It’s Not News to Us
New York artist Danny Evans uses his mad Photoshop skillz to fight for truth, justice and pinche reality in a series of celebrity photographs artfully reimagined as photos of ordinary people. Here are Johnny Depp and Madonna, for example:
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Not done yet? You can take more, no problem? Meet Brad and Angelina and Jennifer Lopez by herself and pictured with Marc Anthony:
Mas…You can’t un-see this: Celebrity Photoshop ‘makeunders’ (photos)
“The Magnificent Riflebird (Ptiloris magnificus) is a medium-sized (up to 34 cm long) passerine bird widely distributed throughout lowland rainforests of New Guinea and far Northeastern Australia. Males are polygamous and perform solitary courtship displays on a ‘dancing perch’. During these displays, the male fully extends his wings and raises his tail; he hops upward while swinging his head from side to side, showing off his metallic blue-green breast shield. Multiple females will observe these displays, and, if satisfied with the performance, reward the male with copulations.” …Wikipedia.
It’s no surprise to us Pochodores — it’s why we started POCHO.COM:
Actual research reveals more and more U.S. Latinos are getting their ñews in Ingles — ñews from respected journalists like brothers Jorge Cooper-Ramos (right), and Anderson Ramos-Cooper (left.)
OK, sometimes Latinos get their ñews from Gustavo Almadovar live in the O.C., but not lately.
Meanwhile, Univision is leading in the July ratings wars with the most viewers under 50, the first time a Spanish-language network topped the charts.
For comic magician Andy Gross, it was just a walk in the park. For everyone else — well, let’s just say some chonies had to be changed.
(PNS reporting from TAMPA) Chicano actor Jesse Borrego, famous for Blood In, Blood Out, is set to unveil a new salsa that he says will “light a fire under your ass!”
The salsa, named “Chinga Tu Madre!” will be sold in cans only and is slated for release this September by the Rick Bayless Division of Frito Lay.
Borrego invited PNS to sample some of the salsa Tuesday at what he calls his “private office.”
From Israel comes this tale of a little girl in a “futuristic Pre-Columbian tribe” where everyone wears a mask. When the girl reaches the age of maturity, she’ll get a mask herself and she understands that accepting the mask will make her one of the tribe. Also involved: Carlos Castandeda’s Don Juan, abstract electronic music, high-speed rail, totem poles, pyramids, tunnels, skyscrapers, the Great Wall of China and iPads (could be Androids, hard to tell.) Mas Que La Cara , according to creator Yaniv Cohen, a college student, is from the Spanish and means “more than the face” or “added face.” It’s also the root of the word “masque.”
We’ve already run maps seeking to explain such mysteries as Texas and Florida. But now for something completely different via our friends at Wired.com. Well semi-different. Actually not that different from the Texas map but instructive, nevertheless. It’s a map [click to enlarge] of Los United Estates, from Yanko Tsvetkov’s Atlas of Prejudice. Look right to you?
And here’s Tsetkov’s map of the world according to Americans [click to enlarge]:
At the Orange County Fair in Costa Mesa, there’s a tempting challenge for manly men — finish a gargantuan pile of fried dough (AKA a Mexican funnel cake) in 30 minutes and this exciting taste sensation is yours for free. It’s a $20 dessert, weighs five pounds and comes with whipped cream and strawberries. Of course, it’s easier said than done, as this video shows.
With Salvadorans about to outnumber Cubans in America, it’s time to learn all we can about our new neighbors. From the land of pupusas comes this video which may help you get to know Salvadorans a little better. The Salvadoran world view runs from burros to putas to negros to picsa and, don’t forget, psh psh! [Video by Jaysityo!]
(PNS reporting from WEST HOLLYWOOD) “Everything is everything,” a long-time West Hollywood denizen reminded passersby Sunday.
