An Appalling Charm

Fernando Romero



The killing streets took another victim one July night almost eight years ago. We lived on a small, second-fl oor apartment on Seventh Street and Lime Avenue. This is a part of Long Beach ridden with all the idiosyncrasies of society; violence, drug activity, prostitution, racial hatred, crime, alcoholism and poverty. There also exists a morbid sense of magical realism that can sometimes be attributed to this place; a dichotomy that fuses the ugliness of life with that of the human spirit. Almost like a sign of hope and a testament to the will of instinct. There is something about this place that speaks of an appalling charm. It is a place where the angels starve. Where children will play soccer out in the street with the carcass of a dead rat like my brothers and I once did. Where you could tie a string to the legs of a June bug and fl y it like a kite. Perhaps, it is the way a loved one’s shoes will hang from power lines like a eulogy. Or maybe it is simply the way gun shots sound like the clap of a hand echoed off in the distance. And how you sometimes feel envious when you see people fall asleep under the bright light of day.

Published on July 10, 2001, Press-Telegram (Long Beach, CA)

MOTHER OF SEVEN SHOT TO DEATH

A single mother with seven children was shot to death outside her home and her neighbor was wounded when a gunman opened fi re on them Sunday night. “I don’t know why this happened,’“ said the neighbor, who was sitting outside in the 700 block of East Seventh Street with Graciela Zavala and two teen-age boys at about 11:15 p.m. when someone walked out of a nearby alley and opened fi re. “We were just sitting out here, just talking and laughing.” Ms. Zavala was reportedly sitting on the front porch of her apartment with neighbors when an unknown assailant walked up and fi red multiple shots into the group.

I saw the front page of the Press-Telegram the following Tuesday. I read the story of the slain woman. Her name was Graciela; she was 39, a single mother of seven and of working-class background. Maybe it was a sense of guilt and fear that I felt that grabbed and tore at me, but I waited for the twilight of the setting sun before I walked over to the street corner where she had fallen two days earlier. On the steps of the porch, there was a candlelight vigil in honor of this woman whose life had come to a deafening end. I passed by. I saw candles alight bearing the vibrant image of the Jesus Sacred Heart crowded by fl owers, cards and pictures of the departed. I saw a photograph of her that stood pressed against a candle. She had a round face, high cheek bones and small brown eyes coupled with long, fl owing black hair. She was wearing a black a dress and in her left hand she was holding a rosary. She had a picaresque smile, probably reminiscent of her younger days.

The vigil had a gathering of about a dozen people. I assumed most were relatives and close friends, and like me, people just came and went. I wasn’t there more than ten minutes. I didn’t know any of the people that were gathered so I stood there almost with a sense of indifference. Albeit, it was my neighborhood, the resistance for a sense of community and the need for isolation had dictated everyone’s life until a tragedy struck, the same way we made new neighbors late one nigth in January 1994 when the Northridge earthquake shook the world and reminded us, all of us, of our existance and what binds us.

I saw the people there; I saw their eyes and they were sad like a defeated race. I could sense death. I crossed myself and left in the selfi sh hope that such a tragedy should never hit close to home. It was one of those Summer nights I felt the most cold, but also felt a little more closer to this strange thing; this humanity.

Across the porch where the candlelight vigil stood, was a Catholic gift shop and down the street on Olive Avenue, St. Anthony’s Church, where we attended Mass on Sunday mornings. Down Seventh Street toward Los Alamitos Avenue, was St. Francis, where we would go with my mother, when we my brothers and I were all young, family struggling for money and still new to this place. There, we received donations of canned fruit, canned food, and other food stuffs and as restless as we were, my brothers and I would help my mother carry these home. No car, no transportation, nothing, just the six of us walking with fortitude without any lament, like mother goose leading her ducklings to a pond somewhere over a green pasture buried amidst this inner-city jungle.

About two weeks later, I sat inside the front offices at Millikan High School. For the summer session, I had a graphic arts class for first period and was a student aide to the front office of the school for second period. I was talking to my friend Helen when a girl, also a student aide, came to me.

“Hey, is your name Fernando?” she asked.

I nodded.

“Yeah, I think there’s a phone call for you,” she said.

I was perplexed, but followed her.

She handed me the phone.

“Hello,” I said into the phone.

“Hey, it’s me. It’s Paula,” I recognized my sister-in-law’s voice immediately and by the tone of it, I knew that something was wrong.

“Your mom’s in the hospital. She fell down the stairs this morning. She’s hurt pretty bad.”

I cringed. I felt kicked in the stomach.

“Is she gonna be okay?” I asked calmly sensing the room and this girl who still had her eyes locked on me.

“Well, kind of… She’s at St. Mary’s. Everyone’s is already here or on their way,” Paula said.

“Okay…I’m on my way.”

I hung up. I rushed back to where Helen sat to grab my stuff.

“Is everything alright?” Helen asked with her eyes widened.

“No, I have to go,” I responded. “My mom’s in the hospital.”

Helen gasped as I ran out the office and out of the school in a frantic dash to catch the first bus headed Downtown. While on the bus, my thoughts were on my mother’s welfare. I fashioned my own prayer asking for my mother to never die. I thought about my father and my brothers and wondered what they were thinking at that exact moment. I thought about the woman who had ceased to exist two weeks prior; and of the similarities of one mother to the other. I thought about life and death and concluded that time was never on our side.

I arrived at St. Mary’s within an hour. I was the last one there. My brothers and my father were gathered in the lobby. It was a sight to see; seven males huddled together with an expression of fear not unlike the dangers of warfare. As the last one, it was my turn to see my mother. I didn’t want to see her at all; not like this at least.

We waited about anxiously until I was ushered in to see my mother at around noon. Her room was in one of the upper floors of the medical center. Inside the hospital room, my mother was in a cast up to her neck. I could see her face and eyes only. Her eyes looked weary and the hazel in her iris gave off a grey reflection. It took me a while to recognize her. She seemed to have aged decades in only one day. It was obvious she was numbed with a lot pain medication. The medical staff had said she wouldn’t be able to talk much and that each visit would be better if it were short.

I stood against the side of the hospital bed. She looked up at me and gave me a concerned look. In her eyes, she saw me as if though I were still a child. In a way, we were all still kids. My youngest brother was seven and the oldest was 22. I felt helpless. I didn’t know what to do; I didn’t know what to say. She was in a full body cast and the questions such as; how are you doing, or are you okay? They all seemed redundant. But I still felt like the worst son in the world. Because there, underneath the body cast and the bandages was the woman who had birthed and raised six boys, the woman who’d given me life and I couldn’t utter a word of encouragement.

“Hi mom,” I finally said.

She forced a smile and with a raspy voice she said in Spanish, “I’m so glad you could make it. I didn’t see you when everyone else came in. Did you talk to your dad and your brothers?”

“Yeah.”

“Everything is going to be okay, she reassured me. “The doctors said I will be here for about a week. Then, they’ll probably send me home in a cast.”

“That’s good,” I said.

Then, I just stood there. Her left hand was free from cast. I held her hand until my time ran out. I kissed her on the forehead and left.

Visiting hours were over. There was nothing else to do, but to go home. So we did. “Can we go back tomorrow?” my seven year old brother Eduardo asked indiscriminately to the platoon of men that marched out of St. Mary’s.

“Yeah,” my father said. “We’ll come back tomorrow.”

I was seventeen at the time, aged in between Gonzalo and Valentin who were two years younger and older than me respectively. Ezequiel was the oldest and David had just turned 21.

It was quiet. No one said anything on the way home. We got home, ate and idled about the afternoon until my father went off to work.

That night, my brothers, my father and I were swallowed by an immense solitude. In the midst of the binge and purge of the expression of loneliness, there was a sense of guilt among us, as if though we could have prevented this.

“So what happened?” I asked. “Why’d she fall?”

“I think she was just tired and slipped and fell,” Valentin said.

“She was probably sleepy too,” Gonzalo said.

At the hospital, my mother had told Ezequiel, the oldest, what had happened.

“She said she was getting out of bed to move the car,” Ezequiel said.

It was street sweeping day and my mother was called out of bed by my father to move one of my brothers’ car.

“Why didn’t my dad wake you up instead of her?” David said. “You should have moved the car.

We all know she barely gets any sleep.”

Everyone’s face became dim.

In those days, both my parents worked late-night shifts. My mother worked in the oil refi neries in Wilmington and my father worked in a factory in West Long Beach. They would leave at around four in the afternoon, the same time we came from school. Sometimes the week would pass by without even seeing my parents. I only saw them early in the morning while getting ready for school.

My mother would come from work around two in the morning. Then, she would get up at seven in the morning, make breakfast for all of us, drive my little brother to school, come home, sleep for a couple of more hours, wake up and go to work again.

