LA Weekly

Berenice Garcia Corral was commander of the sex crimes unit of Chihuahua state's State Investigation Agency before masked men shot her in her driveway in Ciuadad Juarez on Monday night. La Jornada reports that she was shot at least 10 times with AK-47 rifles. On Tuesday in the municipality of Hidalgo del Parral a local police officer was shot and killed, and two more in Juarez were injured in shoot-outs. Authorities in Juarez said the Garcia Corral killing was related to a "case that she was investigating," suggesting a link to the shameful mystery of the Juarez women murders.

This was news on page 18 of the paper, by the way. It's easy to imagine what sort of coverage a killling of a police officer and one high-level female investigator in the span of two days in the same region would get in the U.S. But this is Mexico's internal narco war we're talking about. Killings happen daily in the states where the drug trade is centered. You've heard about the spectacular events, surely. In Tijuana, 15 were killed in a single day last month during a chaotic blast of street combat. In January Tijuana kindergarteners were caught in the ongoing cross-fire. Every day, as they battle the cartels who are battling themselves, civil and federal police casualities are mounting.

The deaths are news but not news. Reports are buried or overlooked. Some papers even keep daily narco-related death counts. Another day, another serving of bloodshed in organized crime in Mexico. On Wednesday, for instance, La Jornada's piece from Juarez noted as a tag-on that six more narco war victims were added in the cities of Nogales and Hermosillo. Their names were Oscar Jaime Valenzuela Valenzuela, his wife Yolanda Lopez Herrera, and police officer Juan Alvaro Gomez Higuera. A fourth victim remained unidentified and, seperately, two unidentified bodies were found near an airstrip.

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

May Day, Dia Internacional del los Trabajadores, is a national holiday here. On Thursday most stores and shops were closed and people didn't work, giving Mexico's huge network of unions, or "sindicatos," an opportunity to march through the city center and hold a rally at the Zocalo -- while another set of workers busied themselves with (finally!) dismantling the "Ashes & Snow" temporary museum (eyesore) that has dominated the square for six months.

It was a somewhat ordinary rally. The Zocalo was not packed, as it has been recently, and the speakers were mostly sindicato bigwigs repeating the familiar lines against the conservative federal government and against the privatization of Mexico's industries and resources. Curiously, even as thousands of Mexican and Latin American immigrants marched in Los Angeles and across the United States on May Day, there was hardly a mention of the immigrant rights movement in the U.S. at the Zocalo on Thursday. No effort to tie the struggles of their countrymen to the north to the struggles of workers here in the patria.

So I went and had a long lunch at El Generalito on Filomeno Mata. Cauliflower soup, a green salad, then tortitas de espinaca, essentially an empanada made out of spinach stuffed with cheese and drenched with a nice jitomate sauce, with beans on the side. And a tall dark beer from the tap. As I ate, taxi drivers from Ecatepec marched by on Madero street.

Well, anyway, the real resistance on May Day, I would soon find out, wasn't going to be in the Centro Historico. It would be at a ska-punk-psychobilly fest just a few miles to the northwest, where hordes of young people in Mexico City gathered to do what they do best: dance, do drugs, make out, and fight.

Read on...

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The Jumex Collection art museum is located at a industrial plant in the rough-edged northern outskirts of metropolitan Mexico City, in the municipality of Ecatepec, in the state of Mexico. Initial access from a busy boulevard is gained through a guarded gate and then down a long asphalt drive. Then, through another guard post, then down a concrete walkway. No indication of any kind that Art is just around the corner. The walk would feel like it was pulled from some abandoned plant in Mike Davis’s Fontana when I visited on Saturday were it not for the huge party tent, soft colored lights, and the army of waiters buzzing about distributing brownies and tequila cocktails to partygoers.

It was the opening for “Brave New Worlds,” the ambitious exhibit originally organized by the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, now on view at the Jumex plant. As people tend to do at such events, visitors walked through the show and gazed and considered. But this being Mexico City, this being an art scene well accustomed to extravagant partying, and this in particular being the Jumex Collection, you could sorta feel a lot of people were thinking, "Egh. Where's the booze?"

That's how openings are celebrated when hosted by Eugenio Lopez Alonso, Jumex owner and Latin America’s most prominent collector of contemporary art. Whether in vans provided by the Jumex crew or in private cars (often with private drivers), scores of art-hungry (and just hungry-hungry) guests arrived, whiling away the afternoon and evening on velvety couches that were organized in maze patterns under the tents and propped up by used wooden crate lifts that were left, cheekily, undisguised.

Read on...

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Sleek and elegant, but still tinged with that trademark vibe of rascally weirdness, the fall/winter line by Marvin & Quetzal helped finish Fashion Week Mexico with a dazzling bang. The young duo, among the most promising working in Mexico today, used a bright palette of colors yet managed to keep their looks lean and mature.

