Elecciones

Sorry I haven't written in so long but I've just been so busy going to the Campamento Tortuguero and to the university to work on my research project about the trash that is on the beach of the area where the camp is. Something that has been pretty crazy and that has definitely caught my attention lately is the fact that elections are coming up very soon (I think July 1st), therefore all the people running for something are campaigning like crazy. In Mexico, elections for president, mayor, senators, etc are all on the same day so all of them are campaigning at the same time. In addition, there are more than two political parties here, so there are several candidates for each one of the many positions. It's insane! I don't think that I've ever seen political campaigns like I've seen here. First of all, they have posters with their name and picture everywhere, literally, everywhere. They're on cars, walls, buses, restaurants, stores..... Also, they have t-shirts that they hand out to people. So you see people wearing campaign t-shirts around. They also give out all sorts of merchandising: a piece of cloth to cover tortillas with the name of the political party on it, balloons, hats...and I even got an orange with stickers on it promoting the political party. They also go around giving out free food and drinks! Turns out, from what I heard, that the different political parties aren't even that different from each other anyway and it seems like a lot of people end up voting for whoever gave them more "free stuff." At the end of the day, what has happened in the past, no matter who wins, they all just steal the money from the country and not do anything but show up when they're supposed to with their designer outfits. Politicians have the highest income here, which is the reason why they all want to run for a position. One of the posters that I've seen is of a woman who is running for mayor of the city, I think, and who has huge lips that look fake, like she definitely had surgery. Seriously, I don't think I would ever vote for someone who had plastic surgery so that her lips look bigger. I don't know, maybe it's just me, but that doesn't look serious and professional to me at all. She looks like she was taken from a Telenovela or a typical gossiping TV show that is on the afternoons.

What's very common here is the fact that you have to know someone and be liked by them in order to get a job for the government, or even at most other places. If you don't know someone in a company already, it is very unlikely that you will get a job there even if you are the most qualified person for it. This could be why working isn't taken that seriously by many people. A lot of them feel like they don't have to try hard because they're friends with the boss so they will never get fired, while other people get discouraged because they feel that even if they work hard they could never get a job because they don't have contacts in companies where they do what he/she studied for. If you work for the government, you get paid pretty well but if after the following election, the political party changes, then they get to pick the people who they want working for them, therefore if they don't like you they can just fire you for no reason. This is very likely because if one works for the government when political party A is in power, even if it's just as a secretary in the office of tourism, for example, they see you as a member of that one political party. The system is so complex to me, it's kind of hard to understand, but I've been hearing a lot of things that just sound so unfair. 


While working in the tourism office, I got to see some politicians such as the governor of the state of Campeche and his wife, the mayor of the city, and some mayors of other cities of Mexico. First of all, something that just gets on my nerves is the way they dress. The streets in Campeche, for example, are falling apart; cars get ruined really badly because there are holes everywhere but the government doesn't do anything about it. In the meantime, they are all wearing designer outfits, a different one for each event they attend, EVEN IF THEY ARE ON THE SAME DAY. The mayor of the city has a personal assistant, to whom he treats as a slave. For example, on one event she was on the stage, several "important people" were sitting on tables on the stage giving speeches. She calls him to the stage and asks him for something, then he goes back with a tissue so that she could clean up the little sweat she had on her chin. But that wasn't the only time he called him over of course. I hate how people in power like that take advantage of it in the worst way. I wish one of them would realize that there are places in their own town that are falling apart and that they could survive without a personal assistant and all those expensive commodities. I also learned that everything in politics here is about pleasing other politicians, making a show, competing to see which city is the best host for those important people. There was an assembly of world patrimony cities of Mexico so they had to host mayors and other important people from these other cities. They took them to the best hotels in Campeche and organized several events payed with the State's money, which is basically formed by the taxes that the citizens pay (which are really expensive for them). These events included a fancy breakfast, coffee breaks with exaggerated amounts of snacks and beverages, a fancy lunch, and a trip to Calakmul (of which I was lucky to be a part of). They also provided transportation for them in a van (for which they had to get gas). And they got them several gifts that are typical of the area, most of these are very expensive. So they used an incredible amount of the state's money for luxuries for the visitors to show that they are good hosts. It's funny that they try to act like they have a lot of money when the streets and some houses are all destroyed. Maybe they could use some of that money to make their town better. Or they could use some of the outrageous amount of money used for campaigning to feed people, or to help people live in better conditions. 


I hope you enjoyed reading about my complains. I will write a positive entry very soon :)
SP.