COMPAÑERO
Vol. 2, No. 1, Winter 1996
Jeff
Valdez
COMPAÑERO
Vol. 2, No. 1, Winter 1996
Jeff
Valdez
HILO, the Hispanic Initiative for Literacy Opportunities, and El Escritorio produced and sponsored the 3rd Annual Festival de las Artes on November 16, 1996 at Pueblo Community College in Pueblo, Colorado. The agenda was dynamic, with authors, artists, musicians, singers, dancers and artisans all showing their best. The following is a summary of all of the presenters at the event.
Literature
Manuel Ramos, author of the National Bestseller, THE BALLAD OF ROCKY RUIZ, winner of the Chicano/Latino Literary Contest, 1993 Colorado Book Award for Best Fiction Novel and Edgar Award Nominee for Best First Mystery gave a presentation to an appreciative audience.
Victoria Galvez, a film producer, a writer, a performer, Victoria is someone with unequaled experience and superb talent. She epitomizes the "Renaissance Woman." Her performance included excerpts from her book Corn on the Macabre which she does with rhythm and music in the background with a beatnik feel.
Artists
Jacinto & Rick Avalos, two of Colorado's most accomplished photographers.
Andrew Sanchez is a Junior at the University of Southern Colorado, exhibited his art and graphic designs.
Robert Guerrero is a contemporary Southwest artist with an emphasis on realistic and semi-abstract styles.
Gilbert Garcia is a self taught artist who started by doing paintings in oil, acrylics and watercolors more than twenty years ago. In 1994 he won Jurors Choice at the Colorado State Fair Art Exhibit for his sculpture "Bald Eagle."
Ralph Garcia has won many awards for his wildlife carvings, particularly his bull elk. Ralph is the son of well known sculptor, Gilbert Garcia, who also exhibited at the Festival de las Artes this year.
Anthony Armijo's art shows the fine details of the faces and dress of his southwest subjects with a unique style of background settings.
Victoria Soto captured the landscapes of the Colorado valleys beautifully.
David Sanchez, a student at Pueblo Community College. Besides his southwest visual art he makes amazing masks of the southwest.
Musicians
Jeff Valdez is one of the most versatile and talented musicians in Colorado. Jeff has played throughout the world touring Russia, Poland, Germany, Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, England, Jamaica and Ireland, where he appeared on BBC television. He currently owns his own recording studio located in Pueblo, Colorado, called Kachina Digital Recording. Jeff wrote "Spirit of the Grass," a song about the attempts to obtain and export San Luis Valley water. He is virtually a one-man symphony with the talent and knowledge to put sounds together that seem impossible. Jeff captured the subtle sounds of the likes of B. B. King and Jose Feliciano which he performed along with others and some of his own songs that he has written and recorded.
Singers
Deanna Valdez is a beautiful singer that captured the sounds of Selena and Gloria Estefan beautifully. She changed from English to Spanish in a heartbeat. Her renditions of Mexican music make her unique while her contemporary singing surprised everyone with such songs as Unchained Melody by the Righteous Brothers.
Adrianne Gauna a talented Mariachi singer has performed before for the Festival de las Artes and is greatly appreciated.
Orators
Donato Martinez is a sophomore enrolled in Honors classes at East High School in Pueblo, Colorado gave an excellent presentation on the fateful meeting of Cortez and Moctezuma.
Jennifer Trujillo was chosen the 1996 Colorado State Fair Fiesta Queen. She is currently attending Colorado College preparing to enter medical school.
Dance Groups
Bellas Artes performed under the instruction of two Mexican students, Iskra Merino and Francisco Rico.
The Guadalupe Dancers are a household word in folkloric dance in Colorado. The group itself was founded twenty seven years ago and preserves some of the best of our traditions. They performed Ni¤o Dormido, Jarabe Nayarita, Los Viejitos, and El Recumbe.
The Pueblo Ballet Folklorico de Pueblo is the newest folkloric dance group in Pueblo. Jimmy Newmoon Roybal, one of the groups instructors also recited "I am Joaquin," by Corky Gonzales, and got a standing ovation.
Attacks in the media, attacks on the street, attacks by politicians and a deadening silence by the great majority of citizens in the United States. The object of these attacks is the Mexican Immigrant, the people who are coming to the United State to work, to make a better life for themselves, for their families and to contribute to the society in which they live.
