Yucatán & Mayan Mexico

One of the longest-running tales passed around among visitors to the mountains of the Chiapas Highlands – virtually everyone who gets there seems to have heard it - is the one about how the Mayans from the communities around San Cristóbal de Las Casas are afraid of cameras because they think they ‘steal their souls’.

For an added thrill, it’s often added that someone was once killed at San Juan Chamula, largest of the Highland villages, for nothing more than taking an innocent snap.

Chiapas Photography Project – Maruch Sántiz Gómez

This powerful folk myth is retold by many tourist shamans, in guidebooks.

It is true that most Highland Maya dislike and object to the standard travellers’ practice of constant, uninvited picture-taking (some, like the women who sell in the markets in San Cristóbal, have just had to get used to it).

In Chamula this amounts to an overt ban on taking photos in many parts of the village, enforced by ‘constables’ with big sticks who, if they catch you trying to take a picture off-limits - and above all in the church - will grab the camera, tear out the film, and return it to you probably broken and with a deal of abuse (nowadays, they know how to deal with digitals too).

However, there is no record that they’ve ever killed anybody – if they did, the victim was a very solitary traveller, as he or she has never been recorded missing.

This and the idea of ‘stealing souls’, though, all add to the idea of the Maya as being weird, primitive and unfathomable, and help outsiders feel comfortably superior.

They fit in with a conventional image of indigenous peoples, which itself has so often been set by first-world photographers in search of the exotic, pointing their cameras at subjects who seem to stare back blankly, apparently comprehending nothing and with no original responses of their own.

They’re also a gross distortion of what the Highland Maya actually think.

One of the prime reasons for their resentment of picture-snapping is very practical: they are acutely aware that their faces appear on all sorts of books and postcards, for which they receive no reward whatsoever.

They dislike being used as decorative objects and getting nothing in return, and so impersonal picture-taking is seen as just exploitative.

On a deeper level, suspicion of photography is related not to any crude idea of cameras ‘stealing souls’ but to the much more complex Mayan concept of chu’lel (‘vital energy’ or ‘life force’).

This is possessed by living creatures and inanimate objects alike, and any contact between people, with animals, or between people and the earth, involves an exchange of chu’lel.

Casual picture-taking is rejected because it takes away chu’lel without asking - like walking into someone’s house without knocking - and because the Highland Maya dislike all impersonal interactions.

And, the Maya can use photography themselves.

A spectacular demonstration of this are the Chiapas Photography Project (CPP), started in 1992, and the Archivo Fotográfico Indígena (AFI).

These remarkable projects provide more than 200 photographers from the Mayan communities around San Cristóbal, most of them women, with cameras and technical support to enable them to take pictures of their own world for themselves, with their own eyes.

It was founded by Carlota Duarte, an American nun, with the aid of a range of volunteers, but nowadays the Mayan photographers are increasingly self-sustaining.

The results are extraordinary, from images of village life to much more idiosyncratic projects, and have been publicized in exhibitions and an impressive series of books.

Mayan women can often seem to be among the world’s most timid, tradition-ringed people, but rather than staying within set traditions the AFI photographers have each developed very personal styles, and readily experiment.

Camaristas, a group collection by all the AFI’s photographers published in 1998, presents a very intimate, direct vision of modern Mayan life.

Maruch Santís Gómez has published Creencias (‘Beliefs’), a series of subtle black-and-white images illustrating traditional Chamulan proverbs that has been so successful her work has been shown in galleries in Mexico City and outside Mexico.

Xunká López Díaz has produced My Little Sister Cristina, a Chamula Girl, capturing family life with enormous charm and imagination.

And one of the most beautiful recent publications is Nuestro Chile (‘Our Chili’) by Juana López López, wonderfully vibrant, near-abstract images of habaneros, poblanos and other chilis set against traditional textiles and mats.

Juana López has also been working on a very different project, a great series of pictures in which the overall image is intricately composed of many small pictures of different aspects of the subject, in a style similar to one used by David Hockney in the 1980s.

The thought occurs that she must have somehow seen Hockney’s work, and been influenced by it. The answer is no, she came up with the idea herself.

Though still operating with very tight resources - virtually all its members still have to combine their photography with selling in markets, tending the family plot or whatever else they do to get by - the project has given these photographers an entirely new, individual expression and presence, a powerful example of ‘giving voice to the voiceless’.

The Archivo Fotógrafico Indígena is the most prominent part of the Chiapas Photography Project, which now also includes Lok’tamayach – Fotógrafos Mayas de Chiapas, an association set up by the AFI’s photographers to extend their work to other parts of Chiapas.

An effort is now being made to back up the CPP with a permanent endowment, to ensure all its activities have a permanent future.

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Nick Rider is the author of the Cadogan Guide to Yucatán and Mayan Mexico

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The AFI is based at a study centre beside the Chamula road out of San Cristóbal:

CIESAS
Carretera a Chamula Km 3.5
La Quinta San Martín
San Cristóbal de Las Casas
CP 29247
Chiapas

The publications can can be ordered through the website, or can be found in bookshops in San Cristóbal.

While there’s no permanent exhibition, the AFI is also open to visitors (Mon–Fri, 8–2), but always call ahead – (967) 678 5670.

See also: An inside lens on Maya life – NYT / IHT

The film will be based on Gibson’s own screenplay. He will also direct (but not star in) the film, to be called somewhat apocalyptically… “Apocalypto”.

Intriguingly, ‘characters will speak “an obscure” Maya dialect’, as the BBC rather annoyingly puts it. Of course, Maya dialects are still spoken as a primary or secondary language by at least 3 million people in the region.

Casting of Maya local to the region of Mexico where Gibson will begin shooting in October is apparently already underway.

