Luiseño | Poetry + Politics

Why Germany's immigrants fly the flag for their adopted country - World Cup, Football

2010-07-06T13:15:00.000-07:00

By Tony Paterson in Berlin
Saturday, 3 July 2010

With Germany fielding its most ethnically mixed World Cup side on record, the country's immigrant Turkish and Arab population is showing unprecedented support for the national 11 by flying Germany's red, black and gold flags from cars, restaurants and businesses.

But while the display of patriotic fervour has been welcomed by Chancellor Angela Merkel's government as a sign of long-awaited "positive integration", it has infuriated Germany's radical leftwing anarchist scene which has begun a war against flag-flying immigrants.

Several German anarchist publications have denounced the flags as "Black red and gold rags" which encourage "dangerous nationalist tendencies". So-called "anarchist commandos" have raided Turkish and Arab businesses in Berlin, either ripping down or burning football flags on public display.

Ibrahim Bassal, a German of Arab descent who owns a mobile phone shop in Berlin's ethnically mixed Neukölln district, started hanging a 50ft German tricolour from the top of his shop building when the World Cup began. The flag has been torn down several times and once an unknown assailant set fire to it in the early hours of the morning.

Mr Bassal said that before the attacks, a group of 16 aggressive, black-clad young Germans entered his shop and accused him of "arousing Nazi sympathies" with his flag. "We have been living in and working in Germany for decades and our children were born here," Mr Bassal complained earlier this week. "Of course we support Germany. What's that got to do with Nazis? What's the problem?"

Scores of other Berliners with Turkish and Arab roots have complained of similar attacks in which flags have been torn off cars or shop fronts and sometimes shredded or burned. A group calling itself "Kommando Kevin-Prince Boateng" has indirectly claimed responsibility for the flag war after posting a notice on the Indymedia website calling for the "capture" of German flags. Boateng, a Portsmouth midfielder playing for Ghana in the World Cup, put German team captain Michael Ballack (Chelsea) out of the tournament with a foul in May's FA Cup final.

The anarchists' reaction is not new. Berlin's radical left-wing activists launched similar campaigns in 2006 when Germany was hosting the World Cup. They stole hundreds of flags in the city's Friedrichshain district and pelted soccer supporters with water bombs.

During the 2008 European championships German flags were stolen, shredded and hung from lampposts as anarchist "trophies". However this tournament marks the first time that immigrants have been targeted for flying the German flag. "They see us as immigrants," Mr Bassal said of the anarchists. "They don't understand that Germans who aren't from Germany support the national side." While much of that support stems from the fact that Turkey, the country of Germany's largest, 1.7 million- strong, immigrant group, is not playing in the contest, the huge backing given to the side by Germans with Turkish and Arab roots is undoubtedly due to the ethnic mix of the players.

The German squad has a higher number of players from diverse ethnic background than at any time in its history. Around half the players were born abroad, have parents who were born abroad or have one non-German parent. One of the side's biggest stars is Mesut Ozil, the son of Turkish parents whose goal sent Germany through to the second round of the World Cup. The enthusiasm for Ozil was on show during the Germany-England game last Sunday, when hundreds of Berlin's Turkish residents flocked to the city's football fan mile draped in German national flags. Commentators have noted that half of the German current side would have not have been allowed to compete little more than a decade ago because the country's strict citizenship laws, which used to be based on "German blood ties", would have barred them.

Yet when it comes to national sporting highlights such as tonight's Germany-Argentina showdown, immigrants like Berlin's Ibrahim Bassal remain defiant. A neighbourhood "flag watch" has been set up in his district to safeguard the honour of the German tricolour hanging from his building. "We won't let our pride be taken away," he insists.

Journey Parallax

2010-05-18T13:59:00.000-07:00

Depeche Mode "Hole To Feed"

2010-05-10T13:20:00.000-07:00

By Eric Wareheim

May Day NYC 2010

2010-05-02T13:56:00.000-07:00

Foto By Netza Moreno

Axitia Mode 09.19.09

2009-08-17T07:28:00.000-07:00

A few things to check out here on the Axitia Mode-ality: 1) this flyer for an upcoming event.

2) Radio Broadcasting:

and the supplemental info:
http://www.myspace.com/axitiamode
http://twitter.com/axitiamode

via dr. frankenstien

2009-04-25T00:56:00.000-07:00

FREE !!!!!!!!!!!!!

Being thirsty for knowledge and on a budget can be a mutha.

I found a few books online that i thnk are worth a look.

"Hey, but you don't have to take my word for it.
"

this first link is a piece by Samuel Aun Weor. It discusses some thoughts on the universal relativity of the wisdom that originated from our ancestros on this Original west Coast, Cihuatlampa.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/5365775/the-secret-doctrine-of-anahuac

This following link is a wonderful manual for learning nahautl by
Sr. Genaro Medina Ramos.

http://oz.plymouth.edu/~wjt/Nahuatl/Nahuatl1.pdf

If you interested in learning about the gran calculadora "calculator", the ancient calendario del sol. read this.

http://www.samaelgnosis.net/calendario_azteca/calendario_azteca.pdf

you might need adobe for some of these files.

but nonetheless, enjoy.

Tlazocamatli,

FRANKENSTEIN

PASS IT ON !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Convergence: Art and Activism

2009-04-01T07:11:00.001-07:00

A Conference on the Intersection of Arts and Activism.
Tufts University Medford/Somerville Campus
April 3-5, 2009

I will be presenting Saturday, 04/04/09, showing a work in progress of our short doc based on footage shot starting May 2006 through present footage of Esperanza del Barrio.

Followed by a panel discussion with Professor Radiclani Clytus and Lecia Rosenthal.

http://convergence-art.com/schedule.html

The Least of These

2009-03-30T05:31:00.000-07:00

Juaneco y su Combo: "Mujer Hilandera"

2009-03-18T15:31:00.000-07:00

MATROX RTX.2 HDV - DV - SP

2009-03-17T17:17:00.000-07:00

Sacramento and Its Riverside Tent City

2009-03-12T10:59:00.000-07:00

Oddly, I came across this news report while channel flipping the other day, but flipped the channel before seeing that the report was about Sacramento, Califas. I remember seeing the people and assumed it was a community, say, in the South, a place that I associate with blight (I know that sounds awful, but it's true--I'm fed this by the mainstream media, it's a reaction that comes without any thought). Then Ricardo sent me the link to the NYTimes story.

I generally don't like to put up such depressing things on this blog, but this is so close to home. And i'd actually rather not comment on the content, but point out that the media, in general, has this incredible power to depress people these days. It's all doom and gloom. Not that this sort of thing shouldn't be reported. But it bothers me, how much power the media has to tax our existence.

'Unframed' Record Release Party

2009-03-08T16:14:00.000-07:00

Ballet for (anti-riot) water cannon vehicle

2009-03-03T05:44:00.000-08:00

Vendor Law Reform Protest

2009-02-24T23:37:00.000-08:00

For a New Generation, Kimchi Goes With Tacos

2009-02-24T07:36:00.000-08:00

The food at Kogi Korean BBQ-To-Go, the taco vendor that has overtaken Los Angeles, does not fit into any known culinary category. One man overheard on his cellphone as he waited in line on a recent night said it best: “It’s like this Korean Mexican fusion thing of crazy deliciousness.”

Read Full NYTimes Article

Esperanza del Barrio: Grassroots Organizing

2009-02-11T08:19:00.000-08:00

The Savage Detectives, Roberto Bolaño

2009-01-22T06:20:00.000-08:00

In El Cubo. To get from Nogales to El Cubo you have to take the highway to Santa Ana and head west, from Santa Ana to Pueblo Nuevo, Pueblo Nuevo to Altar, Altar to Caborca, Caborca to San Isidro, then take the road to Sonoyta, on the Arizona border, but turn off onto a dirt road before you get there and go about fifteen or twenty miles. The Nogales newspaper talked about "his faithful companion, a devoted teacher in El Cubo." In the town we went to the school, and one glance was enough to tell us that it had been built after 1940. Cesárea Tinajero couldn't have taught here. Though if we dug around under it, we might be able to find the old school.

We talked to the teacher. She teaches the children Spanish and Pápago. The Pápagos live in Arizona and Sonora. We asked the teacher whether she was Pápago. No, she isn't. I'm from Guaymas, she tells us, and my grandfather was a Mayo. We ask her why she teaches Pápago. So the language won't be lost, she tells us. There are only two hundred Pápagos left in Mexico. You're right, that's not many, we admit. In Arizona there are almost sixteen thousand, but only two hundred in Mexico. And how many Pápagos are left in El Cubo? About twenty, says the teacher, but it doesn't matter, I'll keep teaching. Then she explains that the Pápagos don't call themselves that. They call themselves O'Odham and the Pimas call themselves Óob and the Seris call themselves Konkáak. We tell her that we were in Bahía Kino, in Punta Chueca, and El Dólar and we heard the fishermen singing Seri songs. The teacher is surprised. There are seven hundred Konkáak, she says, if that, and they don't fish. Well, these fishermen had learned a Seri song, we say. Maybe, says the teacher, but more likely they fooled you.

Esperanza del Barrio: Saliendo Adelante

2009-01-14T00:02:00.000-08:00

La Raza Cósmica

2009-01-01T23:23:00.000-08:00

Esperanza del Barrio: ¡La Lucha Sigue!

2008-12-11T23:59:00.000-08:00

Movement for Justice in El Barrio

2008-10-28T00:07:00.000-07:00

Came across this article while doing research for upcoming videos on street vendors in East Harlem:

"Zapatismo is not a new political ideology or a rehash of old ideologies. Zapatismo is nothing, it doesn't exist. It only serves as a bridge, to cross from one side to the other. So everyone fits within zapatismo, everyone who wants to cross from one side to the other. Everyone has his or her own side and other side. There are no universal recipes, lines, strategies, tactics, laws, rules or slogans. There is only a desire: to build a better world, that is, a new world."
-- The Clandestine Revolutionary Indigenous General Command of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (CCRI-CG of the EZLN)

Movement for Justice in El Barrio (MJB), an East Harlem-based organization of immigrants and low-income people of color, has been fighting gentrification in Manhattan’s “last frontier” for over three years now. Being majority Mexican and sharing an affinity for the zapatistas’ way of organizing, MJB decided less than a year after forming to join the Other Campaign as an essential component of their work for self-determination.

Read on...

Community Techno Unit

2008-10-20T19:16:00.000-07:00

Working for the Pearson Foundation's Digital Arts Alliance

sounds from the deep.

