By David Martinez

The people of Mexico's Yucatán peninsula have long rebelled against the powers that be, from 1857, when peasants seized the Mexican army's Fort Bacalar, to the 1920s, when the state of Merida's Socialist governor Felipe Carrillo Puerto organized Leagues of Resistance to push agrarian reform and seize ruling-class haciendas ... at least until he was assassinated in 1923.

In fact, one of the biggest delegation of indigenous Yucatán peninsula residents traveling to Cancún to protest the Fifth Ministerial meeting of the World Trade Organization, which begins Sept. 10, comes from a village named after Felipe Carrillo Puerto. Yet it is the flood of antiglobalization activists from around the world that is expected to make this an epic clash reminiscent of Seattle's WTO conference in 1999.

The majority of Mexican people I speak to aren't that well informed about the WTO's agenda. They only know what the papers report, that thousands of lunatics will descend on Cancún in the coming days, which is why the police presence has quadrupled on the streets here, reinforced by the military's armored vehicles.

Many of the locals who are informed have mixed feelings. Arturo, 27, works in a print shop in downtown Cancún. He appreciates the "good" aspects of "free trade," such as the products that are now available to the average Mexican. He cites American sneakers and big cars as examples. But he says that free trade is death for small businesses, which he has watched gradually disappear in his lifetime.

Then there are those like Otto, a 19-year-old activist from Nezahualcoyotl, near Mexico City. His first action was in 2001, when he and his friends attacked the Italian embassy in the capital with rocks, paint, and eggs in retaliation for the killing of Carlo Giuliani during antiglobalization protests in the streets of Genoa. He has come to Cancún to try to shut down the WTO.