Maguey Mexicano
Museo Dolores Olmedo Patiño
Xochimilco, Mexico
Vamos Mexico
Mexico 3 - 1 Venezuela
Reliant Stadium, Houston, TX
January 25, 2012
Gustavo Ayón: Del Rancho a la NBA
“Allá voy NBA”, garabateó Gustavo Ayón en la hoja de un cuaderno un día cualquiera en el que su anhelo de ser estrella del basquetbol acaparaba su atención.
María Aguirre, su madre, aún conserva esa libreta que encontró cuando no alcanzaba a descifrar los sueños de su hijo. Nada sabía ella de la liga de baloncesto más importante del mundo, tan sólo que su muchacho no se miraba al espejo sin un balón en las manos.
Casi nueve años después de aquel decreto, los Hornets de Nueva Orleáns, uno de los 30 equipos que integran la NBA, contrataron a Gustavo Ayón por tres temporadas a cambio de 5 millones de dólares. Se convirtió así en el tercer mexicano que llega a la liga estadunidense, detrás de Horacio Llamas y Eduardo Nájera.
Lea más en Proceso
Soneros del Tesechoacán
Trailer for documtery film on Son Jarocho, the music of Veracruz.
Be on the lookout, Soneros is currently touring California and may be coming to a city near you!
11 Year-Old Carries On Family’s Aztec Dance Tradition
San Francisco Mission District resident Connie Xochiquetzalli “Xochi” Peña has been an Aztec dancer all her life.
As a 2 year-old, she danced an entire parade route. Now 11, Xochi sometimes steps in for her mother and teaches dance class at the Mission Cultural Center.
She comes from a long line of Aztec dancers. Her great-grandfather on her mother’s side was also a dancer in her family’s native Toluca, Estado de Mexico.
Xochi has big plans for herself, ones that include practicing either law or medicine. If dancing parade routes as a toddler and teacher classes while still in the sixth grade is any indication, we’re sure she can do anything she sets her mind to.
via SF Gate
Photo: Rod Yip/The Chronicle
Mexico’s Artists Respond to Drug War With Poetry & Song
Javier Sicilia is a novelist and a poet. In 2009, he was awarded Mexico’s prestigious Aguascalientes National Poetry Prize. This September, he read a poem dedicated to his son, Juan Francisco, at a rally:
There is nothing else to say
The world is not worthy of the word
They drowned it, deep inside of us
As they asphyxiated you
As they ripped your lungs apart
And the pain does not leave me
All we have is a world
For the silence of the just
Only for your silence and my silence, Juanelo.
This was the last poem Sicilia wrote. His son was murdered in the central state of Morelos in March, along with six other people, by members of a drug cartel.
Javier Sicilia renounced poetry and became the leader of a national protest against the drug war. Yet he says poetry has been an integral part of the “Peace with Justice and Dignity” movement.
“Poetry has been present, the poets have been part of it,” Sicilia says. “The problem is that the mass media don’t like to cover it and don’t understand that this movement was born out of poetry, and the reason why it’s important is because it’s filled with a poetic content that has transformed the language. And behind all of this is a profound ethics, as with all poetry.”
Sicilia says the poet has a moral responsibility to tell these stories.
Other artists are also reacting to the violent realities in Mexico today. Singer Lila Downs addresses the violence in a song that deals directly with the consequences, called “La Reina del Inframundo” — Queen of the Underworld. The lyrics read:
“Six feet underground, it’s for a certain kind of weed, for which the bosses up north are making us kill each other off, and now I’m the queen of the underworld, and my crown is a tombstone …”
Video: Lila Downs ♪ La Reina del Inframundo
Read More and Listen at NPR
Cuauhpilli • Guerrero Águila • Eagle Warrior
Statue of an Cuauhpilli, meaning Eagle Warrior in Nahuatl, stands at attention at Mexico’s National Musuem of Anthropology in Mexico City.
Found at the Huey Teocalli, commonly known as El Templo Mayor, a large temple complex adjacent to the city’s present day Zócalo (Plaza de la Constitución).
The Eagle Warrior and the Jaguar Warrior were the Mexica’s two most specialized warrior societies, or military orders. As seen on many of Mexico’s national soccer team apparel, the Eagle Warrior symbol remains popular amongst Mexicans of all ages and stripes.
This statue is part of the Sala Mexica or Mexica Hall, a permenant exhibition at the museum.
José Alfredo Jiménez
Singer, songwriter José Alfredo Jiménez was born January 19, 1926, in the small town of Dolores Hidalgo, Guanajuato.
Beloved by millions, he is widely regarded as Mexico’s most talented songwriter ever.
A man of the people, his gravesite is visited by thousands every year. Fittingly, his epitaph reads, “La Vida No Vale Nada” (“Life Is Not Worth Anything”), lyric to one of his most popular songs, “Camino de Guanajuato.”
¡Que Viva José Alfredo!
(via elisamexica)
Food and Aid Arrives to the Sierra Tarahumara
Days after a false report claiming distraught Rarámuri mothers unable to feed their children were taking their own lives in the mountains of Chihuahua, food and aid donated by thousands of Mexicans this past weekend finally arrived.
Chihuahua is experiencing one of the worst droughts in over 70 years. Groups in the United States are raising money in support of affected communities.
Stay tuned for more information.