Kenny Southpaw, who has observed the local scene in this small Los Angeles County city since he completed his court-ordered halfway house stay in October 2010, maintains an office on the mini-mall sidewalk in front of Los Tacos on the south side of Santa Monica Boulevard, just west of Fairfax Avenue, across from the Method Acting school and between the 7-Eleven and the gay “Wash & Cruise” laundromat.
“What goes around comes around,” he informed convenience store shoppers, Mexican food diners and people with dirty clothes who ignored his pleas for cigarettes, food and beer.
“Got any spare change?” he added.
Kenny photo by PattyMooney. Los Tacos photo via VisitWestHollywood.com
Sara Inés Calderón (@SaraChicaD on the Twitter) does not look Mexican. But even if she doesn’t have a nopal on her forehead, she has nopales in the frying pan. [With these Vine videos you need to click on the speaker icon in the top left of the image to hear Sara Inés squee.]
NOPAL EN LA FRENTE ROUNDUP:
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I’m back in my hometown — however briefly — for the San Diego Comic-Con, SDCC, where I had a chance to talk with and take photos with two of my heroes, Montgomery Burns and Alfred E. Neuman.
Alcaraz. Lalo Alcaraz. I’ve got a license to toon:
Photographers here are always happy to snap pix of hot chicas in super hero garb. Click on the gigantor image to enlarge:
Mas…Release the hounds? What, me worry? I’m @ #SDCC (photos)
Our MiJA, Elise @buttronica Roedenbeck, doesn’t want much. She just wants additional followers on the Twitter as part of her plan for worldwide social media domination. Follow Elise to win a small box lunch with individual carafe of wine plus other cool incentives like scribbled notes and video winks (must be over legal drinking age and legal box-eating age in your jurisdiction.) Vegans — ask about the kale-quinoa bowls!
And then comes along Pope Francis (his handle is @pontifex) who is offering PAPAL INDULGENCES on Twitter. Not PayPal, you geeks, but Papal Indulgences from the Holy Father that shorten your stay in the limbo of Purgatory. What’s our MiJA to do?
[What can we say about Elise Roedenbeck, POCHO’s New Jack City Burro Jefe Emeritus, that hasn’t been ruled out by the terms of the negotiated settlement and mutual release of all claims? Just this: She sure likes butter, and it’s “butt-ronica” not “but-tronica.”]
(PNS reporting from EL PASO) Fabian Ramirez expressed deep disappointment Wednesday night as he left the 7PM showing of Pacific Rim at the Premiere Cinema 18 at Bassett Place Mall.
The 42-year-old father of three teenagers told PNS he heard the “movie was about MEChA” and “wanted to expose my kids to a movie about Chicanos.” Ramirez, a former chair of the Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano(a) de Aztlan (MEChA) at the University of Texas campus here, gathered his children Vladimir, Xochitl and Emiliano for what he hoped would be a big family night out: Seeing “Chicanos fighting against the power structure of AmeriKKKa.”
Instead, Ramirez found the “the movie was about these big robots piloted by military shooting monsters.”
“Pacific Rim,” he sadly concluded, “is not about my MEChAs.”
Mas…Chicano concludes ‘Pacific Rim’ is not a movie about his MEChAs
Of course we are sensitive to the complaints from Beantown (they’re beaners after all) about Rolling Stone’s decision to make controversial Caucasian-American Dzhokhar Tsarnaev their glamorous cover boy.
But as recovering ñewspeeps ourselves, we have to point out that the accused terrorist isn’t the first villain to make it to the cover of a slick zine:
And there was no outrage when Oprah Winfrey put these two masterdeporters on the cover of O magazine in March of 2012.
We have to confess, though. POCHO’s biggest dream is to get banned in Boston.
Nopal and eggs and what? That’s what POCHO’s Subcommandanta del Ñews Sara Inés Calderón — @SaraChicaD on the Twitter — was making herself for dinner while she Skyped with the Pochodores Tuesday night. She came up with this video to explain. [With these Vine vids, you need to click on the top left corner of the image to hear the audio.]
