Category Archives: 2021

2021, March 2021

Women Writers Off the Beaten Path

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By Carole Reedy

Not every writer creates a book that achieves best-seller status or wins a literary prize. Glancing over my 2019-2020 list of the books I read, particular authors caught my eye. Not the brilliant and popular Elena Ferrante, Joyce Carol Oates, or Maggie O’Farrell, but equally notable women writing from a variety of places and perspectives. Here are a few of my favorite unique novels, most with woman protagonists off the beaten path.

Magda Szabó: Stunning character development is her trademark

This Hungarian writer died in 2007 at age 90. Although popular in Hungary and parts of Europe, Szabó didn’t gain status in the English-speaking world until the 21st century, when her novel The Door (1987), which centers on a relationship between a prominent writer and her housekeeper, was translated into English by Len Rix (2005). Although The Door was translated for the American market by Stefan Draughon, Rix seems to have a particular talent for translating Szabó. Since that success, his translations of her novels Katalin Street (1969, tr. 2017) and Abigail (1970, tr. 2020) have won several prominent literary awards.

Szabó’s early writing career was interrupted by the repression of the Stalinist era from 1949 to 1956. She was labeled an enemy of the Communist Party because her work did not conform to the social realism it demanded. Her husband, a writer and translator, was also censored.

The four novels translated by Rix are readily available in English now, both in book form and on Kindle. The best known, The Door, was listed in the New York Times Book Review’s Top Ten Books of 2015. Abigail, a story of a young girl who is sent by her father to a girls’ boarding school in Hungary during World War II, is among her more popular books.

Iza’s Ballad (1963, tr. 2016 by George Szirtas) is my personal favorite, the tale of a doctor’s relationship with her mother and the toll that personal and professional obligations take on her life. The primary women characters are not always likeable, but Szabo’s ability to home in on the circumstances and details of their lives makes for a most compelling read. We are given an understanding of the characters from their hidden thoughts as well as their actions, and it’s in this intimacy that Szabó’s talent lies.

Katalin Street also takes place during Hungary’s struggle sunder German occupation in World War II and Stalin’s subsequent Communist regime. It is the story of three families over a period of time in which both the living and the dead tell their tales of happiness and hardship. Again, stunning character development is Szabó’s trademark.

Miriam Toews: Growing up in a Mennonite community

The early years of Toews’ life spent growing up in a Mennonite household provided this author plenty of fuel for writing about women.

Women Talking: A Novel (2018) is based on actual events that took place in a Mennonite community in Bolivia. Nightly attacks by men in the community result in the “women talking” of the title. Simple, while at the same time complex and revealing, this is a short but emotionally charged story.

In an interview with The Guardian, Toews explains her impetus for writing this story: “I felt an obligation, a need, to write about these women. I am related to them. I could easily been one of them.” In fact, Toews, like the Bolivian Mennonites, is descended from the Molotschna colony, a Russian Mennonite settlement in what is now Ukraine.

All My Puny Sorrows (2014) is another novel centered on a Mennonite family, but this time the focus is on one member, a concert pianist, and the people who love her and their attempts to stave off her suicide attempts. Her mother, husband, and dearest of sisters struggle, as does the protagonist, against demons in an attempt to lead normal lives. Toews’ own father and sister both committed suicide within a ten-year period.

Siri Hustvedt: Elaborately structured works

Probably the most diversely accomplished of the women writers mentioned here, Hustvedt received a doctorate from Columbia University in the US, as well as three honorary doctorates from Norway, France, and Germany. Her writing encompasses all the literary arts: essays, short stories, nonfiction, poetry, and six novels. In 2019 she won the prestigious Princess of Asturias Award for Literature.

In addition, Hustvedt’s fascination with psychoanalysis, neurology, and psychiatry has led to a second career as a lecturer on these subjects.

Hustvedt also writes about art, yet another topic on which she’s extremely knowledgeable. The Blazing World (2014) invites us into a world of art in which a woman artist presents her own work not as her own, instead tagging them with the names of men. The novel won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Fiction in and was long-listed for the Booker Prize.
Memories of the Future (2019) is elaborately structured (as are all her books), bringing together a diverse set of themes that permeate our lives: memory, perception, and sensation. I especially warmed to the beginning, which describes the dismally fractured life of a young writer in New York City.

Hustvedt and her author-husband Paul Auster, along with their singer-songwriter daughter Sophie Auster, gathered members of the literary community including Salman Rushdie, Margaret Atwood, and Russell Banks to form the group Writers Against Trump to oppose “the racist, destructive, incompetent, corrupt, and fascist regime of Donald Trump, and to give our language, thought, and time to his defeat in November.” The group still meets in a continuing effort to protect the country’s democracy.

C.M. Mayo: A fine blend of Mexican and American

Mayo’s Mexican husband smiles when he notes that she was just five miles from being born Mexican. She was indeed born in El Paso, Texas, in the US, just a hop, skip, and jump from the Mexican border. And she’s lived in Mexico City for many years with this same husband.

Mayo has a wealth of writing to share with us. She has written poetry, essays, novels, and has a delightful blog featuring all types of extraneous writing. Her website is a trove of surprises, all warming a reader’s heart and all about Mexico. While the offerings are geared toward English speakers, both Mayo and her writing are a fine blend of Mexican and American.

Mexico: A Traveler’s Literary Companion (2006) is the place to start. This is a compilation of 24 pieces of fiction and prose by Mexican writers, many translated for the first time. Filled with the jewels of Carlos Fuentes, Juan Villoro, and Laura Esquivel, it is organized according to sections of the country. The Los Angeles Times tells it’s a book we should “throw in a suitcase or mochila (backpack) on your way to Mexico or just settling into a favorite patio chair. It will open your eyes, fill you with pleasure and render our perennial vecinos a little less distante.”

The Last Prince of the Mexican Empire was named the Library Journal’s Best Book of 2009. Indeed, it’s an exhaustively researched novel based on the fascinating story of a little-known adopted son of Maximilian, the archduke of Austria, during his short reign as Emperor of Mexico in 1864.

In another vein, Mayo gives us Miraculous Air: Journey of a Thousand Miles through Baja California, the Other Mexico (2002). Her exploration of the thousand-mile peninsula is filled with beauty and reflection on this most-separate Mexican entity, about which John Steinbeck said, “The very air here is miraculous.”

Garnett Kilberg Cohen: Characters you wish you had known

Cohen hails from my hometown of Chicago and her work was recommended to me by a friend, to whom I’m grateful. Kilberg Cohen is the recipient of multiple literary awards and is a professor of creative writing at Columbia College, Chicago.

