The world is going through major shifts politically and economically.
People are questioning power structures and challenging them.
There are so many layers to the problems that simple solutions can not apply.
It is an exciting time to be alive.
Haven't been writing here much for a variety of reasons including feeling like there are so many new things happening each and everyday, and people are so connected to their own social media, how could my words matter or even register? I also feel blogging is kind of over. I saw the film "Contagion" and in it a character said, "Blogging is like graffiti with punctuation."
With that said, here I am sorting through my thoughts after CicLAvia, Occupy LA, my dad's 71st bday, DJing with old friends, connecting with colleagues outside of CSUN, witnessing so much bad ass Chicano/a art (via Pacific Standard Time) including the amazing ASCO show at LACMA, the deaths of two raiders: Al Davis and Steve Jobs, and wondering what else I can bring to my classes to help my students to love to learn.
some good things don't change
oh yeah and happy colonizer day
10/9/11
6/5/11
Food: Guisados
Guisados is one of the latest food joints in BH. Sitting on the corner of Chavez and St. Louis it is in a primo location. Passing by it for the last few months I noticed the tacos were $2.50, and a drink $3, kind of high for this area. Thus, I never saw too many locals sitting in there eating. I usually saw peeps that don't look like BH residents running from their cars into Guisados and back.
Finally I decided to try it out.
The taco sample plate at $6.50 offers 6 mini tacos and is the best deal. All the tacos are very different and you can taste the care that went into finding the perfect blend of spices with the meats, down to the black beans and fresh made corn tortillas.
The owner of Guisados is related to the carniceria next door, so they get fresh corn masa, grounded and mixed, fresh every 30 min.
I also tried a tamale de mole. The mole sat on top of the tamale but was very tasty. Reminded me of how my mom made hers.
Overall it is very tasty and homemade-ish. Give it a try.
I don't know if they will survive on just outsiders and the occasional local that wants to spend that much on a taco, but we'll see.
Finally I decided to try it out.
The taco sample plate at $6.50 offers 6 mini tacos and is the best deal. All the tacos are very different and you can taste the care that went into finding the perfect blend of spices with the meats, down to the black beans and fresh made corn tortillas.
The owner of Guisados is related to the carniceria next door, so they get fresh corn masa, grounded and mixed, fresh every 30 min.
I also tried a tamale de mole. The mole sat on top of the tamale but was very tasty. Reminded me of how my mom made hers.
Overall it is very tasty and homemade-ish. Give it a try.
I don't know if they will survive on just outsiders and the occasional local that wants to spend that much on a taco, but we'll see.
6/3/11
June 3, 1943
Sixty eight years ago today, the Sailor Riots began. Another race based riot started by whites fueled by the LA Times, the police and ignorance. The US had locked up the Japanese in concentration camps, but not people of German lineage, so they needed someone else to hate on and as usual Mexicans were targeted.
None of the sailors or members of the white mobs that joined were arrested. Mexicans and blacks were beaten, striped in the streets, arrested and women were raped.
(at 2:30 a scene about the riots begins)
This is a very clear example of how the white population would often attack communities of color based on misinformation from media, fear, lies and racism. All race riots up until the 1965 Watts riots were led by white people and targeted barrios, ghettos and other areas where people of color lived. In some cases entire towns were burned to the ground.
For more information go here.
None of the sailors or members of the white mobs that joined were arrested. Mexicans and blacks were beaten, striped in the streets, arrested and women were raped.
(at 2:30 a scene about the riots begins)
This is a very clear example of how the white population would often attack communities of color based on misinformation from media, fear, lies and racism. All race riots up until the 1965 Watts riots were led by white people and targeted barrios, ghettos and other areas where people of color lived. In some cases entire towns were burned to the ground.
For more information go here.
5/23/11
Finals
Another semester in the can. It was a good one. Six classes altogether making me drive from the 405 to the 605. Lots to read still and grade, but the hardest part is over.