This classic Jack Benny routine with Mel Blanc from the 1960s make for major LULz. But is this vintage comedy sketch racist, just old school or both? Mel Blanc talks in a “Mexican” accent but does his portrayal demean Mexicans? How about his wardrobe? What do you think?
Mas…Racist? Jack Benny meets a ‘Mexican’ at the airport (video)
ZOMG! Comic Saenz’s girlfriend Hope Sandoval is back fronting Mazzy Star in this day-old video-less video California from an upcoming (September) release Seasons of Your Day. Saenz loves her immediately-recognizable smokey voice and encourages Ms. Sandoval to please forgive him for that one time at the Dal Rae in Pico Rivera.
“White Hispanic” is one of mainstream media’s hottest new buzzwords, a term that has leaped off of old census forms and job applications to join the ranks of “twerking,” “3-D printing,” and “Death to Edward Snowden!”
The mainstream media needs to distinguish between different colors of Latinos because it was too polite to ask “Why is Trayvon Martin’s killer, George Zimmerman, so… DARK for his name? And isn’t Aaron Hernandez, that allegedly trigger-happy New England Patriots player, a little… LIGHT for his?”
I guess I could be called a “White Hispanic,” as my dad’s from Colombia and my Yiddishe momme reps Brooklyn. I really wish it didn’t take two high-profile killings to bring Latino-and-white people into the public eye, but Linda Ronstadt (photo) and Joan Baez aren’t making new albums and Little Ricky’s been off TV for a while.
Mas…White Hispanics: ‘Hey! We’re not ALL murderous douchebags’
It comes with the territory — when you tackle controversial issues you attract controversial responses. Or, as I like to call it, Crackpot Racist Hate Mail From Right Wing Nut Jobs (CRHMFRWNJ for short.)
Some of the messages scrawled on paper bags in crayon (and blood?) are mailed to various newspapers around the country that publish La Cucaracha and/or my editorial cartoons. Some post comments here on POCHO and assorted loons follow me from Twitter to Facebook to my blog to leave me droppings from their thought processes. No one follows them around with pooper escoopers, so I’m stuck with what they call in the sewage industry “solid waste” — mierda for you pochos.
I spent maybe 10 or 20 minutes going through the folder on my Mac desktop named Love_Letters, and came up with this list of my Pocho Ocho favorite insults:
8. Go back to Africa!
Mas…The Pocho Ocho top favorite ways racists try to tell me off
“The horse knows the routine, you say?” “Si.” “And all I have to do is sit in the saddle and hold the reins and he’ll dance to the music?” “Si.” “What happened to the last contract cowboy you hired for the parade?” “Sigh.”
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A few weeks ago we featured some astounding videos of actors’ (dramatic) readings of Yelp customer reviews — customer reviews of US-Mexico border crossings.
NPR’s Latino USA with Maria Hinjosa snagged Jefe-in-Chief Lalo Alcaraz last week to find out if he had anything to add to the discussion.
Listen here to learn if he did! 😉
Mas…POCHO Jefe Lalo Alcaraz Yelps about the border on NPR (audio)
“We set out on an adventure on foot together with a young man to find out more about the native flora and fauna of different Latin-American landscapes,” Argentinian band Poncho writes. “On the way, this young man discovers new plants and animals and becomes one with them, and meets a sexy Mother Earth goddess (Pachamama) with whom he falls in love.”
And from the other side of the moon, comes Chilean actress and singer Celine Raymond:
Mas…Argentine band Poncho explores Mother Earth in ‘Tiki Tiki’ (video)
POCHO Subcommandanta del Ñews Sara Inés Calderón (@SaraChicaD on Twitter) is all about the TGIF! [Hover and click on the loudspeaker icon in the top left corner to hear the audio.]
I disagree with Dennis Leoni.
In the POCHO article, he says this: “One more time, what do we need to do? BUILD OUR OWN MARKETPLACE!”