2008-05-28T17:47:00.001-07:00

As you can read below,,, luiseño is about to make a quick move again towards its california motherland. with new sights and sounds under our wings we hope to make a slightly more substantial impact on our people of the west.

2008-05-16T19:43:00.000-07:00

• * ¨ FROM: PEOPLE OF THE WEST

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

HOWDY DUDE are you on your way already?????? Hope you are doing good. what do you think about the happs on the world mann.. It's fucking scary. You got dudes fucking with some of the biggest magnetic fields in the world, causing all these earthquakes, cyclones, and so on. Im freaked out over here. Global control is at it's worst, and nobody with power is doing anything about it, politicly, biblicly , and morally, the world is fucked up. I just hope that we get some more time here, I like my life and I'm just getting to enjoy it. What do you know or what can you tell me to make me feel better. I'm worried for the world and all these beautiful people that don't even have a clue on what is really happening, this shit is weighing on me hard-core. There has got to be something we can do. How come I feel so............................................?//:
;[;'']\][[\][\\=[=[[][[--=[=-=[0900-=-[]\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\/////////////////////\\\\\\\\\

El Bandito Siete loves you brother and hopes all is good!

_____________________________________________________________________

Convoca el CNI a reunión urgente en apoyo de la comunidad wixárika;a

2008-02-27T23:58:00.000-08:00

Spiral Blaster (NYC) + Luiseño Moda (Nuevo Ideal)

2008-02-27T23:57:00.000-08:00

VIVA OBAMA 2008

2008-02-23T07:19:00.000-08:00

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Here's an article on Miguel Orozco who launched the video and runs the website AmigosdeObama.com.

blevin blectum in nyc

2008-02-21T15:47:00.000-08:00

Tus Mensajes [Old School Divide]

2008-02-16T07:56:00.000-08:00

from The Unapologetic Mexican

FROM THE MAIL:

I thought I'd bring this to your attention. I live in Atlanta. A commercial started running about 10 days ago that shows a black guy (I'm black) talking about how millions of jobs are being lost to illegal immigrants. As he talks, only black faces are shown in the video. I don't know if this ad is being shown in other cities, but I've never seen it before. It has aired 3 times in the last 10 days, and the next time it does I'll make a point to get the name of the sponsor. I can't help to think that in this Republican dominated state, some Karl Rove types are trying to stir the pot and create dissension as we head further into the campaign season. I smell old school divide and conquer tactics. For what it's worth.

It's true. So easy for disease-minded power brokers to jam wedges in sore places. We must not let them. We must remember what we have in common, and we must nurture those things. And we must see where a true enemy lies. And be ready at all times to love. And to direct the fight to those who bring it.

Peace. (and Justice.)

Presidente de Mexico Felipe Calderón Visiting USA

2008-02-12T23:21:00.000-08:00

I find a few things interesting about this report of Calderon's visit to the U.S. ---

"The encounter had a decidedly grass-roots tone, which, from the looks of his official agenda, seems to be exactly the tone that Mr. Calderón is trying to strike during his first official visit to the United States since he took office on Dec. 1, 2006."
Admittedly, I don't know much about mr. calderon. I haven't been following his presidency. I have heard however that there are reports of heightened military presence in such areas as Oaxaca and Chiapas. I guess a couple of links to articles would be good here....

Going back to the article:

Joel Magallán, executive director of Asociación Tepeyac de New York, an education and advocacy group, called the meeting “una entrada,” or an entryway, meaning it was not meaningful enough to produce any results, but could mark the start of a relationship.

“Yes, the meeting was important so he could see the faces of the people who have been working for the Mexicans in the United States,” Mr. Magallán said in Spanish after the encounter...

Something seems amiss here, a translation error or something, since obviously what's important are the Mexican faces working in the United States...

Mr. Calderón also talked about the inter-dependence that has characterized United States-Mexico relations, with Mexico providing much of the low-wage labor needed in the United States and the United States providing Mexicans who are here the opportunity to work and sending billions of dollars each year to support their families back home.

I would like to hear what mr. calderon had to say on this matter. This is an interesting thing to hear any presidential leader discussing--namely that the immigration issue is on both sides of the border. I know Obama acknowledges that immigration reform must occur on both sides of the border---here's his "official" stance on immigration. With Clinton all I get are memories of NAFTA...ugh...

Quoting Norberta Díaz of Asociación de Mujeres Poblanas, a Brooklyn-based organization that educates Mexican women about America’s health and educational systems:

“We’re not asking for amnesty — all we ask for is reform,” she added. “We hope he won’t do like President Fox did when Bush came to Mexico, when he had this big party with ranchera music and food. When he hosts a visit from the next president of the United States, we hope that Calderón talks about immigration and shows that he’s interested, that he cares about what happens to the Mexicans who are here.”

I didn't know that president fox threw a party with ranchera music and food when president bush came to visit!!! How come we weren't invited? That would have been hilarious to see!!! Can you imagine bush with his stupid little smirk trying to enjoy ranchera music??? Too funny too funny...

Matters of Great Concern Should Be Treated Lightly

2008-02-12T11:47:00.001-08:00

It just got into my head to prepare a video for the Luiseño Artist Collective on what it is that we do. A mission statement of sorts, in the form of a 2 to 3 minute "documentary." The script in my mind should follow the basic layout of informational videos out there, ones that I get hired out to do work on as an editor. I tell people every time--gosh, these little videos are just like writing papers back in college! And people usually agree. What does that say about the world we live in? It haunts me, though i guess this cross-disciplinary "coincidence"--that a script for a short doc often follows the layout of a basic academic paper--also allows me to be an editor as well as writer.

In thinking of this video for the Luiseño Artist Collective, however, I am inclined---in the words of one savy producer of a Tylenol commercial I worked on years ago, when I was still an assistant at Version2!---to "break that category" immediately. I am compelled to start the whole doc, for instance, with footage of John the Philosopher.

For those of you who know me, some of you may know how dear this footage is to me, how much it had an influence on a portion of my life, toward the end of college, living in Chicago not long before moving to New York. My initial intention was to do a full-fledged documentary on the man I got to know as John the Philosopher. I told my father I wanted to contrast this man's knowledge as a philosopher in the world with the knowledge of "philosphers" at a University--though of course nowadays, no one has the gumption to use this title, the people I am referring to were academics at the University of Chicago.

I spent entire nights with John the Philosopher, who was homeless, who would wander and sleep in various places throughout Hyde Park. He introduced me to Spider and he knew a young cat, 19 and introduced to me out of ear-shot as a hustler, whom he was trying to mentor. Once, during the day, perhaps the day that Hong waited for me in another section of the park, an off-duty cop came through and talked. He talked about the culture of policemen, of undercover cops who were also drug dealers. I didn't know if i should believe a word he was saying. Once John asked me for something to write with--and he wrote, in beautiful handwriting, a card to his friend Spider. Spider, who was an alcoholic, who seemed to accept my presence, but nonetheless always seemed on edge, was drinking cheap malt beer with busted knuckles. He told me he didn't like to fight, but that he fought when he had to.

I was younger though, too young and immature, and couldn't make this movie. I simply could not organize the documentary I wanted to make about this man. As winter encroached on the Autumn weather, John told me he was leaving on a bus to San Diego, where his sister lived. Months later I saw him with a group of homeless men, one a middle aged white man with a bright blue Cubs jacket and a hat and glasses, as they walked past the monastery on Kimbark next to the Nickles Park. I was across the street and they didn't notice me. There was so much spirit in the way the walked, the whole group, as John the Philospher spoke to them. That would be the last I would see of him.

But I do have video and audio of John the Philosopher. Some people have seen this video. At a certain point I stopped showing it. I would venture to say that I have probably thought of this video every day of my life since I first came across the footage though. And I believe a part of me knew it would be around with me for years to come, at least in spirit. In the video, a homeless man who goes by John the Philosopher is in our apartment in Chicago, in the red room. Hong is there and so is Zimmry and of course Simon, who invited John inside, and some other people. Am i dreaming this footage, I wonder? did it really happen? Simon reads John the Philosopher a passage from Nietzsche's The Gay Science, a passage in the beginning about the footbridge, and John the Philosopher comments on it, a brilliant comment, that gives us rapture. Later in the dining room with the theater lights and the Virgin Guadalupe installation, John the Philosopher talks about wanting to paint a picture, about writing a book, or about both.

Part of me tells myself that I should maintain this beloved footage secret for now, keep it for the real doc, still being made, forever being created... but then again, i argue with myself--or, maybe i should say, the entity known as Antronix argues--that I shouldn't be afraid of using footage in multiple videos.

Reappropriating footage in multiple contexts is something I've wanted to put into practice...for a really long time...ever since i had the notion of making a film around my identity. The film would be a compilation of people that resemble me physically or psychologically; the original idea was to make a movie that weaved footage of Edward James Olmos in Zoot Suit, scenes from Laurence of Arabia, Benicio Del Toro in Usual Suspects, Jose Canseco, a general representation of Latino/Irish/Middle-Eastern hybrid identities.

The form I was beginning to explore--albeit only in my mind, as I watched films over the shoulders of people at the Film Studies Center in Chicago--was the creation of fluid video pieces, videos that used the same footage, but always changing; the ongoing work would be to constantly re-appropriate footage in different works, such as my beloved John the Philosopher video, so as to continually give footage new shades of context and new meanings.

Many years later I realize that using footage over and over, in different contexts, with different in and out points, serves to inform audiences of the manipulation that goes on behind editing. For instance, take this Colgate commercial I found on Youtube. Commercials, movies, whatever, are always edited, for better or for worse. The smiles and the toothpaste work into a cohesive whole to present a pleasant portrait, something charming, delightful, appealing, desirable. Sex is often subtly infused or entirely removed, on an instinctual level, by the editor. Perfect consistency must be kept in order to preserve the integrity of the desire to consume and/or purchase being created in a 30 second commercial.

But what about then presenting the takes of smiles after the point they should be cut, into the moment beyond the out-point, and into regular, plodding life? The moment for instance when the smile next to the toothpaste goes blank, grimaces, looks up at the director, transforms into a sincere gesture, or simply goes blank? This is interesting to me, and perhaps one day I will execute it here, if i have the footage handy, and if i have a moment as well as the patience, to go through with the whole process of showing what happens after an edit should be made, when life goes on.

But then again one knows what happens after we smile--we know that we eventually scowl, or that our eyes may turn profound or dumb, or that our cheeks may dimple, because life goes on, and we understand this, until death; there is no "ending" but death, we will be in the ground with dirt in our mouths, or mummified in a tomb if we are lucky, or floating over the sea as ashes, or piled neatly in a clump as a man in military uniform puts a light to our stinking bodies.