The attacks in the media have crossed the line between humor and vicious malignment. Columnists such as Mike Royko of Chicago strikes out not only at undocumented immigrants, but at the Mexican character. For example saying, "Just name one thing that Mexico has done this century that has been of any genuine use to the rest of this planet" and "And before its entire population sneaks across the border, we should seize it and make it a colony."
Ken Hamblin a columnist for the Denver Post commenting, "I don't think it's beyond the president's men... to not ruffle the feathers of Mexican-Americans by detaining and deporting their relatives and friends who cross the border as criminals." The implication appears, by association, that something is illegal about being Mexican-American.
The media aside, these attacks are often vicious, as in the recent attack by the police on unarmed, unresisting Mexican victims on a highway in California. There have been numerous reports of violence at the border between Mexico and the U.S. and much of the violence has been perpetrated by the U.S. authorities against the Mexican immigrants. Violence against the Mexican immigrant and Mexican-Americans has been documented in many other places and in many other situations in the United States.
Perhaps the most dangerous of these attacks are the political attacks made by aspiring politicians hoping to generate enough fear and hate as to appear to be the savior of the God-fearing folk of this country. They are not only attacking the so-called illegal immigrants and their children, they are also attacking the legal immigrants in this country. They paint the picture of hordes of alien people (not like Americans?) lining up at the welfare offices, terrorizing the citizenry and in general despoiling the environment.
Their solutions to these horrendous problems are to deny education to children of illegal immigrants, deny health benefits to both legal and illegal immigrants, deny any government assistance to any legal immigrant and ultimately, or so it appears, to rid the United States of these un-American types that have come to destroy this nation.
There are certainly arguments for limiting the number of people entering any country, probably the same arguments that Native American peoples had against the unlimited and uncontrolled influx of alien people from the east. The loss of nation, the loss of family, the loss of identity, these certainly are important factors when considering with whom you wish to live if you have a choice, and apparently the Native Americans didn't. The principle difference between the new immigrants from the south and those from the east is that those from the south aren't coming to conquer and remove the current residents, they instead are coming to work within the existing system and contribute.
The economic and social arguments for open-borders, free flow of goods and people are as complex as the arguments for closed borders and isolationism. The arguments against hate and for humanitarianism are not complex. All people are worthy of dignity and respect, whether they have a piece of paper indicating their legal status or not. Their status is that of HUMAN BEING. They do not deserve to be apprehended, tried and beaten in the streets. Nor do they deserve starvation or denial of education simply because they have made that choice that my grandfather made, the choice that almost all the ancestors of those now living in this country made, to move to another place to work, to raise a family, to contribute to society. If we were to have an American Indian INS (immigration control officers) and if they were to enforce some of the more extreme political solutions, I am sure that the legal status of 98% of all U.S. residents would be questionable.
The argument that the Mexican immigrants are a drain on society is simply not true. The economic contribution alone offsets any public assistance that some may receive. For those that do abuse the generosity of this country by falsely claiming benefits, their example is deplorable, but their removal is not the solution to the problem. The problem is that the system of public assistance is not run properly. The solution, in very simple terms, is to not provide benefits to those who don't need them and to assist those who do need them, legal or illegal.
My grandfather came to this country when the border was just an obstacle called the Rio Grande. He was leaving behind a revolution. He wanted a better life, and he found one in the Arkansas valley of Colorado. He returned to Mexico to marry and bring my grandmother to this country. Their children, including my father, were born in the Arkansas valley, American citizens. My grandfather became a citizen late in his life, my grandmother never did.
Does the fact that my grandfather crossed the Rio Grande, without papers, make him a bad guy? Did the beets he hoed with a short handled hoe, did the railroad ties that he laid, did the plants that he raised, did the cattle that he sold, know that he didn't have papers. A significant part of what can be called the building of the West was done with brown hands, with Mexican hands. Are these bad guys that built homes and raised children, that supported the Church, that bought groceries at the small local stores, that bought their first car from a local dealer, that dedicated their lives to working harder, longer and for less pay than their lighter skinned co-workers, or that gave their lives in the name of freedom and the good 'ol USA?