The most popular of her works is a book of short stories called Swarm to Glory (2014). Several of the stories have appeared in publications throughout the US. Kilberg Cohen populates these small gems with characters you wish you had known while simultaneously relating simply and directly an utterly complex idea: the something we are looking for in our lives.

How We Move the Air (2010) is a short novel made up of the recollections of seven friends (each with his/her own chapter) who recall the suicide of a dear friend. It is filled with extreme emotion and insights into what and how we remember.

This may be just the time to try some new books and authors, because really … what else do we have but time?

2021, March 2021

Microenterprise in Mexico: Building Women’s Businesses

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By Deborah Van Hoewyk

In 1976, amidst crushing poverty on the other side of the world, an idea popped up. Muhammad Yunus, born into the British Raj in 1940 in what is now Bangladesh, was an economist with a crazy-quilt professional background. An academic, a social activist, a banker, and more, Yunus went out one day to visit the poorest households in rural Bangladesh. He found women making bamboo furniture; to buy the bamboo, they took out money-lender loans, but the interest rates were so high, the women earned practically nothing, despite all their work.

Lending to the “Unbanked” – and to Women

As a banker, Yunus knew that conventional banks would not make tiny loans at reasonable interest rates to the bamboo workers – the banks did not believe these people capable of paying back a loan.

Enter the idea, and what an idea it was! Microcredit – tiny loans for tiny businesses started by people so poor they’d never even been inside a bank. Yunus adapted the idea of lending circles – groups of women were issued the loan, picked the recipient out of the group, and members supported her in making sure her business did well enough to pay it back. Then it was someone else’s turn.

Over the next six years, Yunus would reach 28,000 microenterprise borrowers; the program became the Grameen Bank (“village bank”). Together, Yunus and the Grameen Bank were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006. The idea swept the social and academic world of poverty alleviation – microenterprise development was an innovative, sustainable path out of poverty. Today, 97% of Grameen borrowers are women; the repayment rate is 99.6%.

Why women? To Yunus, it was obvious that poverty inflicts greater stress on women, and when women make money they spend it first on their business, then on their families, and finally on their future. Pro Mujer is a U.S.-based women’s development organization that works throughout Latin America; in Mexico, it operates from Mexico City east to the state of Veracruz. Their research shows that Mexican women reinvest 90% of their income in their families and communities. Men? A measly 40%.

Born in the U.S.A., Bred in Latin America

Back on this side of the world, an organization called ACCIÓN International took shape fifteen years before Yunus came upon the bamboo furniture makers of Bangladesh. In the late 1950s, jumping the gun a bit on President Kennedy’s Peace Corps, a Berkeley law student named Joseph Blatchford undertook a thirty-stop goodwill tour involving tennis (he was an ace) and jazz, meeting with youth across South America in an effort to create cross-cultural understanding. He set up a volunteer “Youth Force” dedicated to international service in 1961, establishing ACCIÓN International in 22 barrios across Venezuela.

With the philosophy of listening to what local communities wanted to do, Acción volunteers helped build schools and water systems and health centers, giving people the tools they needed to help themselves. The United States Peace Corps started doing the same thing by the end of 1961; after eight years of expanding ACCIÓN International beyond Venezuela to Peru and Brazil, Blatchford went home and became Director of the Peace Corps. ACCIÓN International became just Accion and started focusing on microlending. In less than five years, Accion’s program in Recife, Brazil, made 885 small loans; those businesses employed 1,386 people.

Based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Accion began to build a network of financial institutions willing to lend to the poor. The great majority of microlending is conducted through the lending-circle model (now also called a “communal bank”). The networking strategy allowed Accion to expand its microfinance programs to 14 Latin American countries – Mexico among them.

In Mexico, Banco Compartamos (the “We Share” bank) opened its doors in 1990, and Accion invested. Accion also partners with CrediConfia in east central Mexico (Mexico City and the states of Mexico, Hidalgo, Puebla, and Michoacán), as well as the online microfinance platform Konfio, which started up in 2016. There are branches of Banco Compartamos in the Huatulco area in Chahue, Santa María, and Pochutla. Moreover, Oaxaca is almost unique among Mexican states in having a growing universe of credit unions (casas de ahorro, caja popular), often located in remote locations and quite willing to set up lending-circle-type financing. The biggest credit union, Caja Popular Mexicana, has branches in La Crucecita and Santa María.

The Microfinance – Microenterprise Development Connection

Mexican statistics indicate that very large businesses (over 250 employees) make up less than 1% of all Mexican businesses. The remaining 99% comprises medium (51-250 employees), small (11-50), and micro (1-10) businesses. The microenterprises are about 94% of all businesses and provide half of all the jobs in Mexico.

What does it take for a woman to get started on her own business? Here we should note that microfinance and microenterprise development are not the same. Microfinance provides a key tool for business expansion – without money, even if a business owner only needs enough money to stock 20 more scarves in her shop, there is no growth. Starting up a microenterprise is something else entirely. Like poor women everywhere, Mexican women face institutional barriers to getting financing, and the pathways to education and training are often blocked. But they also face cultural barriers.

Gender discrimination in Mexico is far more explicit (and can be extreme, see the article “Hits, Blows and Coffins,” on page 18 in this issue) than in other countries. Sociologist Gina Zabludovsky Kuper, from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), researches gender and power, and has written extensively about women as entrepreneurs and executives. In terms of microbusinesses, Zabludovsky Kuper points out that there’s a cultural perception about “women who start microbusiness in order to contribute to the family economy or get out of poverty” – they have to stay at the micro level because “their work is only viewed as auxiliary”; the women themselves often buy into the notion that just being a sideline business “is what is reasonable for them.”

Microenterprise – Making It Work

Nonetheless, in some places in Mexico, the programs to train and encourage women do come together with microfinance institutions, and women-owned microenterprises do start up and succeed.
The Mexico City nonprofit Crea Communidades de Emprendadores Sociales is typical of a microenterprise development organization. It offers programs to empower women entrepreneurs with training in business skills, technical assistance, and business support; it also brings participants into a support network for each other. It serves central Mexico (CDMX, and the states of Mexico, Aquascalientes, Guanajuato, and Querétaro), offering online services across the country as well.

From 2002 to 2006, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation in Michigan funded a program in Oaxaca called Yo Quiero, Yo Puedo … Empezar Mi Propio Negocio (I Want to, I Can … Start My Own Business). Yo Quiero arose out of a women’s health initiative founded in 1985, added life-skills training in 1990, and started Yo Quiero, Yo Puedo as a school-based self-efficacy intervention in 1996. With Kellogg Funding, the microenterprise program served 600 rural women, started 17 bancos communal and 300 women-owned businesses, and had a 100% loan repayment rate. It included training 25 “social promoters,” who continue to run the program in Oaxaca, and have added a youth microentprise program that serves Oaxaca, Puebla, and Michoacán.

