Catemaco News

Although rockets sparkle the sky on this International Day of Women in beautiful downtown Catemaco, Veracruz, the status of many women here is not much above the status of a favorite horse. Many Gringos, especially the older ones who seek shelter in Mexico from their incompetence in the USA, consider Mexican women LBFM´s (littlebrownfuckingmachines) based on their acquaintance with the result of the failure of Mexican women´s participation in their country`s economic and social development.

Women in Mexico gained the right to vote in federal elections in 1947. Civil rights for women in 2006, although included in various federal & state legislations are still lacking in judicial applications. Customary women´s rights in the rural areas of Mexico are similar to the Taliban regime in Afghanistan without the head dress.

Although laws exist to prohibit the applications, traditionally, women cannot inherit property, and in essence become chattel of their first born sons.

Only a few years ago, Mexican law acknowledged marital rape as a crime. Physical wife abuse is still one of the primary reasons for deployment of police forces in Mexico and Los Tuxtlas and usually still results in legal avoidance.

Child sale or trade still occurs, especially of female babies. But, fortunately, Mexico´s extreme effort to end the spiraling population curve has produced satisfying results in the decrease of that particularly nasty curve. Pre-natal and child care is barely above minimal international levels.

Psychologically, many Mexicans are dependent on ownership of their “tierra” as a fountain for their identity, especially among native peoples; and as a consequence, the Mexican government politically is obligated to retain rural people on their “tierra” and supports them via numerous hand outs, leaving mostly women holding the “so called farm”. In many cases it is the women of Catemaco who are heavily impacted by their men´s migration to greener pastures, both within Mexico and the USA, and they depend on their husband´s transmission of monies to stay alive, and , if not, “man” the hundreds of vendor stands for their survival.

On this day, the International Day of Women, aside from all women everywhere, I especially salute those women of Catemaco and Los Tuxtlas, who maintained their families, struggled within the ingrained Mexican bureaucracy and SURVIVED.

I just made my weekly visit to "El Caracol" a tiny roadside seafood place on the road out of Catemaco to Playa Azul, and jealously eyed the 3 pound Tilapia fish my neighbor was eating and I bitched to the owner about serving me Tilapias the size of children shoes.

Apparently the big fish eater had brought his own fish!!! And where did he get it? He is the head honcho in a Mexican federal breeding facility down the road near Coxcoapan. And he told the sad tale of ,"Ripley´s Believe it or NOT", 3,500 registered fishermen on Laguna Catemaco. At present Laguna Catemaco is totally overfished. If a fisherman (almost no women) catches something shoe size, it is almost a hoarded treasure. The central market abounds with minnow size tilapias, and it is Tlacotalpan and other areas that provide restaurant size fish. Several years of efforts to establish some fishing laws for the laguna, including seasons, sizes, etc., have so far been torpedoed by the local fishing gods.