Don Tomás, the story of a birdman
By Tania Noriz, Sept 29, 2006

Every day at 8am, Don Tomás Bautista leaves his small apartment in colonia Allende laden with handicrafts and Veracruz-style clothing, heading for the streets to sell his wares. People recognize him easily, clothed in the garb of his native Papantla, selling shirts and vanilla.

Don Tomás Bautista is also is a brave man—a birdman. For 41 years he has been a performer in one of the most recognized pre-Hispanic traditions in Mexico, the ceremony of the Voladores de Papantla (the flyers of Papantla). For 10 years, the Voladores have captivated tourists and locals during one of San Miguel’s main celebrations, the Alborada (dawn), which honors the patron saint of the city, Saint Michael the Archangel. The aerial spectacle, thousands of years old, originally honored the sun god and is for Don Tomás as much an ancestral rite as a thrilling display of daredevilry.

No fear of flying

 

“To be a volador requires something more than a desire. You need to be brave,” says Don Tomás, who learned the tradition from his uncle at the age of 13. Don Tomás was raised by a single mother, abandoned by her husband, who worked in the field to provide shelter and food for her five children.

As a child, Tomás had to leave school after second grade to work in the field cleaning bananas and oranges; when he was older, he worked digging wells for only 10 pesos a day.

“My uncle taught me to fly,” he recalled. “One day I told him that I wanted to earn some centavitos. He asked my mother’s permission, and that is how I began. You just have to lose your fear of heights and have enough nerve.” Don Tomás began practicing with a short wooden pole 12 meters high but soon graduated to the 37-meter metal pole.

Financial hardship forced Don Tomás to leave his town to travel with other voladores throughout Mexico. He journeyed to Tamaulipas, Colima, Sinaloa, Jalisco and Baja California. “We went on an adventure around the country. After flying, we asked for money from the public, and that is how we started to earn an income.”

But there have been many difficult days full of hunger and worry. Don Tomás, like his companions, had to pay for lodging and food. They were also hindered by the barrier of illiteracy, because none knew how to read or write. “A trip that I especially remember was the one that I took to Matamoros, Tamaulipas, because some people told me the pay would be good. However, I didn’t earn any money the whole week of that trip. I couldn’t eat for a week and my worried family called me. They told me one of my daughters had had an accident. I had to beg money to buy the bus ticket. My partners went with me to the bus station, but couldn’t purchase the tickets because they didn’t know how to read or write. I proudly told them I would buy them because I learned to read and write by myself.”

Don Tomás says that when he arrived in his hometown, his daughter, uninjured, opened the door. His family tricked him into returning sooner to Papantla. 

After that trip, Don Tomás traveled to Querétaro to sell craftworks. There, an American customer asked for some little drums and rattles to sell in San Miguel, and that is how Don Tomás arrived here 25 years ago. “For me it was a blessing, because this is the way I have been able to come out ahead.” 

 

Dedicating almost all his time to his main source of living, the sale of Papantla shirts made by his wife and daughters, Don Tomás is a happy man. “I have my family and my work and we are well. What else can I ask?”

But Don Tomás has to face separation from his home and family, whom he visits every three weeks when he travels to Papantla to replenish his merchandise. “This is my life. Some days are sweet and some days are sour. My work is risky, and I make constant trips to Papantla and perform in the flight dance ceremony for the Saint Michael celebration, but I am not scared. I am a brave man.”

Roots of an ancestral tradition

The Papantla region of Veracruz is located near the coast of the Gulf of Mexico. It is famous for being the world’s largest producer of vanilla. It is also well known for the Tajín, an archeological site of the Totonaca culture and one of the most important religious centers of Mesoamerica. The town has also gained fame because of the Voladores de Papantla, a group of four aerialists who spin and descend by ropes from a wooden pole more than 30 meters high.

 

The dance of Papantla originated with the Totonaca and Huastecan cultures of the mountainous zone of Veracruz, where the tradition is still alive. The dance is linked to fertility gods such as Quetzalcóatl and Tláloc, the god of water.

The Voladores fly from the top of the pole tied to a rotating platform called a manzana (apple), and their rotating descent symbolizes the movement of the stars, and especially the sun.

The ritual combines music, dance and offerings. Five participants take part; four dancers and a leader, called a cacique, who dances at the top of the pole playing a flute and is in charge of directing the ceremony. The four dancers fly down with opened arms wearing suits with bird motifs. In the past, the wooden pole used to be cut by the Voladores in a special ceremony. Nowadays, many poles are metal, and the pole-cutting ritual takes place in only a few communities of Papantla.

Don Tomás explains: “We request permission from God before cutting the wood, and after cutting it with an axe we carry it to the place where we are going to install it. Later, we looked for a padrino (godfather) who will buy the offerings, as well as aguardiente (a distilled alcohol beverage), four eggs and four cigarettes. These offerings are given to the cacique, who performs the inaugural ritual.”

Before climbing the pole, the cacique offers the aguardiente to the four cardinal points; he then ascends to the top and begins to play the son del perdón (the forgiveness tune) on his flute. The four dancers climb up and sit on the manzana structure. “The cacique dances and greets the four cardinal points and salutes the sun,” explains Don Tomás. “As we dancers tie the cords around our waists and legs we ask God to forgive our faults and entrust Him with our lives. Then we all begin to descend at the same time, because at this point nobody can turn back.”