She did that for a while. I’m sure her body gave her signs, but she has always been stronger than anybody I know.

During vacation time from school or even on Friday nights, I would sometimes stay up watching Late Night With Conan O’Brien. My mother would come home from work and she would tell me about her day. Some nights she would let it all out and tell me all about her day. If I asked her to fi x me a hot plate; she would. Sometimes, I would lie awake in my bed, pretending to be asleep in the hopes she would nudge at me. She would stand at the door and while I played dead. I wanted to her to nudge me, but she didn’t. I don’t know why acted like that.

She does not remember the day she fell from a fl ight of stairs of the apartment building we lived in. Her mind was lost. She said she simply remembers waking up, walking out the door, grabbing hold of the banister and then being wheeled on a stretcher surrounded by paramedics. She lost her footing on the top of the stairs and fell heavy without rolling like a body bag made of cement. She was unconscious before she reached the bottom steps. No scream, no cries; nothing.

There is a picture buried deep inside one of our photo albums. In it, we are all kids, infants even. I’m wearing a Ghostbusters t-shirt, sporting a really bad haircut, surrounded by four of my brothers as we stand, towered over by my mother. It was 1985, my father wasn’t with us when we went to this family portrait photo shoot. He had gone to other side, el norte style, to help out the family. Back then, my mother, would generate income by selling bed sheets and pillow cases she sewed herself inside the house. She would embroider bed sheets and pillow cases with the Virgin Mary of Guadalupe emblazoned on them. I don’t remember those days, but I’ve heard the will of instinct and perseverance when my parents retell the stories of those moments of hardship.

My mother was released in due time from the hospital and she recovered eventually. But it was those moments in that hospital bed, with the pervasive futility of life which triggered feelings of isolation. She had always been there and one assumed she always would be. She had always been as ever-present as the sun and as free as the eagle; almost unbendable. But nowadays when I see her, I try to be as expressive of how much she has meant to me; to all of us. To not do so would be a sacrilege; an unforgivable sin. ¶

Celina, esto es para ti. Muchas gracias...

Houston, We Have a Problema

Tina Vazquez

It’s never a good sign when you have to begin a book review with, "I really wanted to like …" Gwendolyn Zepeda’s completely uninspired first novel Houston, we have a Problema is disturbingly typical — which is perhaps the worst thing you can be as a writer.

I really wanted to like her Latina protagonist Jessica Luna. I was hoping she’d be fiercely smart, funny, and unexpected. Sadly, she stopped being promising about six pages in. Zepeda allows her character to fall victim to the usual clichés featured in both movies and literature pertaining to the Latino culture. Watch as Jessica Luna worries about the size of her ample ass. Watch as she pines and obsesses over the attractive Latino painter who treats her like shit, but superbly provides the drama she "loves." Listen as she makes earth shattering observations, such as "He was the kind of guy who obviously loved his mother, and therefore he always treated women like gold." Aside from that, Jessica Luna simply wasn’t a likeable character.

Perhaps you’re not supposed to admit things like this in a formal review, but I was reading Michelle Tea’s Rose of No Man’s Land at the same time as Houston, we have a Problema. The two books are worlds apart, but they were both written in first person from the main character’s perspective. Tea’s main character is a young teenage girl, while Zepeda’s is a twenty-six-year old woman. Despite this fact, Rose of No Man’s Land managed to be biting and intellectually stimulating; it had backbone and its character had nuance and layers. Zepeda’s character Jessica Luna lacked depth of any kind and was completely self-involved, uninteresting, and annoying. You’re forced to sit through her every mundane thought concerning her ridiculous love life and her boring job at an insurance company. Her internal struggles are so trivial that her "problems" are laughable. This sad state is only compounded by the fact that she visits a psychic for guidance- should she date the gabacho or the Mexicano? Should she do web design or try for a promotion at the insurance company? By the end of each chapter you’re left thinking who gives a fuck?

Houston, we have a Problema was obviously intended to be Jessica Luna’s coming of age tale, but if falls very, very flat. It also only furthers certain negative stereotypes associated with Latinas; that all of us love drama, that we want men who are bad for us, that we’re meek, apologetic, and indecisive. Though the protagonist routinely says she’s purposely steering clear of marriage, she spends more than half the book obsessing over men. Jessica Luna lets her life pass her by, unwilling to make her own decisions and unable to pinpoint whatever it is that she wants. I’d like to say that the novel ends on a promising note, but it doesn’t. In the end she dumps the white guy and the Latino painter … and then entertains the thought of dating two new men. Big whoop. ¶


Tina Vazquez is a writer for Feminist Review.

Ni una muerta mas en Juarez

Fernando Romero



The Part About "La Violencia"

An all-out war against drug cartels has raged in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico since January 2008. The drug warfare has pitted the powerful drug cartels present in Northern Mexico and the armed troops trickling into the city located on the U.S. - Mexico border across El Paso, Texas. According to reports by the Associated Press, the death toll has already reached over 2,000 as of March 2009. The dead include members of drug cartels, soldiers, law enforcement personnel and innocent men, women and children.

In the midst of la violencia propagated by the dueling sides, the narcos and the federales, the city of Juarez remains a harvesting ground for a phenomenon almost two decades in the sow. In between daily executions, shootings and kidnappings, a familiar terror looms in the city. Girls and women are still disappearing at an alarming rate and their bodies continue to turn up in waste grounds and ditches of Ciudad Juarez. The victims tend to be young women, usually teenagers, but sometimes even younger, most of working-class background who were either students or maquiladora factory workers.


No human rights crisis in Mexico has moved world public opinion more than the rapes and murders of young women in Ciudad Juarez. According to Amnesty International, over the past 16 years, approximately 600 women have been brutally murdered in Ciudad. Juarez, while scores are still missing and remain unaccounted for. As of this March, Women’s History Month, six women have been killed in Ciudad Juarez.


According to an article published at the end of last year by newspaper La Jornada, the current volatile and hostile situation in the city claimed the highest number of murdered women in 2008 at 86. The article cited that 2008 surpassed 2002 when 42 women were murdered. 2007 is third on the list with 32. The autopsy reports all showed indicators similar to previous cases stemming to 1993, which read that at least a third of the victims suffered some form of sexual assault. Within the same timeframe, between January 2008 and March 2009, at least 18 girls and women have gone missing.


Maria Luisa Garcia Andrade, co-director of Nuestras Hijas de Regreso a Casa, a non-profit organization based in Ciudad Juarez said the recent disappearances are reminiscent of past years. Garcia Andrade’s sister, Lilia Alejandra, was kidnapped, raped and murdered in 2001. The case was never solved. Organizations like Nuestras Hijas de Regreso, and others, work to prevent and denounce the femicides in Juarez, as well as ending gender violence.


Via a phone interview, Garcia Andrade said in Spanish the current disappearances of women have taken a turn for the worse.


"Women disappeared and, unfortunately, soon after that we would find them dead because they had been brutally murdered," Garcia Andrade said. "Unfortunately, now they are disappearing, but we don't know what's happening to them. We don't know if they are alive or dead."


Amnesty International field organizer, Julissa Gomez said the violence has escalated since Mexican President Vicente Calderon declared an all-out war with the drug cartels in January 2008. She added that the situation of violence has impelled a surge in multi-faceted aggression affecting all the inhabitants of Ciudad Juarez, but that gender-based violence remains rife and prevalent.


"The violence has definitely escalated since the drug wars began," she said. "But you still see the same patterns on female murder victims. Still, they tend to be young, working-class, maquiladora workers."


The Part About the Murders


The girl’s body turned up in the Campestre Virreyes district of Ciudad Juarez. A 13-year old girl from working-class background was found beaten, raped and strangled to death. "Alma Chavira Farel – stuck and strangled, violated by two," read the description on the website No Angel Came. The website provides articles, activist links and stories of the departed women in Ciudad Juarez. The account happened in 1993. January 23rd 1993. From then on, the killings of women began to be counted. But it’s likely there had been other deaths before her. Perhaps for the sake of convenience, maybe because she was the first to be killed in 1993, she heads the list. Although surely there were other girls and women who died in 1992. Other girls and women who didn’t make it onto the list or were never found, who were buried in unmarked graves in the desert or whose ashes were scattered in the middle of the night, when not even the person scattering them knew where he was.


