Can't get enough of those South American power to the people via technology news stories. An email blast from NYC's Mean Red hipped me to this one. It's the continuation to where John Perkin's Confessions of an Economic Hit Man left off, with strategies to use global techniques to fight back against corporate global domination. In Ecuador the Shuar tribe is getting loked to fight off the oil companies sequestering of tribal lands and demolition of the rain forest. A nonprofit out of Virgina has equipped the tribes-people with GPS devices to successfully map the forest. The devices aid them in "territorial vigilance" - they chart and deleniate boundaries to assert their interests. In other words they have lawyers and the shit is written out and documented so they can prove they own the land when the bulldozers show up illegally.
Next I read about Facebook bringing about global protest against guerrilla terrorist group The Farc in Colombia:
The protesters waved flags and wore T-shirts with the slogan: "No more kidnapping, no more lies, no more deaths, no more Farc." Some estimates put the number of people protesting in Bogota at between 500,000 and two million. The protest was started less than a month ago on the social networking website Facebook by a 33-year-old engineer, Oscar Morales, from his home in Barranquilla on Colombia's Caribbean coast. Over 250,000 Facebook users signed on, and the movement was taken up by newspapers and radio and television stations across the country...BBC News
When government fails, Google Earth and social media prevail. I'm hoping Bay Area techies work on Superfriends powers next - like Wonder Twin rings available at Radioshack.
Zizek happens Wednesdays and has been on hiatus for the past month and a half and tonight it is a brand new party.
Zizek was named after a well-known Slovenian philosopher, Slavoj Zizek, who married an Argentine lingerie model. The party includes live cumbia and South American rap acts along with resident deejays and global guests like Diplo. Villa Diamante is a resident, Zurita makes appearances, as does El Remolon, Daleduro, Oro11, and Marcelo Fabian. These are the members of Buenos Aires’ rat pack of hip hop/ cumbia/ reggaeton. Whatever you call it, they bring the street to the club. In March, they’re taking their sound of urban Buenos Aires mobile; not to Punta Del Este or even to Rio, the chicos are bringing Zizek to South By Southwest......more
Hillary, please. If America was so ready for real change, as Obama says, it would have done something to stop all the criminal activity of the past eight years while we were as one nation, under oil.
Of course I like him myself and would like to see change. But I don't think he can bring about change with inspiring speeches. I don't see him as ready to fight the bad guys properly and they're not going away anytime soon. Thinking their time is done is incredibly naive. There will be more Cheneys and they will kill more people, steal from entire nations and generations, and the American on his couch enjoying Obama's speeches will continue to do nothing to stop the empire.
In 2008, most Americans are too busy working to approach critical analysis of the propaganda thrown at them by advertisers and media. Many haven't been provided the opportunity for an education that teaches you to read between the lines. Real change takes time and effort and America isn't in a position to do that hard work right now. The country has been debilitated by eight years of fear, manipulation, and of the pillaging of the economy. What America needs is a competent leader like Hillary who will clean up the mess that is our foreign policy, economy, and education and health care systems. Despite his popularity, JFK didn't do much as president. He was great at being Hollywood. Obama isn't prepared to do battle with the repubs and push through key policy. He's approached the race without an economic proposal and is banking on his public image to put him in the seat of world leader, rather than real know-how.
Hillary is fit to fight the anti-democratic forces in Washington, like those in this past administration, and win. To fight the machine of politicians engaged in a policy of self interest, you must be in the machine with your own mechanized army. If Obama wins and if he is then elected to the presidency, he may easily become a do-nothing president, and possibly through little fault of his own, but rather through not being prepared to work the machine. The country can't afford that at this point in our history. I hope he gets his chance to work for change. In about eight years from now.
You're probably wondering if there are any Latinos in this Latin American country (see previous entry, Buenos Aires is Italian for Barcelona). Since a Latino identifies with being of mixed race and being from Latin America, Argentines could technically qualify. Except that many are not of mixed race and that those who are may not claim to be. Basically, in order to identify with the name of an ethnic group you must accept its name and Argentines do not, in this case. Their reasoning seems to be a mix in itself; mostly political with a bit of race thrown in. I'm still trying to figure out the big picture from a "yanqui" point of view and here's what I've come up with so far.
I'm told the area surrounding Buenos Aires has always had the least number of ethnically indigenous people in Argentina. It is the port and the capitol and has always been the center of immigration. Immigration here means primarily European immigrants, or traditionally it has meant people coming from Europe, most recently immigration was from Eastern Europe.
