Posts tagged holidays

Despite this, many Mexicans continue to celebrate Cinco de Mayo. ¿Por qué? The Nobel laureate Octavio Paz had a theory. Examining the Mexican propensity to party, Paz wrote, “The explosive, dramatic, sometimes even suicidal manner in which we strip ourselves, surrender ourselves is evidence that something inhibits and suffocates us. Something impedes us from being. And since we cannot or dare not confront our own selves, we resort to the fiesta.

There’s something there. Strangely, Mexicans enjoy harping over the country’s inability to defeat foreign aggressors. Look at the examples: The Mexican government bemoans the Conquest nearly 500 years later, simultaneously outraged that Spaniards slaughtered and raped the inhabitants of Anáhuac and angry that Montezuma acquiesced so quickly to Cortés. The annexation by los pinche americanos of half of Mexico 150 years ago because of General Santa Anna’s idiocies still makes some Chicanos so miserable they start comparing themselves to Palestinians. (Palestinians! As if someone who speaks horrid Spanish, has parents born in Jalisco that are descended from Europeans, and hasn’t lived a day without potable water can logically compare himself to people who have lived in the same parched spot since the time of Christ.) That pretty pocho Oscar de la Hoya beat the Mexican hero Julio César Chávez —twice. And let’s not talk about the underachieving Mexican soccer squad.

According to Paz, the only way to live with such a bitter legacy is to party. And Cinco de Mayo is Paz’s ultimate example of celebrating to forget—even if it promotes a lie.