On Feb. 14, 2001, V-Day, 17 year-old Lilia Alejandra Garcia Andrade disappeared. A maquiladora worker and mother of two. Lilia Alejandra was last seen after her shift at a maquila walking toward the unlit area of waste ground that she had to cross every night to reach the bus stop. When she did not come home that night her mother knew something had happened to her and reported her missing the next morning. Four days later some people living near a waste ground in Juarez called the police to report that they could see a naked young woman being raped and beaten by two men in a nearby parked car. No police car was dispatched. Following a second call, a patrol car was sent but did not arrive for over an hour, by which time the parked car was gone. Police made no investigation into the attack, the identity of the victim, or the inadequate response time. Lilia Alejandra’s body was found in the waste ground where the attack occurred only two days later, showing grotesque evidence of physical and sexual assault. The forensic report concluded that Lilia Alejandra had been held captive for at least five days before she was strangled to death a day and a half prior to the discovery of her body.


On March 10, 2008, two days after International Women's Day, Paulina Elizabeth Lujan, disappeared and was later found raped and murdered in the same manner as more than two dozen other young women.


The idiosyncrasies in the murders and investigation teeter on the absurd. In November 2001, skeletal remains of eight women were found in a vacant lot 300 yards from the Association of Maquiladoras headquarters, a group representing most of the city's U.S.-owned export assembly plants. In this case, only the body of Claudia Ivette Gonzalez, 20 years old was identified. There was no investigation into the maquiladoras.

The Part About the Femicide

Femicide, a word that has been incorporated into the lexicon from the Spanish word feminicidio, or, femicidio, can be specifically attributed to the continuing reports of murders and disappearances of women and girls in Ciudad Juarez. The term refers to gender-based violence, and specifically to the systematic killing of women.

Femicide implicates brutal acts of violence. In Ciudad Juarez, the majority of femicide victims were tortured, raped, mutilated, cremated and even quartered. Femicide also implies a disregard for the welfare of all women by the State. Therefore it is considered "femicide" when concurrence of different factors are involved including; the criminal element, the silence of said crimes, disregard for human birth rights, as well as the negligence and complicity of the authorities in charge of preventing and eradicating these crimes.


The term is aptly attributed to the murder cases in Ciudad Juarez and also Ciudad de Guatemala, Guatemala, due in part that it’s believed authorities are not investigating the murders with diligence on the basis that it involves women.

In fact, the State’s response to the murder cases in Ciudad Juarez has been one of delays, denials, delusions, shoddy investigations and multi-layered exercises all muddled within the bureaucratic realm. Investigations were characterized with botched or even lack of investigation, loss or theft of key evidence and files and mistreatment of victim’s relatives.

The phenomenon and the dimension of the cases have caused worldwide attention, attracting human rights groups, activists and celebrities demanding authorities to stop the continuing femicide from happening and to demand justice for the murdered women and girls. Amnesty's Women's Human Rights campaign has long been active on the femicides in Ciudad Juarez. Its 2003 report "Mexico: Intolerable Killings," along with subsequent actions and activism, has played an important role in bringing attention to the lack of accountability in Ciudad Juarez and the mishandling of the murders by local law enforcement authorities.
Gomez said that Amnesty International has cited many human rights violations regarding the cases in Ciudad Juarez. She said that the lack of persecution of suspects, the rampant impunity; all encompass a disregard for the victims’ families and are all human rights violations.

"Impunity in Mexico has been a problem for many years," Gomez said. "There is a lack of judicial system. That leads to the detriment of human rights. There’s been evidence of investigations just falling apart. There is no justice there."

Authorities claim the femicides are a chapter from the past, but the recent disappearances and killings fit a familiar, sordid pattern. Garcia Andrade said, "Nothing has been resolved here. It’s not my organization that’s saying that. It’s all the murders which continue, that are saying that. It’s the impunity, that’s saying that."

Gomez said that life for women in Ciudad Juarez is dire. She said the societal problems that exist in Mexico and other parts of Latin America contribute to the reasons why femicide continues. She cited the patriarchal society, machismo, and victim-blaming, among other causes, for the continuing femicides.

"It’s a society that doesn’t seem to value women as much as men," Gomez said."This is a systematic problem."

Garcia Andrade uttered what seemed a sense indifference by authorities. "In the end, it’s only women who were murdered. And to top it off, they were poor. What importance does that have?"

The Part About Taking Action

Thanks to the efforts of the families of the victims and local women's organizations in Ciudad Juarez, coupled with international campaigning by the likes of Amnesty International and V-Day, things have begun to change. In 2004, amidst mass protests and rallies, the federal government of Mexico got involved.


Garcia Andrade said the problems in this issue need to be addressed to bring awareness at different levels in society.

Gomez said that Amnesty International’s main concern on the femicides in Juarez is to continue to bring awareness to the issue. Gomez said, "Our goal is to keep this issue in the focus of people’s mind and to not let it become a forgotten issue."

At Cal State University, Long Beach, an event dubbed, "Femicide in the Americas," is scheduled for Thursday, March 26. The event will be hosted by the Women’s Studies Student Association and will tackle femicide directly, addressing the femicides in Ciudad Juarez, Guatemala, Canada, and other parts of the region affected by the issue.

The event will include panel discussions, film screenings and keynote speaker, Lucia Muñoz from Mujeres Iniciando en las Americas. MIA’s mission is to increase public awareness in the U.S. of the femicide and maltreatment of women in Guatemala. Last semester, members of WSSA traveled to Guatemala as part of a delegation to end femicide in that country.

Gomez said that another goal sought by Amnesty International is to continue to pressure the governments of U.S. and Mexico to act. "We’re introducing a resolution to both the House and the Senate, in the hopes to set up a branch of government that will be purposely geared to set up programs in Juarez to combat this issue."

Gomez said Amnesty International will ask its members to call on Congress and push for the resolution bill. She said one of the things that students or the general population can do is to tell friends and keep the issue alive. She added that as U.S. residents, students can call delegates in Mexico and ask to appoint a special prosecutor at the federal level to combat and solve the femicides. Gomez said, "I encourage students to sign on with us, to the keep the issue relevant and focused on people’s mind."

Garcia Andrade said spreading awareness on the issue and educating the public are the best weapons to combat the current femicide in Ciudad Juarez.

The issue has been taken up as a feminist cause, but has trascended the realm of feminism. Amnesty International has recommended for people to get involved in this issue and write to proper authorities, Mexican authorities, Mexican Embassy highlighting concerns, publicize the case in local and national media and distribute details of this case to individuals or groups who may be interested and could potentially pose as allies in this issue. ¶

Just a Girl Out Looking For Love

Jot@s Anónim@s
Anonymous ♀

I can see Tila Tequila claiming that her "bisexual dating show," A Shot at Love, made same-sex relationships acceptable and was the curious variable that pushed through the legalization of same-sex marriage in California in early 2008. I can hear my male coworker telling me how the woman who is walking out the door has a beautiful body as he bites his lip, apparently admitting me into the vulgar world of "those who like women." I remember going on a date with a guy recently and hearing the "Ahh…" that follows the admission of a kink; the one accompanied by private thoughts of him and me… and some other chick. The stereotypes and personalities constrict me and it’s like - whoa.

I first came to understand my sexuality in the contemplative solace of a far-away land - I studied abroad my junior year. At that time, I was twenty, 15 pounds lighter and a women’s studies major. I was taking a class titled Sexualities and Feminism, taught by an F-to-M transsexual. The beginning of the course reminded everyone that sex isn’t so black-and-white - intersex people, anyone? We discovered the barbaric lengths to which Western society will go to eliminate the so-called "gray areas" of nature by surgically altering newborn-baby genitalia. We flipped through the history of sexuality, Bible through contemporary politics. If I had done all my readings, it would have been an even lovelier class.

And, in between all this talk of pre-op and post-op, and of using prosthetics to urinate standing up (funnels, anyone?), my dear professor proposed something one morning that began the end of my sexual paranoia and confusion. He proposed that people’s sexualities change based on factors of society, culture and stage on one’s life - that sexuality is not static and that indeed, it is fluid.

It clicked at that moment. All the instances of doubt flashed through my mind like primitive thoughts that I’d been too close-minded to let develop. What had been until then, a desire to classify and fit in somewhere seemed to suddenly dissipate into the sea of enlightenment that was my human mind. I breathed. I was going to be okay.

I brought all this back to the States with me, and it is here that the liberty of my love and desire tinkered with and met the realities of identity. The more I stopped resisting my inclinations, the more it became apparent that in accepting fluidity, I would have to take up a queer identity. It was inevitable because I started getting really annoyed when people assumed I only liked men, or terribly peeved whenever homophobia was expressed. I’d always gotten angry anyway, but suddenly it was personal. So, it is ironic that the identity that had freed me from myself actually trapped me publicly. I didn’t expect that.

Take an innocent act like feeling attraction towards a woman, for instance. Before I gave myself the liberty to look at a woman and feel that attraction, I always felt society’s pull inside me. Look at her. No, wait! What are you doing - she’s a girl! Then, when I gave myself the liberty, the urge to respect her suddenly worried me. It was no longer "looking at her is wrong", but "looking at her is going to freak her out." When I look at women, I would hate to disrespect them and their heterosexuality. I would hate to stare at their boobs. I would hate to stare at their butts. It’s hard to help, sure, but I would hate for a woman to think of me as a creep; it’s happened before.