South of Oaxaca City, Villa de Zaachila is the site of the largest landfill in the state. A project named Mujeres A.V.E. supports solidarity networks for women to help them start and grow microenterprises that support their families and contribute to the community. Organized by the SiKanda Foundation (Oaxaca) and supported by the British Cherie Blair Foundation for Women, among others, Mujeres A.V.E. helped 45 women build the skills to strengthen their businesses and access new markets in its first year of operation (2018).

See for Yourself in Oaxaca!

There’s a new way to learn about Mexican microenterprise – visit one. Independent women micro-entrepreneurs, along with long-standing family businesses, abound in the craft towns around the state capital, Oaxaca de Juárez, and at least a couple of travel companies will arrange a tour for you.

The online Spanish travel company Authenticities (www.authenticitys.com) has a tour specifically focused on the entrepreurial women artisans – weavers, chicken-raisers, flower-growers, tamale-makers, potters – who participate in a micro-finance program to which Authenticities contributes.

Fundación en Via, which itself runs microfinance and microenterprise developments programs (https://www.envia.org/microfinance-tours), takes you to visit microenterprises where the owner is ready for her next En Via loan. The tour takes nearly all day, visits two communities, and gives the owners the chance to show you what they do and explain how previous and upcoming loans have helped build their businesses.

2021, March 2021

Concrete Ceilings: The 21st Century Status of Women Politicians in North America

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By Marcia Chaiken and Jan Chaiken

The 20th century was a golden age for enfranchising women in many countries around the globe. Between 1900 and 1920, women in about 20 countries joined their New Zealand sisters, who won their right to vote in 1893; these included Canada, but with exceptions (First Nation women were excluded until 1960). In 1920, women in the United States were enfranchised, slowly followed over the decades by other countries around the world. In Mexico, although women were allowed to vote in some state elections, it wasn’t until 1953 that women were allowed to vote in federal elections. By 1999 all countries except three Muslim nations had granted the right to vote to women; the last country that recognized the partial right of women to vote was Saudi Arabia, where in 2011 women were allowed to vote in municipal elections; it is the only country in the world where some people are still ineligible to vote solely on the basis of gender. The right to vote and the right to stand for office were initiated simultaneously in almost all countries; but in Canada, for example, women were not eligible to run for office until 2 years after the first year when women could vote.

It’s been more than a century since women in Canada and U.S. were enfranchised, and almost 70 years in Mexico. One might think that given this long stretch of time, and the many movements for women’s rights around the world, the third decade of the twenty-first century should see women having equal representation in all branches of Federal government and holding major executive positions at the state/provincial levels. But reality is short of that ideal.

The progress of North American women in being elected to the legislative branch of government has been mixed. As of 2021, only 27% of the members of the U.S. Congress are women; 120 women out of 439 representatives in the House and 24 of 100 members of the Senate. While this is a 50% increase in women in the U.S. Congress over 10 years ago, it is far from equal representation. Canadian women are doing slightly better in elective legislative positions: as of the 2020 elections, 100 women out of 338 members of Parliament were serving in the House of Commons; Canadian Senate seats, which are appointed rather than elected, have a far more equitable gender distribution, with 48 women out of 100 members.

In Mexico, women have actually reached an equitable representation in Congress. Due to systemic changes and a mandate that political parties achieve gender-parity in candidates for Congress, women were elected to 49% of the lower house and 51% of the Senate in the 2018 elections. This ranked Mexico in fourth place for women’s representation in countries around the world.

Women still are under-represented in the judicial branches of federal government in North America. In both Canada and the United States only 3 of the 9 Supreme Court Justices are women, and in the US only 5 women have ever served as a Supreme Court Justice. In Mexico, with the resignation of one woman from the Supreme Court, only one woman serves on an 11-member Court.

The status of the election of women in North America to head the Executive Branch of the federal government is even worse. As of the end of 2019, close to 90 countries around the world have had an elected or appointed woman as head of State. Canada can barely be included in that category, by virtue of a 4-month period in 1993 when Kim Campbell served as Prime Minister after the Conservative Party PM resigned toward the end of his term and Campbell won the Party leadership. The United States and Mexico have never had a woman head of state, although Hillary Clinton won the popular vote in the U.S. 2016 Presidential Election but lost the Electoral College vote. Recently, in November 2020, Kamala Harris bored a hole through the concrete ceiling that has blocked North American women from the highest offices, and was elected as Vice President. She is a heartbeat away from the Presidency, but so were the majority of U.S. vice presidents who never became president.

State and provincial/territorial elections also have produced relatively few women heads of government. Currently, out of the 13 provinces and territories in Canada, only one, the Northwest Territories, has a woman First Minister, Caroline Cochrane. In Mexico, only one of the 31 States, Sonora, has a woman governor, Claudia Pavlovitch. In the United States, 9 out of 50 States (18%) currently have women serving as governors.

One elected position that might seem to be emerging as a power base for women is the office of the mayor in large cities. This perception is probably due to the high visibility of several women mayors but is not borne out by overall data. In Canada, Sandra Master, the mayor of Regina, Saskatchewan, and Valérie Plante, the mayor of Montreal, Québec, are relatively well-known, but only four other women are currently mayors of Canadian cities with populations of over 100,000. Among the 100 largest cities in the United States, only 27% are headed by women mayors; those with mayors often in the news are Chicago, Mayor Lori Lightfoot; San Francisco, Mayor London Breed; Seattle, Mayor Jenny Durkin; Washington, DC, Mayor Muriel Bowser; and Atlanta, Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms. In Mexico, only two women are mayors (municipal presidents) of the 10 largest municipalities. But since they head the two largest cities in Mexico (Tijuana with Presidente Karla Ruiz MacFarland and Mexico City with Presidente Claudia Sheinbaum), they have altered the perception of the power of women in Mexico’s government. Claudia Sheinbaum in particular has been newsworthy as the first woman (and the first Jew) ever elected to head the government in Mexico City, and she was elected hot on the heels of the former mayor of Mexico City, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, or AMLO, who is now president of Mexico.

How can we explain these data that show a far lower proportion of women than men in these elected or appointed government positions? The example of women reaching parity in Congress in Mexico suggests that systemic change is needed for women to successfully compete. One reason offered by men for explaining the relative lack of women in high government office is that women are more interested in very local matters than serving as the heads of large cities, states/provinces of their county; they cite statistics showing fewer women running for such offices. But a report by the Canadian Inter-Parliamentary Union has identified the reason for fewer women entering political spheres: it is not a lack of interest but the reality of violence against women.

