Confronting Fidel Castro's Death through Poetry

As the end of the year approaches, I am finally beginning to confront the death of Fidel Castro, who changed the course of my life forever.

My relationship with him — even as an absence — has always been complex. 

When I was little, I remember seeing his photograph, a big bushy beard overpowering the frame. And while we were eating our supper, I would ask my mom innocently, as children often do, "Mom, doesn't Fidel get his soup noodles stuck all over his beard? And how does he ever get them out after he eats?"

My father in an undated photo toasting
for our future happiness, in Cuba
Fores Family Album

Maybe that's what happened to all those around him...

My father fled Cuba because he lacked political freedoms. He believed we had these liberties here in the United States, however, so my brothers, sisters, and I grew up convinced in this country of democratic justice and fair play. This lawyer — my gentle father — could have been imprisoned for years or died for us in Cuba. He suffered greatly trying to escape, just like my mother: as children, we do not remember much. And my parents never talked about it afterward, only to tell us how lucky we were to be living in this land. When my dad chose to come to the United States to ask for political asylum, he knew he wanted us to be able to live and speak freely, and he never doubted that we might not have that.

Every Vote Counts, brick by brick

When I went to vote the second day of early voting, I should have written about what happened to me then — in this very conservative town where I live in middle America — because I was furious. 


But I did not, as I had too many other things preying on my mind, and this was just another thing on the list. As I see the articles going back and forth, however, and I see the atrocities going on in the name of "voter fraud," I cannot stand it any longer. 

Do you want to vote but think you cannot because you do not have proper ID?

When you go to vote, even if you do not have two pieces of identification, or if you do not have a photo ID, it does not matter anymore, according to Texas law, which was voted on and "trumped" down in July of this year, against all Texas Republican conservative wishes and much to Trump's dismay. According to the Federal Appeal Court, Texas was in violation of the Voting Rights Act, and so, the state had to find ways to accomodate voters who could not find appropriate documents, the ones the state wanted everyone to use but were hard to acquire for certain folks.

On the Responsibilities of Citizenship

In the past, this land has been renowned as the melting pot of nations. 

I am sure a lot of our parents, grandparents, and even great grandparents, however, are turning in their graves as my friend and colleague Paul Zoltan writes these cautionary words. The full support of the country our parents loved and clamored for, the USA — which they thought no one could surpass because of the liberty they won at such a hard price — would disappoint them. Our predecessors had to forsake their own countries. They left other safe harbors as well because they thought no one could ever offer them a better chance at safeguarding their liberties as this one true nation, yet that privilege now seems elusive. 

What was protected by the constitution they enthusiastically adopted as their own seems now to be a shard, used arbitrarily to break the most vulnerable, and indeed, many other populations as well. 

But I leave you with Paul's words, because he says it so much better... 

Paul's father's naturalization papers from 1965,
hanging in his immigration law offices

On theResponsibilities of Citizenship
By Paul Zoltan

In the waiting area of my small law practice hangs my father’s naturalization certificate. He took the oath of allegiance and became a United States citizen when I was all of eight days old.

My dad had arrived in this country as a refugee from Hungary six years earlier. The story of his exile begins, improbably, in Belgium. In 1958, two years after Hungary’s tragic rebellion, my father was chosen to represent his nation’s engineering achievements at the World Exposition in Brussels. Though Hungary’s Communist regime had encouraged him and other participants openly to share ideas with engineers from outside the Soviet Bloc, my father did so with trepidation: having grown up a member of Hungary’s landed aristocracy, he belonged to what the Communists called the “suspect class.” His three half-brothers, who’d never fought in the war, were sent off to Soviet work camps as “war criminals,” never to be seen again. When a telegram reached my father in Brussels demanding his immediate return to Budapest, he smelled a rat. Purportedly it came from the university where he taught, but his dean insisted she hadn’t sent it. So my father sought out the British Secret Service.

PAINTING OVER GRAFFITI ON WALLS IS NOT THE SAME AS BLEACHING OUT BLOOD FROM PEOPLE’S COLLECTIVE MEMORY

The recent publication of the second damning GIEI report, first publicized in the New York Times with subsequent coverage on National Public Radio is clear evidence that the Ayotzinapa movement has endured the test of time by staying in the world’s attention almost two years after the forced disappearance of the 43 normalistas. The Interdisciplinary Group of Independent Experts responsible for the GIEI Report (named such for its acronym in Spanish) was created by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights on March 2015 to investigate what happened to the 43 students on September 26, 2014 in Iguala, Guerrero.