The bulk of the Portenos (people from Buenos Aires) trace their roots to when, in the 19th and 20th centuries, large numbers of Spanish and Italians came to Argentina for a new life. In the late 1800's there was expansion into the Pampas, the middle of the country that is the nation's bread basket. For years the army had been losing the battle over indigenous lands in the Pampas but that changed with one general's savage defeat of native fighters in a series of battles called the Desert Campaign. Manifest Destiny was claimed to defend genocide as a national hero, General Roca, murdered or expelled 100% of the people in the area:
"At the end of 1878 he started the first wave to "clean" the area between the Alsina trench and the Río Negro River by continuous and systematic attacks to the aboriginals' settlements.
With 6,000 soldiers armed with new breech-loading Remington rifles supplied by the United States, in 1879 he began the second wave" (wiki)
In part, it seems the American habit of supplying arms to kill innocent, non-European families explains why so many people have remained ethnically European in this area of the country. There's recent immigration from Peru and Bolivia and there are native Argentines in the North and some in the South of the country, but here in the city there are few.
Racial identity isn't a popular subject so I do my best to get an accurate perspective of my new home. One thing is certain, Argentines of all flavors don't call themselves Latino. They do call themselves Latino Americano and view the name Latino to be a "yanqui" construction. They call Americans yanquis because they view all inhabitants of the Americas to be American. Argentines seem to look at the word Latino as a response by American Latinos to their marginalization in the US. Max tells me most Latin nationals don't use the moniker Latino but rather Latin American or just American. They don't appreciate the US hogging the name of two continents and neither does Canada. We're all Americans, yo. In fact, the official name for my nationality here is estadounidense which translates as something like "UnitedStatesian."
The few people that do identify specifically with the term Latino also identify with hip hop culture. The emcees here adopt a Puerto Rican accent when they rhyme. Max claims the Latino identity is a yanqui construction rather than a global representation of Latin Americans. I guess Argentina makes for a complex and interesting place to examine ethnic identity.
Wishing you a Happy New Year. 2007 brought big changes, personally, like a new country. If you'd told me last NYE that 2007 would have me changing careers, countries, and living with a boyfriend, well, it would have been a lot to take in. A new year is no joke - anything can take place. 2007 took out a generation of my family with the passing of grandma, Sylvia Alden. It brought news that one of my closest friends will shortly be the mother of Manny Jr, what! A fact I still haven't quite accepted is that I no longer live in New York City - urban love of my life. Say it ain't so, yo. Next visit is looking like July/August, hope you can wait papi (I'm talking to NYC here. The city has a fresh-from-the-barbershop look, doo-rag with the oversized-Yankees-cap-to-the-side, and shiny kicks. The city I heart looks like a straphanging NY male :) KnowI'msayin?) Here is a recap of Halloween, NYC Marathon, Crown Point Festival, 205 Club record release, and just good times in the city of how-much-work-and-play-can-you-jam-pack-into-one-week. Mindy is a b fuzzy Crown Point shot - Tisra is channeling Dorothy with the red pumps the wop? Sydney's dad Emz performing at the marathon in Am App girlfriends! Roberto pimping , Melinda getting her muppet on Nikki and me at Adam's bday Adam, hair and friends spot had great mojitos Micah, Zaheda, and Colt 45 Micah so saxy at 205 Fairfax High represent thanks to the ladies for the Redheadphone love Derrin Maxwell and the N9's (Moist Paula on the left hand side) The ladies love Danny and Micah (Apollo Heights now on tour on the west coast www.myspace.com/apolloheights) and Emz thinks I don't take performing seriously. That's some serious color. ladies brunch means a lot to me
One reason NYC is great? You can't get married by proxy. In Montana two people can get married without ever entering the state. Two people stand in for you, sign for you, and you are married to somebody you never said "I do" to. Look out - you might be married and not even know. http://www.marriagebyproxy.com/ NYC is great because it's not exactly American but it makes the country go. spontaneous party in the L station
This is an instructional video on time management in the blogosphere - feeds. For those who haven't started ordering in yet, and still haul tush to the blog mall - dealing with traffic and looking for a parking space, this video will teach you how to bring it all home so you never, ever, never leave your screen. Ever.
I thought I was all smart, getting rid of cable, putting the TV up in the loft where it's hard to get to. Now the internet has a good grip over my cerebro and it's squishing it, massaging, playing a couple of rounds of hoops with my skull when it needs to stretch its legs. This video is for all you well-adjusted web users.
