The Guadalajara Reporter

The Huevos Revueltos concept of politics

Foreigners almost universally paid little attention to Mexican politics when my wife and I landed at Lake Chapala in the sixties.  Many Mexicans then seemed to know only enough to realize they were on the losing end of a very soiled stick.

Yet some “gringos” (meaning foreigners) held bountiful comidas for incoming presidentes municipales (inevitably called “mayors”) every three years when a new face took office for reasons too complicated for outsiders to easily – and accurately – uncover.  Often the owner of this new face (always male) was a merchant whose business they patronized.  The idea was for him to know them, so if a problem arose involving the law, they might have a – sometimes imaginary – sympathetic ear.  But as far as the Republic’s president was concerned, few knew what he and cohorts were up to, besides now and then complaining about “arrogant” and “unfair” Washington decisions.

Very few northlanders had any idea how Mexican politics worked – or did not work. And to no little extent that also often seemed to be the perception of those Mexicans they knew well – meaning mostly their maid and gardener, merchants at whose stores they favored.  Today, that is not the case, particularly for Mexican citizens.  Television changed that.  And now, the internet and its fellow “devices” inform their children and grandchildren who pass along the outlandish antics (which younger folk find most flavorsome) to their elders.  Alerted, my Mexican friends tend to have pronounced opinions issuing from the often implausible official announcements and behavior.  However, they still wisely tend to be wary in talking candidly about politics with anyone but close friends.