| If you were looking for media hype over Alex in Mexico all you need to do is look at Mexican networks, Televisa really did quite a job over Alex in the Monterrey area. The video of the Santa Catarina river overflowing at its banks, which was the way was "canalized" in the 1950s is not only reminiscent of Gilbert its WORST than Gilbert, Gilbert filled it up, this time it was about to burst its already (artificially) increased channel, not only this river but its tributaries like the Arroyo Topo Chico, La Estanzuela and Rio La Silla aren't too far behind. La Estanzuela is usually an old quaint river that in its upper part its tubed to the old turn of the century waterworks, where thanks to its height used to give Monterrey a wonderful water pressure at a time when the dry Monterrey valley was like an oasis with a wide but shallow and temperamental river (the mentioned Santa Catarina), at Topo Chico you had mineral springs (whose waters where later bottled as carbonated water and where the very first Coca-Cola was bottled in Mexico in 1924), you had a pool feed by a natural artesian well (Ojo de Santa Lucia): the Alberca Monterrey open to most "gente decente" (compared to many country clubs and swimming clubs today they were more inclusive to middle class residents though they didn't let you in if you looked too poor but after all these were the 1900s) and you had one of the very first sewage systems, plus electricity from an Anglo-Canadian company, jobs at the factories and the heat while bad and there was no AC or even electric fans in those days, the hills had some hilly brush and even some forest later cut down to build the sprawling neighborhoods over the hills (not the best of ideas, but it a a desperate move, unlike Mexico City the Monterrey and San Pedro valleys are small and it doesn't have the flatness of Guadalajara or Merida to simply spread out) so at least at night the breeze turned cool to the low 70s so some relief was available, water was expensive but they had "filtered" (screened actually, they didn't use chlorine though, which explains why still diarrhea was a problem (by the way its still a problem, even with chlorinated water, believe it or not in Monterrey in the dead of summer the heat can be so bad that if you drink, lets say milk at a late breakfast and go out all day it will somehow spoil in your stomach, I am not inventing this years ago a public dept. doctor said this!). Getting back to things in 1909 if you where a "regiomontano" with a job and a house things did not look so bad unlike your counterpart in the rest of Mexico where you where either indepted to a patron who stiffed you at a Casa de Raya (company store) or worse where kept literally as a serf in an hacienda where you worked to pay off a debt that just grew since you were paid in hacienda tokens and could only buy beans and tortillas in the plantation store where they sold you pretty much at tripple the price, etc. In Monterrey you worked either for the city building public buildings or for a private contractor as a mason or a factory worker at the glassworks, the brewer or the steelworks (the largest in Latin America until 1986), and the boss payed you in cash. There was even a somewhat mild tolerated union, something unheard in the Diaz period but the powers thought that coercion wasn't always the direct answer, they did use it but not as often as in the rest of Mexico at the time. So you live in a sprawling neighborhood called San Luisito, it is on the opposite side of the bank than the rest of the city so an interesting bridge with stores inside was built, this "barrio" is located in an old bank between a part of the mild tempered Santa Catarina where it is wide, to one side, a little less shallower to the other and shallow to the front. Its hot, at night the cool wind comes but its humid its raining constantly, well whatever tomorrow it will be cooler. Except there is no tomorrow.... The "mild" river turns into a torrent, the channel of the river deep in the middle and mostly flat shoots out to the sides, the river takes its old huge bank and San Luisito is flooded, not just San Luisito but areas of the old downtown where some old families of Monterrey, not necessarily rich but with nice sounding last names and some property, are flooded out too, if they are not to close to the water they may see the water coming in and get out, if not they'll be taken by the current and drown, about a quarter of San Luisito is under water and many drown in their sleep. For a city of only 70.000 souls, about 4,000 to 5,000 perish, about a fifth die in a single horrible night of 1909. San Luisito is destroyed, the "benevolent" local government is slow, people begin to wonder if this little life is really any better than their counterparts who are paid in tokens in the haciendas to the south. And more interestingly the old families that lost their homes, and who had lost their influence already to "big" money, in the other side of the bank in the old city also wonder why they have to put up with this old general as governor and possibly a president who cares only about big firms and big ranches, the seeds of the Mexican revolution which began only a year later are planted. Now lets focus to 2010, in comes Alex around eternally hit La Pesca as a minimmal Cat. 2 in wind but it brings a whopper in rain, Brownsville sees about almost a foot