As a woman, I know what it’s like to be under the objectifying male gaze. And while I don’t want to ever fight my feelings of attraction again, I also would hate to imitate that gaze. I know what I think of men who stare at my body with savage lust.

Sometimes I wish we all wore tags. Mine would read: Chicana, feminist, atheist, fluid sexuality. I wish we did, and that it was matter-of-fact and that no one got their asses kicked for it. I would identify other open mujeres and smile at them without hesitation. But I guess that’s what those rainbow accessories are for.

And I write all this to say the following: to love women and men and everything in between is an honest and innocent desire. I want to stop feeling like a freak. I want my sexuality to stop being perceived as a fucking kink. I want my love to be invisible and ordinary, just like yours.

The Vagina Monologues

Julio Salgado

If you spent this Valentine’s Day alone and you’re a straight male, then you only have yourself to blame. This month, the Women’s Studies Student Association sponsored a free screening of the Vagina Monologues. The Multicultural Center was full of young female students and just a handful of males, including my boyfriend and I. I don’t understand straight guys. Here you have the perfect opportunity to mingle with your beloved opposite sex and you screw it up. You could have learned a thing or two about vaginas and what women really want. You could have been seen as the understanding male willing to go outside his box and dedicate an hour to vaginas. Not in a sexual way, but in a very informative way.

Playwright Eve Ensler wrote the Vagina Monologues after talking to a bunch of women about their vaginas. She talked to Caucasians, Latinas, Black and Jewish women about the one thing it seems they don’t get to talk about often. Ensler’s gift for writing and performing has made this piece of informative art such a classic. The play has gone on to be extremely successful world wide, gaining accolades from celebrities and Oprah Winfrey (come on, la Winfrey is on a whole different category from celebrities.)

My personal favorite was the piece titled My Angry Vagina. I never really thought about certain inventions that have been created by men for women. Ensler hilarious delivery about the cruelty of tampons and the duck-like tools used by OBGYN’s is just dead on. Women have always been seen as the weaker sex. But honestly, until the day that men are able to pop babies out of their assholes, we will never know about the brutality of childbirth. The day that men are able to squeeze a human being from a small orifice in their body is the day that the pill will be given like candy in the Boys Scouts. And that my friends, is an unfair world for the vagina.

Las Dudosas

Iris Arcón

Bisexuality could have stopped the ban on same-sex marriage. I know, you’re all probably thinking, "What the hell are you talking about?" More open people, less Mormons, and fewer hateful people could have stopped the ban on same sex marriages. But isn’t bisexuality somewhat like that? It can be said that bisexuals are open to either a man or a woman, right? Some see it as confusion, while others see bisexuality as the place in between. A place where you have chosen not to choose. You are not on a "side" yet. Oh, that infamous "side." The side that changes you forever. Ni de aqui, ni de alla. Estás dudosa o dudoso. However, you choose to define bisexuality, I do believe that everyone should be bisexual. Bisexuality could help us understand sexuality in so many ways. More importantly, the hostility towards bisexuals that might exist out there, especially towards bisexual women, need not be necessary. Before I dig myself into a deeper grave with my fellow lesbians and gays (or anyone else reading this), hear me out first.

I’ll start off by painting a picture of the kinds of hostility that I have noticed in the "gay world." Ask most lesbians and gays in the bars of Los Angeles and they’ll tell you their thoughts on the fallacy of bisexuality. Many who identify as lesbians and gays do not believe there is such a thing.

Ask any straight woman or man however, and they’ll say that bisexuals do exist.

I have noticed a difference between the reaction to bisexuality that some gays and lesbians express. Tell most lesbians you meet that you are a bisexual woman, and you’ll get an immediate "look." A look of, "Then why the fuck are you wasting my time? There’s no such thing as bisexuality." It’s a look that says, "Well you’re either in or you’re not in. You cannot be both." As a woman trying to find a good woman where my options consist of the few gay clubs and a friend of a friend of a friend that knows a lesbian (that might be single), the search can be very frustrating. I understand that lesbians are looking for other women with whom they can have stable, loving relationships and that they do not want to be left for a man, but nobody wants to be left for anyone else, man or woman, right? Maybe it is the betrayal for another man that might make lesbians think twice about getting involved with bisexual women. I do not quite know. Whatever it is, I do believe the attitude is completely unnecessary.

In contrast, a bisexual man can tell a gay man that he is bisexual and the response will be completely different. The gay man will immediately say, "Oh, don’t worry hon’, you’ll be gay soon." The reaction to bisexual men versus bisexual women makes me rather upset. Why do men get to be bisexual with less judgment while women get "the look?" I have never come across a gay man who realized he was straight after all and then started dating women again. I have also never come across a bisexual man who did not turn out to be gay over time, but I would love to meet one though. That would be a great experience for men, and it would help us understand sexuality. Bisexuality in all men could help them understand what it is like to be part of an oppressed group, as well. If all of the men and women that had voted for the ban on sex-marriage had been bisexual, they would have understood us more. Could that have helped us keep same-sex marriages?

So, why is the reaction different for bisexual men and bisexual women? Why is society still harsher on women than on men? Even more importantly, why are lesbians and gays harsher on women than on men? Shouldn’t gays and lesbians know what it’s like to be in situations where there are all sorts of pressures from family, religion, and culture?

Homosexuality is completely different for men and women. Society has constructed our culture to believe that men are puñales upon any sort of contact with the same sex. Any sexual arousal that comes from being attracted to masculinity is considered well, gay. For them, it’s put quite plain and simple. Men cannot go back. They have already betrayed heterosexuality. When it really should not have been. That is why the reaction at bars is always, "You’ll be gay soon." That is also why it is easier for men to be gay. I am not saying this in terms of who gets harassed more (men or women) or who can get away with this or that more. That would be putting two oppressed groups in a competition over which one is more oppressed and it is certainly not what I want to do. I am referring to this in terms of the path to a "defined" sexuality, something that is more black and white. It is easier for gay men to identify as gay men because of what they should never ever do: enjoy sex with another man. It is not the same for women though. But why?

There are certain pressures that women experience, but men do not and they never will. If men grew up to be either gay or straight, they were always raised to be straight men. Gay men were raised to be heterosexual and to marry a woman. Men were raised to receive servitude from women and they were taught to be dominant and in charge. Yes, I acknowledge that there are also many abusive same-sex relationships, but gay men were still not raised like Latinas. I, as many other Latinas do, know exactly what it feels like to grow up a Catholic girl with the constant pressure to serve the men of the house. I know what it feels like to have been raised with the concept that "true love" and "the one" will only come from a man. I have had heterosexuality and traditions hammered into my head ever since I can remember. I am a woman: a bastion of my culture. My children will inherit my culture and in order to do so I had to understand that for women things are a certain way. I could never relate to it of course, because I never saw myself married to a man, let alone serving him. But that was how it was shaped for me, for us. Men never experienced this.

It is that quest to avoid continuous sexism that has made female sexuality more fluid. Gay men, being men, have never and will never have to flee sexism like women. That quest to be treated with respect, equality, and as wonderful, beautiful women that we are has been the reason for much judgment on behalf of many. And it should not.

A week ago, I met up with a friend of mine at a bar. We talked for hours about stuff going on, including the women in our lives. In college, like many other women, she came out of the closet to her friends as bisexual. She started her first long-term relationship with a woman about a year ago. It was a relationship that not only made her acknowledge her lesbianism, but unfortunately it also left her emotionally damaged. Even though it hasn’t been the relationship that she had wished it was, she knows she’s a lesbian.

"I met a guy the other day at the bar."

"A man?"

"Yeah. He’s so nice to me. Doesn’t treat me like shit. Makes me feel good again, you know?

That’s what I need right now."

"Yeah. I can tell. There’s a smile on your face now."

"I haven’t met women. And well, you know how hard it is to meet good women."

"Yeah. I know."

Many lesbians and gays might say that she doesn’t know what she wants, that she’s confused; how can she go back to a man? She needs to choose a side.

This all brings me back to Proposition 8. We all know what it feels like to be judged by our love for the same sex. We have all experienced it and many of us will continue to experience it. This is exactly what we are doing to our fellow bisexuals. Yes, some might turn out to be straight. Many will also be either gay or lesbians. Some will choose not to choose.

