A Letter from Tenacatita.

(Crossposted from The Wild Wild Left Back ground story here then this week here.)

It is good to know these people have names, have stories. Dobie. Richard. Mary Ann. John. Oscar. Emma. Isela. Barb.

I feel like they are becoming family to me. They have offered to open up their homes to me for a visit there, when they get their beach back. Hammocks and palapas, they say, no cooking or cleaning for me! HA! They must not know me too well. Stopping me from cooking and cleaning? You would have better luck stopping the tides.

I want to share a note from Dobie. I will be speaking to her soon, hopefully next Friday on WWL, as soon as their internet becomes high-speed.

At about 10 PM last night Isela (who was here on Sunday), a lawyer for

Diputado David Hernandez called to ask me if I could go to the gate

this morning because Villalobos and the governor were saying that

there was free access to the beach.

I printed out the article in the Informador with the following quote

by Villalobos,

“El acceso está dado, la gente puede entrar a la playa, pero pueden

entrar tres, cuatro o cinco turistas; si llegan 300 personas con

palos, piedras y se quieren meter, pues eso es una invasión, es una

agresión y no lo vamos a permitir”.

Las únicas condiciones para ingresar al litoral, explicó, son no

acudir bajo los efectos del alcohol, en posesión de armas o a bordo de

un vehículo, ya que en el interior del predio en cuestión no hay

estacionamientos.”

Translated says “The access is given, people can enter the beach but

3, 4 or 5 tourists can enter, if 300 people show up with shovels,

rocks and that want to go in, well, this is an invasion, it’s an

agression and we won’t allow it.

The only conditions to enter the beach, he explained, are not to come

in drunk, in possession of weapons or by vehicle because inside the

property in question, there’s no place to park.

I’ve attached a photo of the gates (the signs are new). I talked to

the police for about 40 minutes. They read what I had printed out but

said they have new order, since Sunday, that no one can enter

(although yesterday someone from Profepa was here with Chito and they

did let them in). I haven’t spoken to Chito yet about what happened.

I was very polite, told them there were things I didn’t understand.

They were also very polite. They kept saying it was a legal issue and

they had the law on their side and everyone should respect the law. I

mentioned that there are also laws about evictions – the person has to

be notified in advance, etc. Then they told me that most of the

restaurants didn’t have anything anyway except some plastic chairs. I

told them that wasn’t true because I knew all those restaurants and

what they had and besides, there were photos showing the police

hauling away their possessions.

I asked them how they thought Villalobos had the right to tear down

houses that weren”t even in the zona federal and they said they

didn’t tear down anything not in the zona federal, but that’s also not

true as Oscar and Emma’s house and Los Pericos (except for the

ramadas) were not in the zona federal.

They said that anyone from town can come and work there, that the pay

is good. I had to control myself, but I figured if I got angry and

yelled at them, the conversation would end, so I tried to be

diplomatic. I said to one of them, (who told me he lived in Guad. and

hadn’t seen his family for almost 3 months), let’s say you own your

house in Guadalajara and someone comes one day and throws all you

stuff out on the ground, kicks you out and then tears your house down.

Would you go ask that person for work? I mean really. And yes it’s

true, some of the people from Rebalsito, Agua Caliente and Miguel

Hidalgo are working on the beach – the women who went in on Sunday

estimate 25-30 workers.

I told them II had a friend with a house on the beach and she wanted

to know if was still there – could I go and take a picture? That

didn’t work either. No way were they going to let me pass. When I took

out my camera and said I was going to take a picture of the gate, they

all turned around and retreated.

I asked about arriving by boat and they said people can come by boat,

swim, snorkel, dive, but can’t touch the beach (how generous, no?). I

sure hope SEMARNAT hurries up to give the concession to the

ayuntamiento of La Huerta. Usually it takes at least 6 months, but

they’re hoping to hurry it through.

I’ve done a lot of hard things in my life, but this has been and

continues to be the hardest. There’s no escaping it. And the more I

do, the more people ask me to do. Just today I had 4 different people

(representing federal or local diputados call asking me to send the

foto of the gate because in Mexico and Guad. gov’t officials are

saying there’s free access. And with this slow internet – I wind up

spending hours just doing simple things. There’s a chance I might have

high speed internet by the end of next week – not through Telmex but

something different that is much faster than infinitum. I sure hope

it’s true. It took me 7 HOURS to download a 9 minute video.

One of the young men in town took a great video on Sunday. I’ll see if

I can send it next time I go to town – it’s pretty long, so I don’t

know, but I’ll try. I haven’t even had time to go to town.

About 10 people went to Guad. yesterday and met with Lopez Obrador

(PRD who really won the presidential election but they gave it to

Calderon, sound familiar?). They brought him an album of fotos of how

Tenacatita was before and how it is now. He says he wants to help –

we’ll see what happens.

The issue is very hot right now. It’s on national news – tv, radio,

newspapers, internet every day. It’s a bummer that it takes violence

to make people take note.

Lots more to say, but I need to go eat.

Saludos,

dobie

Meanwhile, in the news?

100 Deputies have endorsed the impeachment of the governor of the State, Emilio González Márquez.

Babelfish translation to Englis:

http://babelfish.yahoo.com/tra…

In the meantime, an exhausted woman, living as best she can, is giving her all to fight for her people.

My heart breaks for her, for them all.