From the weblog of Luis J. Rodriguez, March 26, 2007:

I’m glad to invite everyone to the grand opening of Tia Chucha’s Centro Cultural this Saturday, March 31, from 4 to 8 PM. It will be at the new space that we’ve finally painted and organized after we were forced to vacate our old store/center in Sylmar (the new location is only 10 minutes away from there).

This will be an easy-going evening of food, poetry, raffles, and presentations by our instructors and some of their students from our various workshops, including Son Jarocho Mexican traditional music, Guitar, African Drumming, DJing, Reiki Healing, Danza Azteca, Mexikayotl Indigenous Cosmology, and more. Books will also be on sale as well as sign-ups for our events and workshops.

Your humble servant will be your host.

We will also be starting our regular schedule for “Noche Bohemias” (guitar, song, and poetry, mostly for our Spanish-speaking community), Open Mic (poetry, Hip Hop, Song for anyone), Film, and more (this schedule will be available on Saturday).

The new space is nice and clean, located at 10258 Foothill Blvd., Lake View Terrace, CA 91340 (on the corner of Foothill and Wheatland, in front of the Number 91 Bustop). Our new phone number is 818-896-1479.

Please join us as we try to re-weave the amazing tapestry of song, dance, words, theater, art, and ideas that temporarily unraveled with our move. However, we have the regenerative power as community to start anew, to continue our important work, and to prepare for better days ahead. You’ll love our new space.

From a blog post by Luis J. Rodriguez at www.luisjrodriguez.com/blog/

Wow, we’ve had a crazy month – with the benefit event on February 17 that brought around 600 people (we also raised $10,000 – thanks to everyone) – and Tia Chucha’s move. Let me tell you—it’s extremely difficult to tear down a café, bookstore, and cultural center (it was hard enough to create it). My wife Trini organized the move, and she did an amazing job. The staff came through, beyond their hours, but we also had an army of volunteers. They packed boxes, moved furniture and heavy bookshelves, unhooked computers, and even tore down some of the Mayan wood motifs and other specialty wood items we had at the shop.

The hardest thing to move was the café stuff (refrigerators, water heaters, espresso machines, ice makers, display cases, and more had to be removed along with pipes and electrical lines). Most of this stuff went into storage, many of which we plan to sell (anyone interested, please contact us). Some of these things went to our new temporary location in Lake View Terrace. The new space is less than half the size of what the old space consisted of, so we won’t have a café, but we’ll have some books, our offices, a little storage, and a performance space (we’ll have some drinks for sale and hot water at least). More on this later.

Anyway, last Wednesday Trini turned in the keys. It was sad, heartbreaking really, considering how much money, work, love, and caring went into this space. But as we have been saying, Tia Chucha’s is not about any particular building or structure. It’s a spirit, an essential way to be alive, to be indigenous, to be active and conscious. We will take that spirit to the temporary location, and carry it forward until we create a new permanent or semi-permanent Tia Chucha’s in about two to three years.

It’s about knowing how to rise up stronger and more prepared out of any adversity and crisis, like the Phoenix renewed out of the ashes. It’s something we have to teach and model for our community, our youth, our families. We’re going to stay positive, hopeful. So we’re ready for our move, our next phase, our new beginnings.

Our resident Mexika Danza group, the staff, board members, and key volunteers held a beautiful ceremony last Tuesday, a day before we closed up everything. We buried some sacred medicine and other items near a tree in the back of the old space. We said prayers and a good many wonderful words about Tia Chucha’s – our impact, our importance, and the future. There were also many sentiments of thanks, so many thanks, for the blessings we’ve been bestowed and the community we’ve helped engender and grow.

Our new temporary location is at 10258 Foothill Blvd., Lake View Terrace, CA 91342. Our new main number is 818-896-1479 and our fax number is 818-896-1489. However, we are not yet open. We will inform everybody about our opening date – we’ll have a new Grand Opening event – and our plans for future workshops, events, meetings.

I do want to remind everyone to keep May 19 on you calendar. That day we’ll hold our 2nd Annual “Celebrating Words: Written, Performed & Sung” Festival at Sylmar Park, free to the public (with poets, bands, speakers, booths, books, and more).

