Belching Out the Devil (36 page)

‘That's a very good day if they manage that, ‘ says Laura, ‘I live in the area that should get water twelve hours a day and often that water doesn't come on at all, and when it does you have to boil it for at least twenty minutes before you can drink it.'

‘When do you know it is OK to drink?

‘You get this white powder, really fine grains that falls to the bottom. God knows what it is but it ain't water. So when that falls to the bottom I know I can drink the stuff on top of it.'

‘What happens if you don't boil it?'

‘You don't want to find out.'

Two days later I didn't and she's right - you don't.

San Cristóbal's Coordinator of Epidemiology in Sanitary Jurisdiction No. II of the Highlands Region of Chiapas has an office that is only marginally bigger than his title. His name is Cuauhtemoc Zapata Cabrera and he is another eager and smiling official. The building he works out of is just by the abattoir, which is a bit too open-air for my liking. The less brutal environs of his cosy office, are cluttered with papers, books, folders and kids' toys, which I assume is to make them as happy as the physical state that drew them here allows. Over the next half hour he explains that gastroenteritis is one of the top five sicknesses in the highlands of Chiapas. In his district in 2006 there were 9,998 cases involving intestinal amoebas, intestinal non-specific organisms, giardia, paratyphoid, food poisoning due to protozoa and the like. The infection rates are higher in the indigenous communities and there is a focus on teaching the importance of boiling water and how to soak food in iodine and chlorine.

The lack of water, clean or otherwise, is a common story too. We bump into a friend of a friend of Laura's, a Spanish teacher called Yasmina who lives with her husband and children in an area that should get water six hours a day. In reality they get it ‘Two or three times a week and maybe for three hours, sometimes four…We never know when it is going to come on, so we have a storage tank.' The next day her water went off and didn't come back on for two weeks.

 

And actually Laura and Yasmina are both relatively well off when it comes to water. Consider the situation the Comunidad 5th de Marzo, (5th March Community) found themselves in. The community squatted on an area of land, which was to have been developed into a hotel golf course, and for that alone they will have my undying love. As far as I am concerned the situation could only have been bettered if a Bush family member had been playing a few rounds at the time. Although initially a Zapatista community, it opened its doors to all comers and has expanded over the years. The water board, after refusing to run taps into homes, charged people instead for the standpipes they ran in. Javiar, one of the community's inhabitants said, ‘They didn't give us even public fountains…and because we didn't pay they say “well we are not giving you any water”.' So in a land that is water rich and in a culture that relies on taking water from springs, rivers and wells this refusal to pay for the second rate was met with petty punishment. In 2007 the water board issued locks for paying customers - so they can slip the small metal cap over the standpipe and padlock it after they are done, to ensure no free water for these golf-hating ingrates.
^g

Meanwhile the Coca-Cola plant sits on top of the best water source around, the Huitepec aquifer. The plant has a twenty-year lease to extract water and is legally entitled to withdraw 500 million litres of it a year.
¹
And in academic research conducted with the anonymous assistance of a senior plant official it was revealed that in 2003 the company extracted 240 million litres of water and paid $320,000 Mexican pesos-about 1p per 150 litres - which is not bad for a main ingredient.
²
The concession at Huitepec is one of twenty-seven that Coca-Cola has negotiated with the CNA Comission Nacional del Agua (the National Water Commission)
³
- the body run by the ex-Coca-Cola man Cristóbal Jaime Jaquez, who had been appointed by another ex-Coca-Cola man, President Vicente Fox.
⁴

 

Up on Huitepec mountain above the Coke plant one of the community representatives or agente municipal, says the water level has gone down, He sits in his zip-up mauve jacket and flicked-back greying hair like an elderly member of the Soprano family about to take a driving test, ‘There has been a lot of depletion but that is understandable. There are more of us, there is global warming so we have less water and obviously as water flows underground Coca-Cola has an effect.' Further along the hill Martin, an ex-agente municipal and farmer is wearing split shoes and no socks. He has worked on the land so long that his huge, gnarled hands look like something could take root on them. His hands tell the story behind his impassive face. When I ask says about the well water on his land, ‘Yeah it has gone down,' he says and then adds, ‘The thing is they [Coca-Cola] have a very deep well that sucks up a lot of water.' The situation is not critical in terms of supply but he worries for the future.

 

There is no allegation that Coke is directly responsible for the lack of clean available water through San Cristóbal, but this is
the situation they operate in and one they can take advantage of. Even the guidebooks say ‘Don't drink the tap water, buy bottled water' - such as Coke's water brands. As Yasmina says ‘It is the worst thing…There is a shortage for basic needs, no electricity, no water but everywhere Coca-Cola.'