Guernica by Pablo Picasso, 1937 Museo Reina Sofia, Madrid, Spain
Guernica warns humanity against the devastation of war & suffering: aren't the forced disappearances of Ayotzinapa an annihalation of the worst sort?

I Do Not Exist.... UNDOCUMENTED!

I went to see the play Deferred Action this past weekend, a wonderful production about the trials and tribulations of the DACA movement, and the real lives it touches.

I hope the play catches on and begins to make its rounds in other cities: it is defnitely worth seeing.

Erik during the 2011 "I am a DREAM Voter" Campaign 

In any case, this play depicts the ongoing conflict brought on by the onslaught of deportation, and how DACA and the DREAM Act are trying to counter deportation's horrible effects. Millions of young people who were brought to the United States as children are now finding themselves in limbo, or their parents are in the crosshairs. Although the US government wants to deny these young people the only home they have ever known — the United States — they cannot call their home country their own either, because in most cases, they do not even remember it.

The Rebellion of Los Mojados / LA REBELION DE LOS MOJADOS

My last post was from millenials and the vote, and how important it is. Now I bring you back longtime activist and frequent contributor Julio César Guerrero, telling us about the Xicano vote...

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Back in 1954, the Mexican film industry released an iconic movie entitled LA REBELION DE LOS COLGADOS. Based on a novel by B. Traven, the movie told the story of a Chamula Indian family that ended up working as slaves in the mahogany rich jungles of Chiapas, illustrating the socio economic conditions prevalent during the Porfirio Dias dictatorship, which brought about the Agrarian Revolution of 1910. It goes without saying that when the movie came out, things hadn’t changed that much under the reign of the PRI, which may explain why the film begins with the disclaimer, "Today Mexico is one of the great modern democracies."

Poster for film La Rebelión de Los Mojados, 1954

The story of La Rebelión de los Colgados is a classic depiction of brutal oppression characteristic of feudal times juxtaposed against the era of the industrial revolution. The title derives from the depiction of workers' punishment, if they did not comply with the work assigned. Each individual was forced to cut four tons of mahogany per day, and failure to comply led to punishment: they would be hanged by their limbs from a tree. By the end, the Indians rebel, turning against the company men. 

Your Vote, Your Voice!

As I cast my ballot early today in the voting booth, I decided to stop dawdling and write something about the importance of voting. I have wanted to post my daughter's words, because — as a millenial — she has something important to say about voting in a way I could never replicate. 

So an article right before Super Tuesday I thought would fit the bill. 

Sandra Karina Tovar, center, main speaker at the LASSO Conference (Latin American Student Success Organization)
Tarrant County College, South Campus in Dallas, Texas

Camila Pacheco-Fores is young, yet she is old enough to vote, and she has the privilege to do so, as many students and young professionals do. A surprising percentage, however, choose not to use that right. I am glad she has been thinking long and hard about the vote, however, and she is talking about it, discussing it with friends, and writing about what moves her. 

Happy New Year: You're DEPORTED!

I met Paul Zoltan, immigration lawyer and human being extraordinaire, when I wanted to work a little closer to home helping refugees. Although going to South Texas to help the mothers and children crossing the border is extremely rewarding — and I know it helped both refugees and Sacred Heart Respite Center, which continues to do great work — I needed a place where I could volunteer my time and services closer to home. 

© Lalo Alcaraz 2014

Paul Zoltan has mounted an incredible operation, together with Catholic Charities of Dallas. 

But as all operations go, he needs much help. 

If you are a lawyer, a writer, a translator, a teacher, a good samaritan — and you can offer your assistance — please contact me to help out at the next pro se asylum clinic in February at Catholic Charities of Dallas. We hold these immigration clinics every two months now, so we are in constant need of volunteers! 

Just in Time for MLA in Austin...

Just in time for the MLA Conference in Austin from January 7th through January 10th, I am adding these articles, trailers, and information about Ayotzinapa, cronica de un crimen de estado, so that if you happen to go to Austin for the conference, or if you live nearby, you can check out and see this impactful documentary in Spanish with English subtitles at Monkey Wrench Books on Friday, January 8th, at 7:30PM.