Women who, in the face of violence against their gender, have chosen to run for high office or stand for appointments to powerful positions, have been brutalized both physically and psychologically. Gisela Raquel Mota Ocampo, the Mayor of Temixco, Mexico, was assassinated the day after her inauguration on January 16, 2016; she was just one of numerous women politicians who have been murdered in Mexico. Kim Campbell, the only Canadian women Prime Minister, was vilified during her campaign for a second term. Hillary Clinton, the only woman who was a major candidate for the U.S. presidency was not only slandered with grotesque stories about pedophilia but actually stalked on stage by her opponent, Donald Trump, a self-confessed sexual predator. And most recently, the world was riveted by a mob instigated by Trump, breaking into the U.S. Capitol and screaming for the assassination of the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi.

In some ways it is miraculous that women in North America persevere in seeking high political office. They are truly the inheritors of the suffragettes and women in the Mexican Revolution who preceded them more than a century ago – risking life and limb and reputation to win the right to vote and to stand for office. We can only hope that in less than a century from now, the concrete ceiling keeping women down will be obliterated by systemic changes in government and the eradication of violence against women.

2021, March 2021

Hits, Blows and Coffins

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By Kary Vannice

There has been much talk in the news over the last year about the financial “hit” many Mexicans have suffered as a result of the Coronavirus lockdown and economic downturn. Countless businesses took a “blow” as they were forced to close their doors. And for many, that put the final nail in the coffin of their business.

However, there is another equally important story, not making headlines, also connected to the Coronavirus outbreak. This story too is full of hits, blows and coffins. But, in this story, they are not financial, they are physical.

Less than a month after social distancing measures took effect in Mexico, domestic-violence-related 911 calls increased by 60% and federal authorities estimated that violence against women and girls had gone up between 30% to 100%. And that was in just the first three weeks of the pandemic.

Now, nearly a year later, the statistics on violence against women in Mexico during the pandemic are gruesome and, in all likelihood, don’t even come close to telling the full story, as many women are too afraid to file an official report and the ones who try often report that authorities urge them not to.

Even if a report is filed, odds are it will never result in a conviction. According to the government’s own data, 93% of all crimes in Mexico went unsolved in 2018; according to U.S. researchers, 98% of violent crimes go unsolved – which is a very sad reality for the families of the thousands of women who are killed in Mexico each year.

On average, 10 women a day are murdered in Mexico. In the early months of the pandemic, that number rose by more than 20%. Ten women a day might not sound like many in a country 127 million, but multiply that by 30 days and you have 300 women a month and multiply that by 12 months and you have 3,600 women murdered each year.

And for every one woman or girl murdered, there are countless others that suffer physical violence. Statistics report that two-thirds of all women in Mexico have experienced some form of violence, 44% of which is at the hands of a domestic partner.

Domestic violence is now referred to as the “shadow pandemic” in Mexico and throughout Latin America. One civil rights group said, “The so-called ‘shadow pandemic’ is characterized by a lack of information, incomplete data, and a culture of silence. How are national governments and support services supposed to respond to such an intimate and private, but also urgent, issue?”

Well, here in Mexico, quite poorly, as it turns out. When asked at a press conference about the startling numbers of domestic violence reports in the early days of the pandemic, Mexico’s President Lopez Obrador replied, “90% of calls to domestic abuse hotlines are fake.” But neither he nor his administration could provide any evidence that this statement was true. His failure to substantiate these literal cries for help as factual does nothing to change the culture of oppression and control over women’s bodies in Mexico.

A few weeks later, perhaps as damage control, the administration unveiled a new public service campaign aimed at addressing the rising domestic violence problem. The campaign depicted men and boys starting to get angry with women and girls in the home and advised them to “Take a breath and count to 10.” It then showed them smiling and waving a white flag of peace and surrender.

However, that same month, the AP reported that the Mexican government proposed cutting funding to women’s counselling centers in rural and indigenous areas, at a time when they knew they were needed more than ever.

It is unlikely that simply counting to 10 is going to change a deeply machismo culture, especially when the country’s own president “blames violence against women on the neoliberal policies of his right-wing predecessors and dismissed Mexico’s growing feminist movement as a plot orchestrated by his right-wing opposition,” as one news outlet reported.

Where does this leave Mexico’s women?

Well, unfortunately, we are back to the hits, blows and coffins. With the Coronavirus pandemic still ongoing, victims of domestic abuse have fewer support resources available to them than ever before and they are less likely to report their abuse due to the fact that they have to queue up outside of civil offices in full view of community members and potentially their own aggressors.

The Coronavirus has contributed to a spike in domestic violence in Mexico but is by no means its root cause. The root of it is a deeply misogynistic culture, which Cornell University philosopher Kate Manne defines as, the “policing of women’s subordination” in patriarchal societies, or the way people condemn women who don’t adhere to social expectations.

Until social expectations evolve in Mexico so women are seen as having rights equal to those of men, domestic violence and femicide will continue. Many, many more women and girls will suffer the consequences, as they continue to go unprotected in their own homes and often unaccounted for when they disappear.

2021, February 2021

Editor’s Letter

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By Jane Bauer

“We have a chance to do something extraordinary. As we head out of this pandemic we can change the world. Create a world of love. A world where we are kind to each other. A world where we are kind no matter what class, race, sexual orientation, what religion or lack of or what job we have. A world where we don’t judge those at the food bank because that may be us if things were just slightly different. Let love and kindness be our roadmap.”
― Johnny Corn

If there was ever a moment to make us reevaluate our choices and values, it is now. The pandemic situation is showing us that we need to take into account the welfare of the collective and put our selfishness aside. We need to protect those in our global communities: the vulnerable, the less fortunate, those who lack many of the privileges we take for granted. An attitude of “me first” will only ruin us all.

While I tend to have a Darwinian approach to survival, I also want to be the type of person who values collective needs above my own. As people continue to bicker about guidelines and restrictions – touting the importance of personal rights and freedoms – I question what is the best course of action and I don’t have a firm answer and I value aspects of each argument.

The pandemic has not only affected the world’s medical health but the economic health of the majority of us. I wonder how we will bounce back if we allow our individualism to dictate our choices.

With the beginning dispersal of the Covid-19 vaccine it seemed like things were starting to improve and yet this has only served to show how delineated the line between the have and have-nots is. With wealthy countries stockpiling vaccinations, I have to wonder if it’s not the fittest that will survive but the fortunate.

While ‘love’ may seem like a schmaltzy solution offered up by a greeting card, it actually may be the only real solution. We need the term “globalization” to refer not only to our economies but to our compassion. Even though we have been encouraged to stay home and isolate physically, we cannot isolate ourselves morally.

