On Privilege

By Jessie Punn, Universidad de las Americas, Mexico

Last weekend, I went on a trip to Puerto Escondido on the Oaxacan Coast. It was paradise – white sandy beaches, the most crystal-clear ocean, and the most spectacular sunset I had ever seen.

One afternoon, after having spent hours floating in the sea and reading my book on the beach, I went for a wander with my friends where we bumped into a lady selling tamales. We bought some and sat down to eat them on the sand. About 10 minutes later, the lady came back and asked if we would mind if she sat with us for a minute in the shade. Of course we said yes, and she started to chat with us. 

You know those moments that just put your whole life in perspective?

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Reina has a 1-year-old baby. Everyday, she wakes up at 2 am to make tamales, then she walks three hours to the beach to sell them to tourists who have the luxury of enjoying the intense Oaxaca sun, she walks up and down the beach all day, selling her delicious tamales for 30 pesos apiece, then she walks three hours home, sleeps for two hours, then starts the whole day again.

And still, she was so incredibly kind to us, offering us more tamales as a gift (which we obviously paid her for), before going on her way.

Everywhere you go in Cholula, you are faced with the wealth divide. If you have food in a restaurant, you can expect a small child to come up to you, selling marzipan for 10 pesos, and while you sit to enjoy your meal, the knowledge sits in the back of your mind that that child has nothing, while you grew up with everything. Comparing that with the perfectly kept lawns of UDLAP, and the Porsche keys that sit on the desk of the student next to me, it is clear that there exists two worlds in Cholula.

Discussing this feeling with a housemate, she echoed to me that she had also noticed the incredible wealth of many of the UDLAP students. It’s unsurprising really – UDLAP is a private university in a country with incredibly competitive public universities, but at UDLAP there is very much an “us and them” mentality. When chatting to uber drivers, and you mention that you study at UDLAP, the reaction is always the same – the students there are rich and disconnected. 

I was state educated until university, so this feeling of being surrounded by students who are so displaced from the general population is extremely alien to me. 

Of course this isn’t to say that there’s not a huge wealth gap in the UK, but the two things seem to coexist in much less proximity than they do here. Where we have support for families that are struggling, here poverty lines the streets. I also feel like culturally, British people are much more conservative with their wealth, even vaguely ashamed of it, but it is a completely different story here.

It is an odd feeling, falling in love with a place while knowing that you only experience the best side of it. I really do love Cholula, but I am also acutely aware that I experience it from a position of enormous privilege. I have a student loan that bankrolls my time here – for the locals here, it is a completely different story. The cost of living here is incredibly low, which was hugely appealing for me when I knew that I was placed here to study, but something about going out for a three-course-meal and paying only 90pesos (about £3.85) leaves a sour taste in the mouth. 

I resolved early on that I was going to spend as much of my money as possible on local services. I buy clothes and jewellery from local markets, not big chains, I do as much of my food shop as possible in small, independent shops, and where possible, I have lunch off campus, rather than giving more of my money to the already rich university. I want to do everything I can to use my privilege here for good.