Category Archives: Greater Los Angeles

Nominated: Worst Water Feature in LA County

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It’s hard to get a good picture from a moving vehicle and this is the best I could do. What you kinda see in that picture above is a ridiculous aesthetic touch for that new mall in Monterey Park on Atlantic by the 10, better known as the newest location of Happy Family Vegetarian Restaurant, after being forced to relocate from this very spot to allow for the development of this very mall! Wherever they go they still make great food. Too bad the new place is a drab and lifeless stucco enclosure, no doubt some vision of the future of yet another lousy developer.

Which brings us back to that aesthetic touch, a water feature in the underground parking lot, which you only notice on the way out. There is something dehumanizing about this fountain. A miserable attempt at having you leave the miserable development in a better mood because you saw some water floating by. It ends up only highlighting the lifelessness of the whole structure, reminding you of how unnatural this all is, a fucking mini-river on your way out of an ugly underground parking structure. Lipstick on a corpse.

If you plan to visit this waterwork, take the exit to Hellman which is where you will find this refreshing addition to our social car lives. Don’t you dare park to get a closer view, the river of cars need to keep flowing!

Yes, I hereby nominate this as the Worst Water Feature in LA County. There just can’t be anything else as absurd, can there?

In Quotes: The Labyrinth of Solitude

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My great-grandmother Matilde V. Tellez at an unknown Los Angeles park, circa 1940s.

Octavio Paz lived in Los Angeles during the late 1940s. Below is an excerpt from his book The Labyrinth of Solitude.

When I arrived in the United States I lived for awhile in Los Angeles, a city inhabited by over a million persons of Mexican origin. At first sight, the visitor is surprised not only by the purity of the sky and the ugliness of the dispersed and ostentatious buildings, but also by the city’s vaguely Mexican atmosphere, which cannot be captured in words or concepts. This Mexicanism – delight in decorations, carelessness and pomp, negligence, passion and reserve – floats in the air. I say “floats” because it never mixes or unites with the other world, the North American world based on precision and efficiency. It floats, without offering any opposition; it hovers, blown here and there by wind, sometimes breaking up like a cloud, sometimes standing erect like a rising skyrocket. It creeps, it wrinkles, it expands and contracts; it sleeps or dreams; it is ragged but beautiful. It floats, never quite existing, never quite vanishing.

Self Help Graphics & Art is Moving!

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Photo courtesy of Rosanna Ahrens

Today, Evonne Gallardo, Executive Director and the Board of Directors of Self Help Graphics & Art announced that the 40 year old institution of culture and art in East Los Angeles is moving to a new home.

Relocation from the icon building decorated in tile by artist Eduardo Oropeza, has been a buzz on the eastside for a while now—but negotiations as to where to move and being forward-facing, have been long, arduous and thorough.
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San Pedro Community Garden

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I thought I would share this post I wrote on the Slanguage website over here on LA east side because I felt that this community garden was pretty special.

Slanguage got a great opportunity to go visit and explore the San Pedro community garden. This 3 ½ acre land is owned by the city of Los Angeles and has been around over 40 years. For a yearly fee anybody can start a garden. The garden is fitted with hoses for easy access to water, mulch is also available.  However, not just anybody can maintain their roots here; some gardeners have managed to sustain their plots for up to thirty years.

More after the jump

2 Random Minutes at the Glendale Americana

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Why do I get these terrible assignments? Who did I upset in management to get stuck covering this bullshit beat? Damn these office politics.

Oh wait, I’m off today. Crud, the work time and “free time” is starting to merge in the worst sort of way. Gonna have to get that looked at, it can’t be good for my health. Well then, let me explain that I didn’t end up here by choice as in “let’s go take a dip into the cesspool called Americana, just for fun!” it was more like “let’s try to redeem these gift cards for a corporate eatery some nice people gave us before the Corporate Overlords start deducting some surcharge cuz they want to re-gift to themselves something they sold” and before I forget I have a free meal ticket to this place that I wouldn’t put on my to-do list. To make a short story longer, the wait at the BJ’s (haha!) was 45 minutes on a Friday night- AS IF! Don’t people have things to do or places to go on the weekends? I guess they were all cashing in their gift cards at the same time, surely this wasn’t THE destination for the night? Please Lord, tell me it ain’t so.

Thus my 2nd excursion (1st was a family related b-day requirement) into Americana territory. It’s just as bad as The Grove, full of shitty corporate shopping, crappy corporate food, and hints of the plaza concept as interpreted by the needs of companies that want to sell you things.  Public space perfected by Corporations. It’s like a park, only not.