This situation is teaching us that none of us lives in isolation. Let us fight this moral malaise with love. If a virus can spread across the world at such speed, imagine what we could accomplish if we let love and kindness be our road map?

Stay safe and loving.
See you next month,

Jane

2021, February 2021

Love in the Time of Covid: Remembrance of Times Past

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By Marcia Chaiken and Jan Chaiken

We have been sheltering in place since March 15, 2020. Just the two of us. Fortunately, fifty-seven years of marriage have allowed us to stockpile decades of memories of times when we sought opportunities to flee our busy lives in the U.S. and find solitary romance – often in Mexico.

Our earliest romantic moments in Mexico took place in the 1970s in archeological sites in eastern Mexico. Chichen Itza, Uxmal, and Palenque were relatively inaccessible at that time and were visited by very few tourists traveling independently. There were only one or two places to stay in each area, and we tried to choose one adjacent to the ruins, a new or newly renovated hotel that was large, luxurious and, for the most part, empty. We usually breakfasted by ourselves at dining room tables covered with pristine white tablecloths.

We spent the early, coolest part of the day wandering over the ruins of temples, climbing reconstructed pyramids, and reading to each other from papers published by archeologists with detailed descriptions of the digs. We filled in the gaps in knowledge by amusing each other with made-up stories of our interpretations of the glyphs – the ancient Mayan pictographs adorning the buildings and stelae, which at that time were still undeciphered.

When the sun became piercing and the busloads of tourists arrived, we cooled off in the hotel swimming pool or, at Palenque, in a memorable artificial stream that fed the pool. Then we ate lunch and retired to our freshly cleaned room. In the cool of the evening, when the grounds were nearly deserted and moonlit, we wandered hand in hand listening to the unidentifiable sounds in the surrounding jungle and watching the shadows play over the remains of the Mayan civilization, while imagining other couples from that civilization also strolling in the moonlight.

A decade later, in the 1980s, after having exhausted exploring many of the Mayan architectural sites, we romanced in Mexico in mainly uninhabited areas with fish-filled lagoons prime for snorkeling. Isla Mujeres was a memorable boat trip from Cancun; our hotel was noteworthy for a spectacular view, lack of hot water, and proximity to a good place to snorkel, but not much else.

Akumal became our favorite place to stay; all we really needed was a studio apartment with a kitchenette, a view of the water, and the sound of the waves pounding on the beach. After packing a lunch, we spent the days swimming side-by-side in waters that were natural aquariums, pointing out spectacular specimens of fish and other forms of marine life. The Xel Ha lagoon, not yet developed for tourists and accessible only by a narrow path through the jungle, became our private pool.

Xcaret was a bit more luxurious, having a changing room, a bathroom facility and chairs for lounging – but at that time not much more. The area was generally less private, but we could always find a place away from other people where we could commune with the fish, large iguanas, and each other. And the ocean in front of our Akumal digs abounded with interesting aquatic phenomena – sponges building their habitat, octopi lurking under rocks and snatching unsuspecting passing fish, and schools of fish, forming and reforming. Deserted cenotes around the area provided a place where we would float on our backs side-by-side and watch the birds and clouds overhead.

The following decade for the most part had rare times for romance. We were both working over 70 hours a week, flying all over the U.S. and almost never to the same destination. We became notorious for planning our flights so we could spend an hour or two together in an airline club in Chicago or elsewhere. We were fortunate enough to have a month’s vacation every year. Then we travelled as far from the U.S. as possible and chose places where it was really difficult for our employers and employees to reach us – mountains in New Zealand; islands on the Great Barrier Reef; rural villages in Italy, Spain and France; rivers in China; archeological sites in Malaysia. Mexico was too close and too accessible to prevent someone from contacting us about a statistical error or an ungrammatical sentence in a report to be published. So, although our stockpile of romantic times continued to grow, Mexico was not part of the pile.

That changed on Inauguration Day in 2001. Jan, who held a presidential appointment in the Clinton administration, was suddenly freed from his pager, cell phone, and government responsibilities. Marcia had developed internet communication between members of her research teams and could work from anywhere as long as she had her computer.

We immediately packed the computer, clothes and other essential items in our car and headed south and into Mexico. We spent the better part of that year driving around the country, staying in memorably romantic beach casitas or apartments with incredible city vistas. We wandered together through art museums discovering new artists. We enjoyed wonderful concerts. And we had numerous adventures, sometimes totally lost, sometimes totally terrified, but always together. And then we discovered Huatulco!

Although we settled down at the end of 2001 in Ashland, Oregon, one of the best tourist destinations in the U.S., we returned again and again to Huatulco, finally buying a condo and spending about six months a year here. For many years we drove our car, loaded with books and supplies, from Oregon to our condo, over varying routes and stopping to see friends or interesting locations on the way. Romantic times abounded – many over meals in fabulous restaurants in Oaxaca, San Cristóbal, Mexico City, and of course Huatulco. When Cafe Juanita was located in Santa Cruz, we had a standing reservation for New Year’s Eve and Valentine’s Day at our “own” table overlooking the plaza. After the move to the Chahue Marina, Juanita’s continued to be our place for romantic dinners – even planning our 50th wedding celebration there while having a Valentine’s dinner. We also have had a very favorite place in Huatulco for romantic breakfasts – but since we enjoy frequently being the only people there, you’re not going to find out where it is.

Finally, for the past 10 years, we’ve found many romantic moments, exploring together and writing articles for The Eye about our adventures. You can read about many of these in the Eye archives. So, thanks to you, readers, to our fellow Eye writers, and most of all to our Eye editor Jane for the many opportunities you have provided for building memories of romance in times past and hopes for more romance in Mexico, post-pandemic.

2021, February 2021

Romantic Picnic Options in Huatulco

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By Brooke Gazer

Pondering ideas for a romantic Valentine’s Day? This year you might want to consider something safely away from crowded venues. Huatulco offers many possibilities to enjoy the great outdoors, so an intimate picnic for two could be the perfect option. Here are a few suggestions for sparsely populated destinations and some ideas as to what to bring.

Where to Go

Huatulco is blessed with beautiful beaches. If you are up for a bit of a hike, here are four possibilities.

La Bocana – From Los Güeros Restaurant (the one on the left facing the beach), follow the shoreline to the river. The walk on the sand is about fifteen minutes, passing enormous boulders reminiscent of Henry Moore sculptures. This beach can be rough for swimming, but you can refresh yourself along the way by getting your feet wet.

Playa Arena – On the highway heading west (from Santa Cruz towards Secrets Hotel), about 2 km past the hotels and shops in Tangolunda, you will find a footpath leading to this dramatic virgin beach. The entrance is not marked, but look for a cement post on either side of the path. The walk should not take more than 20 minutes and while not completely flat, neither is it overly challenging.