Thank you once again to my intrepid colleague Vanessa Vaile for putting this list of articles together. And if you are a filmmaker, do not overlook the STUFF Film Festival links: Robert & Mariella Perez will be reviewing new films now for their next festival Mundo de Sueños in September and then the 2016 STUFF film festival a few months after that! 

 Trailer Ayotzinapa Cronica de un Crimen de Estado en EU - YouTube

 "Ayotzinapa: crónica de un crimen de Estado", en A Contracorriente. Rompeviento TV 28/5/15 - YouTube

 AyotzinapaLaPelícula (@AyotzinapaDocu) | Twitter

 Cine Ayotzinapa - YouTube

 filmfestival

 Mundo De Sueños Film Festival - FilmFreeway

 STUFF 2015 Film Festival by South Texas Underground Film Festival

THE MENUDO STORY

Great friends form friendships for different reasons, and these are prolonged because there is a spark that, once connected, cannot be broken. Julio César Guerrero and Lupe Rivera were activists together, and through all the years — the raza, the causa, the struggle — they shared their friendship always.

Though I did not know Mr. Rivera, I have come to appreciate him through Julio César's fond memories of him, and of the materials he’s sent me. In all this I kept seeing references to Lupe's love of food and making people happy with food.

His niece Marge Rivera Bermann captures that essence well when she ties wisdom with food: “...he seemed to never age. His experience brought him great wisdom and I loved to listen to him. I'll never forget the smell of barbacuo wafting through the house in the wee hours of Sunday morning as well as his empanadas de calabaza - the biggest and the best!"

So what better way to remember his friend than through a story of one of Lupe's favorite pastimes? Thank you, Julio César. I am sure Lupe is smiling where ever he may be. 

I was notified this summer of the passing of Lupe Rivera, a dear friend I met in the Quad-Cities area in the late sixties. QC is a cluster of cities located three hours west of Chicago and divided by the Mississippi River, which forms a natural border between Iowa and Illinois.

Guadalupe M. Rivera, 06/11/1933 - 5/5/2015

This is the largest metropolitan area in Illinois next to Chicago with Rock Island on one side — home base to the famous Rock Island Line — turned into a popular folk song by singer Johnny Cash, and Silvis, home of Hero Street, USA, subject of books and documentaries about a group of Mexican American soldiers on the other: these men lost their lives during WWII and the Korean War. On the Iowa side, too, there is Davenport, the city where Chicano rocker Ritchie Valens played his last concert before his plane crashed in the winter of 1959.

This entire area was a hub for large farm equipment manufacturers such as John Deere, International Harvester and CASE, which supported most of the local economy through good UAW Union salaries, benefits, and pensions. Despite the racism and discrimination in the railroad yard and foundries of the times (which still persist today), people of color could enjoy a basic middle class income that contrasted with the low wages and lousy working conditions of families employed in the agricultural fields of surrounding areas.

Ayotzinapa, October 14-31, 2015: 16 links

For the Day of the Dead, a small present from my good friend and colleague, Vanessa Vaile, to all of us. Read and keep on learning how governments are callous, if nothing else, and how they are complicit in everything that has happened, and is happening, to all the forcibly disappeared peoples crossing borders, looking for a better life, away from violence, corruption, crime.


Ayotzinapa, October 14-31, 2015: 16 links

 Iguala massacre: Mexican army makes new arrests in Iguala massacre investigation | In English | EL PAÍS

 Antonio Tizapa, Father of One of the Missing 'Mexico 43,' Will Run the New York City Marathon With a Heavy, Hopeful Heart | Village Voice

 Mexico: Army in Guerrero Accused of Working with Drug Cartel | News | teleSUR English

 Mexico plans to use drones as search for missing Ayotzinapa students continues – Latin Correspondent

 Mexico: Civilians Detain Federal Cops They Link to Drug Cartel | News | teleSUR English

 Human Rights Experts to Keep Investigating Ayotzinapa Case | News | teleSUR English

 What really happened to the 43 students in Mexico? » peoplesworld

 Mexico remembers Tlatelolco, 1968 » peoplesworld

 Parents of Disappeared Mexican Students Want Army Investigated | News | teleSUR English

