The latest in Brooklyn Jewelry

On my bus ride home, I just saw a rubenesque young woman clad in several lycra garments, the Playboy bunny on the back of her neck being just the most prominent of her (visible?) tattoos, 6-inch long acrylic nails, and a pair of the earrings, above. They are probably about 5 inches across the center and come in more than one shade of the enamel part that imitates wicker.

CNN's Palin Resignation Coverage

CNN has a small count-down clock (minutes and seconds) on the screen indicating the time left until Sarah Palin's resignation as Governor of Alaska becomes official and she is no longer in office!!!!

Bomba in Loiza

undated film probably from the early 1950s based on the (fabulous! check out the young woman in the white flouncy dress, white stiletto pumps, and the hanky dangling from her wrist! starting on minute 12)



Familia Cepeda, undated footage



Bobmba in Ponce 1957

The narrator says that this is one of the purest "negroid" (his word) vestiges left in Puerto Rican culture, and that the bomba music and dance has an elegance that the Spanish colonial slave masters would envy!




This one is fantastic, it starts with the same family dancing above and goes forward until the 1970s.


More footage, from the early 1980s the narrator is talking about the preservation of our African heritage in Loiza.

July 26, Feast day of Saint James, Loiza, 1949

This footage was directed by Ricardo Alegria, a pioneering cultural historian and anthropologist. He founded the Institute of Puerto Rican Culture, among infinite achievements on behalf of recording Island culture.

Here is more information on Alegria: http://latino.si.edu/virtualgallery/OJOS/bios/bios_Alegria.htm

Footage of celebrations of the feast day of the Apostle Saint James (Santiago), in Loiza, Puerto Rico. Saint James, Patron of Spain, is known there as Santiago Matamoros (yes, Moorslayer, referring to the "reconquest" of Spain from the Muslims, surely Dick Cheney has an altar to this saint in his bedroom).

Loiza is known for the preservation of African music and dance and their festival honoring Saint James is famous. You can see the beautiful masks made of coconut shells worn during the carnival as well. The narrator, who doesn't mention the African cultural contribution, says that the vegigante (wearing the masks) is the devil and he opposes Saint James (Santiago Caballero). The female character is called Loca (crazy) and according to the narrator paints her face black. In Mexico, the worship of the saint was translated as Santiago Mata Indios (killer of Indians). Here, the "moors" depicted as dark-skinned in Spain are conflated with the descendants of African slaves, while others play the role of the colonial invaders. The woman gets to play the irrational insane outsider, and not surprisingly, her face is painted black.

Obviously I know NOTHING whatsoever about the festival but I can't help but make these conjectures from my contemporary point of view.......I certainly wasn't taught anything about this during my brief period of elementary school (1st to 3rd grades) study on the Island. I only learned what I little I know after coming to New York, then I saw a great exhibition in Puerto Rico called La Tercera Raiz: Precencia Africana en Puerto Rico, and more recently, visited the museum devoted to African culture that is in Old San Juan.

Link to museum: http://www.icp.gobierno.pr/myp/museos/m16.htm

La Tercera Raiz: Presencia Africana en Puerto Rico (Puerto Rico: Centro de Estudios de la Realidad Puertorriqueña, 1992)

Center for Puerto Rican Studies, Hunter College, NY:

http://www.centropr.org/home.html

Links to research sources:

http://www.ceaprc.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=70&Itemid=38

US Invasion of Puerto Rico 1898

Map of the US invsion

Political cartoon, Uncle Sam trying on the role of colonial master for size

Virile Uncle Sam shows his strength to old Europe, balancing his new colonies

US values of Republican democracy and freedom brought to the savages now safe under the Americans' enlightened colonial oversight

Coño, despierta Boricua

Andres Jimenez singing his patriotic song, Coño, despierta Boricua

Today is the 111th anniversary of the US occupation of Puerto Rico via the port of Guanica.

Today is the 31st anniversary of the Puerto Rican government and FBI assassination of independence activists at Cerro Maravilla, during the administration of Carlos Romero Barcelo.

Taco Bell Chihuahua Dead, Aged 15

Moment of Silence, according to PEOPLE magazien, Gidget, the iconic Taco Bell chihuahua, has died at the age of fifteen.