Anne's dispatches from Valladolid: Southwestern towns with "casas tristes"

Saturday, May 23, 2009

Southwestern towns with "casas tristes"

Criss-crossing southwestern Yucatan where many migrants in San Francisco are from, you see local and transnational economies cheek by jowl.

Concrete houses with fancy columns, next to Guano ones, but empty, since it takes a US salary to maintain them; they're known as "casas tristes". The social pressure to keep up, take the risk and head north is palpable. Now with jobs in the US scarce, the question is what's happening to families of migrants: reports say remittances are way down, affecting 7% of Mexican households. And the economic toll from flu and the decline in tourism is heavy.

Guano houses are super well-designed for the heat; this one has closed walls, but most have poles for walls that let in air, and the straw roof makes great shade.

The columns on these houses are signs of status like in the southern US.

1 comment:

Mar CanetJuly 25, 2010 at 1:59 AM
Nice term for empty houses, in spain there is an existing open database of empty houses with this name. Check it out: http://casastristes.org
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Caridad Tah Otzil’s deceit. By Ana Patricia Martinez Huchim

"The time will come for going out begging; such is the fate of the old and poor"

Doña Caridad[1] the Mayera[2] is grandmother to everyone on “huaya” road. She’s more than eighty years old and practically bald, due to advanced age. What little hair she has left is black on account of all the “pich” birds she ate in her childhood, birds which she herself would hunt, skillfully, with a slingshot, having always had great aim for everything. Everything.

Up until a few months ago, Doña Caridad would go begging during the week, dressed as a poor mestiza: tattered and faded hipil, threadbare shawl, and barefoot; but Sunday afternoons, she’d get dressed up like a jeweled lady, with powder and rouge on her face, and lotion on her neck, and she’d head to the town square to catch an open-air concert. At night, on her way home, she’d stop off at “God’s Blessing” corner store to get a shot of anisette.

“–For warming my bones- Utia’al u chokokintik in baakel ” she’d say, sipping the liqueur.

Doña Caridad had eight children, two boys and six girls, seven of whom were married, and now has forty-two grandchildren and twelve great grandchildren.

“But having children is no guarantee they’ll help you in your old age, Chéen ba’ale’ u yaantal u paalal máake’ ma’ u k’áat u ya’al wa yaan u yáantikecho’ob ken nojochmáakech,” the old woman exclaims.

One of Doña’s sons, Plácido, turned out to be a real bum, too lazy even to look for a wife. At noon, when his mother gets home from begging, she shakes the lazybones' hammock, and he mumbles, half awake:

“Is it getting light or getting dark?”

The neighbors, put out by how the slacker sponges off his mother, have tried several times to punish him. They know the old woman feeds him with the money she makes from begging, so one day they got together to plan a trick on him.

“Doña Caridad,” called one of them, ever-so-nicely, “here’s a little food for you. There’s no meat in it, but the broth is full of vitamins.”

Savoring the delicious broth in advance, the old woman puts the pot over the fire and wakes the loafer to give him his share. But to their bitter surprise, they find not soup but brown watery rinse water from scrubbing a wood table.

Weekdays, when she returns from begging, Doña Caridad is swarmed by her grandchildren, who come running from the neighborhood to rummage through her bag. They fish out crusts of food and eat them as if they were the most exquisite treats. And they’ll grab her cane to play horse.

“Hey, gimme back my cane!-–¡Ey, suute’ex in xóolte’!” she cries, as the little ones run helter skelter.

“You little devils, leave my bag alone! –¡Mejen kisne’ex, p’aate’ex in páaw!” she yells, jumping in the fight like one of the kids.

She bickers with her dogs, too -has always had lots of them, all malixes (muts), to whom she gives strange names: one who goes wild in heat is “Tart”; another, soskil (Bristle) for the way his hair stands straight up; another xníich' (Smiley) for showing his teeth; there’s “tasteless beans” a timid dog who doesn’t bark; “Froth” a mutt- Pekinese mix; and k’aasfino (neither fish nor fowl).

But since she doesn’t have the means to feed all these animals, the dogs steal food from the neighborhood. A few months ago, fed up with all the thieving, someone threw poisoned meat at the dogs. By morning, several dogs were dead. At first, they seemed to be sleeping, but as their sleep dragged on, the dogs reminded Doña Caridad of her son, Placido, and she scolded them, saying:

“I’ve had it with you lazybones. Pick yourselves up! the sun’s already high–Ma’ in k’áat u yaabak in waalo’ob jooykepo’ob, ¡líik’ene’ex!, ts’o’ok u chúunk’intaj.