Cacaluta – Following the highway to Maguey, there is a sign for Cacaluta where the road branches off to the right, about 200 meters before Maguey. Do not confuse this with a service road marked “Tanque Cacaluta,” which dead ends and is difficult to turn around on. Your turn is a bit farther ahead. About 2 km past the turnoff is a small parking lot where the paved road ends. You must leave your vehicle here to continue along a dirt road down to the beach. This scenic walk through the jungle might take about forty-five minutes. Foot traffic and bicycles are permitted on the road, but not motorbikes.

El Órgano – On the opposite side of the highway to Maguey, i.e., when you are returning from Maguey to Santa Cruz, there is an opening in the forest with a sign that says “PRIVATE,” located about halfway between the turnoff to Cacaluta and the last glorieta (traffic circle) after Santa Cruz. There is no parking lot, but people do leave their cars parked on this road. The walk is fifteen to twenty minutes down to El Organo beach. Only foot traffic is allowed on this path.

For those who don’t find the prospect of hiking very appealing, you can rent a panga (small motorboats with overhead canopies) at the marina in Santa Cruz. Your hotel or a tourist stand can make the arrangements for you; if your Spanish is good, you can go down to the marina and negotiate for yourself.

The panga can take you to beaches farther out – Playas Chachacual, La India, Riscalillo, or Cacaluta. These are all gorgeous virgin beaches within the Bahías de Huatulco National Park.

For a shorter excursion, a panga will take you to virgin beaches within a half-hour ride, like Violín or Órgano. The captain will leave you and return a few hours later. You pay only for the return trip, so you can rest assured you will not be left stranded.

On the other hand, if you’re looking for a non-beach interlude, here are two options.

The Huatulco National Park has an access in Santa Cruz. Follow Boulevard Benito Juarez as it branches off to the right at the Binniguenda Hotel and becomes Avenida Oaxaca. The sign says “Sector E.” At the end of Av. Oaxaca, a dirt road takes you into the park. Bicycles, but not motorbikes, are permitted on this. A short distance into the Park is a rustic open-air church where you can sit down for your picnic – just remember to carry out whatever you brought in! There are paths past the church through the park that will take you all the way to the beaches mentioned above or out to the main highway (Route 200) into Huatulco.

The Parque Ecologico Rufino Tamayo is underused and somewhat neglected, but it has some paved foot paths and concrete stairs. There are a few dilapidated benches and picnic tables (bring a cloth to clean them off!). This forest reserve has three entrances; the one on Calle (not Avenida) Oaxaca has parking. Calle Oaxaca is the street heading away from the main entrance to La Crucecita; the park entrance is located directly across the street from Jessic Toys.

What to pack…
Assuming you do not want to cook, these are a few suggestions should travel easily.

Several vendors throughout Huatulco offer roast chicken with tortillas and salsa.

Either of the big supermarkets has an excellent assortment of cheeses, cold cuts, and condiments like olive, pickles, or artichoke hearts.

Dozens of local restaurants will do take out, but these two do only take out. Nutrición Gourmet Huatulco offers a wide selection of sandwiches, salads, and sushi. Order by phone or WhatsApp, 958 124 2799. Punto y Come – offers vegetarian dishes, and falafel pitas, a 90-peso bargain, packed to assemble upon arrival at your picnic spot. Calle Palo Verde 210 in La Crucecita; order by phone or WhatsApp 958 125 5679.

Don’t forget a hat and sunscreen, and of course something to keep you hydrated.

You are unlikely to encounter any vendors, so leave your wallet at home. However, officially there is a small fee to use the Huatulco National Park. If you see a ranger, you might be asked for 10 pesos to buy a paper bracelet indicating you are authorized to be in the park, so have some change in your pocket.

Wherever you go and whatever you consume, I am sure it will be a memorable day. To ensure that others can enjoy a similar experience, please remember this simple international rule for visiting national parks and reserves: Take nothing but pictures. Leave nothing but footprints.

Brooke Gazer operates Agua Azul la Villa, an ocean-view Bed and Breakfast (www.bbaguaazul.com).

2021, February 2021

Marriage in the Time of COVID – A Statistical Review

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By Randy Jackson

If we are lucky, we only have to endure various COVID-19 effects on society for one to two years. Any effect that the pandemic might have on the incidence of marriage likely won’t even register as a bump on the long, long road in the history of marriage; however, whatever COVID effects there might be, could also exacerbate some negative trends in the institution of marriage in 2020-21. Sampling from a flood of research, articles, and speculation on the institution of marriage, I pulled together four interesting statistics to see what might happen to pandemic marriages.

The first record of a marriage ceremony is from Mesopotamia in 2350 BC. Anthropologists suggest that marriages between one man and one woman started around the time when humans first formed agricultural societies, about eleven or twelve thousand years ago. With the advent of personal property, men needed to know which children were their biological heirs. Back then, and for a long, long time thereafter, the title of Tina Turner’s 1984 hit song “What’s love got to do with it?” pretty much summed things up. Marriages were arrangements made between family groups for economic and political reasons. They bound one man to one woman (not equally) for the production of children, the division of labour, and the inheritance of property.

How Do We Meet and Marry?

Even today half of all marriages in the world are arranged. India comes to mind in this regard, as 90% of that country’s marriages are arranged. Young people in India, even in the wealthiest and most educated levels of society, still largely prefer to enter into a marriage where a spouse is chosen for them (in modern educated families each marriage candidate holds a veto). There are a number of studies that show arranged marriages are no less successful than those called “love marriages.” Just before COVID struck, 35% of couples met online, the most frequent method for meeting a partner. COVID could only increase this trend.

When Do We Marry?

Another trend going into the pandemic is that people are getting married later. In Greek and Roman times up to the middle ages, marriage was common for girls starting at age 12, for boys it was age 14. By the 15th century records show the common marriage age was closer to 17. By colonial times in Europe and North America, women were commonly getting married by 20 and men by 26. By 2017, the age of marriage in Canada, Mexico and the USA was 27 for women and 30 for men. Marriage age in Europe is generally higher – Sweden had the highest marriage age among countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, well into the mid-30’s. Turkey had the lowest marriage age in the OECD, with women marrying before the age of 25 and men before 28.

How Often Do We Call It Quits?

News stories abound on the extra stress on marriages because of COVID lockdowns and restrictions. One of many such articles is a BBC story from December 2020, “Why the pandemic is causing spikes in break-ups and divorces.” Although the story uses anecdotal or “soft” data, not statistics (it’s too early for that), one source was a major British law firm. The firm reported an increase in divorce inquiries of 122% over the previous year. There have been increases in divorce inquiries in the U.S., China, and Sweden – and no doubt other countries as well. There’s a busy year ahead for divorce lawyers.