But, no matter what happens to them and what "side" they have chosen, they will all know what it feels like to be on our side. They have experienced it. They have walked in our shoes. The ones that have figured out that they are straight, know exactly what we go through every single day in society. They have stepped outside of their privilege bubble and they have lived as an oppressed group. That in itself means so much. Isn’t that sort of what we would like to get across to the entire nation in the first place? Don’t we want some sort of understanding from the heterosexual majority? Yet, we cannot give that understanding to bisexuals? How can we expect understanding when we cannot give it to each other in the first place? I believe that if everyone were bisexual, we wouldn’t have had a ban on same-sex marriage. If everyone could understand and experience what it is like to be a lesbian or gay, they would not have taken our right to marry away. Bisexuals, no matter what "side" they choose, are our allies.

So, lesbians, chill the fuck out with your "looks." Straight men and women, please become bisexual. Gay men, stay bisexual. And you bisexuals, just stay cool. ¶

La niña de mis ojos

Anonymous
I rushed home from the university to live the moment on my computer. I planned on YouTubing Obama’s speech as soon as I could lock myself in my room and get on my laptop. On the long ride home, I had been listening to a punk version of "A Change is Gonna Come", thinking it perfect for the occasion. Later, I was delighted to hear him quote the song in his victory speech. "It’s been a long time coming," he bellowed.

And then, in the midst of all the tears of joy and the surreal quality of the night, I kept anxiously refreshing the Los Angeles Times web page for results of the California elections.

I had a headache, but I kept clicking and clicking, getting the most up-to-date results as the minutes went by. Even as I was hearing our president-elect speak in the YouTube video, I couldn’t help but refresh the page. It looked like it was passing, but that was from preliminary results in conservative counties, the web site said. Hope. I clicked again and again until my head hurt so much that I decided to just sleep on it.

In the morning, things were still muddy, but I kept the Internet close. By mid-afternoon however, it was getting clear: voting Californians, well about fifty-two percent of them, had passed the motion that would amend the state’s constitution to define marriage as that which occurs between a man and a woman. That’s when I started to get different feelings about these historic elections.

It was Saturday night after the elections. With the weight of human hate on my shoulders and the thought of comfy chickens, I had a right to be emotionally exhausted. But that was nothing that a good evening spent at my grandmother’s house with all my cousins, aunts and uncles couldn’t wisp away. Yeah.

I was sitting in the living room when my uncle approached me. He got straight to the point.

"What did you vote on Prop 8?"

"What do you think?" I answered him, coolly.

"I think that you voted ‘no’," he replied.

"And you?" I asked, almost reluctantly but unable to refuse his attempt at meaningful conversation.

"I voted ‘yes’ because I do not want my kids to be taught blah, blah, blah, gibberish, blah…" referencing of course, the successful public-schools-will-turn-your-kids-gay-if-this-proposition-does-not-pass television propaganda.

I stared at him for a second. I sighed. I had to try.

"But it’s not going to make them gay. And what’s wrong with that anyway?" I told him.

Then, my other uncle and his wife decided to chime in. That is how, in what seemed like five seconds, a one-on-one discussion turned into a yelling match. Even my mom was trying to help me. After a few minutes of listening to the same circular arguments, I let myself sink into the background. I sat there, sandwiched between these gay-passionate straight folks.

"Gays this! Gays that!"

"Oh, the horror! Fragile little children will get so confused!"

"Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve!"

Then, my uncle stopped all conversation, marking a triumphant victory for the haters in the room. Thundering with druggie-turned-apostle-of-Christ wisdom, he turned to look at my mother, who was arguing against him. His forehead vein popping, he challenged her. He asked her the make-it or break-it question:

"¿Pero está bien moralmente? Crees eso en tu corazón?"

And I heard my mother falter. I continued to stare at my lap, at that moment feeling quite detached from the world. I knew better than to hold her accountable for anything. I let them keep talking, keep yelling, keep knowing.

But, I’m not the type to let it stay like that. My patience has its limits and I finally decided to interject. I took a deep breath.

"As a…bi…sexual," I struggled to declare. They turned to look at me. "Bisexual" isn’t even the label I like, but given the audience, I wasn’t too concerned with the technicalities. I did it as a sort of plea for authority on the subject, for respect, for a bit of compassion.

And it only made them listen for a few seconds in momentary discomfort. They smiled smugly, as if I was trying to trick them out of their convictions by presenting worthless evidence. They weren’t fooled by my honesty. They resumed the argument and by then, my face was scrunched and I was crying.

I stood up quickly and retreated to my cousin’s room – I had just come out to my family. For the first time in twenty-two years, they seemed to be complete strangers, arrogant inhibitors of love and progress. I wondered how they could be my lifelong support and joy, and then turn into fiery rhetorical wolves at the passing of a petty law. None of this was about marriage. None of it was about civil rights. It was about allowing advocates of tradition to openly express their otherwise politically incorrect homophobia. They needed to sit me down in the living room and tell me what was up because of course, they were able to vote for it on Tuesday. Their too-often-repressed voices had to be heard! I guess.

I sat on my cousin’s bed sniffling. See, this whole "degenerate" sexuality thing is fairly new to me. I just came out to myself this year. Perhaps that is why I couldn’t handle it like a woman with ovaries. It’s so damn fresh.

I got up to look at myself in my cousin’s makeup mirror. I was crying, but I also did not want my eyeliner to run, which is an excellent thought for subduing tears. Stepping in closer, I looked into the peaceful depth of the blue-shadowed, brown eyes that were staring back at me. Like a clairvoyant, I tried to see the future revealed in my misty eyes.

The thought bit, and I asked the forces that be to show me if there was any way that years from now, I could end up with only a taste for boys. I concentrated and looked in deep, but at that moment, I could only see la niña de mis ojos. ¶

Elisa

Anonymous
When I was eleven years old I went to Robert A. Millikan Middle School in Sherman Oaks because I had nothing else to do during the Summer. We couldn’t possibly afford anything fancy like a summer camp and I didn’t really have any friends, so my mom decided to send me to Summer school. She didn’t care about the classes I took, she only wanted for me to have something to do for three months. They had open enrollment back then, so it didn’t matter that I was a poor kid from Van Nuys. I would just have to take the bus every morning and take it back down a three-mile stretch of street.

I had an entire Summer and a slew of choices. I settled on taking "Introduction to Design Concepts" and "Environmental Art" (apparently, they meant murals). There was one other girl who had the same classes and took the same bus home. Her name was Elisa. She was thirteen and therefore an older girl. She had a pretty face, thin and with a birthmark painted on the left side of her face, like the milk you just poured into your café. Her hair was long and wavy, the color of canela. She had fairy-like hands and moved with a swift gentleness that betrayed her personality and her strawberry-scented conditioner.

She had been born in East LA. Her mother was from Guatemala. She had grown up like every child of an immigrant; at the crossroads of two cultures. Constant conflicts with her grandmother had made her strong, though not without a hint of sadness. She had slender shoulders and they were strong and determined. She was always confident, even when she didn’t really believe that she was. She was rebellious and constantly dressed in red, black, and white (this was before The White Stripes). Her studded belt matched her leather boots and her chains jingled with her stride.

When I met Elisa, I considered myself to be what every other 11 year-old girl didshould be; normal. I listened to pop music and I wanted to be popular. Elisa, on the other hand, listened to punk rock, alternative rock, and metal. I started looking for all the rock music that I could find, hoping that I would at least like some of it, and that I could bring back something to talk to her about. Mamá was startled with my sudden changes in music tastes. I told her that I was finally being an individual, breaking free from the pack, and listening to what I wanted to instead of what I was told to (words still too big for me to comprehend just yet).

After meeting Elisa, I no longer wanted to be another sheep, another cog in the capitalist society that we had been bred into (I had yet to learn what capitalist meant). I wanted to dress like her, be like her, and just have more things in common with her. Even if I had never decided to try and please her with all my sudden changes in likes and dislikes. She was a catalyst in my life for uncovering a new emotion in me; jealousy.

I will always remember the last time that I saw her…

It was the last day of Summer school and she was going to high school in the Fall. I turned around as the doors were closing, to wave goodbye to her one last time, to try and memorize her face before she left me forever. But she didn’t notice. I watched her profile smile and her delicate wrists slide a piece of her hair behind her ear. She was talking to one of the boys who always rode the bus. To be fair, he was actually very cute, but she still wasn’t looking at me. Me, who she would never see again. As she laughed, her eyes sparkled. She didn’t love me.

I was just the little girl that followed her around. We took the same bus and the same classes, and being her shadow was the most I could really hope for. Even if I was too young to become a good friend, I tried to learn as much as I could from and about her. She radiated with the rebellion that all eleven year-old girls are drawn to. One could even say that she set me on the right track for feminism, equal rights, and critical analysis of established systems. She taught me a lot about myself, and even though I will probably never see her again, I will always remember my first girl-crush. ¶

Those Bloody Days

Yadira Arroyo

i bled
in chunks
and rivers

my vulva
all soaked
stained panties

seven pads
in seven hours
expensive

when i sat
on toilet
it flowed

and my lips
they pulsed
throbbing

aching vulva
bleeding hole
coincides with --

i don't bleed
so bad
anymore

one pad
in four hours
not stressful

a spot
here and there
at ease

at ease
my mind
and my wounded



vagina.