Not that I want to keep reminding you of the possible ways there are to die. More fun is to laugh at death, to understand how far away it is, and that all we do have is life--boring, plodding, life, and sometimes, art. Let's instead watch a scene from Werner Herzog's Grizzly Man. Life, death, the magic of cinema, it's all there:

Timothy Treadwell - Grizzly Man Pt. 4

And now let's watch an interview with one of Tim Treadwell's closest people on this earth:

Timothy Treadwell - Grizzly Man Pt. 6

The scene shows us a seemingly rehearsed ritual of sorts, where a coroner presents dead Timothy Treadwell's watch to his one-time girlfriend, Jewel. The coroner's emotion, appropriately respectful, also has a tone of awkward insincerity, and is followed by Jewel's emotional recalling of Tim Treadway and the girlfriend who died with him, Amy. Standard-fare documentary filmmaking--i.e., if it were actually the Discovery Channel who were making Grizzly Man, and not Werner Herzog, would have probably ended the scene with this bit of emotion, perhaps merged it with the final outburst and carried it into the next scene, a nice cohesive arc drawing superficial emotion from the audience. Or worse yet--in a gruseome MTV version--the filmmakers would cut after showing us the bling of Tim's watch!...

But the scene doesn't end where most would have ended it, since Herzog is here inviting us to laugh--not at Timothy Treadwell, mind you--but to laugh at death, and at the intention of a filmmaker to make a film about death. Of all the ways to die, why not by a grizzly bear who mauls you and eats you? The scene, instead of ending, brings us back to plodding, light-hearted laughter--"...so there it is." "There it is...I can't believe it..." Superficial smiles and consoling gestures. "Hopefully it'll continue to run a long time." "I think it will." Etc, etc. Another emotional outburst, back to regular life...

how bizarre to say all of this, to talk without end

Girls Club Worldwide

2008-02-01T18:55:00.000-08:00

Our friend Leslie sent us a link to a program called Girls Club Worldwide.
They have a youth program that links up a group of young girls from the Lower East Side in New York City and San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas, Mexico.

YOUNG-HAE CHANGE HEAVY INDUSTRIES

2008-01-10T17:23:00.000-08:00

Ian Epps, ( ) aka Parenthesis, Darsombra , and Pacific Before Tiger at Tommy's Tavern

2008-01-07T13:05:00.000-08:00

I found out about the above show through Ian Epps, whose music I've been listening to for maybe about a year now, but had yet to see performed live. I went with no expectations whatsoever and I came home with a record. I believe events benefit from presenting few expectations of what is about to happen. The memory is better, seriously. Think about walking into an art installation with various contributors--one doesn't necessarily just remember individual works of art, but the context as well--i.e., the audio, the people, the space itself. And if spirits are present--real spirits, not just alcoholic spirits--it becomes worth writing about somehow.

Tommy's is in Greenpoint, not all that far from the bridge to Queens. A single door separates it from the street. It's got two rooms, separated by swinging double doors with glassless diamond windows. The first room has enough room for a pool table, the bar itself, an enormous nu-generation juke box that you can pay for with a debit card and a video game unit with Penthouse Photohunt, among others. It has an aura of having been there for a long time, a bar that has neither prospered nor failed, in the words of Mailer. The emptied out back room is big enough for small shows.

Small clusters of people haunt Tommy's tonight--a group wedged between the pool table and the wall, women on the corner of the bar, a guy to our right on the phone speaking Polish. It's sort of obvious that there's a non-distinct group their for the show, and then there are the regulars and passersby. People who've come to the bar on their own, for no other reason than to be among drinkers and strangers, to drink $2 Schaeffers. I feel no pretensions in the place, about 30 strong, all you need, if you think about it.

( ) aka Parenthesis performed first and his was the record I bought and have been listening to over the past couple of days. I listen to it with my fingers on the EQ knobs, playing it loudly, with and without the three frequencies i have control over. Check out his work here and here.

Later as I'm getting another Schaeffer I notice tres chavos playing pool. They have a faintly military air about them, almost a discipline to their leisurely game of pool. Two of them, trimly built, are wearing vaguely military gear--one has an army hat and the other has military fatigues, or something like that. Militant fashion. The third dude is wider and has long hair. Anyway, these guys are playing pool with the girl with the dark curly hair and striped sweatshirt, who complained to everyone in particular that she couldn't remember New Year's night. The room carries her voice throughout the bar whenever she says anything, through the glassless windows and into the performance space.

This same girl commented on my new Christmas sweatshirt--the one with the post-capitalist--i.e., futuristic--design, a smart reproduction of indigenous american aesthetics for working-class consumption. I love this sweatshirt. Anyway, when the rockabilly-like brooklyn bartender (whom Ian said was her boyfriend, which is a nice twist) went missing looking for a cable, she was the one who yelled--"Hey bartender I need you to get me a drink before it gets too far past my parole curfew." Anyway, she's playing pool with the raza militantes, a cordial game that ends as I sip my beer. I go back inside to catch Pacific Before Tiger's set and she comes in sometime later and yells "You Guys Rock!" over Tiger's hopeful tones.

I have to mention that I hate most bar experiences these days. In fact, I went to see a dj set the next night by Antiguo Automata Mexicano, and it was the stupidest shit I've ever been to. Not because of Antiguo, whose work you should check out, but because the bar was dead (despite the beats of course), the spirit was awash. Lonely dudes who looked like dejected graphic designers looked me over as I listened to the show, a couple on a "date" sort of gave me a weird look. The air was stiff though the bartender kept giving me free beers. Antiguo seemed to be in a good mood and the bar-goers clapped during his set, but the the spirits were listless, unshifting. The difference with this bar, in the heart of Williamsburg, was perhaps that it had prospered, it was making someone rich. Spirits sucked dry.

Back at Tommy's land, we headed back inside after grabbing a slice of pizza. A soul at the door made conversation with us, a three-part exchange with a beginning middle and an end that i have no recollection of whatsoever, and we were re-admitted. Darsombra is setting up his gear at this point--and he had a lot of it, neatly organized I might add. I hear the girl's voice again, the voiceover of the evening, ask "Ya acabaron su musica? Ya acabaron sus canciones de mierda?" This was when I laughed and decided to take some pictures, though I'd be too shy until Ian played. We need oppositional voices to what we do, at all times, rather than smiles and polite nods. This probably also separated Tommy's Tavern from the Antiguo show--a genuine diversity.

Ian came on last. Nick mentioned that Ian plays the guitar in less electronic/expermintal modes, which adds something somehow to the aura of his music. He performs with a guitar and a computer, and the experience is unique.

Christmas In LaLaLandddia

2007-12-26T07:31:00.000-08:00

Living in Williamsburg Brooklyn, NY, it's easy to corner yourself into one of the polar cultural extremes of the neighborhood. On the one hand, there are people "native" to the neighborhood--often Dominicans, Puerto Ricans or Hasidic. To a certain extent, Polish people given the proximity to Greenpoint, Mexicans, Chinese. Whatever the statistics, however, these cultural groups represent the working class of Williamsburg. And whether or not they are "native" to the neighborhood--in fact, many are probably new immigrants--they are certainly being pushed out (with the exception perhaps of the Hasidic Orthodox Jews) by the more affluent nouveau riche, the artsy college kid, graphic designers, real estate brokers, business men/women, etc. In short, the working class are being pushed out by gentrifiers who raise the cost of living in a neighborhood beyond the means of a working class person or family.

It's nothing new at this point, especially to those who have lived in New York City for a few years. The socio-economic class of people living in Manhattan has seemingly become less and less diverse over the 5 years I've been here; the rent is preposterous, and more than likely for a space of about 400sq ft. The same is now true to parts of Brooklyn--i.e., Williamsburg, DUMBO, Brooklyn Heights. In Bedstuy the new condos stick out like walled in fortresses while a silent battle is waged on renters of older property because their replacements can simply pay more money.

We take this gap for granted in some respects. Walking the streets of Williamsburg, it's easy to find oneself with loathing for the folks on their iPhones, and to a certain extent self-loathing when you reach into your own pocket to dial a friend for drinks at SuperCore, and of course a complete inability to bridge a gap between yourself and the construction worker. I call Williamsburg and the rest of Manhattan LaLaLandddia: the proximity of people does not prevent them from living in their own la-la-lands. The middle to upper middle classes have their money, their drugs, their stuff, while the poor have their language, their debt, their often confusing plights.

On Chrsitmas Eve I walk into my corner bodega to get some beers for dinner. I recognize most of the guys by now, but sometimes I see men I've never seen before working in the back stacking boxes, refilling the fridges. A guy with rasta hair and a boricua accent once sold me an old 8mm film camera next to the beer fridges; he had two boxes full of them, $5 each. A part of me on this night wants to be part of their ever-expanding world, to greet the old men, to call out Feliz Navidad! but instead I go to the back to select my beers. Shortly after a bald man with construction boots and a green toned flannel walks in and greets everyone in front of the TV and behind the counter in Spanish. One of the older men by the TV responds, to which he laughs and says--"There's nothing but silence outside! Back home people would be out, there would be music, people would be dancing. And here...?" Someone reiterates the silence.

Back home must be the Dominican Republic; the store has a little flag here and there, fotos of vacations taken in their home country. I wonder about the silence outside as I leave the bodega. It's true that in Mexico Christmas Eve wouldn't be the near deathly silence that we have on Bedford Ave. Christmas day is even worse. People stay inside playing with their new gadgets, their toys, their crap. Walks on Christmas day are certainly peaceful, but hardly joyous. I wonder about Christmas in LaLaLanddia, what money does to the spirit. I wish I was somewhere else.

Cross Hatch Tortilla Mix

2007-12-22T12:04:00.000-08:00

…∆ ∞ º

•™ ∞ bvtte

Re:ª
Semblance™
¡Fit Form!

workers in a tortilla factory

Film by Peru Ana Ana Peru

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Now playing: Immortal Technique - Track17
via FoxyTunes

iluminaciones

2007-12-14T12:44:00.000-08:00

Cyber Encuentro Aztlan-AmericanMastersP

Still tired from shooting/interviewing people of Gridley about el Dia de la Virgen Guadalupe, messages from cyberspace gifted to May 1st, 2006 fotos. Poetry + Politics + MysteryFlickrComments.

americanmastersp: ¡Quiubo Raza!

