RECREATIONS AND SOCIAL LIFE
The Mexican National Theater in Mexico City is one of the most costly
and elaborate in the world. Among other things, it has a glass curtain,
made at a cost of thousands of dollars by a great jewelry firm in New
York. But the theater has never been finished. The tendency of the
government recently has been to regard schools and lecturers on
agriculture as more important than places where the rich may enjoy
themselves in the evening. Yet nearly every important Mexican city has a
magnificent municipal theater, supported by taxes on the people.
The same play is not given week after week, as in the largest United
States cities. Stock companies present a different play every few days,
or even every day. One reason they can do this is that in Mexico, as in
continental Europe, a prompter is used. He sits in a little box at the
front of and half under the stage, and reads the lines to be repeated by
the actors. Sometimes he can be heard all over the house, but this does
not seem to bother a Mexican audience at all. Actors who are used to
having a prompter can seldom remember their lines without one. I
remember a very funny performance of _Hamlet_ given in New York City by
a foreign company which had just come up from Mexico. As there are no
prompters’ boxes in New York, except in the opera houses, this company’s
prompter had to stand in the wings at one side of the stage. The
prompter had bought a huge Mexican hat, which he wore through the entire
play, and as there was a light behind him, the shadow of a man in modern
clothing topped by a huge cowboy hat was thrown on the stage among the
actors, who were garbed in medieval doublet and hose. You can imagine
how odd was the effect.
Most plays in Mexican theaters do not last a whole evening. _Zarzuelas_,
Spanish one-act farces, are more common. You may buy a ticket for one
_tanda_, a single play, or for the whole evening. But if you pay for
only a _tanda_ and then decide you would like to see the whole show, you
may find that you have to go out or take another seat because your seat
has been bought for the next _tanda_.
Popular Sports
Among other Mexican recreations are bullfights and cockfights, always
with much gambling. In fact, gambling itself is one of the chief
recreations. Lottery tickets are sold everywhere, even by peddlers who
call the numbers as they wander along the streets. During a ball game
the noise of betting often drowns out the umpire’s voice.
There are bull rings in most Mexican cities. The one in the capital,
probably the largest in the world, is a huge steel structure. Great
crowds gather there for the most important bullfights, which are usually
offered on Sunday. Sometimes as many as 30,000 spectators—men, women and
children of all classes—see a fight. Yet even such a crowd is small by
comparison with that at one of our championship prizefights—and the
admission fee to a bullfight is a great deal less.
[Illustration:
Keystone View Co., Inc.
Mexico’s chief sport is the bullfight.
]
Of the cruelties of bullfights, where horses are gored to death and
bulls worn out with painful teasing before they are butchered—or of
cockfights, where the roosters gouge out each other’s eyes with their
sharp spurs, and perhaps both die of their wounds—I will say little.
After all, we cannot fairly criticize such sports so long as brutality
and gambling are allowed at our crowded prizefights.
Horseback riding used to be quite general in Mexico, and many Mexicans
ride well. There is almost no tennis or golf, except among foreigners.
In mining districts, and in other places where Americans live, there is
some baseball. One of the most amusing things in Mexico is to hear our
baseball terms translated into Spanish, or mispronounced in English.
Sometimes, on a Sunday, a “gringo” and a Mexican team play a game—and
the Mexicans do not always lose.
[Illustration:
A Mexican boy who likes to play baseball.
]
However, baseball is rather strenuous for the Mexican climate and
temperament. Because of the plateau altitude, it is hard work even for
Americans to run bases. There is gymnasium work in most city schools,
and the young men of the cities are fond of fencing. One of the most
interesting games played in Mexico City and a few other places is
_pelota_ or _jaí alaí_. This game was invented by the Basques, who live
in the Pyrenees Mountains on the border between France and Spain. There
are two players on each side. On the right hand they wear a long
_cesta_, a kind of trough woven like a basket. With this they play a
game that reminds one of handball. At the end of the long, high room is
a slate wall against which the ball is struck. A constant uproar of
gambling goes on among the spectators at a _jaí alaí_ game. Since this
is a very violent game, for which the players must be in the pink of
condition, it has become almost entirely professional, like
bullfighting, which also was once engaged in by amateurs.
The Plaza Promenade
The mildest and pleasantest, as well as most general, recreation in
Mexico and in almost all the countries south of the United States is the
promenade. The central _plaza_ is the center of social activity. During
band concerts the people walk slowly round and round the _plaza_. The
single men go in one direction, and the girls and young women in the
other. They smile or stare at one another each time they meet. In some
places there are four lines, two lines of the upper class inside and two
of the poorer people outside.
The _plaza_ is where most courtships begin. In Mexico boys and girls do
not mingle freely. A young lady may not appear in public with any man to
whom she is not related. After she is married, her husband, father, or
brother must always go with her. An elderly Mexican woman is expected to
have at least one servant along when she shops. The “women of the
people,” as the wives and daughters of the peons are called, are more
free in their movements. The girls and women of the middle class have
not long worked in stores and offices, but now thousands of girls are
employed in such places in Mexico City. An unmarried woman, if she does
not enter a convent, lives with her father or brother.
