[1] Xokonoschtletl began working as a tourist guide and became involved with indigenous activists who promoted the protection of traditional Mexican culture.

He later founded the Asociación Civil Yankuik Anahuak (International Civil Association People of the Valley of Mexico), through which he has struggled for thirty years, without financial support from the government, for the return of a quetzalpanecáyotl (quetzal feather headdress) known as Montezuma's headdress housed at the Vienna Museum of Ethnology (Museum für Völkerkunde).

[7] Over the years, his request has been supported by the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia (INAH, National Institute of Anthropology and History), by Thomas Klestil and Heinz Fischer when they were president of Austria.

The members of the Social Democratic Party of Austria, led by Peter Schieder (chairman of the parliamentary committee of Foreign Policy), presented a proposal to return the headdress in 2005.

In this initiative, they said that it would be a token of gratitude for the Mexican people, because Mexico was the first country to show their support to Austria in 1938, protesting against its annexation to Nazi Germany.