This city has a disproportionate amount of Barcelona. For a place so far from Western Europe, it's got a lot of Catalan and Basque - as well as Napeolitan, Calabrian, and French bistro. If you've been to Barcelona you know what I mean - it's not exactly Spanish, it's got a Boho-edge-of-Europe, port-city feel to it. So does Buenos Aires, and the two cities seem to be connected. What's popular in Barcelona does well here too - mullet/rat tail haircut concoctions, tapas with no condiments, anarchy wishes and revolutionary dreams, and the music and Euro/gypsy, campfire-jam spectacle of Manu Chao and Tonino Carotone. I'm not hating, nada que ver - definitely celebrating. This is my type of reggae-hippy, eurotrash party. If you're going to have hippies, I hope you'll please serve them in this variety. In fact, the silliness and light-hearted good times of these dreadheads just strips the hippy moniker from the whole thing. The American hippy subculture takes itself seriously. This brand of anti-establishment includes faux, soft-porn videos in costume and with mannequins, a personal style that combines soccer gear with indigenous beanies or leather blazers. There are orchestras and Tango dancing in a theater space that ends in a hand-holding sing-a-long. Adults with gray hair in suits embracing total chaos with cheers? It's a beautiful world, that of Tonino and Manu. Enough to inspire my rant over how much fun I find this video. That's okay, Eugene Hutz of Gogol Bordello finds it inspiring too - and look where it got him? Playing with Madonna and making some enz off his gypsy/anarchy mantras. A rat-tail 'do with an AmEx platinum card - it's an ever-changing playground of a world.
I'm in the middle of Confessions of an Economic Hit Man by John Perkins, great reading from a participant in the mess that is American foreign policy. He was there when Iranian self determination was sabotaged by our great nation. Howard Zinn is a fan and I am too. I'm trying to read Las Venas Abiertas De America Latin, by Eduardo Galeano, but there's still so much vocabulary to learn I quit after a couple of pages each time I pick it up. An average native speaker of a language has an arsenal of 12,000 words at his disposal. Even Dubbya knows a few thousand possibly. I'm fluent by some standards now but far from the target number. So Las Venas will have to wait a bit while I practice with tabloid lit - Argentina's version of In Touch is a great teacher.
There's a lot of middle eastern influence here too - Syria and Lebanon represent in Buenos Aires. And there are Heebs - everywhere. It's a comfortable place to be a white minority but no other continents have historically been invited to the immigration fiesta. I miss black people very much. I get excited when I see a lone face in a crowd - it's weird seeing so few people of African or Asian decent. There is a growing community of Chinese many of whom came by way of Peru. Blacks in BA are from Africa, with the occasional US, French, Brazilian or British tourists. Everyone seems to be a new immigrant or a tourist - even Europe isn't this European.
You're probably wondering if there are any Latinos in this Latin American country. I'm still trying to figure out the big picture. Apparently, Buenos Aires has the least number of ethnically indigenous people in Argentina because it is the port and the capitol and has always been the center of immigration. Immigration here means European immigrants, or traditionally it has meant people coming from Europe - most recently from Eastern Europe. Though, of course, that fact has changed in the last few years as the Eastern Block's economic situation has undergone a dramatic change for the better.
The bulk of the visible Portenos trace their roots to when, in the 19th and 20th centuries, large numbers of Spanish and Italians came to Argentina for a new life. In the mid 1800's there was expansion into the Pampas, the middle of the country that is the nation's bread basket. For years the colonizers had been losing the battle over indigenous lands in the Pampas but that changed with one general's savage defeat of native fighters in a famous battle. He murdered or expelled 100% of the people in the area and that explains why so many people have remained ethnically European in this area of the country. There's recent immigration from Peru and Bolivia and there are native Argentines in the North and some in the South of the country, but here in the city there are few from what I can tell. Racial identity isn't a popular subject so I do my best to get an accurate perspective of my new home. One thing is certain, Argentines don't call themselves Latino. They do call themselves Latino Americano and view the name Latino to be a "Yanqui" construction. They call Americans Yanquis because they view all inhabitants of the Americas to be American. The few that do identify as Latino also identify with hip hop culture and the emcees here adopt a Puerto Rican accent when they rhyme. I guess it makes for a complex and interesting place to examine ethnic identity.
There were African-Argentines here once - people stolen from Africa and forced into slavery like in all the other colonies of the Americas. The story goes that in the mid 19th century, the government mandated military inscription for all black males in the war against Paraguay. When the war ended, no one was allowed back home. The women intermarried and the country has been white and aborigine ever since.
So I count the faces I hope to see increase in number. The population yearns for more global influence, as does the food. There's no spice, like I've told you before - no spice! Pepper is a special request in a restaurant. In this culture there is singing and dancing and warmth all over, despite the blandness of flavor. There's plenty of sausage and wine, como Barcelona.