I can say that they are not bad guys, nor are the Mexicans who are coming north, 80 years after my grandfather did, bad guys. They are here for the same reasons my grandfather came, the same reasons those from Europe, from New York and from Ohio came, the same reasons people immigrate anywhere, to live a better life, for adventure and challenge, and for the future.
When the media, the police and the politicians attack Mexicans and Mexican-Americans it is because of an agenda other than that of protecting a homeland from alien invasion. This continent has been under siege since the first Europeans arrived. The real culprit is hate, the hate that some people tend to cultivate for their own purposes. Greed, power, racism and ignorance are the culprits that have plagued mankind forever and this country is no exception.
A lesson that those in the United States should never forget is that of Nazi Germany. Let us not repeat history and become a nation of hate. The media, the police and the politicians can all be controlled by skilled propagandists whose agenda is that of hate. We should be vigilant against all signs of this happening and make every effort to identify, root-out and neutralize agents of hate.
When articles such as those written by Mike Royko or Ken Hamblin are published a message from the past can remind us of what is really happening. "All propaganda must be popular and its intellectual level must be adjusted to the most limited intelligence among those it is addressed to. Consequently, the greater the mass it is intended to reach, the lower its purely intellectual level will have to be," from Mein Kampf, Adolph Hitler. As Wolfgang Mieder observes, "proverbial stereotypes turned into life-threatening weapons for these innocent victims of the Nazi regime. What originally were hateful verbal slurs was turned into murderous action against millions of people."
© 1996, El Escritorio
When I was about seven years old, my family and I moved into a new house in a small suburb just outside of the city limits of Pueblo, a small city in the southern part of the state. Only thirty minutes from the Beulah mountains and the last house on the block, we were surrounded by prairies. Behind our house was a large prairie that separated our subdivision from the rest of the south side of town. Because I used to walk home from school everyday through that prairie, I had to learn to be careful not to step on any cacti and to be aware of any rattling noises on warm sunny days when the rattle snakes would be out to warn and remind me that I was trespassing on a natural habitat, in which I did not belong and could not understand. This feeling of danger and bewilderment was part of what made the prairie so attractive to me.
In this prairie there were some trails made by bike riders and a few ditches, but other than this, the prairie was virtually untouched by any man made structures or development.
The memories that I have of this prairie are endless. For example, once, my brother, while riding his bike in the prairie, somehow fell into a large cactus. I can't imagine how he did it. All I know is that I can't help but look back at this memory and chuckle a little, at my brother's expense, when I envision our mother pulling out, one by one, each needle that pierced and stuck to his lanky seven year-old body.
I remember how I would ride my bike for hours along the dirt trails in the prairie, during the endless summers when I did not seem to have a care in the world. I also remember peering out my kitchen window watching people taking walks in the prairie. Although they would seem to be so far away, I felt a closeness to them because I felt that I understood the feeling of peace that they were experiencing while walking amidst the wild grasses, cacti, and the sounds of scurrying animals that could be heard here and there. It was a scene of serenity. The prairie was an escape from the worries and cares of daily life. It was in my own backyard and it was nature: wondrous, beautiful, and taken for granted.
Before I moved to Fort Collins two years ago, the prairie was still a living part of nature with its prairie dogs, anthills and breezes with nothing to block their paths. Then, last November, I went home for Thanksgiving and found out that the prairie had been leveled out and was waiting to be paved over for more houses to be built. It was completely gone. I knew that our small neighborhood was expanding and that houses had been built all around us for years, but the prairie behind our house, my prairie, was not supposed to be touched. Had I known it was going to completely disappear, I might have taken one last walk through it. Taken a few pictures of the prairie that was once my childhood playground. Instead, I was faced with an emptiness in my heart that I can't quite explain. Angry and confused, there was nothing that I, or anyone else could do.
I have come to realize that many of us, as a society, have become so used to construction and development occurring all around us, that we have become desensitized to it. There are many times that I notice a new building, mall or parking lot in areas I pass through daily, and say to myself, "When did that happen?" I am sure there are many people that have experienced this feeling. I feel that this is an example of the apathy that exists in our society, about what is happening to the land around us. I believe that too many people, including myself, have for years taken the open space of our vast prairie and farm lands for granted. The fact of the matter is that if there are no measures to preserve these open spaces now, then in the next couple of decades we might end up with more asphalt and houses than the sacred and valuable land that we use as an escape from the noise and exhaust of cities and towns.