But, poking their sleeping bodies with her cane, she found them stiff.

“Ay my poor dogs, who did this to you, who did this to me? –Ts’o’ok u k’uchul u k’iinil u jóok’ol máak u k’áat máatan, bey u beelil tuláakal óotsil máak, she cried inconsolably. One of the dogs pulled through, however, and soon the house was again filled with animals.

Yes, full she was, the old lady, of animals and years. The day she turned 70, she got out of her hammock, took down the machete from the house beam, cut a broom handle as tall as her legs and, trying out a few steps, announced:

“U chowakil in k’ab, in wook che’, in xóolte’, in wéet xíimbal, u nu’ukul in meyaj. “Extension of my hand, my wooden leg, my cane, my walking companion, my instrument!”

Then with a deep sigh, she proclaimed:

–Ts’o’ok u k’uchul u k’iinil u jóok’ol máak u k’áat máatan, bey u beelil tuláakal óotsil máak. The time has come to go out begging; such is the fate of the old and poor.”

From then on she developed peculiar relationship with that cane, as though it were a person: she’d speak to it tenderly, accuse it, insult it, toss it out then retrieve it, but it was always by her side.

“It’s mine, all mine- doesn’t run off like that dead husband of mine, who kept disappearing on me ‘til the day he up and died.”

The old woman, who never liked her name, Charity, liked her last names- Tah (very) and Otzil (poor) - even less, which is why when she was young, she preferred being called “Caro” (expensive). But now, as a beggar, she uses her name every time she puts out her hand, imploring in Spanish which she rarely uses:

–¡Una santa caridad, por el amor de Dios! Blessed charity, for the love of God!

In return for some change, she’ll thank people this way:

–Que Dios te lo pague, chunita. May God repay you, precious.

But to those who give nothing, she’ll say in Maya:

–¡Xts’u’ut kiis! You’re even too stingy to fart-

Her most generous donors are patrons in the bars. Afternoons, Doña Caridad visits all the bars in town, one by one. Even the poorest drunks will take pity on her, paying their respects to the old lady:

–¡Here you are, Chichí (Grandma)!” – and in front of his buddies, one will give her a bill, emptying his pockets though it means not a penny left for his family.

When the time comes for a town’s patron saint festival, Doña Caridad goes on a pilgrimage. She begins her collecting as she climbs onto the bus; the driver won’t charge her. Starting at the back of the car, she’ll move up the aisle, asking for donations ‘til she gets to the driver.

Once she’s in town, she’ll take shelter under the colonnade of the Municipal Palace, after first stepping into a cool dark church to light a candle to the patron saint and to ask for protection. On leaving the church, she’ll look for a shady spot and set to work. People give her all kinds of things. From her spot, she can contemplate the plaza, watching the passersby and dozing off from time to time without letting go of her bag. Afternoons, she changes places: she’ll go to the bullring, taking in the show as she begs. At night, she goes to the dances- she wouldn’t miss one!

“Kex chéen in wich ku yóok’otnak Even if it’s just my eyes that do the dancing” she says wistfully.

On her return, Doña Caridad allows herself no days off. She puts her small earnings away in a horcon (a hole in a wooden post of the house). “Utia’al le k’iine’ ken k’abéetchajke, For a rainy day”, she says, hiding the bundle from her son Placido, and from the grandchildren, and she takes to the streets again.

Nowadays, with over 80 years to her credit, Doña Caridad plies the street no more. Each morning, her grandchildren take her out front and set her on a stone, and as people pass by, the old woman calls to them, reaching out her hand. If they approach, she’ll take up their hands and read them their future:

–Tu’ux ken a jeets’ a k’abe’ te kun taaltech ya’abkach utsil ba’al: tu ts’íik a k’abe’: plata, tu no’ojil a k’abe’: oro Wherever you put your hand, you’ll find profit: in the left one, silver, in the right one, gold,” she’ll say.

And in recognition of this good news, people will give her her "little change", because, as the old saying goes, the words of the elderly, be they blessings or curses, come true.

Chichi’: abuela, anciana.

Chunita: palabra de afecto: preciosa, linda, buena persona.

Horcón: uno de los pilares de madera de las casas de paja.

Huaya: árbol y fruto del wayum.

K’abax: sancocho, cocido a la ligera.

K’aasfino: voz híbrida: semifino.

Malix: corriente, vulgar.

Mayera: hablante del maya.

Mestiza: quien porta el traje regional yucateco de forma cotidiana.

Pich’: pájaro zanate.

Soskil: fibra de henequén.

Xníich’: sonriente.