C

As a Mexican, honestly, I didn't know that there were still Maya communities in the Yucatan, Quintana Roo and Campeche regions that still preserve a lifestyle as their ancestors lived, from that culture of the Mayan Empire. That they continue to speak the Mayan language, that they continue to live and cook as they traditionally did. Naively, I believed that the Mayan culture had disappeared, as it was with Aztecs with the conquest of the Spaniards in Tenochtitlán, the miscegenation and the introduction of a new culture, the European one. Thus creating Mexican culture, a fusion of diverse traditions, cultures and ways of life.

It was when I met Fabio Esteban Amador, an archaeologist and explorer of National Geographic. (Who was then a friend and partner of Ricardo Azarcoya with whom he works together on different projects). Fabio, studied for more than 10 years the Mayan culture in the region of Quintana Roo, Mexico. Working in constant contact with archeological sites, fellow archaeologists in the area, reading books on the subject, discovering unknown archeological sites, and constantly living with Maya communities still alive and present in our Mexico.

​

He told me stories and his knowledge about the Mayan culture. In broad strokes, he told me what they believed, how they lived today, what they ate and how important it was for them to preserve their culture today. Despite the influences of globalization and the growth of tourism developments in the jungles. For example; He told me that the Ceiba was for them a sacred tree since they believed that it is the symbol of Mayan life, where the first man was born. The height of this tree made the Mayans believe that their branches supported the heavens, while their deep roots were the means of communication between the world of the living and the Underworld; Xibalba I had never seen a Ceiba, nor had I been in contact with a Mayan community, knowing its traditions, and discovering more of our contemporary Mexico.

From this, I realized that everything Fabio lived and knew about the modern Maya communities in Quintana Roo, had not documented it in photographs. And I wanted to meet them, live an experience near them, and be able to photograph them and tell their story to those Mexicans who, like me, did not know about the current Mayan culture and how attached they are to what it was before. Because, normally, when they talk to you about the Mayan culture, all you think about is the great pyramids in Quintana Roo, Yucatan and Campeche. In the Mayan calendar, in some dishes (such as the “Cochinita Pibil” or the “Poc Chuc” or the “Black Stuffing”), in the ball game, even in the human sacrifices they made as an offering to their gods. And I wanted to see how much of this remained in the culture of today's Maya communities, and how much had remained as a historical reference to what was once the Mayan empire.

It was so that I undertook a trip to Quintana Roo and because of fate of destiny, I met Cecilia Cahum; whose family (traditional Maya) lived in the “Laguna Chabela”. A lagoon, protected by the vast jungle near Tulum, where I found a true Mayan community. Here I met this ancestral culture through a family of 5 brothers who are the voice of their Mayan ancestors. His purpose as a Mayan family and community is to share his teachings on the importance of nature in everyone's life, while continuing to be faithful to his Maya roots. Although they speak Spanish, they still speak in the Mayan language. Living in the remote community of Punta Laguna (house of the spider monkey, the jaguar, the melipona bees and the puma). The Cahum family really wants to honor their roots by preserving their natural heritage in a sustainable way. By always putting first the well-being of nature, in which their needs are met in a sustainable way. They believe that being able to live in this area is something like a "loan" of nature, in which they pay for taking care of it for the next generations. They still live in Maya "Palapas" that are made in the traditional way, sleeping in handmade hammocks, eating only what they can grow or find inside the jungle. In general, in the Mayan culture, and by the region where they live, they have as their main economic activity that of agriculture. Whose base is the cultivation of corn, beans, chili, squash, jicama, sweet potato, cantaloupe, coffee, cocoa, onion, breeding of guajolotes and chickens, and beekeeping of melipona bee, from which they obtain honey to sell to other neighboring communities.