XV

Yadira Arroyo

This past weekend was my cousin Erika’s quinceañera. The whole family came out to celebrate her presentation to the “adult” world. My father told me earlier that day that he was not going to drink. At the statement, my mom felt his forehead for a fever and I smirked. In the middle of the party, I reminded him of his proclamation.

“¿Esta no es boda?” he asked with a feigned look of surprise. “Me malentendiste. Dije que solo si era boda.” We all had our fun.

As I stood in the background through the entire day’s events, I could not help but think of my own quinceañera a few years back. I thought about it when we were in the two-quinceañeras-for-one mass (efficiency!), when we went to the East LA park for the princess photo shoot, and later on when I was inebriated and calling forth my otherwise-shunned Jalisco roots by zapateando clumsily. Except of course, that I didn’t really have a quince, in the spectacular sense of the word.

There were several reasons, but perhaps the most controversial was the following: la misa. Although, I was only 14 at the time, I had been a staunch atheist since I was 12.

“¿Cómo vas a tener una quinceañera sin misa?” would ask my mother, puzzled.

“Pues fácil,” I would reply. “Sin misa.”

Or, there was always the more engaging:

“Yadira, ¿qué te cuesta sentarte en una silla por una pinche hora?”

“¡Pero yo no creo en eso! ¿Y si me empiezo a reír?”

Variants of this conversation would continue for a few months prior to the weekend of my fifteenth birthday. Teenage angst took its toll; how I hated religion! The thought of going through with the ceremony seemed hypocritical on far too many levels.

Either way, my mother wouldn’t have it and I wouldn’t have it and so, the potential guests didn’t have it.

Oh yes, the guests. As their only daughter and eldest child, my parents certainly fancied the idea of presenting me to the world, a proper and primp señorita. Herein lays another problem: I was nothing of the sort. I was, at best, awkward at 15 and having been raised in a very private home setting, I kept only a handful of friends. I was almost emotionally indifferent to mere acquaintances, and the thought of hosting these strangers at my big day not only seemed superficial, but quite frankly, annoying. That and I sure as hell did not want to do it in a pink dress, which at the time, my mom believed was the way to go.

And so, unwilling to compromise what were then my super revolutionary ideals, my mind knew that a quinceañera was not for me. Nevertheless, standing in the midst of a barrio upbringing, with its high school amigas, Spanish-language commercial signage and early-morning tamaleros ambulantes in the year 2001, my heart ached for acceptance as a daughter who could be presentable and whom my parents would be proud of.

One week prior to my birthday, my parents caved. As they were sitting on the back doorstep and I was walking from my room to the kitchen, I heard them murmur in all their regret. Months had passed by and not a single proactive move to plan mi fiesta was made; never mind that ideologically, it could not have been. They looked up at me as I walked back to my room and my mother called my name. I looked down to where they sat and they looked back and forth at each other, a bit nervously. One of them finally spoke. With my approval, I was to have a party con DJ and a lavender dress the following weekend.

I know that by speaking my mind and being una niña especial, it will always be difficult to gain effortless acceptance from the eldest bearers of my culture, namely my parents. This fact has been quite painful, but I’ve also always wanted things far greater than the grasp of any social confine could offer. Thankfully, my parents have stood by me, through reluctance and relajo.

While I respect and yes, broodingly envy other muchachitas who have bailado el vals and greeted their guests merrily, having a quinceañera could never be for this “loca”, as my mom so kindly puts it. If being mexicana means being una “buena” hija, or falling neatly into the role of a beautiful, altruistic, obedient and domestic daughter, then my identity is inevitably threatened . But, if it in the context of progress, it also calls on a history of pride and resistance, then I reckon I’ll be just fine.

Para mi "peor-es-nada"

Anonymous

Yeah, it’s me again. ¿Quién mas esperabas? ¿La sancha, o qué? Haha, foo’, calm down; no te voy a reclamar nada.

Solo queria decirte que that other night, when you dropped me off, cuando ni siquiera te volteaste a ver si entre bien a mi apartment ‘cause you just drove off? Pues it got me thinking see, it stung in here once more; made me realize que en tus ojos, maybe I’m just some stupid whore. Que en los ultimos meses you lied to and cunningly deceived, pero que dices que me quieres, ay papí lo prometes, que soy la unica pa’ ti.Yet, you don’t kiss me right. Siempre usas mucha lengua. Y cuando te la muerdo en broma, well, let’s not even go there – me dejas en vergüenza.

I always thought I liked you. I guess I really just might. Pero papí, why can’t you just tell me if you’re in a bad mood? You don’t even have to explain it, or talk about it si no quieres.

I just wish you didn’t scream at me and curse that I’m pathetic. Que soy mensa y aburrida, ni tan flaca y mal hablada. Que I won’t put out fast enough por mis tonterias de no quedar embarazada. Que soy confusa e incrédula, yeah, but I believe everything you say. That’s ‘cause I love you baby. I’m true to you, always & forever. You know, like the song says.

People are always talking shit, diciendo que you’re a good-for-nothing porque dejastes el estudio and you don’t support me in MY studies. Dices que I’m just wasting time, what’s the point, si I’m gonna marry you? "Girl, drop that schoolbag," you like to tell me. Like yeah, who am I trying to fool, right?

Anywho, I just had to get this off my chest.

Mis ojos are rojos and my lips are swollen y mi hair’s a mess. I’ll understand if this letter nunca la lees. I know you’re busy and occupied, but when you lose your temper and I’m not here to answer, don’t say I didn’t try.

It’s kind of hard having to live on edge and pretend nobody is listening. Nobody notices when your senses are twisted and your breath is caught short ‘cause you can’t form the words.
In the struggle to be sensible, shy, tu novia querida grapples the trifled language, the painfully extracted sappy phrase:

"I’m fine."

The Latin American Film Series at The Beach

Fernando Romero


The Latin American Film Series began on Thursday, Sept. 25 with the screening of Los Andes no creen en Dios and will continue through Oct. 16 on successive Thursdays at 7 p.m. in the University Theatre at Cal State Long Beach.

The annual film series exhibits four movies made by Latin American filmmakers or produced specifically for Latin American audiences. This year’s theme, “Love Stories: Diverse Visions,” focuses on a compilation of films that present narratives of the intricate idiosyncrasies of love coupled with the socio/political backdrop and settings of Latin America.

Series opener, Los Andes no creen en Dios by Bolivian filmmaker Antonio Eguino was released in 2007 and subsequently screened throughout Latin America. It has the recognition of being the most expensive Bolivian film ever produced. It has received acclaim for its cinematography and was also Bolivia’s submission to the 80th Annual Academy Awards for Best Foreign Film, but failed to make the final cut.

It took more than 23 years for Eguino to premier his latest film after 1984’s Amargo mar. A veteran filmmaker, Eguino makes a comeback with Los Andes no creen en Dios and adds to his repertoire of films including Pueblo chico (1974) and Chuquiago (1977). His films concern the everyday lives of Bolivians threaded with the cultural and socio/political circumstances within that country.

“Los Andes no creen en Dios is an homage to the miners of Bolivia,” Eguino said. “It is an homage to the men and women who dedicated their lives and passions to the mining industry.”

The movie is set in the 1920s and 1940s, when mineral mining peaked in Bolivia.

“I wanted to reconstruct a forgotten age of the Bolivian mining industry,” Eguino said.

With ample artistic license, Eguino recreated and restructured three novels by Bolivian writer Adolfo Costa Du Rels forming the basis for the movie plot.: La plata del diablo, La Misk’i simi (Labios Dulces) and Los Andes no creen en Dios, which later became the title of the film, and gave life to the narrator of this novel turning him into the film’s protagonist.

The film follows writer Alfonso Claros (Diego Bertie) who travels to the small, Bolivian mining town of Uyuni wherein he befriends Joaquín (Milton Cortez). Both friends fall in love with Claudina (Carla Ortiz), the misk’i simi, and get tangled with mining prospector Genaro (Jorge Ortiz) and house madam Clota (Schlomit Baytelman).

Eguino said that his filmmaking is one which reflects about social realities in a region marked by contrasts. He cited that The Andes and most of Latin America is plagued with social inequalities which beg the question of whether or not God exists.
Eguino’s film is one of two dramas to be screened during the film series, the other being Madrigal by Cuban director Fernando Pérez.

Organizer and film and electronic arts professor at CSULB Jose H. Sanchez said the selection for the films is based on diverse criteria.

