Intersections

How the Zetas are ruining the party in Monterrey

  * Above, they took the DJ's headphones, too. Via The Exiled.

Monterrey -- and all of Mexico's northeast, really -- is a war zone right now. The Zetas and the Gulf cartel are hashing out their historic break-up in the only way that a Mexican drug-smuggling organization knows how, by brutally killing as many members of the enemy as possible, and by terrorizing everyone else.

On Sunday there was a huge march in Monterrey to call for peace as the bloodshed rages on. I wonder if some of Monterrey's ravers were there. At The Exiled, an online magazine with a readable edge, writer "Pancho Montana" reports on the Zetas' recent practice of crashing big all-night parties and roughing up the kids.

Why? The Zetas are desperate to retain control of the lucrative drug market in Monterrey. If you don't buy from them, they seem to be saying, you won't buy from no one. An excerpt:

When the thugs had all the ravers assembled into a flock, the little bastards proceeded to rob everyone. Going person to person, they took cell phones, cameras, jewelry, cash, and anything else shiny that got their attention. They were like little ravens with automatic weapons. They even stole the DJ's passport and credit cards. Fuck, they even took his headphones.

But that was all just collateral. The main purpose of their visit were the drugs. With flashlights in hand, they scouted the floor for baggies of weed, pills, LSD, coke, anything ... They must have felt like they were on an Easter egg hunt.

The leader then addressed the people: "Raise your hand if you like weed," he asked the crowd. But nobody raised a hand or so much as moved. They were too scared. So he repeated his question, this time while firing a quick burst from his R-15 into the air. "I said who likes fucking weed?!!" Naturally, a lot of hands went up.

The entire piece is worth the read, even if you're a bit more on the skeptical side and don't fully buy that this pseudonymous writer is telling the pure truth. He suggests toward the end that the Zetas' hold on Monterrey may be close to running its course.

* Previously, "The drug tienditas of Monterrey."

Safari in Los Angeles, in a home in MacArthur Park

* Above, the subjects, from afar, in an apparent dining ritual. Via LAist.

The Entryway is an online project created by two aspiring journalists -- "maybe the whitest people we know" -- who move into a crowded immigrant household in Los Angeles to learn Spanish, so that they can, eventually, better report on their city. It's getting wonderfully fawning feedback so far, and hopes to raise $3,240 to keep going.

Kara Mears takes photos and Devin Browne writes and designs the entries, which are published sort of like a diary, with words and phrases alternating between large and small typeface. The first thing we learn about the young women, in their opening entry, is that they chose their family after an apparently grueling two years of searching because -- unlike other houses in MacArthur Park, I guess -- "This family cares about cleanliness. They cannot live with bedbugs."

There's a sign about cleanliness on the wall. "The sign in the bathroom made me feel better," Devin writes.

We learn nothing else in the first entry about Juan and Maria, the immigrant hosts, other than their home is in fact infested with cockroaches, and that maybe Kara 'shouldn't have brought her other boots.' From there on, nothing about where everyone is specifically from, why and how they moved to the United States, how they make money, how they survive, and, most crucially, the underlying forces that cause migration, poverty, and social marginalization.

You know, the stuff of journalism. But The Entryway, I figured out upon quickly consuming the entire site, isn't a journalism effort. The authors are wasting an incredible journalistic opportunity, in the service of their own vanity.

The pachucos of Tepito

Above, a demonstration of the cha cha cha by members of the Associacion de Pachucos y Rumberas, in the Barrio del Peralvillo, within the Barrio de Tepito, within Colonia Morelos, within Centro -- more or less -- in Mexico City, on 20 March 2010.

The cultural center where the event took place functions as a gallery featuring local Tepito artists. Neighborhood folks came out to take a look. At one point, the pachucos -- in their Chicano-style drapes -- led willing observers in a short cha cha lesson. (My mom, Norma Alicia, got up and gave it a shot.)

* More later.

News and notes *

Posts were light this week here at Intersections. Much of my blogging energy is now being spent at La Plaza, the L.A. Times Latin America news blog.

Recently I've posted about Paquita la del Barrio's anti-gay adoption comments, and exclusive details on her upcoming apology, on the current situation in Chile one week after a new president is sworn in, on the crazy media slants on Felipe Calderon's recent visit to Ciudad Juarez, on the Ladies in White protests in Havana, and more.

Intersections might be a bit dormant for some time. I'm hosting relatives and friends during all of April. Mid-way through the month I'll be in Santa Cruz, speaking at a symposium at UCSC on "New Latino Discourses." The event, sponsored by the UCSC Latino Literary Cultures Project, will examine new communication models that are redefining "the literary" in the new century, according to the organizing professors. That includes the graphic novel, blogs, radio and podcasts, and hypertext lit. I'll have more on this later.

And, yes, I'm still editing my book manuscript, on Round 3. It is difficult but very exciting work that will keep especially occupied till the end of spring.

Meantime, I've updated and edited my links here, organizing them under new lists. I've also added a new advertising panel, via Technorati Media. Whenever I get a chance, I'll be working on updating my Journalism pages.