Here’s my take: It won’t work. It simply will not work. Why? Because the so-called “Latino” experience cannot be compared to the African-American experience in the United States. The “Latino” experience is different for each of us.
Latinos are culturally diverse. Yawn. Haven’t we heard this a million times already? Yet, it probably hasn’t really sunk in. A Mexican-American story will be different from a Puerto-Rican story, a Dominican story, a Colombian story, etc. It will also be different from a Mexican immigrant story, a Nuyorican story, an Ecuadorian/Irish story. Assimilation changes who we are. Migration changes who we are.
Mas…Latinos in Hollywood? First of all, who are these so-called ‘Latinos?’
Dave Letterman sure knows how to bring out the best in a girl!
Will this new patriotic video become more popular on POCHO than this musical BurgerBoy hamburguesas commercial Hayek did when she was young and needed the money?
Mas…Chest bursting in air, Salma Hayek sings national anthem (video)
Mijo:
I’m proud of you. This home is very big with hardwood floors, even in the kitchen! As you know, I prefer tile with a rosy color, como la cathedral in Zacatecas. The country kitchen is very impressive. It’s not like any country kitchen como en mi rancho, but these are new times and a new country; And the abundance of wood paneling does look impressive. It is cedro? Still, how can you reclantar tortillas on an electric stove? Your ama is already confused by it. Y eso? To store wine? Pero tambien to store some Herradura? Esta cocina has windows everywhere! Have you thought about putting fierro on them?
Mas…Mijo: I like your new home, pero no fierro on the windows?
(PNS reporting from HOLLYWOOD) Television producer Marc Cherry is developing a new series called Desperate Tontos, which is about four white actors donning even whiter makeup to play Native Americans. The series is seen as a comeback attempt following Cherry’s floundering Devious Maids series, which was a disastrous attempt to portray Latinas.
Cherry admits Maids took him a little out of his comfort zone as a writer. “I’m a white guy, and I should write what I know,” said Cherry. “And what I know is how to be a white man pimping other people’s cultures.”
Mas…Breaking: ‘Devious Maids’ producer preps ‘Desperate Tontos’
(PNS reporting from PORTLAND) Mario Rojas grew up in a tough Chicago barrio, but since he moved here for college he’s gotten soft, according his friends and family. His old street cred is gone, they worry, and he doesn’t resemble the Mario they used to know.
“He’s all into that hipster shit, organic and whatever, qué es eso? Organic ni nada, ponte a trabajar!” said Rojas’ father, Mario Sr., when contacted by PNS.
Eating a gluten-free alfalfa sprout and chevre cheese taco on an organic blue corn tortilla — and then getting tagged in an Instagram photo by his friend Maggie — didn’t helped Mario Jr.’s reputation either. Until the stylized photographic foul-up, Rojas kept his family in the dark by never sharing pictures of his newly-grown beard, clothes, or food preferences.
Mas…PDX resident loses street cred after Whole Foods Instagram snafu
Okay, time for a reality check.
Despicable Me 2 made $59.5 million in its first two days of release. Do any of you seriously believe that Universal gives a flying fuck if Latinos are upset over the negative stereotyping of a Latino character ?
As my good friend Bob Eisele likes to say, “Here’s the situation…” THEY DON’T CARE. Please allow me to repeat that… THEY DON’T CARE.
We Latinos can yell, scream, jump up and down, stand on our heads, do somersaults and they still won’t care. The movie is on track to make hundreds of millions of dollars for Universal.
Year before last, Ron Meyer, the head of Universal Studios, spoke at a NALIP luncheon and told us to our faces that Universal doesn’t make Latino-themed or Latino-starred movies because Latinos don’t go to see them. And you know what? He’s right. Latinos are almost 40% of the all important opening day box office. Unfortunately, Latinos go to see Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Transformers, Star Trek, Star Wars, Iron Man, Batman, Spiderman, anything but Latino-themed movies. What’s the solution?
Mas…Attention: It’s time to get real about Latino movie projects
