortiz Pinchetti concludes his article, "God help us!"

Karen's Tweet has all the elements:

this thoroughly modern Mexican woman finds herself and her friends "mixed in with close-minded pueblo [indigenous] and neighborhood peoples"; that is, with those who insist on maintaining the original, indigenous traditions of their people and their pueblo or more stridently, refuse to accept 'modern' culture.

The last line of Karen's Tweet is the most poignant of all:

"It's all a matter of education."

José Vasconcelos would be proud.

But not so Francisco Ortiz Pinchetti, who in concluding "God help us!" permits us outsiders to peek into the depths of a profound split in Mexican society and culture.

Still Curious?

• Mexican Culture: Cohetes (Firecrackers or Rockets);
• Cohetes, a Mexican tradition (Craig 'Cisco' Dietz writing in Mexico Desconocido from San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas);
• Mexican Fireworks Castillo (15 min) is very typical of the fireworks displays, complete with the coheteros walking around with long sticks; notice how close spectators are to the burning castillos!