The cacique plays the flute and dances while the dancers spiral downward, making 13 turns around the pole. When the dancers have alighted, the cacique descends and plays the son de la despedida (the good-bye tune).

“It is a very beautiful tradition. To be there makes me feel free and without fear,” says Don Tomás, for whom life has been difficult, though he is still grateful. “Everything that God gives me I receive with pleasure. Thanks to Him my family, my children and I are well and have work.” 

This religious ceremony of respect and balance, this magical ritual that hypnotizes spectators, is a living tradition. “My son is a cacique,” proudly says Don Tomás, “He works in Puerto Vallarta and he is doing well. It makes me happy since he works, entertains people and at the same time preserves this important custom, as I do.”

Monte de Piedad: the bank of the people, part III
By Jesús Ibarra

The Nacional Monte de Piedad is an institution for the people. It not only loans cash to those in need, in some cases exchanging money for pawned items that have no commercial value, but it also is a source of jobs for many Mexicans. Currently, about 3,000 employees work in the 140 branch offices of the pawnshop. The relationship between the institution and its employees is a close one, and each worker has a story to tell. 

José Luis Medina, appraiser

In 1957, José Luis, then 17, began working at Nacional Monte de Piedad, thanks to help from one of his uncles, a manager in the pawnshop. José Luis intended to study medicine, but because of his family’s financial needs he had to look for work. “Medicine is a full-time career and one cannot work at the same time, so I had to forget my dream of being a doctor,” said José Luis, now 66. During the almost 49 years he has worked at the pawnshop, he has held several positions. “I began as a janitor—we all begin as janitors. Sometime later I was moved to the cashiers’ department, and I also was a typist.”

Wishing to advance, he entered the Appraisers Institute, a unique institution in Mexico. He graduated in 1966 and then competed for and won a post at the pawnshop. He has been an appraiser for 40 years. José Luis is a widower with three grown daughters, one of whom also works in Monte de Piedad.

José Luis loves his work. It is a great satisfaction for him to help people who need money. “Many times I have felt it is in my hands to help people. All kinds of people arrive at the pawnshop, from employers who do not have the cash to pay their employees’ salaries to the ill who must go into the hospital.”

José Luis remembers the case of an old woman who left a deep impression on him. “The little old woman brought a shawl to pawn. Although it was very clean, it was old and damaged, so it had no value at all. I told her that I could not take the shawl, and she said she needed the money to bury her grandson. I organized a collection among the other employees to help the old woman and we gave her 100 pesos, but she felt humiliated and insisted on leaving her shawl. Two months later, she returned to pay the loan and recovered her shawl.” 

The appraiser takes care of about 200 people during his workday from 8:30am to 2pm. “As long as I can, I will be working at Monte de Piedad,” he commented.

Carlos Herrero Salas, retailer

“I was 18 years old when I began working at Monte de Piedad,” said Carlos Herrero, 54, who has worked 36 years at the pawnshop. 

Like many, Carlos began working as a janitor. “My mother used to tell me to go to work wearing a suit and tie, because that way I could move up. Soon, I was moved to the general archive.”

Carlos held different positions until he became a retailer in the almonedas (the pawnshop’s stores), and he has worked in different branch offices. He especially remembers one event that took place when he was working in a branch office in Colonia Buenos Aires, one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in Mexico City. “I remember it was a Sunday. Some thieves came into the pawnshop and tied up the guard and burned him alive. A year later, that branch office was closed.”

It is a tradition in Carlos’s family to work for Monte de Piedad. His father was an almoneda manager, his mother worked in the archive and his son is currently an appraiser in the branch office in León. “There are three generations of Carlos Herreros who have worked in the pawnshop: my father, my son and myself,” said Carlos.

Gabriel Cadena, appraiser

Gabriel, an appraiser, has worked at Monte de Piedad for 17 years and has also held several jobs. At the Appraisers Institute he took courses in art history as well as courses in appraising cars, cameras, watches and jewelry, gems and woods and furniture, among other items. He also took a specialized course on minerals at the Earth Sciences College of the UNAM (National Autonomous University of Mexico) and studied at the Tecnológico de Monterrey, one of the most prestigious universities in the country. Currently, Gabriel works as an appraisers’ inspector, checking and supervising other appraisers’ work. He has worked in branch offices all around the country, in places such as Monterrey and San Luis Potosí. For several weeks now he has worked in the branch office in Córdoba, Veracruz. 

Gabriel derives great satisfaction from helping people of diverse economic means, from the poorest workers to artists, politicians and important businessmen. “Each one of them has a story, and there are lots of anecdotes,” said Gabriel. He especially remembers the case of a young nursing student who used to pawn objects frequently in the branch office in Xochimilco, in the southern part of Mexico City. “One day, the young student arrived and showed me his nursing degree. He told me: “I have graduated and am a nurse. Here is my diploma; you are the first person I am showing it to because you helped me a lot.” Everything he had pawned during those years had been used to pay for his tuition, transportation and books,” said Gabriel proudly