View Iluminación luiseño's map

Taken in (See more photos here)

Comments

americanmastersp says:

"CONDENAREMOS A LOS INDIOS A CAMPOS DE CONCENTRACIÓN MODERNOS, LOS MONITOREAREMOS
TRABAJARAN COMO SIRVIENTES, SUS INGRESOS SERAN MINIMOS Y CUANDO EXIJAN DERECHOS LOS DEPORTAREMOS"
USA2007

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Now playing: Aphex Twin - jynweythek
via FoxyTunes

12 de Diciembre, Dia de la Virgen Guadalupe 2007

2007-12-12T16:35:00.000-08:00

Palermo

Gridley

Luiseño 12 de Diciembre ReMix

2007-12-11T11:41:00.000-08:00

¡Que Viva El Campo!

The Mysterious Finding of DJ Daniel Torres

DJ Daniel Torres had been in hiding—lost in a forest, he tells me. Take us with you, I say. It’s a one-man journey, he responds. Maybe we’ll cross paths. Daniel laughed loudly.

Jem Farms

5pm Mass

As I'm researching the Dia de la Virgen Guadalupe, these things stick out at me:

"...the Mexican people, after more than two centuries of experiments, have faith only in the Virgin of Guadalupe and the National Lottery"-Octavio Paz -quote from Wikipedia

---and that as we document this mass, in Gridley, CA, with Mexicanos who have been here in varying amounts of time--from newcomers to many families who have been here for years--it is certain that the influence of central americans, latinos, and whatever other label we can come up with, is imminent, inevitable. In fact, it's happening now; we are in transition. The United States is being changed by Latinos, Hispanos, Latin Americans [your substitution here].

-tony in Gridley

Luiseno+Moda Musica

2007-12-05T11:48:00.000-08:00

Being Multi-Faceted:

Ricquardo has just uploaded some tracks of his to lastFM. Indeed, they are original illbient-minimal-nuevo-progressive-for-the-Nu-Generation type tracks. I was there more in spirit when he was putting them together, so it's only right for me to try to bring some light to them.

Here's one of the tracks

Luiseno Moda – Nostrand Ave

I played the tracks at a party...and the transition to Luseño Moda Musica was smooth like flags in a gentile, seafaring breeze.

Music! Spirit! Luiseño! Away

http://www.last.fm/music/Luiseno+Moda

-TonyTones

In Argentina, a Museum Unveils a Long-Frozen Maiden

2007-09-11T08:31:00.000-07:00

All I know is that I've gotta get down to Peru/Chile/Argentina, to Latin America in general. Check out this article on the unveiling of the long frozen maiden, the boy and the girl of lightning.

Radio Luiseño at KZFR hosted by Frankenstein

2007-09-01T08:19:00.000-07:00

We’re sitting at 90.1 KZFR in Chico, CA, about to go on the air with one of our mixes.
A quick checklist:

Turntables (3): Check (thanks to KZFR, plus one that we brought).
Mixer, check.
Laptops (2): Check.
Cables (after 2 trips to Wal-Mart), check.
Youtube Samples: Check.
Myspace bulletin: Check!! *

DJ Danny T has hella experience in front of crowds, but I believe this is his first time on the air. He’s all giddy. I’ve got a crazy head-ache. It’s been 104 all day!—and I didn’t drink enough water. How the hell am I supposed to make it to Aztlan with a melting brain?

Danny and Ricardo have it under control though, I’m going to chill with our host Frankenstein, who is being kind enough to be supervise our little session.

Frankenstein, every Friday night, from mid-nite to 2am or so, is always serving his people here at community radio station KZFR 90.1. His show is called Mid-Nite Melody, check out the myspace.

Frankenstein comes on right after DJ Smiley’s Cultural Roots of Aztlan starting at 10pm. This block, from 10pm to 2am—is the only place to hear the baddest mix of real old school jams, Mexican hip-hop, and of course music of our cultural roots, the people of Aztlan.

*just kidding. I didn’t have the wherewithal to post one.

Memories of a Newspaper Article I Read Earlier Today

2007-08-25T20:07:00.000-07:00

A woman hurriedly leaves her trailer-park home at midnight. She had been playing cards with friends. She speeds off in her old Ford Thunderbird. Good night, Irene, says her neighbor. Not a good man, a knife couldn’t cut him. He stays behind while she wires money to her daughter.

She made a phone call. She sent the money--or did she--to her daughter.

The turn at the bend in the road sent her Falcon into the telephone pole. Now there is no mother to send money to the family, even though she was playing cards.

Revenge Dream

2007-08-18T08:01:00.000-07:00

Characters:
-Myself and a Friend—Not specified.
-Another Couple—a man and woman, both about my age, in a relationship. In the dream, we know them both, though for whatever reason we have more of an affinity to the girl.
-A Young Boy
-Leftist Rebel "Terrorists"

The dream opens in a forest. Beautiful, idyllic. Near a lake. Large trees, with space allowing sunlight. We are in an alcove. The man has hung his partner, the woman; she's hanging from a tree with a noose around her neck. He is telling us, with gusto, that he hung her recently. He smiles and chuckles as he tells us. My friend and I look at each other. We imagine her hanging from a high branch, she is wearing a long skirt, her feet are at least 6 feet above our heads. We liked the girl, she was a good person that did not deserve this type of death.

Time passes. A couple of days. We return to the alcove knowing the man will be there. We murder him. We tie him up and hang him. It is quick. There is little struggle. We do it without hesitation. He hangs in the same way she did, the way we imagined her in our minds.

Time passes. A young boy is telling us about the body, describing its leathery disintegration. My friend and I look at each other, and begin to wonder if we should have killed him. We ask the boy to lead us to the body, pretending we do not know where it is. It is bluish and leathery, emaciated. We experience no regret.

I leave the site. I am more concerned about being caught than anything else. I am in a restaurant that is situated on a boat. It’s a fancy restaurant, somehow I enter through the back, as if I never boarded the ship. I get poor service, I am alone.

A group dressed in dark military gear threaten to over-run the ship. I feel that they’re looking for me the first time they try to get in, but then I realize they are terrorists, and they are taking over the ship.

Meta(l) Thrash

2007-08-07T21:59:00.000-07:00

The Village Voice is presently running an article on the "comeback" of metal thrash led by Latino bands from California and Central/South America. It's a mildly interesting article, but it doesn't really pick up on a much more interesting topic, namely the political bent of many of these bands. Instead, the article idealizes the "original" thrash metal scene, led by bands like Megadeth and Slayer (recognizing, of course, that while Slayer's lead members are Cuban and Chilean, it is historically the mainstream white audiences that popularized them). In idealizing this original, American-based scene, it relegates the Latino Thrash/Punk/Metal scene to a regurgitation of mainstream, "white" culture, while anyone who has heard some of these bands knows they are also hell-bent on different agendas.

The band they feature, Fuled By Fire, is non-political if you check out their myspace. They don't seem too concerned with the borders, Indigenous Rights, or the Zapatistas. In theory, they're participating in some larger Thrash scene that doesn't pay attention to your skin color, or what you're thrashing about. It's the re-emergence of a "pure" Thrash. The article goes on to quote Latino band-members saying things like "'...But to tell you the truth, we don't really know why thrash is so popular with Latinos. We never really think about race when it comes to thrash, but we have noticed that there are a lot of Latinos in the thrash scene.'" And later: "'I don't think that race/ethnicity have something to do with this...Don't matter what is your race, [but] how much metal you have in your blood.'" In this mode, Thrash/Metal/Punk music is oblivious to where you are born, and thrashing has nothing to do with anything except, well, thrashing. Thrash becomes an elevated, universal concept, which people of any culture can take part in.

This may be true. Thrash Metal rocks!!!, afterall. But let's not overlook the fact that there is a Latino Thrash/Metal/Punk scene, and that there may be very concrete reasons for its existence. The article hints at these reasons, quoting Luis Jorge Saldarriaga of Bogota, Colombia's Death Hunter--"I think the interest comes from feelings of rage, and also unhappiness about certain things occurring in our countries that lead us to look for an aggressive type of music that we can identify ourselves with, and expresses something similar to what we feel..." The article doesn't follow up on this, however, and instead focuses on Latino bands' attempts to "revive" the good old days of the scene, making sure the entity of Thrash doesn't die out.

But there are reasons that Latinos identify with and re-create the Thrash/Metal/Punk scene.
Check for instance these bands-- MasAcrE, La Grita, and Eskapo, three Northern California bands not only doing their part in keeping the scene alive, but continuing another very important historical thread of political music. Connect to any of them and you'll see that they connect to other bands equally as political, many or most of them Latino Thrash/Metal/Punk bands. And let's not forget to look at their politics: Leftist, Anarchist, all for extreme change, expressing deep rage at the world. We listen to them not only because they rock, but because their music is driven by purpose.

The Latinos quoted in the Village Voice article may be interested in keeping the old "scene" alive, and may not have political lyrics. But their rage remains, their metal blood still boils. Thrash is inherently about expressing rage. Whether they realize it or not, they too are political.

-Juan Cicada

news flash:

2007-08-07T13:09:00.000-07:00

.................. HBO FILMS to begin filming in Gridley this October. ! According to C. Barajas an old friend since back in the El Campo days tells Luiseño this morning that his brother Jesse, Gridley High School Counselor and local soccer Coach was contacted from New York about the issue facing a lot of the soccer players in the leagues. Apparently the teams from Gridley, Orland and Yuba City have been doing very well for the last few years, yet no college scouts have come to visit or at least are reluctant to visit because of the fact that a high percentage of the players are undocumented.

More to follow.

Another documentary project being filmed around Gridleyland. HBO, exciting. !

Assimilation, Branding, Lynx

2007-08-06T00:27:00.001-07:00

Since our inception, I haven't been able to "wrap my head around," or "put my finger" on one of our many "raisons d'etres" as an artist collective, until we recently put together an artist statement for EnFoco. We struggle to give context to many issues, and one of them is a term i learned way back in high school, when I spent a summer at UC Berkeley (at an Upward Bound Math/Science summer-session): assimilation.

Sometimes I question my own voice, my own relevance in this project. Shouldn't some "newly arrived" kid from Puebla be fighting for for our culture? Shouldn't he/she Belwether? At least he/she could do it in Spanish! Me, I have to revert to cliches of the English language!! (see quoted expressions above).

But in the end, I figure that Cultural Resistance has no formula. We stay true to ourselves, and the just fight continues.

Article in Today's NYTimes Magazine.

