San José Cuyachapa

Few place names pack in so many pieces: in Nahuatl, Cuyachapa combines cuautla, wooded hill, yacatl, tip or nose, xalla, sandy ground, and the locative pan, to say something like "at the tip of the sandy ground". Before it comes the name of Saint Joseph, the village patron. With 1,143 residents in 2020, it is a community of the municipality of Esperanza at 2,605 m, at the far eastern edge of Puebla, about 22 km from Orizaba and 96 km in a straight line from the state capital.

The altitude is noticeable. In Esperanza average temperatures run only 10 to 14 °C and yearly rainfall ranges from 300 to 700 mm, so INEGI classes almost 86% of the municipality as temperate semi-arid; only a strip has a temperate sub-humid climate. Even so, water here no longer heads to the Pacific like the rest of the Puebla valley, but to the Gulf: the municipality lies in the Papaloapan basin, via the Blanco and Salado rivers, with the seasonal Tecoac stream.

Nearly all the land, about 94%, is farmed; forest and scrub hold small remnants. Religious life is set to brass band music, which accompanies each village's feast. At the table there is mole poblano, pulque to drink and jamoncillo and coconut cocada for sweets. The municipal seat keeps the parish church of Nuestra Señora de la Esperanza and a monument to Benito Juárez. The INEGI compendium records barely any speakers of indigenous languages in the municipality: eleven people.