The diver, the salesman and the taxi driver: the engine of Acapulco is still waiting for tourism

In the small square of La Quebrada, the diver waits for an audience to jump into the water from 35 meters high; the crafts merchant, clients who want a souvenir of the place and the taxi driver, passengers who want to move around the city. Immobile, they now form part of the landscape of one of the most visited points of Acapulco. Their income depends on tourists arriving from the hotels, which on Christmas Eve were only at 5% of their capacity while the reconstruction process continues. Little by little the wounds that he opened are closing Otisthe maximum category hurricane that devastated everything that October 25.

Five days after the winds of more than 250 kilometers per hour passed, when the coastal city looked like a war field, the president said that by Christmas he would have put Acapulco on its feet. Optimism was reduced and the recovery of the tourist enclave is expected for March. In La Quebrada, reality is halfway between the disaster experienced and the words of López Obrador, after more than 61,000 million pesos of investment.

It is Christmas Eve and the square looks clean of debris and palm leaves, but a shopping center that was entire despite being abandoned for twelve years looks without a facade, without windows, without doors. A few meters from the shell, at an entrance that overlooks the La Quebrada viewpoint, diver Alejandro Balanzar waits under a scorching sun for a tourist to arrive to book the best-known show in Acapulco. “I have been a diver since I was 14 years old. 2009 was the year that established me as a professional diver,” says a 32-year-old man now.

Jumping from a 35 meter high cliff to a small sea inlet is complicated. Even more so after the hurricane. “Things have been difficult. We launched again on December 9,” ​​explains Balanzar. Many exhibitions had to be canceled due to lack of people. “We do not belittle the public, but we have to have a minimum amount to guarantee the entry of the diver. We cannot take risks just for one or two people,” Balanzar apologizes. Before Otis They did six shows a day with fire and human torches for groups of more than 30 people.

It hurts that there are no spectators. “Many people have the idea that we are just the typical beach boys who jump and that's it, but behind it there are all logistics,” he explains. The Acapulco Divers Association has 25 jumpers and another 25 people in charge of administration tasks. “This place has allowed our families to get ahead, have a home, a home,” he summarizes. Balance.

—How does it feel to jump into the sea after the hurricane?

—Seeing that there is not enough audience to generate profits makes us a little sad. But when it comes to jumping you don't think, you are grateful for having the opportunity to jump.

Back in the square, several merchants wait for a tourist to stop by to buy a souvenir. In one hour only two have been seen. For the seller Gilberto Cortés the situation is “very sad.” The 57-year-old man has been selling since he was 13. First on the beach and now in La Quebrada, where his stall is full of postcards, magnets and more souvenirs from Acapulco. Some objects that now only guarantee him between 100 and 200 pesos a day. The worst thing is that he had to order the products on credit. “We cover [el puesto] With a tarp tied with nylon, we never thought a hurricane of that magnitude would happen,” he explains. The wind carried away all the merchandise.

It returned to its ungodly schedule of 9 a.m. to 11 p.m. on Saturday of last week. But she hasn't been stopped since the hurricane hit. “There was no work other than fixing our houses there that were destroyed, there he tore off all the roofs. Since they were made of sheets, he took them all,” explains the man about his house in La Sabana, on the outskirts of Acapulco, from where he comes every day in his little red bag – which survived the hurricane – to work. Of the more than 300,000 homes registered, many remain unreconstructed due to the lack of workers in the city.

The only one in the square who is not doing so badly is the taxi driver José Pérez. Before the hurricane there was a lot of competition. Now there are fewer people to pick up, but since there are almost no professional colleagues, the 52-year-old man accumulates many trips. “Many colleagues stopped working because their cars broke down on the coast. Now we make very few trips, and we move people from Acapulco,” he says, leaning on his blue and white car. His front glass is a little cracked because a sheet of iron fell on it.

He makes about five or six trips a day. Pérez compares the situation with that experienced in 2020: “In the pandemic it was the same.” Although of course, the virus did not leave thousands of buildings in ruins and the wheels of his taxi did not “go flat nine times a day” due to debris and fallen trees. He hopes Acapulco recovers in one or two years.

The drama is out

Tourists barely arrive at La Quebrada. But the situation in the outer neighborhoods of Acapulco, where the people who work for the visitor live, is much worse. On Christmas Eve itself, neighborhoods such as Kilómetro Diecisiete, El Conchero or Bajos del Ejido were filled with roofless homes and mountains of rubble and garbage.

In the Jardín neighborhood, a link between the tourist areas of Pie de la Cuesta and the center of Acapulco, many people were waiting for the batch of appliances and furniture provided by the Government since 4 in the morning. At 7 in the afternoon, in a line of about 100 people in front of large military trucks full of packed appliances, Madai García (35 years old) knows that the wait is worth it. He will receive a mattress, a stove, a battery, a blender and a refrigerator.

How do you get this set? “The Government carried out the house-to-house census and everyone who was censused has the right to this,” explains García. Even though he is going to receive new furniture and appliances, he clarifies that in his house “there was almost no damage.” Fortune smiles on him, he has also kept his job. He performs in a stained glass window in the city of broken glass.

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