 

When I ask Martin what he would say to the CEO of Coke in response to the company claim that they support sustainable communities he said ‘Really, he should realise, instead of helping, how much Coke helps fuck communities over.'

 

Perhaps it is not surprising that there is some bitterness felt towards the company and later that evening when Laura and I sit among her friends in a café in the centre of town, they laugh as they tell the tale of Coke's gift to the community. Each year the company donates a thirty-foot high plastic Christmas tree covered in baubles decorated in the Coca-Cola logo and topped off with a large silver star. It stands in front of the church and under the tree is the classic nativity scene, Joseph, Mary and a large Coca-Cola polar bear - the type used in their adverts. In fact it is quite close to the baby Jesus, perhaps not surprisingly Joseph stands further back and Mary is behind him, there is absolutely no sign of the three wise men. Though the bear has a smirk on its face - a smirk and a resentful demeanour, as if to question its Arctic presence in Mexico.

 

A few years ago in the middle of the night miscreants, set fire to the tree, its thirty-foot plastic leaves momentarily shooting a pillar of fire under the star of Bethlehem. In the morning a sharp odour of molten plastic lingered in the air and a pile of black shrunken gunk was all that was left of Coke's gift to the community. The local businesses condemned the act, some blamed the Zapatistas, others blamed troublemakers and
some blamed drunks - though a polar bear was spotted fleeing the scene.

 

But it takes more than a burnt Christmas tree to intimidate the Coca-Cola bottler and the very next year a new plastic tree rose from the ashes in all its majesty. And the baby Jesus was placed in its hallowed and traditional place under the Coca-Cola bauble. Mary and Joseph had obviously received some trauma counselling as they too stood strong under the protective plastic boughs. Though this year, the tree did have barriers around. And an armed guard. To enforce peace on earth.

Back in Mexico City right at the start of this trip, Alejandro from El Poder del Consumidor had said, ‘I think Coke is inside the consumer habits of a great part of this society, and it's stronger in the indigenous communities and with the worst case in Chiapas, Coke is part of the rituals.' Which is why Laura and I are on a tourist bus bound for Chamula - a Tzotzil Mayan town, where the indigenous community allow visitors in to see their religious ceremonies. Here they use Coca-Cola to help remove bad spirits and nightmares by way of a gaseous emission. Now I have heard of Coca-Cola being used for many different purposes from a misguided anti-spermicidal douche to the LAPD using it to wash blood away at the scene of car crashes, but I have never before heard of Coke being used in an exorcism.
^h
So there are a host of anthropological and cultural reasons to go and witness this event, there are questions to ask of the company regarding their marketing practices, as well as an appraisal of the economic and nutritional consequences. Though I have to admit a significant part of the appeal is the
sanctified burping in church. Why they do it and quite how Coca-Cola managed to muscle in on an ancient tradition, are important addendums, but the assault on the mannered orthodoxy of the church by the release of belly air at the altar is too alluring to miss.

 

Bizarrely this is one of the things that got Laura researching Coca-Cola. As an anthropology graduate she lived in the Highlands of Chiapas and became fascinated by the way the drink had become so ingrained in the religious life of the community. Laura explains her research and interviews with indigenous Mayans on the subject. ‘Basically people say that Coke came to the Highlands, the indigenous communities, when it came to San Cristóbal in the 1950s. It was very much the advertising of the time, they used promotions, free gifts, they sponsored film shows in neighbourhood squares or had loudspeakers on a cart which went around town telling everyone to drink Coke.'

 

Laura told me the first man to run a Coke concession in Chamula started in 1962 and brought the bottles into the Tzotzil Mayan town on a horse. His wife recalled that no one really knew of Coca-Cola but Coke's businessmen said they could sell their product and they did very well doing just that. Indigenous people would come here from communities as far as forty kilometres away to buy it.

 

The tour bus potters through the mountain splendour, leaving the city centre of San Cristóbal behind us in the distance. And as we get nearer to Chamula our tour guide, a thirty-something bearded fellow, runs through the dos and don'ts of the trip like a flight attendant:‘You must respect the traditions of the indigenous people. You must not take photographs unless I say. You must not give money to child beggars, it encourages
them stay from school. You must not stare at the people in the church. Remember this is a mix of ancient beliefs - the worship of the sun and the moon and the earth fused with Christianity. It might seem strange too that they drink alcohol in church, indeed some people may be a little drunk but this is their religion and you must be respectful.'

 

I chime in wanting to demonstrate my understanding nature, ‘Well, the Catholic church serve up wine at the communion rail, so they accept the principle, it's just the size of the glass that is at issue here…'

 

But the bearded man turns to me for a second in blank disapproval, then turns back to the group in the bus and starts again, ‘You must respect the traditions…'