“The entries are selected through attending film festivals, such as the Los Angeles Latino International Film Festival,” Sanchez said. “We also take into account recommendations from film and electronic art students attending film festivals such as the Sundance Film Festival.”

This year’s selections included two dramas and two comedies. Asegure a su Mujer, was screened on Thursday, Oct.2. This film is a 1934 comedy made by Fox Studios and directed by Lewis Seiler. The movie was produced for the Latin American market in the 1930s. Sanchez said that prior to its exhibition at the University Theatre, the film had only been publicly screened once before within the United States.

Cuban film Madrigal by Pérez is scheduled for screening on Oct. 9. This dramatic love story is set in two time periods, the years 2005 and 2020; blending fantasy and reality.

The Latino Film Series will conclude with the screening of Maldeamores on Oct. 16. Directed by Puerto Ricans Carlos Ruiz and Maria Pérez Rivera, this comedic film follows many characters who are searching for romance.
The Latin American Film Series is free and open to students, faculty and the general public. All the films are subtitled in English.

“The Latin American Film Series is an excellent way for us to reach both students and the community. Our goal is to provide an experience that will facilitate openness to and understanding of Latin American cinema and culture,” Sanchez said. ¶

There’s this Girl In A Coma...

Fernando Romero

In the singularly fluid universe of Girl In A Coma, a world has been forged to fashion a unique sound of modern punk and alternative rock softened with melancholic, swaggering vocals and tightly-fitted with a retro-cool, bad-ass Riot Grrrl! attitude.

Girl In A Coma (GIAC), the all-female band out of San Antonio rocks in the classic guitar-bass-drums paradigm, but still sounds fresh and innovative. Formed eight years ago, the trio comprised of sisters Nina (guitar and vocals) and Phanie Diaz (drums) and Jenn Alva (bass) has awaited the appraisal and recognition of fans and critics alike for almost a decade.

The band’s big break came in 2006 when cable channel Si TV, the first Latino network to broadcast in English, featured them in their documentary series "Jammin." The band was flown to New York to meet their idol, Joan Jett, who surprised them by signing them onto her indie label, Blackheart Records.

"It happened at the right time too. We had always talked about getting signed on the spot, but we never really thought it would actually happen," Jenn, 28, says.

The band released "Both Before I’m Gone" in May 2007. The album debuted on Billboard’s Heatseekers at No. 23. The band has toured with artists including The Pogues, Social Distortion and Morrissey. It was only fitting that GIAC, which borrowed its name from The Smiths’ 1987 single "Girlfriend in a Coma," was asked by "Moz" himself to open up for him in a string of tour dates last Fall and Winter in the United States and Europe.

The band is just now starting to reap the rewards after all those years trying find the right chemistry and gigging wherever and whenever.

While still in middle school, Phanie bonded with classmate Jenn over a magazine cover of Kurt Cobain’s death. Both Phanie and Jenn shared a liking for bands like Nirvana, The Smiths and The Pixies. The pair instantly linked to start bands of their own. One day, at age 12, Nina, a full eight years younger than Jenn and Phanie, played one of the songs she had written for Phanie and Jenn, trying to get their honest opinion on it. The two older band mates had no idea Nina could play guitar, let alone write songs or that she could sing so well.

"I used to watch them a lot and they would inspire me," Nina, 20, says. "I was just writing some songs and wanted to see what they thought about them."

Both Phanie and Jenn were mesmerized by Nina’s voice and songwriting skills that they decided to form a band with her despite the eight year age difference.

"We were both just blown away by her singing," Phanie, 28, says. "But still, I think she has matured. Her voice and her songwriting have definitely grown a lot since."

The decision says a lot about the faith in Nina’s voice and songwriting. Nina has received countless compliments for her warbling melodic voice, rich in alternative rock that is both dreamy and ethereal and coupled with passionate lyrics coded in irony. Nina’s voice has been likened to Billie Holiday, Patsy Cline, Björk and yes, even, Morrissey.

GIAC also stands amongst a select few of female rock bands comprised by Latinas. There has not been a representation of Latina rock bands who sing primarily in English. Aside from GIAC, the only other U.S. Latina rock band in the public eye is LA-based Go Betty Go.

The members of GIAC assert they have not encountered any roadblocks for being a Chicana/Latina rock band.

"Our heritage is not a downfall, we see it as a bonus really. We just see it as something that opens up more doors for us," Jenn says. "The fact that we’re Latinas or Chicanas is only beneficial for us. It’s not bad at all. We get to be a part of different circles and concerts. We get the best of every world. We don’t see it as something that is excluding us from anything. We’re very proud of who we are and where we come from."

Hailing from San Antonio, influenced by the Tex-Mex culture, the members of GIAC say they like to think they are opening more doors to other Latina-fronted bands.

"We’re hoping to inspire girls to start bands by showing them, this is how you do it," Phanie says.

Currently on tour, the band will take a break late in the Summer to work on their follow-up album and be back out on the road this Fall with Tegan and Sara. Known for incessant touring, GIAC developed a loyal fan base the classical way; doing it non-stop.

"We preach about touring. We tell all the bands back home to hit the road because it’s the most direct way to develop fan base," Phanie says.

"As long as we can stay on the road and people continue to come to our shows, we’re going to continue to do it," Jenn says.

The women from Girl In A Coma are no girls, they’re definite veterans of rock even for Nina who exudes decades’ worth of experience beyond her 20 years in both her voice and songwriting. They carry a very simple philosophy stemming from their humble and poor beginnings.

"All we said we ever wanted was to make a little money, and be happy. What we’re doing, it’s like a minimum wage salary by rock band standards type of thing, and we’re happy doing it. "Jenn says. ¶

...and then, GIAC in Long Beach

Fernando Romero

Girl In A Coma, the Latina trio out of San Antonio came to Alex’s Bar in Long Beach to play their fast-paced, gritty brand of alternative punk rock.

The band’s sound is like The Pixies and early Blondie coupled with the angst of Nirvana.

Bassist Jenn Alva was intense and energetic and the most vibrant of the group as she jumped up and down and back-and-forth on the stage.

Vocalist/guitarist Nina Diaz did the same and sang at the top of her lungs, while her eyes widened as if they would pop out at any moment.

Drummer Phanie D was relentless on drums, providing a beat prompting you to do something - anything.

At the center of it all was vocalist/guitarist Nina, with her stylish, rocker-crooning voice like a cross between Morrissey and Björk. Nina has a voice that makes you lift your head from whatever drink you’ve buried yourself into and pay attention, This was so on "Their Cell," which has melancholy lyrics like "tattooed lovers, they don’t like to reminisce/keep pictures of the ones you once loved." This line, this song is about longing and loss, with infectious melodies and harmonies and her vocals are emotive as if they could reach down into her pathetic, barely-beating heart to rip open the pain from her chest and share it with you.

Fans sang along to songs from the band’s debut album Both Before I’m Gone. The band also introduced a handful of unreleased songs including "BB," "Ven Cerca," and "Slaughter MM," all of which sounded tighter and tougher than the ones fans who have seen the band repeatedly have become accustomed to. Nina’s voice was moving, it was melodramatic and wound up with exasperation, while the band’s rhythm remained alternative punk.

At Alex’s Bar, the trio merged the power of punk and alt rock with pop-y hooks and infectious lyrics, which left the audience asking for more. ¶

Mirrored

Yadira Arroyo

I wake up at the sound of the alarm’s buzz, buzz, buzz. The time is 11:30 a.m. on a completely free day. Free from work, free from school, free from friends and maybe even free from family. I hit the snooze button. About ten minutes later, I am grabbing my towel for a much anticipated, summer-morning shower.

In the bathroom, I pull the hair elastics from my slept-in, lopsided pigtails, scrunch my hair with my hands and then lazily undress. When all my clothes and hair accessories are piled on the toilet seat cover to be taken to my personal hamper after I am done, I grab my toothbrush and toothpaste and place them on the dry ledge of the bathtub. I look into the large mirror opposite the shower, as I always do, and think that it may not be a bad day to skip makeup. I run my hands over my face and then look at the rest of my body, not unsatisfied. I squeeze my breasts because they ache ridiculously, then notice that I need to shave my legs and underarms. I grab a razor from the compartment behind the sink mirror to put beside the toothbrush, but as I close the small door, I squint my eyes to get a better look at what I hadn’t noticed before. It’s there on my upper right arm, ugly and evident.

I turn to the long mirror again and look into my eyes; they begin to flicker in every direction as my body plunges bluntly into accelerated thought. Maybe it was an accident, races my mind. I step up closer to the mirror and examine it. The mark’s shape is so easily distinguishable that there is no mistaking how it got there. There are flashbacks from the previous night. I place my left hand over it and squeeze it gently; I feel the bruised pain at each of its perfectly-arranged four points. I stare at the floor thinking of everything it could mean outside the four walls that I find myself hiding in. The shock of such frailty mocks me.

