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Tepito

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Tepito is a barrio located at Delegación Cuauhtémoc, in Mexico City. It is a popular flea market (tianguis, in Spanish), very famous in all the country. Many prominent Mexican boxers and wrestlers have been born there. However, it is mostly known for being home to dangerous gangs and criminals. Many consider it a dangerous place to visit. It is often called "el barrio bravo de Tepito", (which can be roughly translated as: "the wild neighborhood of Tepito").


Merchandise

The market is famous for selling thousands of items at very low prices. Much of the merchandise sold in Tepito is illegal in one way or another, either stolen or product of piracy. Some of these items include:

  • DVD movies - often sold weeks, even months, before the official cinema release date. Even though, some of them have very poor image quality, incorrect subtitles and other issues.
  • Videogames/Consoles - both original and pirated, also available before the official release dates. Famously, Tepito sellers have been able to modify the Sony Playstation series to make them able to run pirated games, also to clone Nintendo Game Cube mini-disks. A semi-famous case included a seller getting ahold of an Xbox 360 months before the official release.
  • Music CD's - mostly pirated, sold in big quantities for very little money. Most recently MP3 CD's have appeared, with hundreds of songs burned in.
  • Brand clothing and accesories - original and pirated clothes by famous designers such as Giorgio Armani, Versace, Hugo Boss, Ermenegildo Zegna, Mont Blanc, Guess, Louis Vuitton[1], and Burberry. Some pirated clothes in Tepito have parody brands such as Armandi, Versánchez, Guss, and Louis Vuitron. These mock brands are used by Mexican consumers to denote something which may not be legitimate.
  • Electronic devices - such as TV's, stereos, videocameras and DVD players. Popular stories tell of people buying these products and being robbed some streets later by the sellers themselves.
  • Toys - mostly available around December and January. Year after year hundreds of parents swarm the streets of Tepito in the middle weeks of December to buy last-chance Christmas gifts.
  • Software and computers - pirated software can be acquired at very low prices, with pre-installed crackers or stolen serial numbers. Also brand and re-constructed PC's and laptops are to be found, with their respective accesories.
  • Tepito is also known for underground weapons and drugs traffic in high numbers.

Consequences

Statistics point out that eight out of ten CD's bought in Mexico come from pirate distributors, causing losses to the music industry over seven hundred million dollars. Half the brand and designer clothes sold in the country are either illegally sold or pirated, analysts estimate this is reflected in the loss of about four hundred thousand jobs and over nine million dollars in the clothing and textiles industry.[2]


Authorities' Response

For decades, authorities have been unable to control the crime affairs going on in the streets of Tepito. The market is under constant police surveillance, and raids[3] to confiscate piracy, stolen merchandise, pornography, weapons, and drugs take place often, under heavy TV coverage.[4] Campaigns against piracy and buying illegal merchandise, though not directly aimed at Tepito, are made in TV, movie theaters, and the radio to discourage and prevent citizens from buying in street markets - with no considerable results. In Mexico, buying, producing, and selling ilegally copied film and audio materials is a crime, and is sanctioned with high fees and even prison, yet there is no rigorous application of these laws.

Famous ex-Residents


Trivia

  • The Mexican movie El Don de Dios, dealing with a Tepito neighbor standing in between a gang war, was shot in location at the barrio itself, with the sellers' support. The film was leaked and pirated by locals while it was still in post-production. It never made it to the big screens. Ironically, both the film's tagline and a character mention: "ser mexicano es un privilegio, pero ser de Tepito es un don de Dios" - which means: "being Mexican is a privilege, but being from Tepito is a gift of God" - a common motto among neighbors.



Notes

  1. ^ http://www.tvazteca.com/hechos/archivos2/2006/11/140477.shtml
  2. ^ http://www.tvazteca.com/hechos/archivos2/2006/11/140477.shtml
  3. ^ http://www.todito.com/paginas/noticias/Mexico/202605.html
  4. ^ http://www.tvazteca.com/hechos/archivos2/2006/10/138966.shtml
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