 During Iguala tragedy Imperial Couple ate then slept

 Costa Rica Doctors to Examine Mexican Student in Ayotzinapa Case | The Costa Rican Times

 Parents of Disappeared Mexican Students Are Furious Over Docudrama of the Case | VICE News

 Mexico: A Seething Cauldron of Discontent | Socialist Alternative

 Did US funding unwittingly facilitate Mexico's Ayotzinapa kidnappings? - reported.ly

 Ayotzinapa and Tlatelolco: Two atrocities bound by fate and indifference - reported.ly

 43 Missing Students from Mexico - Spring Demonstration at Washington Square & Recent News - Washington Square Park Blog

Why is ABC Hiding from the Public the US Dirty Laundry on the Treatment of Refugee Families?

When Pope Francis touches US soil, he will begin a whirlwind tour through the northeast corner of our vast country. As such, he decided to hold a virtual audience with several parts of the country he would not be able to visit during his brief sojourn here. Via satellite then, he spoke with students at the Cristo Rey Jesuit High School in Chicago’s inner city; the homeless in Los Angeles and those dedicated people who work with them; and finally, parishioners from Sacred Heart Church in McAllen, Texas, many of whom have led the country in efforts to show that the refugee crisis in the United States is a humanitarian crisis, not a political tool to be volleyed back and forth. 

By far, mothers and children are the usual type of refugees we encounter at the border in Texas
Photo Credit, LA Times

The one-hour special aired on ABC News 20/20 on Friday, September 4th, at 9 pm CST. Moreover, it has been posted in its entirety in both English and Spanish on ABCNews.com. 

Ayotzinapa: Chronicle of a State Crime/ Ayotzinapa: Crónica de un crimen de Estado

September 26 — the one-year anniversary of the Ayotzinapa students' forced disappearance from Iguala, Mexico — is coming up. Yet the impunity of taking student teachers en masse laughs at the face of any democracy, and we should all cry out.

As the new semester begins, please share with everyone this film with English subtitles — Ayotzinapa, Chronicle of a State Crime— including your classes if you are teaching at the university level, especially. This film is essential to courses where social justice themes play a vital part, as these 43 student teachers are still nowhere to be found. Thus, you can discuss the wherewithal of government corruption and the narco-state. 

What happens if...

INTERNATIONAL COORDINATION OF THE CARAVANA43: An Anecdotal Journal by Julio César Guerrero, MSW, MA

When Julio César Guerrero wrote a guest post a while back, I promised you the back story of the months of planning for the Caravana43. I know that many of you have already read much about Ayotzinapa. But now  — as we near the anniversary of the disappearance of the 43 students from Ayotzinapa on September 26  — we have much planned, including presentations of a documentary film with English subtitles that concern the atrocious acts of cowardice enacted in Mexico. The film is called Ayotzinapa, Chronicle of a Crime of State. Please write me if you are interested in knowing how to show this film near you. 

As promised, however, here is Julio César's account of the weeks of preparation and activity from beginning to end, as well as his recollections of the actual process of planning this monumental task. Although this is a condensed version of the original Spanish, he wanted to give you the highlights.

Julio César Guerrero doing what he does best, a presentation in NYC
to a community of activists with Dan LaBotz at his right. 
© Fanzine Detektor

So if you are an activist, if you believe in justice and freedom, if you want peace within our nations and real solidarity to exist, then I strongly encourage you to read Julio César's comprehensive testimony of his weeks with the caravana. 

You will learn a lot! 

And if you still feel the need to do something more, join one of the many social justice groups that may have developed from our presence throughout the country, since we know that Caravana43 was only the beginning and catalyst of our fundamental work. 

I am sure you can seek these groups out, because Caravana43 laid out the seeds.

But it is now our turn to nurture these seeds and make them grow. 

¡Todos Somos Ayotzinapa!

INTERNATIONAL COORDINATION OF THE CARAVANA43: 
An Anecdotal Journal

by Julio César Guerrero, MSW, MA

Checking my email, I found a message I sent out on November 11, 2014, proposing the idea of an international solidarity project for the parents of the 43 forcibly disappeared students from Ayotzinapa on September 26, 2014 in Iguala, Guerrero. The idea came about after my visit to Mexico City in October 2014, when I participated in a couple of marches to El Zocalo (Mexico’s Central Plaza), supporting the parents of the forcibly disappeared normalistas (students from the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Teachers’ College).