The ‘story’ details remain very scarce. However, Gibson has already begun pre-production and has chosen a number of as yet unknown locations ahead of an expected summer 2006 release.

I have put out my antennae to discover whether permission has been sought to film at any of the great ancient Maya sites such as Palenque, Chichén Itzá and Tulum.

Carlos Nakasone, Director of the Quintana Roo Film Commission, told me that his office were trying to get in touch with Gibson’s company, Icon Productions.

I am willing to wager that the film will recreate the life-and-death spectacle of the Mayan ball game. That should be better to watch than Quidditch!

Richard Perry reports on the recent discovery and restoration of early colonial murals at Mani, in Yucatan. 

“Mani is the most fascinating of the great monasteries erected by the Franciscans in 16th century Yucatan. After long years of neglect, it has finally been recognised as a unique regional monument.

Fragment of a mural in the open chapel, Mani – Yucatan

“The cloister has been restored and the great open chapel unblocked for the first time in centuries.

“The church contains a rare sculpted cross, and its beautiful colonial altarpieces are among the finest in Mexico.”
Taken from Maya Missions by Richard and Rosalind Perry

I’ve posted some of my own photos of Mani on Flickr. These were taken in March 2003, while restoration work was still ongoing.

To help fight off the winter chills, Richard Perry surrunders to the tropical warmth of Yucatán to explore the historic hacienda of Xcanchakán.

Maya Tulum

Just 5km south of the Tulum archaeological site is Maya Tulum, one of the longest established cabaña beach resorts on the Riviera Maya.

Elisabeth has captured a wonderful set of photos on her current stay.

There is a palpable sense of excitement in the tropical air as haciendas and elegant high-ceilinged city mansions are being transformed into chic bed-and-breakfast hotels.

David Keeps captures the moment beautifully in the December issue of Travel + Leisure magazine: Mérida’s Moment.

In particular, one new B & B worth a mention is the delightful Hotel Marionetas (doubles from US$70 dollars) run by Sofija and Daniel Bosco.

Unmistakable
Originally uploaded by Bradak

The Third annual Festival de las Aves de Yucatán (Yucatán Bird Festival) starts this weekend. Until 21 November. Background.

A welcome email today from Barbara MacKinnon, coordinator of the 3rd annual Festival de las Aves de Yucatán (Yucatán Bird Festival). She reminds me that this year the BirdFest will take place between 13-21 November.

The festival is promoted locally as the ‘Toh’ – Maya for Turquoise-browed Motmot – one of more than 400 colourful bird species in the region.

I was captivated by half a dozen of these lordly blue, green and rust-coloured birds during a visit to the diminutive and seldom-visited Maya site at Xlapak, 113 km (70 miles) south of Mérida in the gently rolling Puuc hills. A reminder that birdwatching in Yucatán opens the way to visiting restored Maya ruins, as well as cenotes (natural sinkholes) and majestic and mysterious caves.

The appropriately named pajaro reloj (‘Pendulum Bird’ in Spanish) swings its long racket-tipped tail feathers in a tic-toc motion while the rest of its body remains statuesque. The Maya consider the Toh a symbol of nobility.

The Festival has quickly established itself as a fixture in the ornithologists calendar, but has something for everyone; a week full of fascinating field trips, exhibits and workshops – whether you are a beginner or advanced birdwatcher, bird photographer or student of Maya culture.

Local guides will teach you Maya bird names in exchange for your friendship during the two-day xoc ch’ich’ (‘bird count’ in Maya) and your participation directly benefits bird conservation efforts in the region.

For reservations, contact: toh@ecoyuc.com or visit www.ecoyuc.com/toh.html.

Photo credit: Turquoise-browed Motmot, courtesy © David Massie

I’ve been exchanging emails with author Jim Brumfield for three years, eager to get my hands on a copy of “A Tourist in the Yucatán”, his debut novel. Now, at last, it’s being republished.

The plot unfolds in parallel strands which take place alternately in the tangled selva of the Yucatán Peninsula and the hush-hush of behind-closed-doors intrigue in Washington DC. After a rampaging shootout on a Cancun ferry in Chapter One, the story proper starts with tourist couple Jack and Josephine Phillips taking a sticky bus ride to Chichén Itzá with a mysterious stranger. The Phillips’ are caught in the wrong place at the wrong time and their world is turned upside down by threatening federales and bloodthirsty thugs belonging to a drug kingpin whose tentacles reach as far as Capitol Hill.

The ancient cities of the Maya, the hurried colonial streets of Merida, and a deserted beach provide the sultry backdrop. After ‘Jo’ disappears and her husband becomes a murder suspect, the pace slows in the middle part of the book, but rewards the reader with a quest to uncover the secrets of an unexcavated pyramid. Jack clings to archaeologist Hector Flores as he, literally, lifts the lid on an ancient Mayan mystery.

Was it worth the long wait? A qualified ‘yes’. The occasional weak chapter is compensated by some really rather good passages and characters that grow with each page. I particularly warmed to the melancholic and middle-aged Nelson Carlton, a boozy but sharp-witted spook. The moderately suspenseful plot is sometimes violent and I was at times a little surprised (shocked?) just how much I enjoyed a novel featuring no fewer than five slayings in its opening scene.

In short, no great classic. But if you ignore a sprinkling of editorial errors and don’t take the stereotypes too seriously, then what’s left is a pretty good political thriller – in a clever setting. Stow it away in your backpack on your next Yucatán adventure.

Now available from Tres Picos Press, and from Amazon in May… just as the mercury shoots up in Yucatán. Jim tells me to expect a sequel based around one of the key characters in “Tourist” who will end up back in the Yucatán.