The Isthmus of Tehuantepec in Oaxaca, Mexico, is home to a matriarchal society in which the youngest son in the family is raised to be gay. From a young age this child is dressed up as a woman and treated as such; isthmeñan society embraces this role and encourages it. This is a long-standing Zapotec tradition extending back before the arrival of the Spaniards.

The sons are called muxhes and have historically been treated not as homosexuals, but rather as a third sex. They take up the roles as women in the matriarchy, and they carry the additional obligation of taking care of their mothers in old age.

Nowadays, muxhes are one of those anomalies that both defines a culture and blatantly contradicts it. This was evident during last month’s festivities, as the organization Vinnii Gaxheé (“different people” in Zapotec) held parades and velas (a type of all night party unique to the isthmus region) to celebrate the tenth anniversary of its founding.

During the organization’s gay pride parade, muxhes threw condoms from floats and served beer out of liter bottles to old women, young gay men and lesbians, straight couples, and families. The feeling was one of fiesta, and the Oaxacan community—conservative, Catholic, and traditional—rallied around it without seeming to blink an eye at the drag queens in elaborate isthmeñan dress laughing and holding hands aboard the floats.

Likewise, the atmosphere at the vela held the Friday following the parade was one of jubilance and abandon. Lorena Herrera, Mexico’s Pamela Anderson, graced the screaming, sweating, drunken croad with her presence and crowned Kathy the 1st the new muxhe queen.

There were parades featuring mock soldiers and the virgin Mary, traditional isthmeñan dances, telenovela stars, crates of Coronas piled in heaps on tables, and drag queens getting down to cumbia. Despite a small electrical fire which shut off the lights on half of the outdoor space, the party kept raging, isthmeñan style. And it seems Vinnii Gaxheé only gets stronger as the years go by.

1. Muxhe in traditional Ishtmeñan dress, striking a pose somewhere between folkloric and seductive.

2. Getting ready to board the float. Lots of drama and anticipation in the air.

3. The queen, Kathy Primera, poised for a trip through the main streets of Oaxaca.

4.A brief moment of repose amidst all the trappings of traditional Mexican fiestas–flags, flowers, firecrackers popping and hissing above the crowds.

5.The muxhes make their way to the Zócalo, maintaining an air of grande dame grace.

6.Queen Kathy Primera takes on an otherworldly power, silhouetted against a Oaxacan evening sky.

7.Muxhes dance salsa and cumbia at the vela, which rages deep into the night.

8.Partygoers dressed to the nines emulate the glamor of queen Kathy Primera.

9.Muxhes exert a captivating juxtaposition of the powerful and the fragile.

10.The younger generation of drag queens, in tight dresses and mini skirts, gets a lot of attention on the dance floor.

11.The night wears on as the crowd goes through cartons and cartons of Corona, glass jugs of mezcal, and plates of isthmeñan tapas.

12.Following her coronation, Kathy Primera is escorted onto the dance floor by stoic, gallant young men in traditional Zapotec dress.

13.Queen Kathy Primera poses with Lorena Herrera amidst the ecstatic, frenzied whistling and shouting of the crowd.

Community Connection

Interested in Mexico? Check out Teresa Ponikvar’s story of coming home to Oaxaca by the numbers and Dani Redd’s close encounters of the guru kind. For practical Mexico advice, take a look at ten nightlife spots in Mexico City and Matador Abroad editor and Oaxaca expat Sarah Menkedick’s foodie primer for Mexico.