My culture classes had final projects. I gave extra points if they did videos and posted them on Youtube. So here are some of the best so far. I have another batch coming in this week.
I had them view lots of videos from Hennessy Youngman, ASCO, Harry Gamboa Jr., Guillermo Gomez Pe~a and former students videos from other semesters. This semester yielded the most video so far.
- funny
- funnier and great camera work
- a star is born
- most creative
I hope they leave them up for awhile. I am very proud of them.
My culture classes had final projects. I gave extra points if they did videos and posted them on Youtube. So here are some of the best so far. I have another batch coming in this week.
I had them view lots of videos from Hennessy Youngman, ASCO, Harry Gamboa Jr., Guillermo Gomez Pe~a and former students videos from other semesters. This semester yielded the most video so far.
- funny
- funnier and great camera work
- a star is born
- most creative
I hope they leave them up for awhile. I am very proud of them.
4/27/11
3/7/11
another one...
Last night my uncle Mike, Miguel Estrada joined my mother, his big sister, in the afterlife.
At 3:30 in the morning he had a third and final heart attack.
This is all my father told me over the phone earlier today.
He also told me there would be no services.
A month after my mom passed two years ago this August, my tio Chayo and month later my tia Rosa both on my father's side passed.
My dad had a rough year in '09.
I barely knew Chayo and Rosa, but I grew up going to Mike's house in the hills of El Sereno. Up there I rode my bike with my cousins Micheal and Francis as their sisters Linda and Lulu played inside. I don't have their numbers to give them my condolences. We are not a close family.
I haven't seen them in years. Their mom, Mike's wife, passed three years ago after a long hard battle with diabetes.
Readers here know I try to make sense of my life in writing about these things of life.
I looked up to my uncle Mike as I look up to my other uncle Kiko, both on my mom's side.
I also look up to my uncles on my dad's side, in particular Chelo, Manuel, Adolfo and Abelardo. Even though I know Adolfo and Abelardo less, the few times I have met them and the stories my dad tells me, for better or worse, have left an impression.
Miguel was the second to youngest of four. My mom, Kiko, Miguel and Leli, grew up in the Loma of Elysian Park/Chavez Ravine. They were displaced from the house their father had built, over the proposed building of public housing that never came to be. I grew up hearing them speak about their animals, trees, friends, games they would play, and the ghosts in those hills.
My earliest memory of Mike was his big BMW motorcycle that looked like a cop bike. My mom said they never had problems in their south central neighborhood, where I grew up, because of that bike. He also had a cool dark blue MG. He worked for Lockheed in the Valley. He was married to my aunt Kitty, don't know if that is her real name. I grew up knowing her as Kitty. Lulu, Linda and Micheal were older than me, but his youngest Francis was born one day after me. We were tight as kids.
Mike grew up in an LA where you had to hide your Mexicaness to get ahead. Even though they were all born here, their accents and burritos in their lunch pails announced they were not "American." Both Mike and Kiko served in the Korean War. Kiko actually went to Korea. In an issue of Stars and Stripes, there is a picture of Kiko standing next to a chalk drawing he did on a large stone of La Virgen de Guadalupe. I didn't know he was artistic. Mike got to serve in a local desert working on radios and other communication devices for the military. I didn't know he was techy like that.
Mike was good man. Loyal. Family man. He took care of his wife til her last days going up and down the long flight of stone stairs that lead from the street down to his hillside home. I loved that house.
He was always interested in what I was doing and learning. The last few times we talked we debated his newly found right wing politics that he picked up via AM radio. I was supposed to go to his house and bring him books and such that he could read and see my point of view. He said I worked at that radical hippy campus. LOL. I was going to take him a copy of "Addicted To War." I would always tell him "Just follow the money. Who benefits from the fear, the wars, the criminalization of people with no power?" It would make him think and he wanted to know more, but then he would get back to repeating the sound bites he heard on the radio. He was cool. I will miss his big hand shakes. His nose that looks like mine. The way he just was. He was my uncle.
