Malokin! Good morning from the Mayan Kingdom! It’s been three days since the big journey has started. I have landed in Mexico on Tuesday. A soft landing as I was welcomed by Marion, a childhood friend from Vendome. We were classmates when we were twelve! We haven’t seen each other since high school until (thanks to Facebook!) we met briefly in Melbourne, Australia in 2010. She now lives in Cancun with her boyfriend Carlos for two and half years. I was lucky to have been welcome so well, it’s a nice welcome to this new continent. Merci Marion! Thank you Carlos! : D
Cancun: postcardlike beaches with turquoise water, surrounded by concrete resorts … but also mysterious Mayan temples loaded with history, secret ‘cenotes’ (freshwater boats), indigenous people who survives between two very different worlds… the contrast is amazing. Here I am with all that I love and hate about ‘tourism’. Ready for a little ponderation on the destination around me?
Prostitution of the Queen…
Have you already gotten your feet in a ‘hotel zone’? In other words, in a small town coming out of the ground, for the sole purpose of hosting tourists coming from all over the world? In Cancun the ‘hotel zone’ opened its first hotel forty years ago and today has over 26 thousand rooms on a surface (part of which is artificial) 20km long and 400m wide (between the sea and the lagoon).
Cancun is the gateway of the mexican ´Mayan Riviera´ and is the ´Springbreakers´ preferred destination, it means “snakes nest” in Mayan… did the Mayan knew that this small fishing village would become a place of such controversy?!
This exhibition of wealth, excess (food, drugs, alcohol, sex …), these huge buildings that destroy the flora and fauna … all this in order to ‘make quick money’ without thinking about the consequences for the region, its people and future generations … This saddens me.
I have found a very interesting article (in french, sorry!) on the subject: ´Cancun, paradise for tourists, hell for Mexicans´ (Nouvel Obs/ Rue 89). The article is from 2008 and surely the situation will not be the same as today, 6 years later. I hope so anyway… I will not stay long enough to find out; but I think the article analyzes very well the problem that Cancun is facing, like many tourist destinations around the world.
…to feed her Kingdom
Memo (Guillermo) is a Mexican who works as a travel advisor in hotels for a big canadian travel agency (like my friend Marion). After a nice trip organized by AllTourNative (with a visit to the Cenote and the Mayan city of Ek Balam, a gorgeous day; thanks Marion for having me, it was really unforgettable!), on the way back, in the van, we started a debate on the ‘prostitution’ of Cancun.
Although he agrees with me, Memo also insists on the fact that the mass coastal tourism has, according to him, its positive aspects. It allows a lot of people to remain in Mexico and have a job to feed their families. It is okay to think about the heritage, cultures … but if people do not have food to eat, they either migrate to other regions or even other countries or die…
So if you stop to think about it, this hotel zone is a bit like their ‘factory’. Is this worse than those regions in the world where people get up in the morning to work non stop without any human contact, eventually becoming some kind of machine?
Ha ha, I’m the devil’s advocate, it is true that there is always something worse … Don’t get angry at me, I try to develop an anti-thesis to the problem! (In fact it is not easy!).
The development of eco-tourism to save some of what is given
Well, there is some hope to improve this situation in the meantime. Hope that is already taking place bit by bit.
Like this gorgeous day with AllTourNative. Cancun has begun to diversify its supply to get out a bit of the ‘all inclusive’ proposed by major international hotels (where tourists hardly ever leave their hotels throughout the stay … and finally hardly contribute to the local economy). This agency offers circuits around Cancun, the chance to immerse in nature and the Mayan culture. A great effort is put on developing a responsible tourism, to respect the environment and its inhabitants.
In fact, I am going to spend a day next week at an eco-hotel in Chetumal, Mayan Secret Boutique Hotel. I can not wait to discover the meaning of ‘eco-tourism’ in this part of Mexico, just steps from the coast mass tourism. I feel curious …
Want to follow me?
And you?
What do you think about the problem? Evil for good?
Do you have some examples of destinations that follow the same pattern?
Any activities recommendations or ‘responsible’ hotels in Mexico?
Translated by Fernando Miguel Manresa Viggiano
