Ricardo Reyna Jr.

I got invited to do something with the Dia de Los Muertos thing with the Water District.  I don’t know if I should do it. But Dia de Los Muertos is visually aesthetic.  Maybe there is something I can do with it.  I think they wanted me to read some poetry and then do something with a  contest I have no idea.  Going to give them a call.

I signed up to this PhD graduate thing at USC in November.  Looking forward to that. Also I’ll have opportunity to stop and see old friends.

GRE time. It’s coming so I have to really begin to study.

The monologues are there. I cannot find this one I called “Interview”. It might be in an old computer I had.  But I am finding out that I am really missing some things I have written in the past twenty years.  I have to really keep track of them.  Especially if I get into a PhD program.

There is this first draft of a novel I wrote like four or five years ago.  It’s just sitting there. I want to go back to it. Maybe next year. But then I’ve been telling myself that forever.

The USC Imap PhD program requires a portfolio.  There are several small projects I am lining up. Including the new one man show.  But also more than likely I will be shooting a small short— abstract stuff– maybe do some type of media work soon.  But that GRE is going to take the majority of time for now.  Maybe the Dia de Los Muertos might be good to do also, shoot it into a small little media project to add to the portfolio.

Those are the things that are on my mind right now…  Oh and the new show is going to be called:

“Wait! What! Que! Huh? Orale!”

The one man show “No More Tequila Please” I did back in 2000 for the LYLC, and was also project with a couple of other friends.  One thing I remember of this was that it was a large crowd; which included the youth conference that was bused there.  No video was shot then. Which I wish I did. One thing I am going to focus with the new batch of monologues; hopefully I can lock them down on video.  There were about six to eight monologues, no mariachis.  One year I did have mariachis, I’ve done so many of them the first part of this decade I can’t remember when there were mariachis in a show. But one year I had mariachis come out at the end of one piece. Maybe I’ll bring that back; though I’ll have to pay the mariachis some how.

I was a young pup then. “Arrest Him! He’s Speaking Spanish!” was in 1995.  There is a video of this performance. I think a high school buddy of mine has a VHS copy of it. How he got it, I have no idea, but I think gave it to him a long time ago when  I was still visiting Texas.  I have an old hi-8 cassette. I have to figure out of a way to transfer it. But it is really not a big concern right now.

One thing I remembered was one of my friends telling me a woman walked out of the performance telling I was too left wing and radical.  With the title of the collection of monologues, what do you expect?  It was a good collection, reflective of the Proposition 181 in California.  Funny how the same times are mirroring Latinos/as right now.

One character that has been coming back from that first performance has been the barrio poet, whose name I gave Beto Aguilar. In a script I wrote entitled “Paletas y Poecia”, he comes out but I think I named him Saul Ramirez. I don’t know, but the same character really identifies with the audience, especially when he does the “Taco Bell” one.   Well, it’s been a while…. need to get to work.

Writing

Recent events in my life have given me inspiration to begin writing some monologues. Call me crazy but I think it’s time I do something like it again. I guess I’d like to do it, in the meantime that I am currently researching and reading books on race and contemporary race theory.  This book on Chicanismo, which I can’t remember the name of right now, is really shaping some ideas in my mind.  So I am there.

I dug up an old notebook that had some old monologues I had done a while back.  These are works I have not touched in around five years.  The last time I was actually performed a one man was in— 2005. That was for the Latino/a Youth Leadership Conference. It was a pretty good show. I remember.

The monologue was based on a supervisor I had at an old job, I had this crappy customer service job over at Citibank. Boy, did I hate that damn job. I really did. It was based on a session where I was being coached by that supervisor on how to sell.  I am a terrible seller. I can’t sell anything. I’m really bad and I always feel like I am cheating the customer or some poor pendejo who calls.  This supervisor wasn’t intellectually smart and in all truth, an idiot. I remember I hated the job so much, I did not disclose to anybody on my bi-lingual Spanish team that I recently graduated with a masters degree.  That is fine. I didn’t care. So this lady, for all I knew, thought I was an illiterate Mexican who had no ambition at all, no motivation and no want in life; and I acted the part. It was pretty funny. Especially when she was telling me I needed ‘goals’ in my life—actually misspelling ‘goals’ as ‘gowls’.

It was that next year I abandoned writing or even touching a monologue.  Life just came in and changed. Also I guess I was just taking in a lot of stuff in my life. I was tired actually. Doing the same thing over and over. I was thinking of only taking my time and let me soak up a little bit of life, fall in love and out; live life a little. I got requests from many students asking for me to do these performances or even reading. I was always declining. An excuse I’d use was I was busy; it was a huge undertaking for me (it’s always is).  Then when I got my braces, I’d use it for an excuse.

“My whole jaw line has shifted. I can’t even talk right.”

Well, the time has changed and now I feel like it. My jaw is okay.

It’s on.

Good day. I have to admit, I feel a whole lot better this year. Maybe it’s because I am really better off with a little more funding; maybe because of the work I am doing. But all in all, I’m looking forward to something that is keeping me a little sane.