No matter what, this blog remains my one true love in the media maelstrom. This is the platform that allows me to interact with the world, and cover The Story, whether it's about art, music, style, sex, pop, politics, or the political-personal. My plate will never be too full.

* Image above via a new favorite, Timothy Hemingway.

Wrath of the three-day weekend *

One of the great traditions in Mexico City -- "great" like Tax Day, "great" like Black Friday -- is running out of town for puente, a three-day weekend. Ingloriously, desperately, chilangos choke the highway exits from the basin on Friday or Saturday to crowd against one another -- just like in the city -- at the most predictable of getaway destinations: Cuernavaca, Valle de Bravo, Acapulco.

Consequently, going anywhere for puente (and no one seems to ever care what the specific holiday is) can be a hectic ordeal. But we went anyway, to Tepoztlán, to test our three-day weekend survival skills.

Mexico's northern border, on fire once more

* Military on the streets in Reynosa, via Gringa-N-Mexico.

Narco-related violence in Mexico is dominating the news once more. Three people with ties to the U.S. consulate in Ciudad Juarez were killed on Saturday. At least thirteen were killed over the weekend in Acapulco. And with scores dead in recent weeks, Reynosa is on fire due an apparent split between the Gulf Cartel and the Zetas. Things are so bad there, journalists are going missing, or just turning away from the story.

Getting a sense of what things like are like on the ground is becoming harder and harder. But there are some voices coming through.

If you can muster checking in on reality, the blog Ontobelli meticulously accounts for narco-related gun battles across the country, mostly via amateur YouTube clips. Many if not most of these battles go unreported in the mainstream press. The blog's author offers this narrated video explaining the background on the current outbreak of violence in Reynosa, Tamaulipas, and all of Mexico's northeast.

For an achingly frank ex-pat account of the situation in Reynosa, check out the blog Gringa-N-Mexico, by a young woman named Lindy -- "born and raised in southern Michigan, just a little country gal" -- who followed her husband to Mexico after he was deported. In a Feb. 24 post, Lindy writes about how completely the Gulf Cartel controls the streets of her adopted city:

I guess the cartel wanted to make the citizens of the city feel better so a few days ago they made a gigantic banner and hung it from an overpass near where we live. It read something along the lines of - Citizens of Reynosa, you are safe. We the cartel so-and-so are here to do our job and we do not wish to harm any people of your city, we only want to do what we have to do and not hurt any civilians. ... How nice of them?

The kicker is when she realizes the meaning behind the acronym "C.D.G." that she spots on some police-looking vehicles.

* UPDATE: Looks like the post has been taken down. Too bad, but not unexpected. Suerte, Lindy.

** INTERESTINGLY: In the case of the consular official in Juarez who was killed along with her husband near the border with El Paso, the local NBC affiliate across the border notes that whatever the victim Lesley (or Leslie) Enriquez did exactly at the consulate has not been specified.

Robert Cason, victim Arthur Redelfs's stepfather, also told KTSM he did not know what his step-daughter-in-law did at the consulate. Meanwhile, Diana Washington Valdez in the El Paso Times quotes a former DEA agent who says he knew Redelfs, a local Sheriff's Office detention officer, "since 1990."

Speaking to The Takeaway, expert narco reporter Ioan Grillo says the Enriquez-Redelfs slaying appeared to be a "very organized hit."

However, unnamed sources in the State Department led The Washington Post to conclude that it "did not appear that the slain consular employee was involved in counternarcotics work."

Officials are saying now that it looks like a case of mistaken identity.

The D.F. scenesters *

In the current fashion-themed issue of Gatopardo magazine, where I am a contributor, readers can find the first published glimpse of my upcoming book on Mexico City, albeit in Spanish. Gatopardo bought rights to excerpt and translate my chapter on the hipster/scenester/fashionista community of D.F., as I saw and experienced it in late 2007, early 2008.

I gotta say, it's a juicy read.

The issue also features a bunch of mini-profiles on young Mexican designers working today. If you're in Mexico or anywhere in Latin America where the magazine is sold (e.g. Sanborns), get a copy and check it out! When Gatopardo.com loads up the new issue, I'll update this post.

* Above, Denise Marchebout, with a style like no other, from this post of unedited portraits at Cesar Arrellano's Diario de Fiestas.

Covering Chile: A reporter's diary *

* Above, a view of Avenida 9 de Julio, central Buenos Aires, arriving.

I just spent eight hectic but exciting days in South America. The L.A. Times, where I just started a news assistant and blogging job in the Mexico City bureau, needed another reporter on the ground in the aftermath of the one the largest earthquakes in history. I raised my hand, and got sent.

How was it? Because I believe in transparency, and because all of this was new to me, here's a reporter's diary:

Day 1: The scramble to the South. After an unsuccessful Sunday trying to get a flight to South America, I ended up catching a March 1 morning Mexicana flight direct to Ezeiza, the airport in Buenos Aires. We arrived at 9 p.m. local time and myself and a fellow journalist friend from Reuters who was on my flight decided to share a cab into the center. I'd have one night of rest before trying to get over the border into Chile the following morning. Still no flights direct to Santiago.