They presented new hats and gloves and also deliciously narcissistic earrings, one big plastic "M" and one big plastic "Q." A parade of severe, metallic boots created a jarring effect when combined with the colors and fabrics on top, and depending on your tastes the combination is either daring or grating. I liked it. Generally, the designers in Mexico this season, from Cherry Project to Julia & Renata, did shoes very well.

More photos after the jump ...

Read on...

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Tall, striking, and as piercingly eloquent as ever when addressing throngs of dedicated supporters, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador is back at the top of a massive street-level social movement in Mexico. And this time it's not over votes. It's over Mexico's oil.

The leftist-populist former mayor of Mexico City -- who in 2006 was narrowly, narrowly defeated in the contested presidential election against conservative Felipe Calderon -- is leading a movement to prevent the "privatization" of the state oil company Pemex. Calderon is seeking to open Pemex to private or foreign investors who he says would be able to help Mexico drill for potential new reserves in the country's drying oil fields. The struggling Pemex is a working symbol of post-Revolution nationalism in Mexico, and the anti-privatization movement argues that any space for foreign capital or influence in Pemex's infrastructure would constitute an assault on the Constitution and on Mexican sovereignty.

Mexico's oil "belongs to all Mexicans," they chant, and it's future should not be determined by a tiny class of Mexican politicians and businessmen whose wealth and influence seems to swell more and more while millions upon millions of other Mexicans live out their lives in dire poverty.

AMLO and his well-organized, women-led "brigades" have taken over -- again -- some streets in the Centro Historico, this time targeting the Senate, where Calderon's reform package is being considered. "They're afraid of us, because we are not afraid," they sing, while promising widespread civil disobedience.

But, to put it bluntly, the whole controversy is confusing as hell.

Read on...

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Televisa on-air personality Kristoff has finally broke his silence and addressed publicly the wave of anti-emo violence that was at least partly inspired by his "Fucking bullshit!" rant, based what some emos themselves have said, and on how widely it was distributed before the first emo attack in Queretaro. Kristoff spoke to MTV News, reportedly after some haggling. (He did not reply to my repeated and detailed interview requests.)

It's fascinating to watch Kristoff brush off the emo controversy and defend himself. He even refers to the UNAM professor who told La Jornada that emos categorically do not constitute one of the urban tribes of Mexico. "It is simply an opinion," Kristoff says, quoting Voltaire.

MTV did an extensive report on the anti-emo violence in Mexico, starting with this clip. For more background see my coverage at Intersections. This post in particular refers to some radio interviews I've done on the topic. And here is a fresh piece on the emo bashings by NPR journalist Michael O'Boyle, in which I'm also interviewed.

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

It's Fashion Week Mexico right now, a week-long fair of new moda showcasing the fall and winter collections from many of Mexico's established designers and some exciting up-and-comers. Five years ago such a sentence might have sounded like an oxymoron. A fashion "scene," in Mexico City? Yet the evidence continues to grow that there is a vibrant, energetic community of fashion designers, fashion journalists, fashion models, and legions of fashionistas that are firmly committed to making the D.F. a "hot" spot in the global fashion universe. The question is, who's going to actually buy the clothes?

** After the jump, more shots from the runways. Above, a doll-face model posing during the presentation of Paola Hernandez's new collection. Her inspiration? "El Porfiriato."

Read on...

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

"What does it taste like to you?" ask the promo advertisements for the new soft drink Pepsi Retro on bus stations and billboards in Mexico City. Clearly, they're asking for it. We've dealt with this question before, suggesting that maybe Pepsi is hoping its new product can dig into the market so dominated by the delicious flavor of Mexican Coca-Cola. Now let's make the taste-test happen.

A four-pack of small Pepsi Retro bottles to go a lunch of pita bread, goat cheese, hot mustard and fresh blueberries. Nice bottle design. The soft drink is fizzy and light, as expected, with a hint of cinnamon simmering in there somewhere. Mmmmm. Interesting. Another bottle, and, yes, here comes the sugar headache. The pita and blueberries run out. My stomach is displeased. I press on. Bottle No. 3. The flavor remains uniform, but I can't have another. In fact, I can't help wishing I had a shiny glass bottle of Mexican Coke nearby. Verdict: a worthwhile one-time novelty, but it's hard to beat the "original."

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The punks had their day here on Saturday, railing against Mexico City's peace-loving emos in what amounts to at least a psychological escalation of the anti-emo movement. Later that night, L.A. deathrock legends Christian Death played in Colonia Roma. Pictured above is singer Eva O and another band member during Friday's night autograph-signing at El Under. Below, for a view of the stage in the sweltering oxygen-less heat during the show, this is the best I could do. Kinda arty, no?