And to set aside July 29, 2007 for the “Tia Chucha Under the Stars: First Annual Celebration of Community & Culure” benefit to be held at the Ford Amphitheater – 2580 Cahuenga Blvd., Hollywood, CA 90068 – from 6 PM to 8 PM. Our theme this year is “Si Se Puede/Yes We Can” and we’ll be joined by the bands Tierra, Ollin, Upground, and others. We’ll have poetry by John Densmore of the Doors and Luis Rodriguez, the Chicano comedy group, Culture Clash, and our host will be comedian Ernie G. Our Azteca Danza group will open the event and Power 106 DJs will be on hand for music and entertainment. Tickets are $30. You can get more information at the Ford Box Office at 323-461-3673 or go to our website at www.tiachucha.com.

[ On January 9th, 2007, Luis J. Rodriguez, the co-founder and creative director of Tia Chucha's Cafe & Centro Cultural, gave us the following sad news, Tia Chucha’s Café at its present location is closing - permanently. Here's Rodriguez's statement on the closing: ]

“Tia Chucha’s must move–but our Spirit, Creativity, and Unity are intact. Just after the holidays, Tia Chucha’s Cafe & Cultural Center was served with a notice forcing us to move. We have to leave by February 28, 2007. A powerfully energized and thriving bookstore/cafe/performance space/cultural center is to be replaced by high-tech laundry machines. The laundry company is apparently investing $8 million in the strip mall, something we can’t compete with.

Maintain a vibrant community space? Of course not! Instead, make way for another laundry outlet! That’s capitalism. Money follows money, not needs, not literacy, not community, or cultural expression. In the world we’ve inherited, most creativity and expression has to make big money, or it’s out.

We created a space that requires a lot of personal and community investment. The community came to embrace Tia Chucha’s and make this space its own. We plan to take the spirit, creativity, and unity we helped nurture to a temporary site as we plan and prepare to obtain a larger permanent site in the Northeast San Fernando Valley. This is a time to come together, strategize, and work to keep Tia Chucha’s viable as a cultural center while we explore our options. We will not give up. We will find a temporary space; we will also curtail our retail operations while we concentrate on our programming, events, outreach, fundraising, and growth.

We ask that you strengthen our efforts and sign this petition in support of Tia Chucha’s coming back stronger, bigger, and better endowed than ever (Editor’s Note: The petition is only available at the Cafe - but you can e-mail letters of support to the address given below.) We need this written support to show the various developers; city, county, and state agencies; and foundations that this community will fight for the arts, music, dance, theater, writing, film, publishing, and a vital gathering place where we can share ideas, history, politics, economics, and our indigenous traditions and thinking.

Our strategy this year includes implementing a fundraising plan with a 5th Anniversary event at Tia Chucha’s on February 17 . We will also have another “Celebrating Words: Written, Performed & Sung” festival at Sylmar Park on May 19. And we have been approved to do a benefit event for Tia Chucha’s at the Ford Amphitheater in Hollywood on July 29. Sign up for our e-mail newsletter, or call 818-362-7060 for more information.”

Nuestro Himno is an updated version of the Star-Spangled Banner that’s sung in Spanish. A loose translation of the original, you can think of the song as an anthem for Immigrant Rights - and it couldn’t come at a more perfect time. The song is presently sweeping the country, becoming a hit among the Spanish speaking population, but also raising the ire of rightwing nativists. Even President Bush commented on the song, saying “I think the national anthem ought to be sung in English” (a language he has not yet mastered.) Those performing on the song include Mexican pop star Gloria Trevi, and Puerto Rican reggaetón stars Ivy Queen and Tito El Bambino.

Writing for the New York Times, Kelefa Sanneh calls Nuestro Himno the “protest song of the moment,” and describes it as “an unlikely collaboration between dozens of pop stars you may never have heard of and a 19th-century amateur poet. The result is ‘Nuestro Himno,’ a new version of ‘The Star-Spangled Banner,’ sung by Latin pop stars. Francis Scott Key’s lyrics have been translated into Spanish, but the basic message — a stirring tribute to a waving flag — remains the same.”

Here’s a sampling of the lyrics:

Its stars, its stripes, Freedom, we are equal
We are brothers, in our anthem.
In the fierce combat is a sign of victory
The glow of battle, in step with liberty
My people - keep fighting, It’s time to break the chains
At night they said: “It’s being defended!”
Oh say! Your starry beauty is still unfolding.

Read the complete lyrics to the song in Spanish and English. Listen to Nuestro Himno online, and download the mp3 file to your computer. !Oh decid! Despliega aún su hermosura estrellada.

