While walking in Echo Park today, I discovered this little free fold-out map & shopping guide…. Continue reading
Which Guey, L.A.
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Category Archives: history
Regulate the Rich. Make them play nice.
- Exxon Mobil makes $76,000 per minute.
- Exxon Mobil paid on $5 bililion dollars in income taxes last year to the US government.
- Exxon Mobil paid $25 billion dollars to foreign governments.
- Exxon Mobil made $400 billion dollars last year.
Also take a look at this yesterdays FT(7/29) article pg 18 “Shells sets pace as big oil lifts R&D spend” in the Financial Times by Ed Crooks to see how they are apparently price fixing, which I deduced sense the oil companies are spending far less than they should on R&D. And the article pg 2 “US Treasury blames supply and demand for oil prices” by James Politi that shows how they even have the US Treasury Department in on this deadly game.
Facts from Conde Nast Portfolio, Crude Reporting by Howell Raines 08/08
Hey they pay less of a percentage of their income on taxes than I do? I’m a human being that works.
Exxon Mobile Oil formerly Standard Oil was started by the John Rockefeller and his descendants still sit on the board (puts it all in an interesting historical perspective).
Now Rockefellers is synonymous with arts and NY and some odd looking guy running for various offices and another one who was VP, but that was just a great PR campaign. Pretty easy for them, since they own pretty much own either indirectly or directly everything we read.
Far East LA and other sh*t I don’t like.
I found a new phrase.
Hipster Racism, I found it at Racialicious, the ladies over there are so smart.
“I define hipster racism (I’m borrowing the phrase from Carmen Van Kerckhove) as ideas, speech, and action meant to denigrate another’s person race or ethnicity under the guise of being urbane, witty (meaning “ironic†nowadays), educated, liberal, and/or trendy.â€
AJ Plaid, Racialicious
I used to just call it the “tattooed, pseudo progressive, over-educated, asshole” problem, but this is much better.
Back in the day (the 90s) an ethnic minority in Los Angeles only had to stay away from Republican areas and never visit the Southern part of the United States (or the South Bay, oh let’s throw in Covina and Tujunga too) and they would be shielded from being openly mocked owing to what they were ethnically (not from being harassed by the cops, they will always be a problem), but those days are over.
We can now enjoy being mocked by Obama supporting, vegetarian diet, Ivy League graduate liberals, with “multi-colored” sex partners. Well thank god. We’ve come so far.
Continue reading
Botanitas: July 18, 2008
Vexing: Female Voices from East LA Punk, Claremont Museum through Aug 31.
Botanitas is an ongoing feature bringing you stories and news from various sources, upcoming events and other bits of ephemera that might be of interest to LA Eastside readers. Suggestions welcome!
Bridging the grade divide in Lincoln Heights
Residential Food Scrap Pilot Program
Old Los Angeles
click through to read >>> Continue reading
ELA DJ Panel #2 Wed. 7/16 @ 6:30 pm
(Everybody knows a DJ. Everyone has danced to a DJ at some time. This is part of our culture. Come and participate in this.
ELA DJ PM panels #2
Part of the “Featuring the Lightz and Soundz of…†Exhibition @ g727
These discussions revolve around the concept of exploring and archiving DJ culture from ELA. The panels are designed to capture testimonies from leaders of the DJ movement from the present, past and future so their history can be included in future discussions of the west coast and global dance scene and Chicano cultural production.
(pics and audio of the first panel http://sicklyseason.com/dialogo/g727/g727dj.htm)
Here are the details.
Panel 2 Wednesday, July 16
Innovators of Style and Programming
An intimate conversation with Frank Del Rio, Richard Vission and other DJs TBC who helped shape the art of mixing and programming. Via their DJ booths, radio shows and productions these DJs refined the art of DJing.
Hosted by Gerard Meraz
Wednesday, July 16th Doors open at 6:30pm
Panel starts 7pm sharp
@ g727
727 South Spring Street
LA, CA 90014
213 627 9563
www.g727.org
Penny and nicked in LA. A car wash story.