[Illustration:
Photo by Hugo Brehme, Mexico City
An old house in Mexico City, showing a paved _patio_. The rooms all
open on this court.
]
An Odd Kind of Courting
Mexicans of marriageable age have rather a poor chance of becoming
acquainted. A young man perhaps catches a glimpse of a girl in church,
or at her window, and wishes he knew her. He probably finds her in the
evening _plaza_ promenade. Even there he does not speak to her, but they
may gradually begin to smile when they meet.
After this has gone on for several evenings, the young man follows the
girl home. She, of course, is with an older relative, and the suitor
stays well behind, pretending he is not following. The girl looks out
through the iron bars of a high window and sees the young man leaning
against the wall of the house across the street. But at first she
pretends not to see him. Later, if he comes every night, she begins to
let him see that she is watching him. But he must be sure to come, even
in bad weather. If he is afraid of a wetting he will be considered a
poor prospect, a “fine-day lover” only. By and by the two begin to talk
through the bars of the parlor window. This coming to a girl’s window
every evening is called “playing the bear,” though it is really the girl
rather than the young man who is inside the “cage”! If the window is
high above the street, sometimes the man may bring a small hand
telephone, such as can be bought in the best Mexican stores. But you may
be sure that some older member of the young lady’s family listens and
keeps an eye on her, so that she will not overstep the bounds prescribed
by Mexican custom.
Finally—provided the young man has not decided to “play bear” somewhere
else, or the young lady has not stopped coming to the window—the father,
or uncle, or a school friend of the young man calls on the father of the
girl. After many preliminaries this go-between explains the suitor’s
prospects, tells how much money he has, and asks that he be allowed to
court the girl formally. If the family is willing, the same relative or
friend brings the young man and presents him, first to the father, then
to the mother, the brothers, sisters, aunts, and cousins who may live in
the house—and finally to the girl herself. Everyone pretends that until
then the young man has never seen her! After that he may call upon her
every evening, though always with some member of the family in the room
or at least within hearing. Marriage usually follows quickly after the
“introduction.” The groom has to pay all the expenses of the ceremony
and must even provide the bride’s trousseau! Usually he tells his future
mother-in-law how much of his money she may spend on the bride; or
perhaps his own mother, sister, or aunt buys the bride’s outfit.
However, the girl often brings a dowry, money or other property, and so
does her share to establish the new household.
Other Mexican Customs
Mexicans are noted for their formal politeness. Almost everyone I met
along the road in the country said “Adiós,” which really means “May God
be with you,” just as our “Good-by” originally did. Even the peon lifts
his hat and says “Con permiso” (“With your permission”) when he wishes
to get past you. A whining beggar can be driven off with a “Pardon me,”
more easily than with rough words.
When people move into a new town the strangers are expected to call on
the old residents, which is the reverse of the custom in most parts of
the United States. Anyone you call on will be very, very polite, even
though he may not like you. A Mexican seldom invites a friend to his
home, and not often to his club. To be sure he may offer you his house,
saying it is yours, or he may seem ready to give you anything of his
that takes your fancy, but you had better accept nothing—though I know
of cases where the owner saw something precious carried off rather than
be discourteous. Saying “My house is yours” is really only a formality,
like our “Dear Sir” in a letter.
Because many of the sidewalks of Mexico are very narrow, it is not
customary always to keep to the right, as we do. A woman, or the older
of two men or women, or the social superior, expects to be given the
side nearest the wall. The person on the outside may have to step off
into the mud.
In introducing one person to another a Mexican begs permission of the
more important person to present the less important one, or of the older
to present the younger. If a man is introduced he responds by giving his
full name, very clearly—“Juan Miguel Calles, servidor de usted” (“your
servant”)—and then the older or more important person does the same.
This is surely better than our way of letting the introducer pronounce
(or mispronounce!) the names. Persons introduced usually bow low without
shaking hands. Men friends when they meet fairly hug each other, shaking
hands when the _abrozo_ or embrace is broken. If two Mexican friends, or
even old acquaintances, meet a dozen times a day, they shake hands, talk
a little, and then shake hands again as they part. Women do not repeat
their names when they are introduced, and instead of embracing each
other, they kiss.
[Illustration:
Rochester Photo, Mexico City
A Mexican barber who attends to his customers wherever he can find
them. He charges very little, but then, he has no rent to pay!
]
Christmas is celebrated for a week or more in Mexico. On Christmas Eve,
and sometimes for several evenings before Christmas, there are
celebrations in the homes. Instead of the Christmas tree, and “stockings
hung by the chimney with care” there are _piñatas_. These are small
earthenware jars stuffed with candy, games, toys and even money and
valuable presents. They are hung from the ceiling of a room or from a
tree in the _patio_, and each child is blindfolded and given three
chances to break the jar with a stick. When at last it is broken, the
children tear the bandages off their eyes and shout and laugh as the
entire company scrambles for the sweetmeats and presents.