Out of Paradise

The view from my first apartment.

Growing up in Utah Valley didn't present a lot of opportunity for social unrest. It did, however, set the stage for a more dramatic transition when I arrived in the middle of Mexico City as a missionary. Riding in the car to my first area was an interesting experience. I had never seen so much graffiti. It was dark when we arrived and all I could hear all night were dogs barking and what I thought were gunshots. (They actually were fireworks for a celebration taking place.) I couldn't believe that people lived like this! Everything seemed dirty and chaotic. But the real crowning moment came a little later.

The Mexican people love their holidays, especially Catholic traditions. Some of these can make you as a representative of a different religion somewhat uneasy. We tried to avoid processions and otherwise big celebrations as much as possible. Though one day we ended up running into one. Certain "pockets" of the city are small, traditional pueblos that were swallowed by the city sprawl and have essentially retained their identities for the most part. Searching for an address led us to one of these areas at the same time the whole community was celebrating in the street. We cautiously moved through it with no problem, but the place was completely overrun and out of control. After returning from the address, we walked past the same spot. The party had stopped and most of the people were gone, but the site was a mess! Trash littered the entire area. I couldn't believe that the police had done nothing to control the celebration or enforce that the party-goers clean up. I don't think any local authorities were even around.

Living in a different country with different customs and lifestyles show me that authority is expected to behave differently by different people. My experience at home was that authority controls and maintains order and cleanliness. For certain parts of Mexico City, the authority only showed up in "really difficult situations" but allowed the people to act how they wanted in most cases. The definition of chaos as well can be relative to the culture. Large parties in the street are normal in Mexico City but are considered a disturbance in our local Utah society.