“Tesco is to stop importing about £1m ($2m) of fresh vegetables from Zimbabwe, reversing its previous stance that the trade was essential to support the families of the farm workers who grow crops such as mange tout and baby corn.†By John Willman in London and Tony Hawkins in Harare at the Financial Times.
Tesco owns the recent upstart in the organic food game, Fresh & Easy (which for some odd reason the blogosphere is obsessed with.)
Not that I believe that Tesco was only trying to help, but how far is too far in regards to “helping†and what’s not far enough?
On Friday I went to a get together at MacArthur Park’s Mama’s Hot Tamales in support of the ongoing carwash boycott that first came to the attention of the media with the boycotting of the Pirian-owned Vermont Hand Wash in Los Feliz.
At the event Barbara Ehrenreicht (author of Nickle and Dimed and the new book This Land Is Their Land: Reports from a Divided Nation) gave the boycott organizers and their supporters her encouragement.
“America has forgotten it’s own history of organized collective action and outright rebellion…†Barbara Ehrenreicht.
That to me is the key. You can’t go too far, but you can screw yourself if you don’t go far enough.
In the Name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Dollar—The Archdiocese Sells the Self Help Graphics & Art Building to Developers
It was like a bad B-movie with the powerful, evil conglomerate evicting the struggling protagonists—for a profit. Once a PR tool used by the Los Angeles Archdiocese to portray themselves as benevolent benefactors to Self Help Graphics & Art’s internationally acclaimed Chicano/a art center—the unmasked and crumbling religious foundation appears to no longer have a need for Self Graphics. Without warning, in a clandestine underhanded maneuver, the Archdiocese has sold the Self Help Graphics building to the odious developers who have been circling in on the east side.
Since the closure of Self Help Graphics by the then Board of Directors (June 7, 2005), Self Help Graphics has begun to rise, aided by artists, volunteers, community members and the spirit of founder Sister Karen Boccalero. Maintaining the small integral staff, getting back in the black, restoring the building to a safe functional level, protecting the art collection, reconnecting with artists, continuing the tradition of artistic center with community based cultural celebration, has been the focus of a group of diligent Self Help Graphics volunteers. It has been the visual, performance, written, crafts, culinary and musical artistic communities, as well as individual community supporters that have sustained Self Help Graphics these past years—without public funding, without grants, and without the local politicians’ help.
Over the last few years the Board of Self Help Graphics had met with the Archdiocese, the nuns from Sister Karen’s order and their representatives to strategize on a comfortable plan to transfer ownership of the building to Self Help Graphics, Inc. More like a ping-pong game—with Self Help Graphics as the ball—these entities each claimed to have no power to reach any decision with respect to the building—urging Self Help Graphic reps to ask one of the other entities—but not them. At the same time, they vehemently assured Self Help Graphics that the occupancy of the building would continue as always—there was no need to feel nervous about the relationship, if anything were to change or the building were to be up for sale, Self Help Graphics would be notified first.
Then suddenly last week–(predicted by many disillusioned community members) the call came, “The building has been sold and escrow closed—you have until December 31 to be out.†Shock, injustice, betrayal, wounded, angry and incredulous are not strong enough words to express what one feels, because you wanted to have hope in the process of the spirit, in truth, in common decency, in the respect for Sister Karen’s idealism.
As a volunteer at Self Help Graphics during the Sister Karen years, the Tomas Benitez years and post 6/7/05, I have seen the various seasons of change. Witnessing Sister Karen’s commitment to Self Help Graphics, a dedication with pressures and worries that cut her life short—I find it hard to believe that she did not make any provisions regarding the continuation of Self Help Graphics, after she was gone. Self Help Graphics was her life and her passion. Could she have also entered into a verbal agreement with her not-so Christian family—that also conveniently got forgotten? Half files, incomplete documents, select meeting minutes, empty drawers left by the pre-6/7/05 Board of Directors—also tell a story.