-Don Quezada

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Now playing: tim hecker - shipyards of la ceiba
via FoxyTunes

Our Town

2007-08-05T07:55:00.000-07:00

An interesting article from NYTimes Mag profiling the effects of anti-immigrant business policies in a small town.

latino house djs in outer-space

2007-07-27T15:07:00.000-07:00

inspired by the music of casino versus japan, i accidentally click on tabs, open programs, try to ignore myspace, relentlessly log in to flickr, pointing and clicking....

the r. part of luiseño: i find my self inside a barn everyday, mixing music and sharing dreams with people of the west. construction of a new, dare i say second Luiseño Studio begins tonight. within days, our space continues to expand, this time with a mega sound system, five turntables, laptops and 2 million records.

my time is short in this green valley. driving back roads once again, long and drawn out sunsets filter into my afternoons, late at night i think about producing beats and finding more latinos in the mix. both are a struggle, yet a few breakthroughs are made.

Artist Statement

2007-07-15T07:45:00.000-07:00

Artist Statement

"Will we be able to speak when it matters most?"
-dream

Luiseño: Cronicas de Comunidad

Adios Gridley, CA
Chapter 1:
Nuevo Ideal, Huejuquilla, MX
Belwether
Nueva York, Guadalajara

There is, on the on hand, the vision of a Central American man in the desert looking North, toward the green lights: his future. Sweat leaks from his arms and neck. He imagines crossing the border, the dream is in fast-forward: the work, the Church, the family, the racism, the confusion, the assimilation, the loss, the money, the lowriders, the white, the brown, the yellow, the success.

Years into this future, there is, on the other hand, his children, now looking South.

We are his children, his return, his venganza.

* * * * * * * * *

As the progeny of dreamers, we continue a mission, we pick up a legacy. We bear the responsibility to the dreams of our parents, the collective dream of a better life, that mythical land, perhaps of a Nuevo Aztlan.

Or, we can’t help but wonder, are we destined to become Nuevos Ricos?

* * * * * * * * * *

As children, we didn't get to many weddings, we stayed at home and listened to music, watched TV, ignored the future. The few weddings that we did go to were mostly close family--brothers, sisters, they were the best times. We love the extended family, the children always look smooth. Our friends don't really care.

Somewhere along the way, however, well beyond the Western phase of teenage ‘rebellion,’ we began to ask, "What are we doing here? Why are we here? We've got all this stuff, but at what cost?”

* * * * * * * * *

Our souls, fortunately or not, have been educated. We’re bilingual (especially if you count Espanglish). We read books in English that affect our lives. Corridos speak to us too. We are from El Campo, East San Jose, Mexican cities and towns in the USA. Our older brothers and sisters own homes in California and drive large cars. We reach out to our cousins down South, they enlighten us with stumbled conversation. We look at myspace and want iPhones; the slightly younger are excited by Harry Potter.

We notice that some Latinos—the happy box-checkers—just want to be around that monstrous, corporate-consumer culture we call “whiteness.” Other Latinos, however, do not want to enter that world: the rockeros, the skaters, the punks, and we can never forget the gang-bangers, who were once neighbors, and are now warriors against assimilation. Just like the O.G.’s before them, and the Pachucos before them.

Are we allowed to add a category? Forgive us, but the Latino Artist also falls into the latter category, the one with the gangsters, in solidarity in the battle against assimilation. Years later, we hope, there will be a corrido about the People of the Left, who just wanted to share, and who had to fight a war in order to share.

But what does this battle ‘against assimilation’ mean? And aren’t the Mexican skater-rockeros re-enacting a decidedly American creation of culture (albeit with, some would say, much better style)? Aren’t artists also sell-outs? How do we figure it all out? Where is our core?

Luiseño tries to get at the culture jam of Latino experience, attitudes, modes of existence/survival. Luiseño tries to grasp the effects of globalization; one trajectory will certainly lead us to more work within Mexico, Guatemala, Bolivia, the rest of Latino America—the world? Luiseño is community-based media creation: youth media, community documentation, community work. Luiseño's primary mode of exhibition is the internet: it means deciding what photos are family, friends or public. As artists, we try to explain that we are just as fragile as the cannery worker, the delivery boy. What can he/she be thinking? We have to ask because we think we can feel it.

Pemex Explosions in Mexico

2007-07-12T07:47:00.000-07:00

Gas pipeline explosions today in Mexico. Revolutionaries fighting Pemex. Heavy.

Western Folklife Center

2007-07-06T07:42:00.000-07:00

At some point, we WILL visit the Western Folklife Center.

Raza Cósmica

2007-07-02T07:37:00.000-07:00

from....

I Am Joaquin
by Rodolfo Corky Gonzales

Yo soy Joaquín,
perdido en un mundo de confusión:

I am Joaquín, lost in a world of confusion,
caught up in the whirl of a gringo society,
confused by the rules, scorned by attitudes,
suppressed by manipulation, and destroyed by modern society.
My fathers have lost the economic battle
and won the struggle of cultural survival.
And now! I must choose between the paradox of
victory of the spirit, despite physical hunger,
or to exist in the grasp of American social neurosis,
sterilization of the soul and a full stomach.
Yes, I have come a long way to nowhere,
unwillingly dragged by that monstrous, technical,
industrial giant called Progress and Anglo success....

Media Against the Chinatown Express

2007-06-06T06:39:00.000-07:00

A Chinatown bus flips, injuring 34 people on September 5, 2006. An article on the safety of the Chinatown bus lines is subsequently published later that month in the Washington Post. On May 20 of this year, an NYC bound bus crashed, killing two people and injuring 32.

The Washington Post talks about the language barrier. Are drivers competent, the article asks, do they speak English well enough to read signs and help out in an emergency.

Let's imagine a scenario:
A Fung-Wah bus driver tips over a bus. He is relatively unhurt—he is able to call for help, knowing that he may have injured people on his bus. But let's assume that he doesn't know much English, that he speaks Cantonese everyday. Does a person who doesn't know English in the US stand by his bus and wait for people who "understand" to make all the phone calls, the attempts for help? Is he devoid of awareness--there has been an accident, people are hurt--is he devoid of compassion?

The article seems to fall on the side of saying that the man with no understanding of English is incompetent and also does not have the ability--the humanity?--to seek out help.

2007-05-23T21:56:00.000-07:00

2007-05-22T18:55:00.000-07:00

blogtime hiatus.

2007-05-22T18:49:00.000-07:00

Website redesign.

Hi. Luiseño is now back after a nice sabatical from blogging. However, back-dated posts will begin poping up here and there.

Maxim

2007-02-10T06:31:00.000-08:00

At the gym in Williamsburg, Brooklyn.

A flyer has been put announcing their masseuse is moving to the "Riviera Maya." Someone has hand written a correction, scrawling in pencil, "Mayan Riviera." Book a session with her now before she’s gone! says the flyer.

Below there’s a picture of a fit woman on the beach looking out onto the sea, her back to us. She's not wearing a top; she is ostensibly the masseuse leaving the gym. Another woman, more dressed, plumper, ostensibly Mexican, brushes the sand off her lower body.

Maxim promotes people who pay to have their asses wiped

2007-01-19T22:26:00.000-08:00

r£uñîºn

2007-01-13T18:56:00.000-08:00

Working With the Pearson Foundation, who do i represent?

2007-01-13T06:17:00.000-08:00

Have been working with the Pearson Foundation since returning to NY.

One class is taught by a mousy caucasian girl with glasses, soft-spoken. In the class are two boys making a narrative revolving around their coming to the United States from the Caribbean. I recorded one boy’s voiceover, from Antigua which he pronounces An-Ti-Ga. His narrative revolves around the events shortly before his plane leaves. His partner, also from the West Indies, also has a narrative revolving around the day he came to the US. They have the most interesting stories, though it's so hard for them to express themsleves.

The rest of the students are writing personal narratives revolving around what they like to do, what music they like, what clothes they wear. Some students write about their neighborhoods—“we represent Bedstuy to the fullest, even though we moved to Canarsie, so it’s just straight Brooklyn we represent." Many of them are Jamaican or from Caribbean islands in general.

As if universal, the need to represent who you are, where you come from, prevails in the projects we are making.

2007-01-05T13:06:00.000-08:00

flinting w/ sufjan

the factory

2007-01-05T12:35:00.000-08:00

Please God, forgive us for not posting to this blog for two months. we promise we have been very busy tending to your flock....

as you can tell, Mexico took over our senses, although we had internet access throughout our, the overall power of the culture gave us little time to collectively look away just for one second to relay the subtle changes in light, the great food, los primos y primas.... tios and tias,. so this piece of internet history will remain silent forever. maybe.

the news is as follows:

* Luiseño Films has mutated into the Luiseño Artists Colllective, the focus remains the same, we just wanted to bring light to any other artists that we meet who share our vision of community expression.

*The Luiseño Artists Collective is now comprised of members from the following communities: Gridley, CA; New York, NY; Huejuquilla el Alto, JAL, MX; Guadalajara, JAL, MX; Zacatecas, ZAC, MX; San Jose, CA; Chico, CA; Oroville, CA; and Biggs, CA.

* The Luiseño Artists Collective, held its first exhibition in the North Valley. December 31st, 2006.

*Luiseño will be working in NYC for the next few months teaching video and filmmaking skills to public school students through the city.

*A film festival is in the works for community radio KZFR in chico, the theme will be building community via the independent media.

*Two mural projects are in the works for the Gridley California community, the first is already underway and has being initiated by Youth First of Gridley, the second will be proposed by the Luiseño Artists Collective in the next few months.

*Music.

* General Happiness.

Reflections/Thoughts of Beginnings

2007-01-01T06:13:00.000-08:00

Toward future engagements, the day after our “inaugural exhibition” to the Gridley community.

I fiddle with normal things on my computer—the nytimes, Zapatista updates, music, my writing (this very document). I glimpse the photographs from yesterday. Another day documented, the beginning of an engagement with the community.

I think about yesterday’s events, I think about all the people we saw.

I slept from 7pm to 10:30 in the morning! Slept right through the New Year’s countdown.

Youth Group students took pictures of themselves lying on the ground like roadkill, good pictures.

My mom made posole.

First Gridley Exhibition

2006-12-31T06:09:00.000-08:00

THE LUISEÑO ARTIST COLLECTIVE
Presents

Chapter 1:
NUEVO IDEAL

Photography, Video, y Radio
of
Gridley, CA, New York, NY USA Huejuquilla, Guadalajara JAL. MX

May 1st, 2006-December 31st, 2006

Born in Gridley, CA, the Luiseño Artist Collective is dedicated to supporting the arts in the communities it serves.

Nuevo Ideal marks Luiseño’s first engagement with the Gridley community. In this inaugural exhibition, artists featured are the Sacred Heart Youth Group, Shannon Bowers, Ricardo Ramirez and Tony Gannon, all of whom are Gridley locals.