Across town in Polanco, the Indie-O festival took over the Vive Cuervo Salon, bringing earthy, earnest (as in, NON-EMO) indie rock to eager D.F. fans.

Read on...

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The nationwide assault campaign against emos in Mexico continues to surge forward, as word is spreading that emos will be hunted and beaten by anti-emo kids in Tijuana on Saturday. Word is emos will rumble with their adversaries at Plaza Rio, Tijuana's central outdoor mall. But hold on. My younger sister, who works at a high school in San Diego where many students commute daily from Tijuana (yes, that's life on the border), says: "My kids were saying that they were pissed because everyone is talking about it and they think the word got out already, location might change."

Meanwhile, here in Mexico City, El Universal reports that emos plan to march on Saturday alongside other "urban tribes" from their unofficial base of the Glorieta de Insurgentes to El Chopo, the revered youth alternative street market where the various tribes of Mexico City usually coexist without trouble. It's an effort to display unity and tolerance as the prospects of more assaults linger online and in the streets. Updates later.

Previously, over at Intersections, "The emos of Mexico are fighting back."

* Photo above, punks, "darketos" and metalheads hanging out at El Chopo in December.

Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (1)

As I've reported at my personal blog Intersections, emos are under attack in Mexico. Here are a few good primary sources to better understand what's happening.

In Mexico, emo culture is a butt of many jokes. It is either despised intensely or generally ignored. But it's only the despising sentiment that lately has been getting wide airply. In the above clip, a Televisa on-air personality named Kristoff expresses a serious dose of anti-emo rhetoric and switches to English to say, on network television, "Fucking bullshit" to the emo movement. Some emos I've interviewed point to the Kristoff clip as a defining provocation of the current wave of anti-emo violence. Now check out this clip from another Televisa program where three emos are interviewed about the attacks. At the end, the kid on the left asks if he can say more thing: he directly accuses Kristoff of spreading anti-emo hate.

Read on...

Permalink | Comments (17) | TrackBacks (0)

These are members of the Frente de Pueblos en Defensa de la Tierra (FPDT), during a reggae and ska festival in San Salvador Atenco on Friday. They took the stage with their iconic machetes and read from a declaration calling for the liberation of political prisoners swept up by the government during the violent confrontation in 2006 between federal forces and the people of this municipio in the flat orbit of Mexico City. The throngs of youth who had gathered to hear such bands as Los de Abajo and Panteon Rococo listened patiently, most of them covered in a film of dust and exhausted from a full afternoon of hardcore slam-dancing. And they were ready for more.

Read on...

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Millions of passengers use the Mexico City metro daily. It is one of the largest and most used systems in the world, a crowning achievement of the capital's fastpaced growth during the mid-20th Century. A new Gold line, Line 12, is under construction. It will provide a much-needed lateral connection between the lines that snake southward. I ride the metro as often as possible, despite its drawbacks. It is often insanely crowded, and under the hot earth of the Valley of Mexico, the subterrean atmosphere can sometimes be decidely unpleasant. This is a view inside the Balderas transfer station.

Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

M.I.A. delivered once again at the MX Beat fest on Saturday night, scoring more direct hits on the ears and hips of thousands of Mexican fans who braved the merciless chill of the highland plain in Toluca where the festival was held. It was the final and biggest night of four in different cities in Mexico that constituted the festival, now in its third year. The simplest analogy is that it's the Mexican Coachella -- and you might remember my first impressions of that event. In any case, setting aside the lines and crowds and corporate propoganda that go with any big music festival, MX Beat was an all-around worth-it trip out into the desolate exurban wilderness. M.I.A. kept us dancing and the Beastie Boys kept us spot-rocking and there was plenty of digitech melodrama and dreamscapes in the form of sets from Lo-Fi-Fnk, The Teenagers, and Cut Copy. I was also basically blown away by Digitalism. Everyone was going insane inside the tent when they played at the end of the night, but maybe it was the freezing cold and general delirium.

Read on...

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Is Isis, the ancient Egyptian mother-god, related in some mystical way with Quetzalcoatl, the feathered serpent of Mesoamerican mythology? That's the central theme behind a new temporary exhibit at Mexico's National Museum of Anthropology. It is one of those "mega-shows" that have been sorta trendy in museums lately: separate entrances, heavy security, sound effects in the gallery spaces, a glossy temporary giftshop. Distractions aside, the show is pretty exciting, particularly the rooms dedicated to Pharoahonic Egypt because they bring to Mexico some never-before-seen antiquities from several Egyptian collections. There are also lots of depictions of Isis from the Roman Empire.

Read on...

Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)