The Z in Piedras Negras

I spent some days in Piedras Negras, Mexico, border town with Eagle Pass, Texas. And something have called my attention, the amount of Z in orange color in some cars and trucks. I've been told that this is done for people that support the narco group the Zetas.

This group has been achieving importance and power in northern Mexico, and for example in Piedras Negras, since 2003 it took control, when the last local narco, Mr. Rubio was assassinated.

For many locals, that usually tolerates the narcos, the arrival of the Zetas has not been nothing beneficial, on the contrary, it has harmed enormously the local economy. It apparently seems, the old narcos, those from town, spent big amounts of money in the city, thus causing economical activity in many sectors, let's think about a celebration: banquets, cleaning, music, service, security, etc.

The Zetas, who not come from this border city, does not spend any important amount of money, for sure, they take it to their own communities.

Nevertheless, many people prefer to put themselves of their side, because it tells a local urban legend, if you dont' do so, you could suffer from firegun shootings, robbery of cars or kidnapping of girls. So better to put a Z.

Politics in Mexico

Next year we'll have elections for the Presidency. And since last year, at least, all medias are just talking about that. Its been crazy. As now political parties don't only have their candidates... now they have pre-candidates! Bizare isn't?

Well, the PRI (which governed Mx for more than 70 years) have two candidates, one the chairman of the board, and other one, a low profile guy, which until now can see his name on a newspaper. His life has turn 180° in less than a month, now he can say he's out of low-profilers.Journalists here says he doesn't have even one shot to get the candidate title. And so I think.

But well, the only good thing, is that before this guy appeared, the PRI had a small change to get back to the Presidency, but now, after a few scandals, I think people realise that this party has nothing to offer to us, the people of Mexico.

The cost of democracy

This term in kind of new for Mexicans, we know that democracy just arrived to us, I'd say on 1997, when left-party PRD won the elections on Mexico City, and definetily marked the the result on 2000 when Fox arrived to the Republic's Presidency.

But does this democracy cost? Well yes, as in every capitalist country I may think. But there's one thing it really bothers me about one particular process: every political party must choose one contendant for the different election positions, but before this, the have many interested persons from their parties, so now they promote their pre-candidates as if there where to run for the real elections! And they got money from gouverment, from our taxes... and let me say this cost a lot for our society.

And even before they got their candidate, we, as society, must know all pre-candidates... what's the sense of that? just waste more money?

Something's wrong with our system, because in a country like Mexico, we just can't afford this concept of democracy.

They've agreed!

Last night the richest bizmen in Mexico, and the richest woman in Latin America, Maria Asuncion Aramburuzabala, sourronded by some celebrities, artist and athletes, held an unusual meeting at the Chapultepec Castle.

Well, this was not just one more party.... but a meeting to sign an agreement in a very specific moment of history in Mexico... the next elections on 2006... so, many people start to think about what this meeting means in this very moment...

You have the elements, some of them at least, what would you think?

By the way, the richest woman in LatinAmerica, Ms. Aramburuzabala married this year the American Ambassador in Mexico, Mr. Tony Garza... and I wonder if she will accept now be known as Ms. Garza... a very common last name in northern Mexico... because if so, she will help many people in Mexico who try to pronounce her lastname correctly!

Discovering Webcast

For many of you webcast may be something "old"... but for me, well, I just discovered it last weekend. And I'm so happy about that, because as a lover of Chinese culture, now I can watch regularly CCTV-9, which is the national chinese network (in English). They have interesting cultural emissions, and the news program is kind of CNN's.

Also, I could follow live the path of Rita in Texas and Louisiana, thanks to KHOU. Because I have to say that Rita has a low/poor coverage in Mexican broadcast networks, and I just love to follow the news live.

About CCTV, it was interesting for me to find out, that the network is welcoming programming in both Spanish and French, and exclusive channel oriented to those audiences. I was wondering if there's another international network with multilingual programming?...