Is Mérida a city or a state? At Televisa’s “Hoy,” a fun-loving daily morning show broadcast from Mexico City, the producers may want to consult a map.
Social media is reacting with a combination of laughter and disdain over a clumsy mistake on a game-show segment. As of Friday morning, it was the most-read story on Diario de Yucatán.
Host Galilea Montijo posed the question to a contestant: “In what state of the republic does the town of Celestún belong, a reserve of flamingos and more than 300 species of birds?”
The choices given by the television presenter were: “A) Mérida, B) Quintana Roo, C) Campeche.” Of course, only two of the three choices are actual states. One is the capital of Yucatán, the state omitted from the list.
The player answered “Campeche,” which was counted as an incorrect answer — because who ever heard of flamingos in Campeche? In Mérida, you can’t spit without hitting a pink flamingo. That’s their impression, at least.
He was zapped while strapped in a electric chair, capital punishment for not choosing the capital. No one on the show came forward to clarify that Mérida is actually the capital of Yucatán, on whose coast those pink flamingos reside.
Diario’s readers were indignant. In often brutal comments they bemoaned the fact that the nation’s capital appeared to be so ignorant about the Peninsula’s geography.