There are many people in Fort Collins that would like to see the town stay the size that it is, and keep developers from expanding. For example, two years ago , in the November election, there was a ballot proposal, called POST 2001, that was a proposal to protect and preserve parks, open space, and trails in Larimer county. I remember that at the time, I did not pay that much attention to the proposal and I did not vote. I read about it in The Collegian editorials almost every other day the weeks prior to the election, but I remained indifferent. I had always considered myself a moderate conservationist, recycling and riding my bike instead of driving and such, but becoming aware of election issues and measures to preserve the environment was not a priority in my "busy" college lifestyle. Between school and work, I felt that I did not have the time to trouble myself with the whole voting process. Unfortunately, I am afraid that my apathetic attitude reflected the attitudes of many other college students and voters in Fort Collins. POST 2001 did not pass, and I believe that it would have passed if more people were more aware of this issue , including college students.
It wasn't until I went home after the election took place, and found my prairie gone that I actually realized and thought to myself, "So that was what POST 2001 was about." It had to literally hit home and personally affect me to get me to think twice about the role that I, as a voter, have in doing my part to take measures to preserve open space and irreplaceable land. Young voters should not have to experience a similar loss like mine to see the importance of preserving what nature we have left in our country.
Once I decided to become more aware of the loss of land and increase of development in our country, I came across many surprising facts and predictions. For example: According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture Resource Inventory, the nation loses 4,000 to 5,000 acres of agricultural land each day; it has been predicted in Maryland that at current development rates, people will have filled two-thirds as much land in the next thirty years as they did in the past 360 years; and since the second world war the U.S. has lost 70 million to 100 million acres of open space.
These very disturbing figures, as well as common sense, tell us that if something is not done to improve and implement open space preservation programs and laws in more states, we will be living in a country made up of brown skies and paved plains of despair, with no chance of getting back the nature that we lost. I don't want to live in a world without nature, and the combination of statistics like those mentioned above, as well as my own experience has made me re-think some of my priorities. No matter how rushed for time I feel that I might be, I can make the time to vote, and so can other college students once it is realized that our voice truly matters in a world where we will soon be the leaders.
© 1996, El Escritorio
The preparation of a simple meal involved not only the act of cooking but a great deal of previous work. Wheat was not very plentiful at first, and my grandmother recalled that bread and tortillas made of wheat were served only on Sunday and on festive occasions. Before the housewife could make the tortillas, the atole, or the chaquegue (a type of gruel), she had to grind the blue corn on the metate. After mills were constructed, which in Guadalupe occurred in 1855, this was not necessary, except on occasions when it was impossible to go to the mill. However, she still had to prepare the corn to be ground since the process was different for each dish. For the tortilla she boiled the corn with cal (lime) until the hard outer skin of the grain loosened, then she washed it several times and dried it thoroughly in the sun before sending it to the mill to be ground into nistmal. For the atole and the chaquegue she roasted the ripened corn in the outdoor oven.
The bread, the bollitos (rolls) the biscochitos (cookies) and the semitas (rolls made with pumpkin), the capirotada (a layer of bread pudding) and the panocha (a pudding made of wheat which has been allowed to sprout) were all cooked in the outdoor oven. A good fire was built and kept burning in the oven until it was thoroughly hot; then the coals were removed, and the oven swept out and cleaned with a damp cloth. To test the temperature, a fluff of wool placed on a wooden shovel was inserted in the oven, and when it turned the proper shade of brown, the bread was brought from the house on wooden trays. Each loaf was carefully transferred from the tray to the oven on the small wooden shovel. When the last loaf was in place the opening was closed and the bread was left to bake for two or three hours. For festive occasions they made sopapillas and bunuelos (made with sweetened egg batter, cinnamon and cloves), both of which had come from Spain.
Since the process of canning was unknown, the housewife dried all vegetables that could be dried. From the versatile corn she made two other dishes: hominy, made by soaking the corn in alum until the hard outer skin could be easily peeled off; and the chicos. To prepare the latter, she would dampen unhusked ears of corn, pile them inside the heated out-door oven and leave them overnight. She then husked the roasted, dried corn and put it away to be cooked with meat in winter.
