Little Pepe de Pollo used to follow his father into Cancun each Saturday, waking before dawn to walk three miles and catch the lone rickety bus that served all the villages in the area. After an arduous morning of riding over rutted jungle roads, lightheaded from breathing in bus exhaust, Pepe and his father would arrive at last in the bustling tourist city and begin practicing the craft that many consider to be a scourge upon society: looting.
Now, years later, Pepe stands next to his own son, each with an armful of DVDs, watches, and pricey electronic equipment. “They used to spit on us when we came to Cancun,” Pepe says through a translator. “They said we were mere criminals and God would punish us for stealing.” A huge grin spreads across his face as he glances down at the day’s haul heaped in his arms. “But who’s laughing now?”
Hurricane Wilma has been an unexpected boon to looters from the Yucatan peninsula who saw mother nature clear the land of tourists and police, leaving unattended the well-stocked shops and boutiques that hold the lucrative booty looters so ardently crave. When the weather clears and tourists finally return, they will find Pepe and his son back in town not as looters but as merchants.
“We’ll sell this stuff back to the tourists for at least twice what it’s worth,” Pepe says as he sorts through DVDs. “They assume that because they’re buying it from us on the street they’re getting a deal compared to buying it in the stores. Tourists are so stupid.”
In addition to stupid tourists, the merchants from whom the merchandise was stolen in the first place will likely have to buy their own goods back from the looters if they hope to stay in business. In Mexico this is commonly known as “looter economics.”
Shop owner Jesus Jimenez arrived just as looters were carting off the last of his wares. “They took everything except the Toby Keith CDs and my pirated copies of that awful “The Island” movie,” he said. “Not even the drunk spring-break kids will buy that crap.”
As he and his son hike back to catch the bus, Pepe marvels at the inefficient looting that took place in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. “The American looters have no plan,” he said shaking his head. “It’s all just smash, grab, and run. People were running into each other, overwhelming some stores and leaving others untouched. They should have practiced before hand. You can’t just wait until looting day and show up expecting everything to go perfectly. It takes planning. I’ve been doing this my whole life. The Americans, they are amateurs.”
When informed that even the poorest American looter lives like a king compared to the squalid filth of Pepe’s village, he just gives a knowing smile. “We may be poor,” he says, “we may be lazy, eat dogs and bathe in the same water we defecate in, but we are proud. My father was a looter, his father was a looter, and so was his father before him. My family has been looting longer than America has been a country. What is freedom and prosperity compared to being part of a proud tradition?” With that, Pepe and his son disappeared into the jungle where they were promptly mauled and eaten by a tiger.