Thousands march into the Zócalo during the Global Day of Action for Ayotzinapa
Wednesday, October 23, 2014
Brett Gundlock/Boreal Collective/Mashable

The display of popular unity the parents of these student teachers generated everywhere they went gave me the idea of extending such support to the United States, something that has become a tradition for the human rights and trade union groups, especially after the enactment of the free trade agreement (NAFTA) in the mid-nineties. The previous year I had coordinated a support caravana for a group of Braceros traveling from Texas through the Midwest that culminated in Washington, DC and New York. I took this idea and adapted it, proposing the same support plan for the Ayotzinapa group.

Read, Think, Inform, ACT: the Transformation of the Written Word!

Though this began as an Ayotzinapa compilation of news, because my friend and colleague Vanessa Vaile knows I am infinitely interested in everything Ayotzinapa ⎼⎼ and she was gathering articles for me doing what she always does (she is an information activist, or better said, an informationist and thinktivist too) ⎼⎼ it turned out to be a lot more than Ayotzinapa articles by the end of this set, one of the endless many, she says. 

I don't know where she finds the time. 

The Curse of the X Sound

I had the privilege to work with Julio César Guerrero during the National US tour of the Caravana 43 of the Ayotzinapa students and parents, who divided their caravana into three segments: the west, the central — where I met him — and the east branch. All then met again in Washington DC and New York City. Julio César took months to brilliantly orchestrate their entire trip, and he did so with passion and gusto. 
         Today, he offers some recollections of a different topic, but nevertheless these are fascinating to language lovers and history buffs. Soon too, he will fill us in with the back story of the months of planning for the Caravana43, since many of you have already read varied newstories of Ayotzinapa, though they keep on happening. 



I joined Michigan State University In the fall of 2003 as an advisor with the "Office of Cultural and Academic Transitions" under the student services division. OCAT was essentially one of the many benefits produced during the Civil Rights movement in the area of higher education, established for the purpose of not only increasing the number of minority students into universities but also, most importantly, of developing and nurturing a culturally sensitive environment on campus, since it fostered a drop-out prevention component.

My first week at work my supervisor told me, as a welcoming gesture, that he was glad I had joined the staff because Chicanos on campus, although not the largest minority, were the student group responsible for most of the political activism and organizing or — in his own words — the ones who “made the most noise.” By coincidence, that same week I was visited by a student member of MEChA who asked me for money to pay for an overnight delivery to the National MEChA Association board. As I understood, he needed to make the deadline for an appeal because the original membership application had been rejected.

MEChA: Student Movement of Chicanos from Aztlán
Union Is Strength!

Maná backs social causes with new song “Mi verdad”, a duet with Shakira

Ana María Alvarado  Abril 21, 2015  1:45 am 

The song “Mi verdad”or "The Truth" talks about the lies media and social networks sometimes tell, as well as dictators 

Maná with Shakira singing "The Truth"

In Maná's song "Mi verdad," the group talks about the lies media and social networks sometimes tell, as well as dictators who have always existed in Latin America. This shows that they have always been committed to this global problem and, especially, to their country.

43 empty chairs...

All You Want To Know About Ayotzinapa & the Caravana 43!

I decided to collect articles and videos from Dallas as the Caravana 43 contingent from Ayotzinapa came through our city. 

Trying to place them all together in one place for easy access, my colleague Vanessa Vaile from Precarious Faculty -- an invaluable educator and friend -- helped me incredulously in getting this huge list together. 

Vanessa Vaile & me

But I am sure there are a lot more articles and other telling bits of information. 

Please let me know what they are: post them here, add to our growing list, so that we have a repository for the great activism and awareness we so need to achieve -- the movement we are trying to bring forth -- so that everyone becomes aware that the disappearance of 43 students is now much more than these 43 students. It marks the disappearance of these 43 plus 25 thousand more. And with them, it also recognizes that over 100,000 have been lost to the horror of drug-related violence and crime. 

But what is worst is that this travesty is condoned, accepted, even propagated by those in power. 

This movement, Ayotzinapa with the Caravana 43, concerns the insolence of a government that made the mistake to think that its people -- because they were poor -- could be bought.