An Intimate Look at Mexico’s Indigenous Seri People

A light wind laden with the scent of the sea softened the stifling heat: The temperature had reached 108 degrees Fahrenheit, and it was only 10 a.m.

Salma’s house was at the end of the main road in Punta Chueca, a small town on the mainland coast of the Sea of Cortez, also known as the Gulf of California, some 75 miles west of Hermosillo, Mexico. She was a young woman — 22 years old when I first met her in 2017 — with a serious face and few words. A member of the Seri people, also known as the Comcáac, she was the only woman who worked in the Indigenous group’s traditional guard, which had been protecting Seri territory for many decades.

“I like to defend my people and my land,” she told me proudly, while holding the weapon she used while out on patrol. “If we don’t do it, no one else can.”

“We are the ones who can support and defend our identity,” she said.

A group of women extracts sea snails from their shells.

In late 2016, I traveled to India to cover a story about a nongovernmental organization that was training women from rural areas how to build and repair solar panels and storage batteries in their local communities. Four of the trainees were Seri women: Guillermina, Veronica, Francisca and Cecilia. They would spend the next six months in the northern Indian state of Rajasthan, learning about solar engineering.

When I heard the women speaking Spanish, I went to greet them and listened as they told me their stories. Concerned about the survival of their people, a nation of only about 1,000 people, the four women had traveled thousands of miles — to a country whose language and customs were entirely foreign to them — in order to acquire a set of skills that would help them improve the conditions in their own community.

I was moved by their struggle.

A necklace made with shells and other sea objects. Seri women make handicrafts — typically sold in the larger cities — to help provide income for their families.

A dream catcher.

A craft made from a sea urchin.

A necklace.

While documenting the work of the N.G.O., I became close with the Seri women, eventually promising them that, when I could, and when they were back in Mexico, I would visit them to help share their stories.

Several months later, in 2017, I was finally able to fulfill my promise.

Fishermen return to Punta Chueca at dusk after fishing all day in Canal del Infiernillo, or Tiny Hell’s Channel, the waterway between the coastal town and Tiburón Island.

The Seri people live in a stark and unforgiving — and intensely biodiverse — corner of the Sonoran Desert, in northwestern Mexico. Most of its members live either in Punta Chueca or in the nearby coastal village of El Desemboque, some 40 miles to the north.

Traditionally, their communal homeland also included Tiburón Island, where certain bands of Seri lived for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. Now, the island — the largest in the Sea of Cortez — is administered as a nature and ecological preserve. It remains a sacred place to the Seri, who maintain exclusive fishing rights in the channel between Tiburón and the mainland.

A young Seri boy holds a bottle of Coca-Cola. The consumption of sugary drinks has contributed to serious health problems in recent years.

Coca-Cola bottles are often reused to hold alcoholic beverages made from the fruit of a cactus, which is fermented and drunk by the Seris during traditional festivities.

The identity of the Seri people is integrally tied to their natural environment, which in recent decades has been susceptible to an increasing number of existential threats: warming temperatures, intensifying storms, regional development, encroachment from mining companies, the overfishing of the surrounding waters and the loss of traditional knowledge about local plants and animals.

For decades, the Seri have also contended with limited access to fresh water — though the recent installation of a second desalination plant in Punta Chueca has offered some relief.

A Seri woman makes handicrafts with the shells she collected that morning, while her niece rests on a hammock.

These threats have caused major changes in the Seri’s habits and customs. One consequence — the result of a decline in traditional diets that relied on fish and once-abundant plants, paired with the introduction of sugary drinks and processed foods — is a significant increase in the prevalence of diabetes.

Travel Trends That Will Define 2022

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Looking ahead. As governments across the world loosen coronavirus restrictions, the travel industry hopes this will be the year that travel comes roaring back. Here is what to expect:

Air travel. Many more passengers are expected to fly compared to last year, but you’ll still need to check the latest entry requirements if you’re traveling abroad.

Lodging. During the pandemic, many travelers discovered the privacy offered by rental residences. Hotels hope to compete again by offering stylish extended-stay properties, sustainable options, rooftop bars and co-working spaces.

Rental cars. Travelers can expect higher prices, and older cars with high mileage, since companies still haven’t been able to expand their fleets. Seeking an alternative? Car-sharing platforms might be a more affordable option.

Cruises. Despite a bumpy start to the year, thanks to Omicron’s surge, demand for cruises remains high. Luxury expedition voyages are particularly appealing right now, because they typically sail on smaller ships and steer away from crowded destinations.

Destinations. Cities are officially back: Travelers are eager to dive into the sights, bites and sounds of a metropolis like Paris or New York. For a more relaxing time, some resorts in the U.S. are pioneering an almost all-inclusive model that takes the guesswork out of planning a vacation.

Experiences. Travel options centered around sexual wellness (think couples retreats and beachfront sessions with intimacy coaches) are growing popular. Trips with an educational bent, meanwhile, are increasingly sought after by families with children.

The community, whose territory lies along a corridor for drug trafficking to the U.S. border, has also seen an increase in drug abuse among its members.

Lydia shows her great-grandson a photograph of her when she was young.

And yet the community remains fiercely protective of its territory and its heritage. In 2014, for example, a small group of Seri women — with the support of the tribe’s traditional guard — defended themselves and their land against a mining company that had begun prospecting at a nearby site for gold, silver and copper. The operation, they said, threatened a sacred site where the tribe traditionally gathered medicinal plants and cactus fruits.

Portrait of Guillermina, at left, with her daughter, Paulina, and her niece in one of the areas where the Seris hold their traditional celebrations.

Despite these challenges, and a relative lack of economic opportunity, young people like Paulina do not want to leave their community. “We are the future,” she told me, adding that she planned to become a lawyer so she could help her people.

“I won’t leave here,” she said.

Paulina, with traditional facial art that she painted on herself.

Salma echoed the sentiment, telling me that her dream was to study biology so that she could help with local conservation efforts.

Her ultimate hope, she said, was to protect the flora and fauna that her people have relied on for countless generations.

Girls play on the shore of Punta Chueca, in front of Tiburón Island.

Núria López Torres is a photojournalist based in Barcelona. You can follow her work on Instagram.

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