One thing that is not news going into the pandemic is that divorce rates around the world have been climbing for decades. The highest divorce rates in the world are in Europe, often greater than 60%, followed by Canada and the USA, nearing 50%. Latin and South America are lower, as is much of Asia. Vietnam has the lowest in the OECD (7%).

This chart shows the percentage of divorces among couples who have been married only once. Divorce rates per capita – perhaps a better statistical measure – are increasing around the world and have been for years leading up to these COVID times. (The divorce rate in the U.S. has actually been decreasing, from a high of 50% in the 1980s, but it varies by age group – “gray” divorce rates are going up.) Divorce rates for 2021 and beyond should be interesting, with couples bursting out of lockdown and heading to their divorce lawyers on the one hand, but fewer marriages in 2020 to hit the rocks further downstream.

How Many of Us Do NOT Marry?

One final statistic that pulls together all the trends mentioned above is the percentage of single-person households.

Following the same country pattern as divorce rates, European countries (especially Nordic countries) have the highest number of single person households, followed by Canada and the USA, then Latin America and Asia. Pakistan has the lowest number of single person households in the OECD.

This statistic is where all aspects of the decline in traditional marriage come to rest. Fewer people are choosing to marry, those marrying are doing so later in life, and more couples are separating and divorcing. All this leads to a higher number of single person households. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. If there is a crisis here, it’s that we need more houses. That first recorded marriage back in 2350 BC, between two kids who would be in grade 7 in our times – just doesn’t work. Things have changed, and marriage too will change and adapt.

Increasing equality between the sexes, personal and economic freedoms, birth control, and just plain knowledge of the world all mean that marriage has some catching up to do. In times of COVID and beyond, women and men will find some form of relationship that works for them and for them to have and raise children. Love – Para Siempre. Feliz Día del Amor y la Amistad.

2021, February 2021

A Year of Reading: Ten New Books for Post-Pandemic 2021

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By Carole Reedy

Among the many worlds that man did not receive as a gift from nature but created out of his own mind, the world of books is the greatest. …Without the word, without the writing of books, there is no history, there is no concept of humanity.
— Hermann Hesse

We’re reading now more than ever, and not just because of the pandemic. A new Gallup Poll indicates that more Americans went to libraries in pre-pandemic 2019 than to the movies; 2020 has also revealed a return of readers to independent bookshops.

If you’re already pondering books for 2021, there are numerous new titles from which to choose. Here I present ten I think The Eye audience will want to read (based on your past most-welcome comments). May each of the following new books, by many of our favorite old authors, brighten spirits that perhaps have been dimmed by life during a pandemic.

Land: How the Hunger for Ownership Shaped the Modern World, by Simon Winchester (2021)

A new book by British/American author Simon Winchester cannot go unnoticed. He’s given us many hours not only of enjoyment, but also of pertinenent and often hidden information and analysis about our world, present and past. His two books about creating, of all things, a massive dictionary (The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary [2005] and The Meaning of Everything: The Story of the Oxford English Dictionary [2004]) are truly, believe it or not, compelling reading that will keep you on the edge of your seat. With his in-depth research, Winchester has created a plethora of books on various subjects, including the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, Krakatoa, and Calcutta. This newest book, Land, explores a subject dear to the hearts of humans, past and present: ownership and property, its history and our future.

Double Blind: A Novel, by Edward St. Aubyn (Anticipated March [U.K.], June [U.S.] 2021)

I think the author Anne Enright says it best when she describes St. Aubyn’s writings: “Everything St. Aubyn writes is worth reading for the cleansing rancor of his intelligence and the fierce elegance of his prose.” Certainly, we saw that in the Patrick Melrose novels/series that he wrote few years back. Art, science, and philosophy are interwoven with psychoanalysis, ecology, love, fear, and all that is human in this new novel, which follows three friends for a year in London, Cap d’Antibes, Oxford, and Big Sur. St. Aubyn’s ability to be blunt yet delicately introspective makes this author one of the most respected and admired in Britain and the world.

Philip Roth: The Biography, by Blake Bailey (Anticipated April 2021)

With an emphasis on “The,” this has been a book years in the making. Bailey was given complete and independent access to Roth’s archives and was actually appointed by Roth, before his death, as his official biographer, so this is the book to read for fans of one of America’s greatest chroniclers. It will always be a bone of contention among those of us who idolize Roth that he never was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Letters to Camondo, by Edmund de Waal (Anticipated April [U.K.], May [U.S.] 2021)

The Hare with the Amber Eyes: A Hidden Inheritance (2010) was a memoir that elicited extreme emotions, either love or strong dislike, in response to style and content. It was, for me at least, a fascinating depiction of the decline and fall of the Ephrussi family dynasty in the banking empires of Europe, specifically Paris, Vienna, and Odessa. It also delights with a side story about netsuke, tiny Japanese wood and ivory carvings. This newest by de Waal spins a similar tale in a different style, this time a Jewish banker and art collector who loses his family in the Holocaust. This “memoir” is a series of 50 imaginary letters that the author writes to Moise de Camondo after he’s invited to make an exhibition of his well-regarded ceramics at the Camondo mansion.

Whereabouts: A Novel, by Jhumpa Lahiri (Anticipated May 2021)

Several years ago, Lahiri decided to learn the Italian language not only for her lifestyle (she relocated her family to Rome in 2011), but also for the voice in her books. This new novel was written in Italian and translated into English. Well-known for her award-winning book of short selections Interpreter of Maladies: Stories (1999) and for the novel (and movie) The Namesake (2003, 2019 [2 ed.]), Lahiri is the recipient of many literary prizes, including the Pulitzer. Whereabouts is her first book in a decade. It will be most interesting to analyze the difference between this novel, written originally in Italian, and those that emerged from her English tongue.

Should We Stay or Should We Go: A Novel, by Lionel Shriver (Anticipated May 2021)

The Queen of Sarcasm is the way I think of this witty, spot-on observer of modern-day life in our confused world. In each of her novels Shriver dissects a new fad, lifestyle, and even the tragedies that permeate our 21st century lives. This latest novel looks at old age and the attitudes toward and self-realization of our older population. Always humorous, yet serious, and clever, yet practical, Shriver weaves her stories with silk thread. Although she is known for her award-winning novel (also a movie) We Need to Talk about Kevin: A Novel (2003), her other novels equal and even surpass that honor, among them So Much for That: A Novel (2010 – my personal favorite), Big Brother: A Novel (2013), The Mandibles: A Family 2029-2047 (2016), and Property: Stories between Two Novellas (2018).