Photos and video result from months of documentation in the Gridley area and during visits to New York City, Huejuquilla, Jal. MX, and Guadalajara, Jal. MX. The Luiseño Artist Collective is always seeking contributors from these regions and beyond.

The Luiseño Artist Collective will continue to seek out local voices deserving recognition. In fact, Luiseño hopes that this is the first of many regular exhibitions within the community.

Luiseño is presently seeking donors who support building community through art.

Please contact Luiseño at:
contact@luisenofilms.com
www.luisenofilms.com

The Myth of the Petroglyph, or the Petrified Revolutionary

2006-12-24T05:57:00.000-08:00

We are in Africa. We are on a journey to observe the causes of hunger in Africa. We visit farmers, we talk with them. We are in an area that is rural yet connected to a Metropolis nearby. It is called Juarez, and it is, in my mind, the future Juarez, Mexico, where people fight for justice, where noble people are prevailing against corruption.

I am there with my family, friends, former co-workers. We are meeting farmers, chefs. Amidst our visit, wind of a letter from arises. Young Tim Farrell mentions the letter, claiming “it’s pretty good, it may work.” I am curious and search out the letter; sitting in an idyllic pasture amongst the misty crags of a sierra where farmers receive assistance to grow their primary crops, I read the letter

It reads:

We seek out people who may be interested. We seek out the best of them. [Image of two men shouldering a tree, lifting]. We must raise money amongst ourselves—say $1000 dollars, and we give it to the chosen farmers. They use the money for the benefit of their crops, to farm unimpeded…

The money is not to be reported, its existence is to remain a secret between us and the chosen farmers. When the farmer succeeds (and he will succeed), we return next season and do it again. The success of the farmer puts him in a position to receive official aid, vast quantities of money. Our money serves him underground, but it’s for a worthy cause, namely to help his people.

I am reading the letter accompanied by imagery, as though the events had already been documented. As I read the letter I have a notion of the perfect farmer to begin the project.

The letter is hopeful, full of ambition, idealism.

The letter continues:

When the time comes, the country will be in a position for revolution.
Based on our efforts, we will be cultivating a revolutionary contingency of people, not only loyal to us because of the funding we will provide, but loyal to ideals, since the first man will be a man of ideals. When the time comes, children will be schooled in the ways of the revolutionary…

I stop reading the letter here. I look up and look at the rolling meadows, the mist setting on the mountain ranges. An image of a boy learning methods of farming that would replace current ones. An image of the words: hegemony replacing hegemony. This is the text the boy is reading, and I no longer want to read the letter.

What does it benefit us to have a revolution if the children are brainwashed from such an early age?

This is the myth of the petrified revolutionary:

The revolutionary was working to save his people. Money would arrive and he would put it in the cookie jar. Everyday he would put his hand in the cookie jar, to drop money off. Or so people thought. It came to the attention of the people that he may be taking money out as he puts the money in, or perhaps he was only pretending to put the money in, and removing his hand with the money intended for the people, or perhaps more. So they came to observe him, a man in a kitchen, allegedly putting his hand in the cookie jar for the benefit of his people. The revolutionary stuck his hand in the cookie jar, only to freeze there, his face looking out at the people he claimed to have been serving, a look on his face that told the people neither what they wanted nor what they feared.

And that is the myth of the petrified revolutionary.

As our visit continues, the makings of the letter become more widespread. A white woman whom everyone adores becomes a target of the letter-writers. She is sought after because she is a great chef and has a wonderful personality on top of that. She has carisma.

She is cooking something one day as she is accosted by two of the letter-writers. At first she politely rebukes their advances, but finally blurts out “I will not be your hero, I’m not even African!” As she is saying this, one hand is balancing a large pot while the other is stirring. An image of a man sticking his hands in a cookie jar, his hand stuck, his body frozen. The image comes to me because she is in exactly the same position. “Let me tell you a story,” she says, “of the petrified revolutionary.”

Huejuquilla and the Global Economy

2006-12-13T11:51:00.000-08:00

A man comes to town from his ranch. He makes pottery and sells his work at the weekly market. Once or twice a year a Norteño couple comes down, a married couple, the woman with orders to fill Texas houses with his pottery. He makes good money off these orders alone. He talks about not having electricity a few years back, about his efforts to have electrical lines installed, as well as a road.

On one of our last days in Huejuquilla we meet a man who installs solar plates on homes outside of the electrical grids. These are largely for Huichol indians; he can’t quite install a system to power a refrigerator, but for a television, a computer, home appliances, it is possible. He talks about how much this benefits the people--Huicholes using the internet to connect to people in the US. I wonder how it’s possible to get internet where they live if there are no phone lines, much less fiber-optic cable.

The obvious benefits of solar electricity aside, there is a question here, a broader question. It's the question of progress--Is this it?—electricity, a telephone line, fiber-optic cable for the Huichol Indians? Not unlike the vision presented by Microsoft in their commercials, a diverse world, enacting their dreams, participating in the global economy, on their terms. Cut to a beautiful shot of a monk somewhere in China on a computer, a business transaction in the morning before getting down to the real work of being…spiritual. Is this the future, the indigenous people winning back autonomy by joining the global economy?

2006-12-12T11:47:00.000-08:00

La Batalla del Pueblo

2006-12-06T23:39:00.000-08:00

We went to la Señora's rancho today. 'Cardo’s mother is hesitant to get out of the car at first, but we finally convince her. Later I learn she hasn’t been back to the rancho in 20 years.

Here is the deep well that once had water. Here are the steps Chato used to play on. Here was the casa de las gallinas. Irma wants a shot of a cross on a hill. It’s so far away, I try to hide my disappointment in the ability of my lens, but I take the picture anyway.

We leave the ranch and head toward the capilla. We stop along the way to take a picture of the school, La Batalla del Pueblo. We see two kids who we’d seen on a previous visit. At the capilla, we decorate the cross with a tinsel string boa, the kind one sees on Christmas trees. The cross is already decked out in an elegant white fabric that looks like the fabric of a wedding dress. Someone else has placed 4 mirrors on the cross and flowers. Lupe explains that people decorate the cross to try to outdo other ranchos. She looks into a Jesus statue’s eyes and coos in adoration; she loves Jesus. The three women decide to recite a rosary while we wait outside.

At the end of their prayer they sing and it’s beautiful. Ricardo and I are miles away, even though we're right outside.

I wonder about the land, who it’s belonged to. Who died over this property? How close by do the Huicholes live?

At night, the windows of our bedroom are directly adjacent to the sidewalk. Footsteps and clear voices pass the house at night. A group of Huichol musicians pass by, a car blasting banda music, drunken revelers. A truckload of cars with drunken young men. I heard celebratory screams deep into the night last night, distant yelps and whistling.

Huexuquilla

2006-12-05T23:13:00.000-08:00

Talking on the phone with Hong, Pancho rides up on his bicycle. He’s in his 30’s, a good looking guy with a thick mustache. He came over to the house the first night we arrived with a present for Don Adolfo. He told me he spent a couple years in Las Vegas doing chrome on cars (I imagined him working on lowriders, but that's just me). He’s got two kids, a wife: he's settled down. One night, I ask him if he's going out to the dance. He chuckles, and says, no, I don't dance anymore. He's got two boys, adorable, happy. There's something that tells me he used to by quite the dancer. He sees I'm busy on the phone and says he'll be around.

Hong tells me she’s applied for a job within HBO Latino, and all I can think about is that the capitalist agenda of HBO doesn’t necessarily fight the exploitation of the Latino community.
A man rides by on a horse. A kid walks by whistling, Hong asks me if it’s me. I get off the phone and make my way to Pancho over at the farmacia. I tell him about my girlfriend, that she's Korean. He tells me to bring her here to Huejuquilla.

I sometimes get the impression that everything is perfect in Huejuquilla. People work, they talk and seem content. I don’t see too much poverty—some Huicholes sleeping in the town square, a man asking for cans. I'm sure there's poverty...but people seem so much happier here. They don't seem discontent, they don't seem to be tortured by everyday life...

But am I not experiencing the town through some grotesque prism? I’m an outsider, people know that I didn’t grow up here, I'm treated differently. It occurs to me that I am, in many ways, still a tourist.

An Evening in Huejuquilla

2006-12-04T10:55:00.000-08:00

Leave the house to go the cyber-cafe to check email. Stop and talk to the dude outside of El Nene, a tiendita that sells music, dvds, car stereos, miscellaneous electronics. Talk for a minute, tells us that too much technology isn’t good for you. A friend of El Nene rolls by and gets out of his car. Talk for a minute more. Leave, round the corner and stop at the family farmacia. Cardo’s father is there, we chat for a minute. Go next door with the intention of stopping at the cyber-café, which turns out to be full. The lady next door, distantly related to 'Cardo, stops to talk to us. Asks us how we’ve liked our stay so far, what we've seen. We tell her about Huejuquilla, Guadalajara. She recommends a natural thermal spring outside of Huejuquilla. She also tends an art gallery right next door to the cyber-cafe, which she opens for us and shows us. Say goodnight and head to the public internet café, run by the pueblo, or the government. Check email, but they’re about to close. Manage to finish right before. Outside we look at our options for stores to buy some cigarettes. I want a beer so we go to the liquor-store nearby. We’ve been there before, and the man there asks us how we’ve liked Huejuquilla so far. He tells us he’s been to the USA, that he’s retired now. He worked for years in San Jose before it turned into Silicon Valley. He knows Chico, Lodi--even Gridley. We tell him we’ll be back to pick up a couple of bottles of tequila. Outside Cardo spots the man with the laptop he’s seen around town. It turns out he’s the engineer doing work with 'Cardo’s father on his property. We talk for a minute about the laptop, his work, etc. We leave, go across the plaza to the other convenience store, but they don’t have the kind of cigarettes i want. We head back toward the house, stop at the farmacia again. Maria is there with her father, along with Betty and Norma and Tia Goya. We say goodnight. We drink a beer outside of the house. Ricardo’s father walks up with someone. He's tall and lanky, has a family in Huejuquilla, but used to work in Gridley, thousands of miles away. He talks to us for a bit about working in the United States, throws out some English words. We say goodnight.

It's late!

Additional Notes on the Subject of La Perrada

2006-11-29T21:06:00.000-08:00

I ask my cousin Karen about this expression, la perrada. I want to know how much it’s used by people, if it’s considered offensive. Its meaning: People – Gente – The Masses – The Herd – Common Folks – The Rabble – and more literally -- Dogs.