Before arriving, a friend from Argentina recommended a neighborhood to check out if I had one night in her city, San Telmo. So me and my Reuters friend did a bit of work then went hunting for dinner at almost 1 a.m. We found an old-school cafe still open, and wolfed down fresh lomo, a salad, and two Argentine beers a piece.

Aftershock culture in Santiago

From my current post at La Plaza, on life in the land of earthquakes, Chile:

The city has endured two to three major aftershocks a day since the Feb. 27 "megathrust" earthquake – and then some. A 6.4 earthquake hit to the north of the capital on Thursday night, followed by up to four considerable aftershocks between midnight and breakfast time on Friday.

More were recorded on Sunday, including a 5.0 magnitude temblor off the coast of Valparaiso. And then -- almost cruelly -- two more considerable aftershocks hit Santiago before dawn Monday, one measuring 4.9 and another measuring 5.1.

In all, nearly 200 aftershocks have rattled nerves in central Chile. Inside homes and apartment buildings, fresh cracks crawl across walls. Day after day, windows and lampshades rattle, walls buckle slightly, and floors sway gently for a few seconds, as if in a lilting breeze. The effect is dizzying.

Read the whole thing here. Embedded links lead to all of our L.A. Times coverage from Santiago, Mexico City, and the most affected areas of central-southern Chile.

To get a sense of just how major this major earthquake was -- not just for Chile but for the planet -- consider this: Hard-hit Concepcion shifted three meters to the west in the quake. Santiago moved 11 inches to the west, and Buenos Aires, capital of Argentina, moved west all of one inch.

Now that's a big earthquake.

* Photo above, Chilean youth cheering in support of earthquake victims at Parque Bustamante, March 6.

Assessing the damage

Above, an industrial electrical supply building along the road to the northwest of the Santiago metropolitan region, damaged by last week's magnitude 8.8. quake. More images of damage that I caught in the outskirts here and here.

While, again, the capital was not devastated by this earthquake as the south and coastal regions were, several buildings in the city have been deemed unsafe to return to, as shown by this interactive map at La Tercera. According to the official death toll (pdf) released by the government on Thursday, 21 people in metropolitan Santiago died in the quake.

That figure surprised me. Some cities in the most affected areas had less victims, but perhaps it is proportional to the city's size. "Santiago is Chile," someone here said the other night. Seven million people live in the capital, and there are 17 million overall in this very long, very geographically isolated nation.

Don Francisco from 'Sábado Gigante' -- who is Chilean, by the way -- is in town to host the teletón for victims. Today I'm reporting a piece on the "scene" and mood in Santiago. Any tips?

Santiago de Chile, on the other side of the world *

It is late summer-early fall in Chile, not late winter-early spring like in Mexico, on the other side of the world from here.

I've been in the Chilean capital of Santiago for three nights now and I'm barely realizing how far this country is from home. Just a couple of hours to the west, it's nothing blue ocean all the way to Australia or Antartica -- which is much closer from here than from the southern tip of Africa.

Chile is Latin America, hence connected in some way to Mexico, but the sheer distance makes it so different. The Spanish is different, for example, a sort of reserved sing-song. The social rules and historical anxieties are different. What does it mean for a people that just twenty years ago speaking out against the government could get you killed? The words for things, way different -- it's feria, not mercado; plata, not baro or lana; halo, not bueno to answer the phone ...

Above, that's me before the Teatro Municipal in downtown Santiago, near the Santa Lucia metro station. Santiago has not been hit as hard by the quake and tsunami as regions to the south and along the coast, so the stories in the quake's aftermath are different here, too. Tonight I finally had a chance to go out and follow my nose. That led me to the artsy gay boho rasta graffiti neighborhood, of course. But more on that later.

* New in the L.A. Times: "Chile's Piñera takes reins, though he's not in charge yet."

** And yes, we are still getting considerable aftershocks -- and a totally new quake to the north earlier tonight. The earth won't stop.

Quake exposes social disparities in Santiago

Above, a photo by L.A. Times staffer Michael Robinson Chavez from the quake devastation in Constitucion, central Chile. Help is finally arriving to the region. Here, my L.A. Times piece on social disparities evident in the aftermath of the quake in Chile's highly developed capital, Santiago.

In Buenos Aires

** QUICK NOTE: I am at a hotel in Buenos Aires, after arriving on a direct flight from Mexico City. It's beautiful here, but there's no time to sight-see.

The quake hit Saturday -- three days ago -- and still foreign journalists are finding trouble getting in to Chile. Santiago's airport is still not operating normally. (I had spent much of Sunday at the airport in D.F. trying to get on any possible flight to the region. Terminal packed with Chileans, Argentinos, Brazilians, all stranded in Mexico...)

Tomorrow I head to the city of Mendoza near the Chilean border and plan on crossing over land into Santiago. I'll be feeding to L.A. Times.