I hope my mom, grandma and grandpa are showing him around the spirit world. Maybe he can find some time to stop by and visit me. Check out my books. I will leave some out for him. I hope I get to see my cousins and just tell them he will always be there, just remember and feel.
At 3:30 in the morning he had a third and final heart attack.
This is all my father told me over the phone earlier today.
He also told me there would be no services.
A month after my mom passed two years ago this August, my tio Chayo and month later my tia Rosa both on my father's side passed.
My dad had a rough year in '09.
I barely knew Chayo and Rosa, but I grew up going to Mike's house in the hills of El Sereno. Up there I rode my bike with my cousins Micheal and Francis as their sisters Linda and Lulu played inside. I don't have their numbers to give them my condolences. We are not a close family.
I haven't seen them in years. Their mom, Mike's wife, passed three years ago after a long hard battle with diabetes.
Readers here know I try to make sense of my life in writing about these things of life.
I looked up to my uncle Mike as I look up to my other uncle Kiko, both on my mom's side.
I also look up to my uncles on my dad's side, in particular Chelo, Manuel, Adolfo and Abelardo. Even though I know Adolfo and Abelardo less, the few times I have met them and the stories my dad tells me, for better or worse, have left an impression.
Miguel was the second to youngest of four. My mom, Kiko, Miguel and Leli, grew up in the Loma of Elysian Park/Chavez Ravine. They were displaced from the house their father had built, over the proposed building of public housing that never came to be. I grew up hearing them speak about their animals, trees, friends, games they would play, and the ghosts in those hills.
My earliest memory of Mike was his big BMW motorcycle that looked like a cop bike. My mom said they never had problems in their south central neighborhood, where I grew up, because of that bike. He also had a cool dark blue MG. He worked for Lockheed in the Valley. He was married to my aunt Kitty, don't know if that is her real name. I grew up knowing her as Kitty. Lulu, Linda and Micheal were older than me, but his youngest Francis was born one day after me. We were tight as kids.
Mike grew up in an LA where you had to hide your Mexicaness to get ahead. Even though they were all born here, their accents and burritos in their lunch pails announced they were not "American." Both Mike and Kiko served in the Korean War. Kiko actually went to Korea. In an issue of Stars and Stripes, there is a picture of Kiko standing next to a chalk drawing he did on a large stone of La Virgen de Guadalupe. I didn't know he was artistic. Mike got to serve in a local desert working on radios and other communication devices for the military. I didn't know he was techy like that.
Mike was good man. Loyal. Family man. He took care of his wife til her last days going up and down the long flight of stone stairs that lead from the street down to his hillside home. I loved that house.
He was always interested in what I was doing and learning. The last few times we talked we debated his newly found right wing politics that he picked up via AM radio. I was supposed to go to his house and bring him books and such that he could read and see my point of view. He said I worked at that radical hippy campus. LOL. I was going to take him a copy of "Addicted To War." I would always tell him "Just follow the money. Who benefits from the fear, the wars, the criminalization of people with no power?" It would make him think and he wanted to know more, but then he would get back to repeating the sound bites he heard on the radio. He was cool. I will miss his big hand shakes. His nose that looks like mine. The way he just was. He was my uncle.
I hope my mom, grandma and grandpa are showing him around the spirit world. Maybe he can find some time to stop by and visit me. Check out my books. I will leave some out for him. I hope I get to see my cousins and just tell them he will always be there, just remember and feel.
2/28/11
Mujeres de Maize Annual Month Long Celebration of Women
For the last 14 years Mujeres de Maize, an Eastside Xicana collective of artivistas, has organized a month of events that celebrate the power, creativity and beauty of being women. Each year more and newer faces respond to the call and share in many of the variety of planned activities. This is not just for women, men should be at these events to bare witness, listen and learn.
I've been a fan for many years. I hope you can make it to any of these amazing events.
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