Category Archives: Eastside

Free Bike Mechanics Workshop

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This Saturday come to Corazon del Pueblo and pick up on some useful skills for your bike, such as basic maintenance and mechanics. Presented by Bici Digna, this workshop will help riders both new and experienced familiarize themselves with some of the basic steps to maintain a working and safe bike. This includes things like being able to adjust your brakes, gears, wheels, tires, how to fix a flat etc. For most experienced rides, skills like these are biking common sense, but as more and more riders are taking to the streets, there are those who may be intimidated and unfamiliar with the workings of their bikes. I know a few people who still haven’t grasped how to fix flat tires and it’s ok, we all gotta start some where right ? This will be the first of what will hopefully be one of many workshops on bike mechanics and how to ride on the streets safely that Bici Digna and City of Lights will be coordinating in the East Side.

Ramona Gardens on NPR

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Taken from NPR.org

I do listen to NPR. I know, I know…but I do. I tend to listen to the news on the radio because most music on the radio is pre-playlisted boredom any how. It was to my surprise when I heard that NPR was to have a story on Ramona Gardens that was not based on gang violence or the like.

The story revolved around the absence of healthy food options in and near Ramona Gardens. This is something that I have seen covered in other working-class neighborhoods of Los Angeles, such as South (Central) Los Angeles. It is not uncommon at all. The few choices that are available from the local ‘convenience stores’ can be summed up in this quote from Olga Perez:

“I bought sour cream that was all green inside,” she says. “I bought a gallon of orange juice that was … as soon as I opened the lid, all green with fur. I’ve bought Rice-a-Roni, and when I opened the box, it was maggots in there.”

Thankfully residents like Olga Perez, some of her neighbors with LA Voice PICO are spearheading a campaign to raise awareness and to lobby local government to bring healthful, fresh options to a part of Los Angeles that is seriously being underserviced.

You can listen or read the story in its entirety here: http://www.npr.org/2011/02/08/133506101/l-a-community-starved-for-healthful-food-options

Rebel Rousers

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click on photos to scroll through pics

Last weekend, I headed over to Self Help Graphics to check out the SkaWars show put on by Evoecore. I didn’t intend to take photos but I was so impressed by the old school classic punk styles and good energy of the attendees at this all ages show (all ages equals high school) that I whipped out my camera phone and did my best with the low lighting and difficult camera taking circumstances. So yes, the photos are fuzzy, out of focus and full of red eyes but who else took photos and posted them on their blog for you to see? No one, so there ya go! Um, also I want to apologize if your photo is here and you have the wrong name and/or city attached to your photo. As the night wore on, some of the liquids I’d been drinking kicked in and I lost track of who was who. Please correct me and I’ll fix the names and cities.

Thanks to all of you for the good times, conversation and for your awesome style choices!

Oh and big thumbs down to the LA County Sheriff’s Department who not only shutdown the show early but used rubber bullets to disperse these young folks (legally children, some of them) from the area. Oh what? You didn’t know they did this? That’s because it happened in East Los Angeles and I guess it’s okay to randomly use rubber bullets on kids this side of town.

Thanks to Ana for your help!

The Pharmacy Time Forgot

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Cards purchased in the 2000s from McMonkman Pharmacy in Lincoln Heights

Not too long ago, at the corner of Daly and North Broadway in Lincoln Heights was a pharmacy untouched by time. It seems the good folks of Lincoln Heights had no reason to buy anything from this store except medication from the pharmacy. This resulted in a drugstore that masqueraded as a museum of products from the 1970s. The store never cleared it’s shelves and items stood dusty on display patiently waiting for an uninformed shopper to carry them home.

As you can imagine, a store like this piqued the interest of a curious person like myself. I would wind through the purposely created maze like shelves – shoplifting deterrents – purveying cosmetic items from decades past. La Maja, the dusting powder my mother and grandmother used featured a vampy raven haired Spanish dancer on the front of the box, and as a little girl, I thought she was the epitome of beauty.


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State of the Torta 3

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Woo. Hoo. It’s 2011. BFD. Probably gonna be full of the same old BS all the way until Dec. 31. Most likely. What to eat until then? Well, a torta is always a good staple sandwich to have, a basic unit of life giving sustenance and sometimes the source of a bit of gustatory pleasure. Let’s see some options I’ve had recently around the general vicinity of Los Angeles in case you might want to consider squeezing them into your busy, likely to be lousy, year ahead. At least you’ll have lunch to look forward to! Err, maybe.

First up, a much mentioned new Cemitas place (at least online) over in Koreatown: another outlet of Cemitas Pal Cabron.

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What’s on Your San Marcos?

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For those of you who do not know someone on the eastside, more than likely you have never seen a plush, faux-mink blanket from Korea called a San Marcos. These blankets come in the most garish colors and eye-hurting mural prints such as wolves, elephants, Statue of Liberty, cheetahs, Raiders logo, Elvis, Scarface, pandas, zebras stripes, American Flag, Tupac, y La Virgen to name some.  One blanket can take up a whole closet when stored—but they are the warmest, snuggliest and cozy luxury on cold winter nights.
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John Carlos De Luna Solo Show

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I’ve had the pleasure of getting to know John and his partner Kristy Lovich these last few years. Conversations over drinks, tamales, smoking outside in the cold or just holding it down on the street corner. Conversations about Xicano Hipsters, art and our favorite paletas and anything else that will come up. The conversations I enjoyed the most and took to heart are those of Johns experiences growing up in the Estrada courts, growing as an artist on and off the streets, being tossed aside by folks who said he was never brown enough to hang out with them and his experiences doing work as a graff writer back in the day. What makes John stand out a little more than everyone else who grew up in Boyle Heights and East L.A. to me is that he’s able to articulate himself with his art and poetry. Continue reading →

French Tacos

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Somewhere in El Sereno a Mexican food truck that tends to the taco business goes by the name of “La Cuisine Francaise”. Hey, they have no twitter feed so that works for me. But the dog seems a lil’ bit scared, por que sera? Bon Appetit!