of rain in Boca Chica BLVD near the Four Corners (a major, but flood prone, thoroughfare). A weak tornado actually touches down for a few minutes, throws out one of those filtered water stations and messes a few trees but nothing more. Some minor storm surge in SPI but not much more so far... To the south is a different story, in Ciudad Victoria inland, the Los Conchos river is about to break out of its banks and the Cierro Prieto damn portholes are opened. The roads are flooded, getting in and out is a bit of a hardship. Then comes Monterrey, the canalized Santa Catarina which filled but did not overflow with Gilbert is about to do just that, it has more water than when Gilbert came (I am not inventing this!), as typical the poor pay first, but this time working class neighborhoods in areas of Santa Catarina, which until the 1940s was the areas water hole but explorations to find underground water ruined it pretty much, and even in the "poor" old side of rich San Pedro where in a twist of irony you have some poor people living in the fringe of the county that is 80% upper class and where 20 percent of the richest of the rich in Mexico live, where to put things close the water hits the hills and there are some mud and rockslides. In San Pedro is mostly mud in Santa Catarina is mostly rock. Then here comes a treat for this show of irony or ironies, picture a middle class neighborhood, not lower middle class, more of an upper middle class neighborhood but not all the way up either. Homes in a supposedly elevated area, well built homes, homes with two cars, dad and mom didn't go to a private university but more likely went to the State University and both have jobs or dad has a full time job and mom is a teacher at either a private or a public school, more likely private, and they probably in keeping with Latin American expectations they have a maid, the kids go to a middle income private school, they used to be all catholic but nowadays they can tend to be secular. They have about two or three kids and probably a dog, if they lived a little more to the west in Contry La Silla or to the east and south in the lower Valle area or around Mitras-San Jeronimo old neighborhood they problably would have a German Shepperd (Regiomontanos love big pushy, fluffy dogs, they kind of go with the though "norteno" mentality) but since they have less room more likely they might have a Chihuahua or a Cocker Spaniel. According to Mexican middle class lyfestyle you have insurance for your car, but not your home, Mexican insurers are unreliable and the expense is worse than the benefits, your home is your sole investment, is your castle what you will leave to your kids to sell when you and your spouse pass away so they can buy homes of their own too and their children can and so on. You have a well built cement block cinder home, not the kind you see in the US in cheap warehouses, but a more structurally sound one with columns with transverse to the sides holding everything firm, rebar is inside the holes of the block, and there is a generous coating of cement and plaster insider, plus tile in the floors, 2 bathrooms and probably a "half-bath" (sink and toilet) on the first story for the guest). The dog seems nervous, why is the pooch so nervous over a little rain, this is a good neighborhood only poor bad build lowland neighborhoods flood, the neighborhood was build over some hills since no level ground was available so while rain can rush like a rapid out there it goes down hill, it seems to be raining a lot but nothing is new. Then suddenly a deluge of water is followed by rocks, big and small and then it breaks the door and enters the garage and into the living/dining room you rush the children into the second story (fortunately, lots where to small for one story homes) until the next day the street looks like a dry river with cars, some of them new some of them older but none of them actually bad... an interesting note in a city where usually the poor are the ones who get hit the hardest, on top of another. You start getting your family out slowly (in one case they need it a hoist over the street, the children were all right but they had seen enough). And the government which has charged you for everything, even for that you never used, its NOWHERE to be seen. Apparently they are always there when it comes to charge for something or to collect taxes but when you need them they are absolutely absent. I had to admit this story, the richer suffering, is not new, in 2003 some rather upper class posh residents had to leave their elite meseta neighborhood of Chipinque due to rockslides, but in their case there was a clear understanding, they knew they should not have built there, in this other case middle class dwellers whose main, and probably sole investment, is their home where told they were safe and where led to believe so. Where I got all of this, try Televisa, the drama, having lived in Mexico a good part of my life I know exactly what they must have felt. Again the scenes are in Televisa Noticieros, I don't know if they still got them, like most Mexican media they like to "erase" bad news, but its worst the try. Right now Mexico is a typpity situation when it comes to security, a flood made a city wake up just a year before a revolution began, I just hope history won't be repeated for the sakes of everyone in Mexico and outside it. |