I don’t believe in hell, but I do believe in the dark forces that work feverously to destroy anything good. Those that work to create beauty, goodness and righteousness in the world must work doubly hard to wipe out the injustices that have taken place and at the same time take a step forward into a better humanity.
A public press conference is scheduled to take place at Self Help Graphics & Art on Friday, July 11, 2008 at 10am. Members of the Self Help Graphics Board of Directors will be present to answer questions about the future of our beloved and historical art center.
For those that are not able to attend the press conference, please know that your input and thoughts are direly needed. For updates on upcoming actions, please keep checking on the Self Help Graphics website at www.selfhelpgraphics.com
El mariachi suena de nuevo
I saw this bit of news over at Curbed L.A. and I had to post it here.
It seems that the streets around la Plaza del Mariachi (First & Boyle) have reopened, thereby allowing for greater traffic in the small streets and mariachis to return to a state of quasi-normalcy. In early March, mariachis moved to side streets because of construction at Mariachi Plaza for the Metro Gold Line. The plaza itself itself is still under construction, but at least the streets are open and the mariachis can now be reached more easily. The plaza itself should reopen by November, when the festival in honor of Santa Cecilia, patron saint of musicians, takes place (one or two weekends before Thanksgiving weekend).
In another bit of mariachi news…
Next Friday, July 11th, Mariachi Los Camperos de Nati Cano is holding a free concert with Son de Madera, one of the leading voices of son jarocho (http://www.myspace.com/sondemadera), as part of the Grand Performances series at California Plaza, at the center of Downtown Los Angeles. For more details, click here.
Image of Mariachi Plaza street sign taken from Francisco Cendejas‘ photostream.
two years.
Almost two years have passed since I moved to Los Angeles. When I decided to make the move, I’d only been to L.A. once—back in 2002 for a wedding. Before that, my knowledge of the city was based on information from movies, songs, books I’d read in Chicana/o and Asian American Studies classes, and the after-dinner-stories told by my Papá and Grandpa.
“There’s a lot of Taos people in Los Angeles,†my grandpa still reminds me, whenever L.A. comes up, which is often. “A lot of our people over there, New Mexico people.†During WWII, my grandpa had been in Los Angeles briefly before his troop was shipped to Burma. According to his story, he was among the troops ordered to beat Mexican youth who wore zoot suits. It was during one of the raids that he was walking down the street when someone called his name. “Hey, primo! What say?†“Nothing, primo. Let’s have a beer!†I guess he decided to have a beer with his cousin and some other folks he knew from home, instead of joining the riots. He told me later that he knew he was caught in a strange position, one that he didn’t agree with—a Chicano soldier. I still wonder what it must have been like for him in that moment.
Over 25 years later, my 22-year-old father came to Los Angeles, wanting to experience new places. He lived in Lincoln Heights and drove an ambulance at night. His favorite memory was of walking from Union Station after work in the morning and grabbing breakfast at a taquerÃa near the placita. He only stayed in L.A. for a year or so before moving back home to New Mexico. That was in the late ‘60s. Even though he hasn’t been to Los Angeles since, I think he imagines it as if it hasn’t changed.
When I last suggested that I should take a train back from Albuquerque, my papá protested. “That area around Union Station is not safe for young ladies,†he’d said…or something like that. Actually, it’s not just Union Station that he thinks is “unsafe for young ladies,†it’s all of Los Angeles. He thought the same thing when I’d moved to NYC several years ago. If he could have his way, I’d live in Albuquerque, which is actually just as (un)safe as Los Angeles, only more familiar. This is clearly a gender issue–obviously, he wouldn’t be concerned if it were one of mis manitos living out here. He forgets that Union Station and the surrounding area (100 years ago)–the site of my dissertation research—is what brought me to Los Angeles in the first place. And I wanted to get to know and become a part of the communities that live in the legacies of the people whose lives I study.