Later in order to have fresh vegetables, and sometimes fruit, they built almarcigos or soterranos. These were made by digging a trench - usually three or four feet - near the back of the house. They made a frame from cottonwood poles which they covered with a foot or so of dirt to insulate it from the cold.
Butchering brought additional duties to the housewife. The more perishable parts of meat had to be cooked immediately. Liberal portions were carried to the neighbors, who in turn shared with her when they butchered. Beef, lamb or goat meat for future use had to be dried. However, since pork could not be dried successfully because it became rancid due to the fat content, they made carne adobada instead, by soaking the pork ribs and loins for a week or ten days in a marinade called adobo, and then hung out to dry. The dried beef was very tough and to tenderize it, she would pound it on a metate until large segments would become paper thin. The children would sense when she was about to do this, and, together with the cat and a dog, would form a circle, each hoping to catch the small pieces that were bound to fall. Almost in unison they could chant: _pegele rieso, pegele rieso, mama (hit it hard, hit it hard, mama).
© 1996, El Escritorio
The People of El Valle can be ordered from El Escritorio
"The world of village women has scarcely appeared in the historical literature of Chicanos except as over generalized and stereotyped images of submissive, cloistered, and powerless women. The focus has been a rigidly patriarchal ideology, articulated only by those peripheral to or outside this world, by the Hispanic elite or Anglo observers of the time, or by later authors imposing views derived from other sites and times. Their vision and the concentration on ideology have not only distorted our view of village life, but marred our understanding of the dynamics of intercultural relations. Recently, authors have cast doubt on these stereotypes, exposing their roots. But the work of historical reconstruction for the period 1880 to 1940 covered here is only beginning." Sara Deutsch, No Separate Refuge, Culture, Class and Gender on an Anglo Hispanic Frontier in the American Southwest, 1880-1940.
As I remember my Grandmother Carlota Cordova de Manchego, the first thing that comes to mind is her energy level. She was always busy even when she seemed to be resting. She was sitting down one time, yarning some socks and I asked her what she was doing. She said, "descansando y haciendo adobes," which literally means resting and making adobes. Today I understand what she meant.
I also remember her strength in holding the family together. When she died all the children and grandchildren seem to have spread to the four winds. In my genealogy I have found woman after woman with the same traits of strength and resilience that I so admire.
Unfortunately, history has neglected the Hispanic woman and her contributions. For example, how many history books include Josephine (Lucia) Gonzales Parsons? Josephine was a socialist and labor activist in the late 19th century. She and her husband, Albert edited "The Alarm," a Chicago socialist weekly. The expected work day then was 12-16 hours. Josephine and Albert led demonstrations for the eight hour day. In 1887 Albert was unjustly executed after a mass rally against police violence turned deadly. Josephine then had to support herself and her children as a seamstress. She was an early advocate of women's right to divorce, to contraception and economic equality. In 1879, she founded the Women's Union, an organization of housewives and wageless women workers.
In "Nuestras Mujeres, Hispanias of New Mexico, their images and their lives, 1582-1992," an article by Erlinda Gonzales-Berry about Carlota Gonzales is a prime example of a Hispanic woman who "through sheer will and hard work, was able to develop strategies that allowed her to go beyond cultural constraints and, at the same time, to conform to cultural expectations."
"A memory from childhood which haunted Carlota throughout her life sums up the conditions of poverty in which her family lived. Their home was a shack with newspaper covered walls and with wooden planks that did not seam together very well. Through the cracks, she and her siblings could spy on the snakes that lived in the crawlspace beneath the house. In order to discourage the unwelcome tenants, Bersabe (her mother) poured boiling water between the cracks."
Carlota always wanted to be a teacher. In 1926, she was one of two Hispanics who graduated from the public high school in Roy, New Mexico. They were the first. She went to Cerro and began teaching for the village's Hispanic children. When she was 28 she eloped and left teaching to begin a family. Later she started attending Highlands University in the summer and at the age of 46 she received her Bachelor's Degree. She taught until the age of 63. Her children became well educated and she believed education was the key to a better life. "Extreme conditions of poverty did not keep her from realizing her dreams, raising a family did not keep her from having a career."
As we look for role models we only need to look at our own family tree to find these dynamic women. In future issues of Compañero we will be bringing more stories of Hispanic women whose courage and determination needs to be recorded in history.
© 1996, El Escritorio