Archeological authorities in Mexico on Tuesday said that they kicked some cast members of a popular local Jersey Shore-style reality show out of the Mayan ruins of Uxmal after they behaved “immaturely” and refused to wear masks or follow social distancing regulations.
It was the latest round of bad promotional work in Mexico’s desperate attempt to revive its tourism industry, which has been decimated by the COVID-19 pandemic.
It seems the young, ripped cast members of Mexico’s popular Acapulco Shore reality show and another contestant show — whom the Yucatan State government described as “influencers” — were invited to tour the ruins soon after they were reopened in a bid to encourage tourists to return.
Photo: EPA-EFE
However, the National Institute of Anthropology and History said the half-dozen cast members “were asked to leave, in compliance with health rules.”
Employees at the 1,000-year-old complex of Mayan temples, palaces and pyramid platforms said that the cast acted “immaturely,” and refused to follow posted rules requiring masks and social distancing.
Photographs posted on social media showed them clowning around and posing in close contact atop one ancient structure.
Yucatan officials denied paying the cast members, but acknowledged that the visit was part of a promotional campaign and defended the invitation.
Yucatan State Secretary of Tourism Promotion Michelle Fridman wrote on Twitter that “the influencers were not paid one single peso. It also wasn’t some half-baked idea but rather part of a strategy included in the plan for recovery from COVID, and if we carefully measure the impact, we estimate we got 200 million hits for a sector that urgently needs promotion.”
Fridman’s office did not respond to requests for comment, but her stance apparently boiled down to “any news is good news” in a state where tourism is vitally important.
Tourist arrivals at airports in Mexico fell by 93.4 percent at the worst point in May, and even with projections showing some recovery in the second half of this year, they are expected to end the year 42.8 percent below last year’s levels.
Tourism provides 11 million jobs, directly or indirectly, in Mexico.
The Uxmal dispute was the latest chapter in a bad year for Mexican tourism promotion.
In August, due to disputes over payments and control of the English-language version of the country’s tourism Web site, its Internet page appeared with hilarious mistranslations.
On the VisitMexico.com site, states like Hidalgo and Guerrero apparently got machine-translated as “Noble” and “Warrior.” The Caribbean resort of Tulum became “Jumpsuit.” The names of other tourist towns were also mangled.
The Mexican Department of Tourism issued a statement apologizing for the apparently outsourced errors and later launched a redesigned page.
THE ‘MONSTER’: The Philippines on Saturday sent a vessel to confront a 12,000-tonne Chinese ship that had entered its exclusive economic zone The Philippines yesterday said it deployed a coast guard ship to challenge Chinese patrol boats attempting to “alter the existing status quo” of the disputed South China Sea. Philippine Coast Guard spokesman Commodore Jay Tarriela said Chinese patrol ships had this year come as close as 60 nautical miles (111km) west of the main Philippine island of Luzon. “Their goal is to normalize such deployments, and if these actions go unnoticed and unchallenged, it will enable them to alter the existing status quo,” he said in a statement. He later told reporters that Manila had deployed a coast guard ship to the area
RISING TENSIONS: The nations’ three leaders discussed China’s ‘dangerous and unlawful behavior in the South China Sea,’ and agreed on the importance of continued coordination Japan, the Philippines and the US vowed to further deepen cooperation under a trilateral arrangement in the face of rising tensions in Asia’s waters, the three nations said following a call among their leaders. Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr and outgoing US President Joe Biden met via videoconference on Monday morning. Marcos’ communications office said the leaders “agreed to enhance and deepen economic, maritime and technology cooperation.” The call followed a first-of-its-kind summit meeting of Marcos, Biden and then-Japanese prime minister Fumio Kishida in Washington in April last year that led to a vow to uphold international
US president-elect Donald Trump is not typically known for his calm or reserve, but in a craftsman’s workshop in rural China he sits in divine contemplation. Cross-legged with his eyes half-closed in a pose evoking the Buddha, this porcelain version of the divisive US leader-in-waiting is the work of designer and sculptor Hong Jinshi (洪金世). The Zen-like figures — which Hong sells for between 999 and 20,000 yuan (US$136 to US$2,728) depending on their size — first went viral in 2021 on the e-commerce platform Taobao, attracting national headlines. Ahead of the real-estate magnate’s inauguration for a second term on Monday next week,
‘PLAINLY ERRONEOUS’: The justice department appealed a Trump-appointed judge’s blocking of the release of a report into election interference by the incoming president US Special Counsel Jack Smith, who led the federal cases against US president-elect Donald Trump on charges of trying to overturn his 2020 election defeat and mishandling of classified documents, has resigned after submitting his investigative report on Trump, an expected move that came amid legal wrangling over how much of that document can be made public in the days ahead. The US Department of Justice disclosed Smith’s departure in a footnote of a court filing on Saturday, saying he had resigned one day earlier. The resignation, 10 days before Trump is inaugurated, follows the conclusion of two unsuccessful criminal prosecutions
RSS