I knew four people in L.A when mi manito and I moved my stuff into my new apartment. Friends told me it was a “brave†move—maybe it was just crazy. I remember thinking, “if I hate it here, I can always pack up and go home.†I can’t front, those first few months really sucked. L.A. is a difficult place to be a newcomer. Now, after two years spent meeting new folks and exploring in the city—in person and amid dusty papers in multiple libraries—it has become more and more familiar. And I like it here.
Someone recently asked me whether I could finally call L.A. my “home.†And I surprised myself when I thought, there’s nowhere else I’d rather live right now…. But on the real, though? I’m not sure I can really call it “home†until I find some of the New Mexico gente my grandpa keeps talking about, who know how to make a great bowl of green chile. If you know some, hook this nuevomexicana up!
PC Slavery. One of the many reasons I celebrate my independence on Juneteenth.
I can see how slavery lasted so long in the United States. Most people in the US didn’t own slaves, though most everyone benefited indirectly, so is the case of the migrant worker.
I like to call migrant workers PC slaves, since people can pretend as if they aren’t doing anything wrong by casually buying clothes, food and other products that people produce who are paid virtually nothing.
I know many people will whine and bitch about how it’s migrant workers choice, but I don’t think you have a choice if you’re a human being in regards to whether you live or die.
And in order to buy food and shelter you need money and that’s not a fact that is up for debate, correct?
So why would anyone say you have a choice in regards to working? Do migrant workers have trust funds? Are they slumming? They have to work to live.
I was reading one of my most favorite rags, the Economist. That’s pretty much the only way I can find out what kind of nastiness the US economy is actually in, since over here in the states people are insistent that there are signs of a recession, but refuse to say the “R†word. It is as if they think it’s a racial slur or something.
“A CAMPAIGN to improve the low wages and awful labour conditions of tomato pickers in Florida has notched up a substantial victory over farm owners and their biggest clients, the fast-food chains. After one embarrassment on top of another, Burger King backed down last month and reached a ground-breaking agreement with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, representing mostly seasonal farmworkers from Mexico, Central America and Haiti. The Miami-based company agreed to pay them one cent more for every pound (450g) of tomatoes they pick, and to improve their working conditions.†From the Economist, The Price of a tomato. June 26, 2008.
This is the kind of country that we live in, where assholes will fight so that they won’t have to pay a person one penny extra, not a dollar, not a quarter, but one bloody penny. But it’s not just that the guy will fight to not pay that one penny, but the fact that in America that’s all we will fight for. That’s all we’ll help someone fight for.
We will fight for one penny (or half of one percent ) and get slapped down and keep working, because we don’t want to seem unreasonable.
Memories Of A Lost Boulevard: THE GARMAR THEATER
Memories of a Lost Boulevard Series, A Tribute to Whittier Boulevard
Whittier Boulevard Movie Theaters, Part 2.
THE GARMAR THEATER
2325 Whittier Blvd., Montebello, CA
As I was speaking to someone the other day about this lost Montebello movie house, A long time resident who was standing within earshot came up and sighed; “The Garmar! I loved that Show! If you couldn’t afford the Golden Gate, you couldn’t afford the Garmar! Continue reading
Memories Of A Lost Boulevard: The Golden Gate Theater
Memories of A Lost Boulevard, A Tribute To Whittier Boulevard
Whittier Boulevard Movie Theaters, Part 1.
 
 THE GOLDEN GATE THEATER
5176 Whittier Blvd. & Atlantic Avenue
East Los Angeles, CA.
Oh, what a wonderful place it was! Growing up, I had inherited my Dad’s passion for cinema and so going to the movies was for me, a much anticipated and sublime experience. We were a movie going family and I often indulged my cinema hunger by visiting all of my neighborhood theaters as often as I could. Among those cherished trips, my visits to the Golden Gate Theater stand out as the most treasured. The sheer joy of going to that temple of flickering images began as you stepped from the sidewalk….