So yes, above you’ll see 2 random minutes of some of the worst aspects of our modern culture. I wonder if I can ask for a hardship stipend for this stressful assignment? And maybe even something extra for that Sinatra on the hour bit with the water show. Now that was excruciating.

Words that Wound, Words that Heal

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“But at a time when our discourse has become so sharply polarized — at a time when we are far too eager to lay the blame for all that ails the world at the feet of those who happen to think differently than we do — it’s important for us to pause for a moment and make sure that we’re talking with each other in a way that heals, not in a way that wounds. (Applause.)” – from President Obama’s Arizona Memorial Speech, January 13, 2011

The above quote by Barack Obama urges us to measure our words—because words are very powerful and we affect those around us with the words we use. A point in reference within our recent history was the affront of “bitches” used in hip hop songs, every other word. Political rappers took the stance to banish this word from their music because it disrespected and diminished woman-hood.
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L.A. to O.C. Dream Ride

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Join us in a 50 mile bike ride to continue raising awareness for Federal Dream Act, California Dream Act (institutional financial aid) and getting drivers licences for all California residents, as well as bringing attention to the rights of all bicyclist in the city of L.A and Orange County. Spokes & Words, The Orange County Dream Team and Dream Team Los Angeles are working together with City of Lights and the Bici Digna program in organizing and funding this event to bring together all these great orgs that fight for social justice for for all.

When: Sunday Feb. 20 (presidents day weekend)

Where: Starting at Corazon del Pueblo 2003 E. 1st. street Boyle Heights 90033 and ending at Centro Cultural de Mexico 310 W. 5th street Santa Ana 92701

Registration: Registration form and $15 fee (link at bottom of page) will be due on Jan. 28. This will include lunch, dinner, bike maintenance during event and over night stay in Orange County. Form can be downloaded via link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/13WcyFiBe45oBXLUIAOkvINgfZAzimUHsIxHlPCWnNOM/edit?hl=en

Route: Approx 50 miles via streets of L.A., San Gabriel River Bike Path and streets of Santa Ana.

Housing: Sleeping over at Centro Cultural de Mexico. Individuals are responsible for bringing their own sleeping bag, pillows, blankets, toiletries, change of clothes etc. and transportation back to L.A. A truck will carry participant’s belongings, sleeping bags etc. to Santa Ana and back to CDP after ride is over.

Food: Lunch, dinner and snacks will be provided for all participants accounted for, for the event.

Bike Safety Work Shops: All participants of event will be required to attend at least one workshop on safety, rules of the road and ridding in a group. No exceptions.

First workshop will be at CDP on Jan 23rd from 1 to 4 p.m. Second will be at Centro Cultural in Santa Ana on Jan 30th from 1 to 4 p.m. and the final workshop will be at CDP on Feb. 5th from 1 to 4 p.m. Riders needing help with their bikes will be encouraged to bring them to the workshop for maintenance and bike tune up. Workshops will be coordinated by City of Lights.

Sponsorship opportunities are available for anyone that wants to donate food, supplies or sponsor riders for the event as well.

Anyone with questions about the event can contact dream.act.riders@gmail.com for more information or concerns

Event Sponsors:
Spokes & Words
City of Lights
Orange County Dream Team
Dream Team Los Angeles
Corazon del Pueblo
El Centro Cultural de Mexico

Link to pay pal account here:
http://justarandomhero.blogspot.com/2011/01/la-to-oc-dream-ride.html

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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Are The Paisa Bars Disappearing?

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My compa Don Ignacio SMC, inspired me to write this post because he had some videos on his Facebook page with old Rancheras/Corridos/Nortenas. While browsing through  the videos and listening to others on YouTube I noticed a common theme of old paisa bars, they seemed always pop up in the older videos. Artists such as Vicente Fernandez and Los Tigeres del Norte and countless others always had scenes in old paisa bars. Most of these are classic movie clips they starred in from back in the 1970s and 1980s.

No tengas miedo metete…..

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Stream Dream: Johnston’s Lake

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Johnston’s Lake, 1888. Photo courtesy of the USC Digital Archives.

Awhile back, I was re-reading Charles J. Fisher’s book on Highland Park which is brimming with old photos of the Northeast LA area. One photo that caught my attention was of a flock of sheep gathered around a small “natural” lake in the San Rafael neighborhood just north of Highland Park. I figured it was lake that had been filled in and forgotten because if it still existed, we’d know about it, right?

By coincidence, a few days later, I read an article in the Los Angeles Times about a garden in the San Rafael neighborhood which was said to be across the street from a lake. Could this be the lake in the photo? The article provided some geographical clues and with the aid of Google maps I was able to locate the general area of the mystery body of water. Time for a visit to the San Rafael Hills!

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