I turn around to slide open the shower door, turning the showerhead on as soon as I step in. The cool water slows the feral molecules that had begun to boil my blood. I breathe. Calm gloom sets in and I begin to sing. I sing a song that carries me as far away from the cause as possible. If this is your venom, I can just as fiercely conjure my antidote. I force myself to bliss.

When I am done, I wrap a towel around myself and look into the mirror once again, my brown eyes tinged with disappointment. This is not my destiny. I take another angry glance at the mark, holding back tears, and walk to my bedroom. Once away from the bare vulnerability of the cleansing room, I dress myself. Covering the cruelty with a striped blouse, I trap the shame in the mirror. If I succumb to weakness now, it is an eternal loss. I finish gathering myself and open the front door. The sunlight once again wraps me in truth as I walk across my front lawn; my destiny remains clutched in my own hands.

Corroded Coral Pink

Yadira Arroyo

The night was just beginning. We went to Foufoune's and sat on the second floor, where we could look down into the dance floor/mosh pit. After about three pitchers, we had some sort of liquor. It was dizzy dizzy, but I ain't no fool -- or so I thought. He cupped my chin with his hand and leaned his head in. I pulled away.

"Why don't you want to kiss me?" he asked. I told him that I just didn't want to.

I got up from my seat, determined to keep enjoying my buzz, and leaned against the rail to look over the crowd. Intoxicated, the thumping punk rock and the stimulating movement of the young ones below gradually propelled me towards sensory bliss. I closed my eyes. Taking it all in, I ignored his presence in order to fully live the moment. With the streaks of light bearing upon me, I began to sway my hips and dance alone. Shut out from the world yet thoroughly alive in it, I smiled to myself. Mmm.

It was nearing midnight and not wanting him in my apartment again, I urged him to be on his way so he could catch the last bus to Kahnawake. He, however, thought it better to prolong the fun. He thought that he could stay at my place. And I? I was drunk. I agreed on the condition that he would have a spot on my floor -- not my bed, not again. So, we stayed until closing and then got into a cab; he was broke -- how nice.

We entered my apartment and lacking the most minimal courtesy, he helped himself to a glass of water. Or was it James who would so obnoxiously take? Anyway, he had something from my kitchen -- how nice. I went into my bedroom to change into my pajamas where I rolled my eyes; I was tired. Not knowing if Heather was home, I did not want to have him roam the apartment unsupervised. After all: my guest, my responsibility; that was my logic. I pointed at the hardwood floor in a corner of my room and, slurring, informed him that he would sleep there. He complained that it was too cold to crash there, but he wasn't really complaining.

I was drunk. I failed. I, whose poise is by sistahs thoroughly exalted in the daytime world, caved. Easily convinced in this state, I told him that he could sleep on the opposite end of my queen-sized bed. I crawled into it and covered myself in order to shield myself from the atmosphere. He took off his shoes, his jacket, then his shirt and his pants. Yeah, to my surprise and utter disgust, I watched as he undressed completely. I stared blankly at the floor, becoming cognizant of the blood draining itself from my body. He walked over and crept into my bed; I could feel the intrusive pressure that he applied to the mattress as he invaded and I could hear every creak of the springs. Facing away from him, I held my eyes wide open. My bed. Mine. My safety. My room. I closed my eyes tight. I heard and felt the mattress again as he crept closer. Even at that point, I give people the benefit of the doubt. Like, perhaps there is some eternal good in people and so maybe I was misunderstanding everything. However, as if on some unimaginative horror movie cue, his fat white body pressed against mine. Shit. Expecting it, sensing it, I next felt his erect penis on my lower back, and then sliding down to my ass. I scooted to the edge of the bed; alert, quiet. I felt his fat white hand creeping over my abdomen. I flung it away, trembling violently inside although I was in fact, still as a rock. He did it again. I removed the perverse filth from my temple. I hung on the edge of my bed; scared, sickened. Whatever it took to keep that thing away from me…

In the morning, I woke up and didn't dare look over my shoulder. I didn't want to risk engraving the repulsing scene into my ever-keen visual memory. I went to the bathroom and stayed there for a long time. To look at him would be to admit that it had really happened, and yet, I couldn't wait to acknowledge the thing that was lying on my bed so that I could throw it out. Of course, I wasn’t about to actually do anything proactive about it, was I? No. Instead, I sat at the dinner table, somberly watching the dreary day through the kitchen window.

He soon woke and smiled. Like nothing. He put on his nasty black leather jacket and met me in the kitchen. Honestly, I was in some sort of shock. He acted like nothing had happened. Not even a fucking apology. He was hungry. In a curious expression of my unscathed humanity, I offered him waffles and the last two eggs in my refrigerator. I watched irately as he flavored the eggs with basil that he decided to steal from my roommate's cabinet, and then merrily fixed himself breakfast. I stared blankly, abused really, at my plate. I made some excuse about having to run some errands and he fuck-finally got the message. He left, but not before taking some more from me – he needed money for the bus. (Yes, yes, take it!) When I shut the door downstairs after he exited, I was extremely relieved.

Climbing up the stairs though, I suddenly felt sick; I was dirty. Cleansing my body suddenly became my most immediate need, so I proceeded accordingly. Standing under the showerhead, my tears ran along with the steamy water in the wet and foggy blur that was being produced. I scoured my soft, loyal skin while simultaneously apologizing to my own body for having let it down in such a manner that at that moment, its honey-brown tone looked more like a corroded coral pink. I scrubbed once, twice, and still, his putrid scent would not begin to fade! I washed my hair with wicked desperation. Panting and realizing that I had done all that I could in the shower, I wrapped a towel around myself and walked feebly to my bedroom. I sat on my bed staring at nothing, but thinking of everything. Miserably sobbing, I clothed myself. I stood in the middle of the room. Then, in a sudden fit of fury and disgust, I tore the blankets and comforter off my bed, carried them in a bundle and tossed them into the washing machine. Unfulfilled, it next occurred to me to wash those tainted dishes. To hell with it, so I threw away the cup. I swept. I cleaned. I tidied. I sanitized. What did I need to do to crawl out of my skin and rid myself of his permeating stench? There were flashes of memory, of the spectre’s flaccid naked body against my back. How could I get rid of his rotten touch?

*

Well, they say that time is the best cure, and I’ve lived long enough to know that it sure as hell is. But you know, I’d like to expand on that concept. I didn’t know that it also made the best friggin’ sanitizer.

In my Place, I looked up at the Glass and saw the Vendor

Yadira Arroyo

I am being told to thirst for you. And I sort of do because there is only so much that I can resist. I mean, wow, in terms of the system, you are a gem. You don't see that of course, but I know better. And what if despite my credence, I could still pocket you? What a secret accomplishment that would be for me. Then you would become my trophy.

That's when it gets twisted. You are something strange that the system expelled. You are strange because you are positively (you know, like, not achromatic) colored vomit and that carries with it a lot of stigma. If anything, your buddies should be the first ones to undo the myth, but no, you refuse to undermine your own discomfort for it is you that the system holds the dearest. If anything, I'd say that you are the system's greatest excrement. You are its pride for you have the tools of dissatisfaction to raise your consciousness and overturn the whole demonic thing, yet you haughtily choose to remain within its walls. You are by far its most obedient baby.

So in your awkward and intriguingly dissectible position on the plane, stupid as you are to stay where you are, I find you interesting. If only I could say that I held you in my hand, what a feat that would be! That alone would qualify and accept me within the system. Secretly, I would betray everything that I stand for. I think that what I am most concerned with though is having an obedient baby's praise. Now that, would surely fuck things up. It's your unique position that allows me to crave you. A craving only lasts so long though, I am well aware. I want to get in and stay in you for a long time and I want you to enter and exit as fast as possible. Hell, it would be the best if you didn't even have to be in me.

Now, why am I writing this? Well, I have a unique position too. This position is tenuous, weak and hurtful because it demonstrates my inability to perform for the system. I don't actually want to be active in it, but if my mere presence could activate that false power, ooh how that would make me giddy! I have a unique position too, but you tricked me. Given the circumstances, I made my calculations and wrote out the formula for a perfect ride. You however, turned out to have the upper hand. How? You were never in the same position as I was and that's what I had figured. As time passed and I connected more dots, I became aware of your strange position. And now, as I deal with the numbers and figures, the new information leads to one answer: I'm getting fucked in this position. Everything would be good if I didn't secretly want to purchase a piece of the poisonous pie. Now I see that I am truly being made into my essence and that's because you are still playing the game. I stopped playing but to you, I will always be something within. Essence.