Despite it's being potentially offensive, i latch onto the word. The movie Amores Perros comes to mind, the opening dog-fight amidst an expanding urban existence. We get what we can take, even if its the scraps.

Guadalajara has been expanding dramatically in the last 30 years. The city where my father met my father, once the city of roses, is now over-crowded with people from the country. How many of these recent arrivals contemplated heading al norte, and how many have relatives in Los Angeles, or Idaho, or Virginia? My cousin Tako talks about the city's over-crowding as we pass through a neighborhood that's cropped up in the past 10 years. "Aqui es pura perrada." Families walk the streets, take their dinners at taco stands. Women sit outside their doors. The houses are close together, many of them joined.

I can't process this herd of people sometimes, the urban organization of people into struggling consumers. I'm greatful to be at the heights of Tonalá.

!Estoy en la Chamba!

2006-11-27T20:59:00.000-08:00

We're driving through the streets of Guadalajara, Mexico with my cousin Taquin. Men and women approach the car selling fruit, water, candy. Ricardo takes a picture of a man selling large calculators. Later, also with Taquin, we get a card with a girl on it wearing a bathing suit, a phone number. We turn our heads to a performer walking on his hands. Check it out, Cardo says. Tako was tired and grouchy. “Pues asi lo hacen aca,” he says, “para el dinero.”

The slang for "hustle," we learn soon enough, is "chamba." It's not exactly a verb, though one can say, "estoy chambiando." I prefer using it as if it were an all-enveloping mode of existence--"estoy en la chamba" (literally: i'm in work).

Making money in Mexico seems more honest, somehow.

Mexicanos Unidos

2006-11-21T20:46:00.000-08:00

Mexicans: tall, short, lanky, bearded, dark, blond, squat, skinny, wavy, pudgy, fit. How many times have i gotten the "you're Mexican?" Mostly it comes from people who have a notion of what Mexicans look like from the Mexicans they encounter--in New York, they're from Puebla, so they have a certain set of characteristics they've maintained from their indigenous ancestors. Yet the Homies, a Northern California pop-cultural creation based on Mexican stereotypes (or should i say archetypes?) , look generally pretty different than the people of Puebla.

Class divisions are strong in Mexico. In the US we have the luxury of forgetting this, realizing it's a much more powerful tool to unite with all Mexicanos--and Central and Latin Americans, and the oppressed black populations, and the Hmong people of Northern California, and hell, why not even some disenfranchised white folks while we're at it? But in Mexico, it's back to that old racist shit: the lighter one is, the more likely it is you're simply not living in poverty. Just look at the soap operas.

Dia de la Revolucion, o la Perrada

2006-11-20T20:30:00.000-08:00

Of all places to go on November 20th, I end up at Zapo-Poom, a "carnival" organized, seemingly, by a group of investors, corporations, or both. The whole experience is marked by the crisp white tents housing "exhibits," markets, restaurants, small dance venues: a showroom for new Dodge trucks, a room containing miniature models of Mexico's biggest tourist sites, a Chivas exhibit showcasing the new stadium still in the works, a "flea-market". A schedule of the nightly performers tells me i just missed Maria Daniela y su Sonido Laser the night before! It's Mexican culture enveloped, masked, by whiteness, and with the undeniable sense of making you want things. It's the whiteness of corporations: New!ness, Stability, Safety, Control.

When deciding where to eat, we have basically a couple of options--a row of tents down the carnival's main drag, featuring restaurants with outdoor seating, menus, waitstaff, etc, and a single large pavilion where you have a bunch of taco stands to order from. We choose the larger tent with various food stalls. “Vamonos aca, con la Perrada,” says my cousin Taquin.

Questions

2006-11-15T07:06:00.000-08:00

Here's a contrast: Mexico’s economic poverty and its cultural riqueza.

What causes an economy where a range of socio-economic classes--from the poverty stricken, to farmers to educated people---are forced to flee their country in search of better, paying work?

Specifically, what role does the United States play in creating poverty in Mexico?

How do Americans not see the importance of a stronger Mexico?

Why should we let corporations determine the quality of life in developing countries?

First Days of Huejuquilla

2006-11-14T06:25:00.000-08:00

We're fortunate to arrive just before the celebration of Huejuquilla's patron saint, San Diego. A perigrinacion makes its way through town, it's destination the iglesia. Dansantes perform in front of the church. The feathers and the cross, this is Mexico.

At night the town gathers around the town square. In the church courtyard: music, theater, atole. Later, the traditional fireworks. This is really the holiday season now--in a week is November 20, Dia de la Revolucion, a secular celebration of course, but a reason for the pueblo to come together nonetheless. Following that is the Dia de la Virgen Guadalupe, and then of course Christmas, New Year's, Dia de los Reyes...Did I miss one? In between there's no reason not to have carnivales and bailes.

This is an aspect of small town living that I long for in good old Gridley, California: the regular rhythms of town gatherings and celebrations--days of explosions set off by days of work and peace. Maybe I'm idealizing the life of a Mexican pueblo, but Gridley by contrast seems constantly on the verge of exploding, and everyday is an effort to repress this urge, to control one's self.

Is Gridley poised for a riot, you're asking? No--far from it, actually. Gridley is under control, and any notion of resistance is quickly diminished by the rapid passage of Time. Time passes in astonishing ways in the US: one goes to work, one ends his/her day, and then it seems there isn't much left but sleep or TV. Time in Mexico, meanwhile, seeps by, it comes and goes like families visiting. Sometimes time is their, and sometimes it's not. At 11pm one still feels it's early--an hour before bed is so much time! The next day begins early, and it's oh so far away.

vosotros

2006-11-12T12:09:00.000-08:00

mcmcmcmcmcmcmcmcmcmcmcmcmcmcmc donalds asta que bastan.

leaving the place, do not drink the water, watch for thieves, protect your cyber-family.

Huejuquilla

2006-11-12T11:41:00.000-08:00

freaking out, internet cafe. dial up. tacos de oro. rockeros donde estan. family fries. no more nothingness. 2 dollar and fifty cent lunch.
------------------------------------------------------------------
regardless.

Chihuahua MX.

2006-11-10T23:39:00.000-08:00

Honeywell, Coca-Cola, Lextor, Holiday INN.

driving/riding

2006-11-10T22:57:00.001-08:00

landscape of a travelling mind:

1) Confessions of an Economic Hitman, John Perkins
2) Elizabeth Costello, J.M. Coetzee
3) Don Quixote

Also, Oaxaca

El Paso feels like Mexico, but it's not. Getting into Mexico is no problem. Within Mexico: 1 military checkpoint, 2 casetas (tolls). Holiday Inn Express Chihahua however may as well be Holiday Inn Express Yuba City, CA.

election theater. upstairs, downstairs.

2006-11-07T15:46:00.000-08:00

did angelides really even try to defeat the andriod gov? besides the fact that i watch zero tv anymore, i still wonder how the democrats tried to reach me? i got some robo-calls last week. urging me to keep the california dream alive. but nothing about how the dream is actually a well kept gated community in the suburbs. angelidies, i realized your were a token canidate a long time ago – but if you are going claim representation for the middle-class and liberal minds, walk around the rural towns of northern california. at least try to give an option to the people i see everyday that might need some help from sacramento. don't just hang back and wait for the elections to be over so you can go back to the random political postion you have held for who knows how many years.

I voted purple.

2nd Mission Proposal

2006-11-07T15:21:00.000-08:00

Since the onslaught of information directed at spectators/audiences/consumers heightened it's rate of attack--arguably at the beginning of the 20th century--the notion of "community" has been changing. As if the age of mechanical reproduction did not affect the masses in never-before seen ways, memeplexic online communities are now as real as physical communities of human beings, if not more.

Fragmented self expression is a requirement to belong to these communities: name, location, interests, etc. People are connecting through any number of online communities, where they share music, photos, videos, often created by the members themselves. Meanwhile, entire websites are devoted to user generated content.

Luiseño Films is an alternative media-arts movent committed to building community, both physical and virtual.

flirting with danger USA

2006-11-07T03:17:00.000-08:00

Proposal For Mission Statement

2006-11-07T01:59:00.000-08:00

It is the year 2006 and the notion of community is beginning a sequential loop. It is both changing and remaining strong. We are in a time of primordial preservation as well as a youthful climate of change. Luiseño Films is an alternative media-arts movent dedicated to serving the memory of communities in a cyclical universe. Memetic Communication has propelled us into a dreamscape present, where justice and freedom reign.

Luiseño is committed to serving its communitities by providing a resource for creative expression on a community level.

2006-11-06T19:56:00.000-08:00

tiger mckenna is on the case today with some reports from the field:

1) explosions reported in Mexico city

2) Ortega headed for victory in Nicaragua

3)Oaxaca continues

ex ex ex's READ: I remember being at the Old Time Sacramento many New Years ago, with Peter Fonda, Juan Cicada and The Romainian Bank Robber.

2006-11-06T19:33:00.000-08:00

We waited and waited for the fireworks to rip throught the orange clouds. And Nothing.

Talking about Republicianism. Fireworks. RepublicianSIM. OAXACA.

2006-11-06T00:08:00.000-08:00

This Is How One Half Lives

2006-11-05T23:57:00.000-08:00

While the dutiful Sebastian Zargossa happily went about his work, bringing new friends into the fold, his alter ego Nigel K-FKA was in the bay-area, forcing observations from the other side, with that other half we must acknowledge, often live with, and especially, love. Here are some of Nigel's notes:

they(/we?) roil through life. roily f-ing polys. One big diahrrhea. a big burst PPPPHHHLLLLLaaaaaUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUrrrrrrtt in the middle:

http://www.fuh2.com/

they(/we?)speakEnglishgotocollegegetjobsStartpredatorylendingcompaniesthatkeep la gente del otro lado livingonthissideinpoverty,oppressionDriveBMWs...
and then its over: sss$$$ching. Retirement and Dia de los Muertos, if they(/we?) are lucky enough to be remembered.

award$$recogni$hn$ex
http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=10&ItemID=11328

So: rat-race-brown flushed-down into the neat sewer pipes of silicon valley
http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0691118469/ref=sib_dp_pt/104-9762342-7143945#reader-link

BUT! the blood comes through the pipes again: they(/we?) have children. and the children: beautiful brown, but what color's their blood?
hint:the color of their parents blue Hummer.
Martines, Rodriguess,. Box-checkers indeed, all of them, but how do they vote, and why are they racist.
who$ fault i$ it?
http://www.pocho.com/news/2000/gpbushexperiment/gpbushX080100.html
*********

Nigel also told of a dream where he and Seb are at the top of a giant bunk-bed party with about 15 other people. The bed falls 80 stories and crushes all of their cameras.
The outcome of the dream/what we can learn from it: 1) Nigel and Seb are completely unharmed 2) falling those 80 stories was quite fun 3) the girl throwing the party had insurance.

