Just Say No to Cancel Culture
I left my house yesterday to meet a dear friend for brunch and to pay my water bill. I hunted for an unmolested OXXO and found three still standing, unburned, and barricaded from within; lights on, and nobody home. I passed a torched OXXO and an equally destroyed Kiosko across the street, both on Morelos. What videos and stills can’t provide is the pervasive stink, even 48 hours later. It’s the kind of acrid smell that you know will stick to your hair, clothes, and skin. Every leaf, windowsill, sidewalk, and surface is covered in ash ranging from pale gray to black as pitch. How’s the inside of my lungs?
South over the bridge into Colonia Emiliano Zapata, and at the foot, the remains of Carl Timothy’s Real Estate office. A couple of workers were inside, digging through the twisted, stinking mess, making a neat pile by what had been their front door of things the flames had missed. The rest of the small plaza looked like an open-air garage sale, with the adjacent businesses, including Kapital Bank, trying to air out and clean their upholstered chairs and everything else.
Over a wonderful breakfast at Langostinos on the beach, my friend said his property management company had informed him that two clients had canceled their trips to Vallarta in light of last Sunday’s assault on the city. The assumed four weeks of income disappeared suddenly. It also meant that the cleaning crew now had no work, and therefore, no pay. They cannot, then, buy groceries to feed their children. The kids go back to school hungry and inattentive, and maybe they see some food just inside a broken glass door, sneak in to get it under the cover of darkness, and you have the potential setting of Les Misérables on every broken OXXO-occupied corner of the city.
The moral of this story is: Please come to Vallarta—don’t cancel your vacation. Not a single resort in town, nor hotel, nor AirB&B was harmed in the protest. We have rebuilding and a lot of cleaning to do, but be assured, it is ongoing. Our city will shine again and quickly. One thing a Mexican will never do is quit – they see what needs to be done and, without being overwhelmed, understand it starts by cleaning one thing at a time. That will clear a small space for the next job, and the next, and in the end, you have a new, clean store, street, or home.
Your one vacation could save an entire family’s livelihood! Remember that every time you enjoy breakfast at a beachside resto, or a cocktail at a swanky bar, you are feeding kids so they can do better at school. Every time you see a show, the performer is paid, yes, and the trickle-down of the peso food chain eventually buys food. That salvation can only happen if you are here, boots (or huaraches) on the ground.
AND, you get to be in one of the most profoundly beautiful cities in the world, whose citizens’ sole raison d’être is to serve you, our lifeline of tourists. Vallarta awaits you with loving, open arms, From Here.