Light Perpetual: A Novel, by Francis Spufford (Anticipated May 2021)

Although I’m utterly unfamiliar with this writer, my interest sparked when I read the style of this newest compared to Kate’s Atkinson’s Life After Life: A Novel (2013) and Paul Auster’s 4321: A Novel (2017), both using the parallel-lives device, which can be so effective for writers and readers alike. The novel creates stories for five working-class children in England in a moment best described as “what if they hadn’t died from a bomb that hit a Woolworth’s shop in 1944, killing 168 people instantly.” It also gives us a glimpse of and new perspective on London and England in the 40s and beyond. Spufford’s first book, Golden Hill: A Novel of Old New York (2016), was well-received by critics and won the Costa Award for best first novel. Spufford hopes that this book “has the fascination of following out strands in the lives where everything makes sense when you look backwards, but you are constantly surprised going forwards.”

Harlem Shuffle: A Novel, by Colson Whitehead (Anticipated September 2021)

A two-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize for fiction (2017, 2020), Harvard-educated Whitehead has left quite an impression on our planet. With this, his eighth novel, a crime story, he takes us to the world of Harlem in the 1960s. It’s a novel he conceived some time ago, but has just completed, in bits and pieces, during the COVID quarantine period this past year. We know Whitehead for his fiction, specifically The Underground Railroad (2016) and The Nickel Boys: A Novel (2019), but his larger career is impressive and diverse. Not only does he write works of fiction and non-fiction, but he has written for the most notable of newspapers and magazines, taught at Princeton University, been a writer-in-residence at Vassar, and received the MacArthur Fellowship (aka the “Genius Grant”).

Crossroads, A Novel (“A Key to All Mythologies,” Book 1), by Jonathan Franzen (Anticipated October 2021)

In my world, this is the literary announcement of the year. In his first book in six years (since Purity: A Novel, in 2015), Franzen has written not one, but three new novels, a trilogy to anticipate over the next several years. Chicago 1971 is the setting and the romp will carry us along with the Hildebrandt family as they “navigate the political, intellectual and social cross-currents of the past 50 years.” Franzen, a passionate birder, outspoken critic of social media, and the leading novelist of his generation, is gifting us, according to his publisher, “a tour-de-force of interwoven perspectives and sustained suspense.” If this is correct, I, for one, cannot wait!

Something to Hide, by Elizabeth George (Anticipated October 2021)

Are you a devoted fan of the Lynley detective series? If so, this is book 21, and I’m sure you’ve read the previous 20, as have I. Others may have watched the PBS television series created from the books. I’ve refused to watch it given what I view as the abhorrent misrepresentation of the character Detective Barbara Havers, one of the brilliant creations of Elizabeth George in the book series. You’ll have to wait until October to find out what snags Barbara creates while honing her fine detective skills under the direction, and often to the distress, of Inspector Lynley.

And thus we move in 2021, led and encouraged by our favorite authors and new artists on the horizon.

2021, February 2021

The New Global Love Affair with a Mexican Spirit

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By Alvin Starkman, M.A., J.D.

Not since the advent of the Margarita in the mid-20th century, has the world been taken by storm by a Mexican alcoholic beverage – but here we are, in the age of mezcal. Of course, we still have tequila, and there are now other spirits being exported from Mexico, including rum and whisky. But it’s mezcal, tequila’s older sister and also an agave distillate, that is receiving global attention. But why, aside from the internet, which reshapes our universe second by second?

Here are a few thoughts.

  1. It all began around 1995, with the arrival of two brands, Del Maguey and Scorpion. The former aimed at attracting a select imbibing audience, that is, spirits aficionados, while the latter sought to pique the interest of mainstream America. Over the past quarter century each has spawned a plethora of other mezcal brands.
  2. It’s been in large part due to the portrayed romanticism of every step of the process: indigenous Mexicans harvesting agave hearts (piñas) from the field by hand and transporting them to their family distilleries on the sides of mules; converting carbohydrates to sugars through baking the agave in a rudimentary pit over firewood and rocks; crushing by hand using a mallet or employing a beast of burden to drag a limestone wheel over the caramelized piñas; standing over wooden vats while the environmental yeasts work to ferment; then finally the smoke billowing into the sky from the wood fueling clay or copper stills. Over those 25 years, and in many instances, industrialization has crept into the process. Some of those big commercial brand owners in fact mislead by representing their methods as those of an era long past. The consuming public eats – or rather, drinks – it up.
  3. The last decade has witnessed a cocktail trade explosion, with mezcal brand owners seeking to capitalize on it by introducing lower-priced agave distillates that restaurant and bar owners can afford to use. We still have those Margaritas, Negronis and the rest, but mezcal is now being introduced as the spirit of choice in their making. Brands, distributors and bartenders work feverishly to develop and promote new cocktails using mezcal as the liquor of choice.
  4. A surfeit of entrepreneurs recognizes the popularity of mezcal, and seeks to capitalize on faddism: alcohol distributors are anxious to represent a brand; restaurateurs are opening mezcalerías; well-known figures in the entertainment industry who want even more recognition are interested in having their names associated with their own or others’ brands; and residents of countries south and north of Mexico, and on the other side of both the Atlantic and the Pacific, are hiring marketing consultants to assist in new brand development.
  1. Over the past several years, multinational corporations – each with an already well-established global reach – have been buying up popular brands of mezcal that continue to be made using traditional means of production. Mezcaleros who have elected to sell their brands did not have the resources to enable them to reach many countries. Not only is mezcal now arriving in far-off lands such as China, New Zealand, Argentina and the Yukon, but the big guns have the financial ability to promote the spirit.
  2. There’s an abundance of money in the pockets of consumers. Despite COVID-19, today a growing middle and upper class has more disposable income than ever before. Both dotcom youths and the older hippie generation now retiring, with their debts paid off and their flock flown the nest, are flush. The former no doubt want to enjoy their wealth, the latter grew up with The Beatles, Iron Butterfly and Jethro Tull, worshipping organic production, Birkenstocks, The Whole Earth Catalog and everything else representing “back to the earth.” Both have the capacity and in many cases the desire to spend $350 US for a bottle of mezcal de pechuga distilled in clay.

There are of course other reasons for the meteoric rise in popularity of mezcal, and some might disagree with this enumeration, but the one point that garners universal consensus is the increasing popularity of the Mexican agave distillate, with a strong likelihood that our love affair with mezcal will continue for decades to come.

Alvin Starkman operates Mezcal Educational Excursions of Oaxaca (www.mezcaleducationaltours.com), and has been playing his part in advancing mezcal’s global popularity.