If it wasn’t for these two little classes, I’d be going crazy.

I posted two items on Facebook today showing two versions of Dora The Explorer.  One is a distorted image, another of the usual way we see Dora in action.  The character of Dora represents so much, especially viewing Dora through the situations many immigrants, i.e., brown people are in today.

Dora is “The Other”.  A sympathetic “Other”.  An “Other” that complies with laws in the United States because she is ambiguous; much like the stereotype of the “Mystical Negro”, Dora symbolizes a pan-Latina/o many White audiences wish to see.   Dora is also neutral.  She poses no threat to the hegemony of the United States nor can tip the scales of White Privilege.  Dora is neither the housekeeper nor the gardener.  She symbolizes all what Anglos/Caucasians who are un-educated or prejudice against Latino/as really want; or what they wish for. Dora is a wish fantasy.

Like White college students taking the disguise of Mexicans with their sombreros and fake mustaches during Cinco de Mayo; this guilt-wish-fantasy plays on so many levels.  It’s okay to like Dora because Dora isn’t working at Burger King or Quiznos making your sandwiches or Whoppers. Dora is not pregnant spewing brown children. Dora isn’t in college, getting educated.  Dora is safe…

“Mexicans are here taking decent American jobs… but my child loves to watch Dora on Nick.”

Bravo…

Dora the Explorer has no country of origin.  Though she is bi-lingual and brown.  White audiences savor the relief Dora isn’t Mexican, Guatemalan or even Salvadorean.  Dora from somewhere—well—she is from nowhere.  She doesn’t listen to mariachis, don’t even mention Maná or Chente, Dora has no comprehension for that type of cultural fortitude.  She is Latino/a without being Latino/a so it’s okay to love her.

The image to the left is full of symbolism. Hate. Rage. Racism. Anger. Irony. Who knows who designed it but it can play both ways.   There is something important here to note:  It does break the image of this playful, compliant little brown person who speaks English and Spanish to a talking monkey named Boots.  Dora Marquez takes a new meaning, that of a brown person who lives and resides here in the United States, whether undocumented or assimilated.  In one way or another we are all locked in on that ugly bruise on her left eye. It is on all of us.

Actual text from a friend I received yesterday:

How you been punk?
Man, long time.

Yup, it has been a long time. Time to get writing again.

Summer is almost gone. It went fast.  I was busy most of it working but at least I kind of some footage for the kids when Harry Ried visited them at the LYLC.

Yesterday, while researching several science fiction television shows, I found out that there was a Latino character in the original Star Trek series.  And you know what? He was a Commodore, even out ranking Captain Kirk.  He wasn’t like an evil alien or from some evil race down south just like my tocayo down here. I always thought Khan was the only Latino that had appeared in the original series.

I was delighted. Never did I hear of such a character. Finally a good guy. Someone that wears those colorful shirts.  I thought that the show really broke the White/Black Paradigm we always see. I was truly surprised.  I’ll admit, I’m not much of a Trekie.  Never have and probably never will.  So this comes as a major revelation to me.  His name is José I. Mendez.  Sounds more Latino than you think.  I was thinking his name was going to be Darious Aguilar Traton. Part Puerto Rican and Vartagon (or any other alien race they usually mix Latinos with).

Commodore Mendez. Chingon? No, not really.

So I decided to check out the only two shows Commodore Mendez appears in.  The Menagerie in Season 1, episodes 11 and 12.  I knew the producers would never hire a real Latino to play a Latino character, so I knew that was coming.  But to have Mendez just disappear in the end; an illusion made by the Talosians, the alien race the Trek heroes were up against. Without divulging into the plot, it was interesting trope to see Latinos as “Others” and not even existing at all.

Commodore Mendez: “Captain Kirk, you do not know how it feels to eat chilaquiles. I miss my chilaquiles in the morning.”

Though it is mentioned that the real Commodore Mendez has relayed an order at the end of the show, thus informing us that there is a real Mendez out there. Again, we see the Latino image or at least a named character, as a ghostly apparition; not real in the Star Trek universe, but just a mention.

Now I’m not a Trekie. As I research I just might find another surprise down the line.  Fans can argue that you have Zoe Saldana now appearing in the new films so STFU.  Yes, but she is not playing a Latina, she is one, but the character is not.  Latinos are still practically extinct in the Star Trek cannon.

Again, it’s been a long three or more months that I have not posted or written anything here. Interestingly, there has been a lot changes through the past few weeks that has taken me to another road. Primary, I have been busy researching, prepping for a paper I have started to write. This hopefully I can submit it to various PhD programs. We’ll see what happens. But, to tell you the truth, some things have changed. Hopefully, I can keep this blog going. Since I have been trying to keep up with it. Now that somethings have calmed, like finding another job, I can slowly concentrate back on it.

Well see.

The past month has been incredibly busy for me. Changing some of my focus to other things. Mainly researching and reading several essays on race, whiteness and media. Hopefully I can mold the three into a solid essay on Caprica and Battlestar Galactica. I am hoping to tie it in with Latino images, so see how it goes.
Be back later.
Paz.