Sundays

2006-11-05T22:39:00.000-08:00

9:30 am. Why? Unlike Saturdays, Sundays always seemed to get away from me, homework, girls, family. ?
10:00 am Northbound Historic US 99, into Biggs. Richvalle. Nelson. Durham. Chico.
–
Butte County is breathing, the earth beneath it is blessed. Could everything be perfect?

El Corazon dise la verdad.

-

11:04 am KZFR Studios. Washington Quezada invited us to document his interview with Dr. Char Prieto, Professor of Foreign Languages and Literatures at Chico State. She and two of her students were on the air speaking about their project and work involving the history of Franco's Spain. They spoke of mass graves left over from the Spanish Civil War, oppression and the dangers of unconditional nationalism. After Hitler commited suicide, and Mussolini was executed and hung by the legs in Giulino di Mezzegra, Franco persisted for another 30 years, prolonging the pain and devastation as long as he could for his unwilling peoples. Off the air, while an unknown singer sung about Federico García Lorca, political parrallels hung silently in the crowded booth.

Afterwards, I spent the afternoon with the three Espanistas at the Pluto's nearby. As the time flew by, more and more people entered in and out of the scene. Talking about our ultimate desires and fears = Instant community. Built within mere minutes, random passers-by became friends and collaboraters.

Awareness.

Lou Reed having a salad in the background.

–

Chico, can you restrain yourself from the temptations of the evil yuppie?

:::!:~:

3:10 pm Southbound Historic US 99. Durham, Nelson, Richvalle, Biggs, Gridley. Birds. Baseball. Packing. Blogging.

Princeton, I promise to visit this week.

-Glue

Saturday

2006-11-04T20:24:00.000-08:00

I remember when Saturdays meant that I finally had time to wander around the valley, alone and happy. Books about Russian Lovers, View Cameras, the ORB, Grain Elevators, overcast skies and cheap gasoline. I spent most of my post high school years doing this, thinking it would go on like this forever and ever.
-
Driving towards Knights Landing–alone, brings back many great memories of my random visits and perpetual picture taking back in my early 20's. Now, as I drive south on Highway 113 I can look left and see the miracle of community and art in this small island town. Luiseno first encountered the work being done on the side of the Plug N' Jug gas station wall back in September, two women sat atop scaffolding working globs of paint into the primered surface. Even then, the mural was an amazing site. People and Place. In an otherwise lonely little town, colors shifted out from the surface, resonating the history of the sleepy hamlet. I received an email from Alyssa Nelson a while ago inviting us to grand celebration in honor of the artists and community that supported the mural's creation.

When I first arrived, I wondered if it was all a dream. The whole thing, did September 2006 ever exist? Was I still 20 years old, dreaming of something like this in the next town I stumbled across... but it couldn't be. I was looking at the completed mural, more alive than I remembered. The shapes and figures within it, swaying back and forth. Colors shifting. Winter on the horizon, cold air and perfect grey skies one minute, breaks of light the next moment; sweat beading up on my forehead. All the while, videotaping... Trucks passing by.

At this point, my disappointment in missing the festivitess had been flashed out of existance and I was just happy to be in Knights Landing again, alone, Saturday.... As I panned the video camera south, a small procession began to appear. Slowly, it move quietly north towards the Mural. Dozens of people, children, neighbors, college students, artists, musicians, farmers, high school kids; everything into my camera. No longer dreaming I stayed still. Eventually, as the crowd grew thicker and thicker, the drumming began.

Saturday, will you marry me?

Los Nuevos Ricos

2006-11-03T23:54:00.000-08:00

On the air, in the place. Thank You Emobos for letting us do whatever we wanted live on the air. We had fun and were glad to do our first on the air live Zelbond session on your show. I love the Unicorns. Emotional HoboCore friday nights 8pm to 10:30. Streaming online. KRBS 107.1 FM in Oroville. Podcast of the live Zelbond session coming soon.

Afterwards, we got invited into the home of a family of Musicians
and got an amazing performance of original material and general warmthness, Thank You Too. The potential for the Oroville Music scene is BIG.

We hope to help make it a reality, yet again another long term project.

Before all of this, we spent the day with Ms. Mahanna's 7th Grade classes at Sycamore School. Returning to my old stomping grounds was therapeutic at the very least. I remember walking around the open air halls with my friend Ramiro as he tried to find girls to make out with; I, feeling wired and distant, dreaming of Depeche Mode.

We brought most of our gear and laid it out on a table so that the kids could see our art and filmaking tools. Needless to say, they went straight for the cameras and started to take pictures of each other. They also delighted us with some skits about jewelry store thefts and muggings. Somewhere in between we gave an off the wall talk about the wonders of life in a small town.

( !@!%?)

We'll be back again.

Dream of the Falling Party

2006-11-03T12:29:00.000-08:00

We were at someone’s "apartment" located in a tall building. It was called an apartment, though it was more like a giant structure made of 4x4s, a skeletal edifice of painted brown wood, the color of the wooden steps at the mobile home. We climbed to the top, or took an elevator. Everyone had to be careful and balance on the wooden skeleton. At the top, a very precarious party. I dont' remember much about the girl who was throwing it, except that she was white, had brown hair. Despite the danger, everyone was having fun fun fun.

Then the structure collapsed. It happened slowly, it gave plenty of time for everyone to brace themselves. I remember gathering my equipment close to me. I did a practice jump, and then I timed it just right just before we all landed. I remember 'Cardito shouting with joy when we realized we were all still alive.

Our equipment however did not survive. We were completely ruined, stressed. I remember looking at my bolex, beat up beyond repair. We felt some resentment toward the girl who’s apartment it was: why'd she have the party there, anyway? Then she called us over and faced us, saying frankly: “none of us really want to talk about what happened up there, but we have insurance for your equipment.” Vindication.

Gridley and Friends.

2006-11-02T11:01:00.000-08:00

General Wandering and photographing. Finally finished watching Batalla en el cielo, hold on tight, don't fall over when the tension breaks...

Eventually we ended up in the Farm Labor Camp in Gridley late at night. It felt a little strange being there after dark, walking around and look for the danzantes that invited us. When we finally found the place where they practice, we realized that it must have been cancelled due to the heavy rain that had pounded the Valley all day –sending farm laborers home in time for lunch and a rare afternoon with the family.

When I lived in El Campo many years ago, we managed to keep busy, but what little art and music there might have been was a far 6 miles into town. Back then, as a child walking a mile to the nearest market took a full hour or so, the rest of the trip was not an option for me, so we would walk back to our sunken homestead with our bags of chips and pepsis in hand. Now that this community is gaining access to this type of art and dance culture many great things are at hand.

El campo is a special place, here you can find backyard weddings, palletas de arroz, bootleg Tears For Fears tapes that play both sides at once, discount clothes sold out of vans, small pets, directTV, a hopeful levee, garbage pail kids and an old carving in a tree that I made when I was 7. ( I couldn't make out my primitive markings, but lets just imagine it says "OAXACA")

~Glue

dia de los olvidados

2006-11-01T12:32:00.000-08:00

2006-10-31T18:47:00.000-08:00

he’s standing on Frog Road looking at a tractor driver till a prune orchard. he waves at the tractor operator, driver waves back. it’s late october, all the prunes have been shaken off, sorted, processed, dried. The peach picking is also long over—the only thing left, according to the pickers on ninos heroes rd., are Kiwis and of course Walnuts. It’s 4pm and mexicanos are working, driving tractors.

frog road is adjacent to an irrigation ditch; he’s being attacked by ten slow mosquitos. In years past he’s spotted in the ditch: carp, crawdads. In still younger days, he’d wade into the ditch with Brother Jordan and Afsheen, catch crawdads, play with them until they died. Once he heard of a way to feed them and eat them so you wouldn’t get sick.

In the distance su carnal Glue Dobbs emerges around a bend, camera in hand. Juan Cicada takes a picture of him coming down the road with his plastic green and yellow camera:
“What’s the dealio, chamelio?” Cicada shouts.
“I backed the truck into a rock!” Glue likes to tell stories. He once had Cicada convinced that he peed his pants just so he could avoid going into McDonald’s. “The neighbors came out and looked. I think they called the cops.” the facts don't always match up but taht doesn't mean he's not telling the truth

where are we? where we are.

2006-10-31T00:49:00.000-08:00

Today. We drifted down Concow Rd. towards the end of the world.

Movement(s)

2006-10-30T10:26:00.000-08:00

Luiseño Films y que?

2006-10-29T23:04:00.000-08:00

Juan Cicada and Glue Dobbs outted live on the air?

Yes it is true. 90.1 fm KZFR dj Smiley introduced us the North Valley on his "Cultural Roots of Aztlan" radio program friday night. Despite the 80 thousand things on our minds; we had few words to say. But it was good being in the mix with the late night KZFR crew during the pledge drive, I even got a call from a fellow Grid-town native, sup Indiana Street Juan.

Besides that, as we started working on a commercial for the zeph' we managed to run into a few long-lost friends and random hippies at the KZFR costume crawl in Chico last night, for a few hundred moments, I felt like I was in Heaven, or Alaska ( I've yet to decide since I have not been to either).

Too good.

The next morning we found ourselves driving back up the historic 99 towards Chico again, on our way to the station again to introduce ourselves to Washington Quezada, host of "The Trip". Needless to say, he welcomed us in the station and on the air again. Since it is pledge drive time at the station we decided to offer as premiums, a set of portraits in the homes of the donor. We got three pledges within a few minutes and one call from another long lost friend and teacher who just happened to be mousing around on the lower edges of the fm spectrum. Too good, again.

As things begin to pick-up, we take more time to think and roam. Excuse the dust on our website, multi-tasking can be heartbreaking.

Being as this is our first official blog post, I would like to recognize a few of the new friends along the way;

The Walnut shakers and movers and sorters and fathers and sons and daughters and mothers and aunts and uncles, you make for fine human beings. The Kiwi pickers, if I can step in and do one thing besides follow you around with a camera I will.

RIP Bradley Will

~Glue Dobbs

Then I almost lost the Battle of Assimilation out in New York City

2006-10-27T12:24:00.000-07:00

We sold our clothes to the state. I don’t mind. I made a lot of mistakes in my mind in my mind.