A number of movies that rewrite the history of the Americas are in the works, with their focus being on the prehispanic civilizations of Mexico. Antonio Banderas, star of Zorro and now Take the Lead, will play the infamous Hernan Cortes in Conquistador. The independent film directed by Brazilian filmaker Andrucha Waddington (Me You Them, House of Sand) and written by Nicholas Kazan (Reversal of Fortune,) tells the “story of the expedition that sailed west from Cuba in 1519 in hopes of expanding the Spanish Empire. Cortes and his band of soldiers came upon what is now Mexico and swiftly brought about the destruction of the Aztec empire led by Moctezuma.” This swashbuckling film now in production at Hollywood Gang Prods., has a budget of over $40 million - but most likely the money won’t help the producers get the story right.

When the Spanish conquistadors first saw the island city of Tenochtitlán (now the capital - Mexico City), they couldn’t believe their eyes. It was the largest city on earth at the time, and it’s huge gleaming temple pyramids looked out over a metropolis that was sectioned by an intricate system of canals and roads. Tenochtitlán rivaled Venice, Italy, for its beauty - and it certainly made Seville, the home city of the conquistadors, look small and insignificant. The Aztec capital had immense gardens, schools, libraries, and marketplaces. It was a place rich in architectural wonders, ritual celebrations, and magnificent wealth. The Spanish could not accept that “savages” would have been so graced by God, and seeing all the works of the Aztecs as simply the work of the devil, set out to totally destroy Tenochtitlán. They smashed every pagan idol, burned and toppled every building, sent the people into slavery (those not decimated by European diseases,) and built their “New Spain” from the ruins of the mighty Aztec city. The meeting of the two sophisticated cultures and the bloody clash between the antagonists gave birth to Mexico.

In fact, the people never called themselves “Aztecs,” they instead referred to themselves as Mexika (Meh-shee-kah or “The people of Mexi,” a legendary warrior-priest from ancient times.) Mexika creation stories tell us the people originally came from Aztlan (The place of the white heron - what many believe to be the greater southwest of the present United States.) The word Aztec was eventually derived from the name, Aztlan. But it’s doubtful any of this will be told in the Banderas/Waddington/Kazan version of the conquest of the Mexika.

Meanwhile, Mel Gibson, fresh from the success of his bloody Passion of the Christ, will direct and produce his own version of pre-Hispanic history, Apocalypto. The film is supposedly based on the Maya civilization that existed in 1000 BC, but since Gibson wrote the script for the film, and Disney will be distributing it, some have questioned the authenticity of Gibson’s version of history. Shooting is now underway and the film is scheduled for release in the summer of 2006.

The name of the film gives some insight into the perspective of Gibson’s production. Apocalypto is a Greek word meaning “unveiling,” that a Maya word or concept was not chosen hints at a yet another Eurocentric view of the ancient Maya. Moreover, Gibson is offering a vision of the Maya that he wishes the audience to accept as fact - a vision that is hotly contested by scholars, anthropologists, and archeologists. These experts differ over the extent to which human sacrifice was practiced by the ancient Maya - and only in the last few decades has it come to light that the Maya may have engaged in the practice to any significant degree. However, Gibson’s film portrays corrupt Maya monarchs who use fear to control the masses in an attempt to hang on to power; commanding the people to build more temples and sacrifice more people else the gods destroy the world. This is not a viewpoint or theory supported by scientific research, but one made of whole cloth by Mr. Gibson. His Apocalypto has no religious message to it - so it is said - but that seems doubtful considering Gibson’s Passion of the Christ.

Not to be left out of the rush to re-write history, Ron Howard will be directing The Serpent and the Eagle for Paramount Pictures. Advance publicity for the movie states it is a “Tale of Spanish Conqueror Cortez who attacked the Aztec nation and plundered its riches with the help of an Aztec princess-turned-slave.” There’s no start or release date set for this film, but you can expect to see it in movie houses by 2007. Also currently in pre-production is Aztec. With a script by writers Jeff Schaffer and Ted Humphrey, and production by The Montecito Picture Company, the advance publicity for this film states; “Set in 1519 at the height of the Aztec civilization, the project revolves around a slave named Tez who plays a brutal ball game called Ullamalitzli, in which the loser is sacrificed. Tez and his team must play the game and try to stay alive long enough to orchestrate a plan to escape the capital city of Tenochtitlan with a fortune in gold.”

What is immediately obvious to any student of history is that the sacred ball game of Ullamalitzli was not a sport per se - and it certainly was not played by slaves. The Montecito Picture Company would have you believe that Ullamalitzli was some ancient form of Rollerball. Ullamalitzli was played by the nobility and the ritualized game had deeply religious connotations. The hundreds of magnificent stone ball courts constructed across ancient Mexico illustrate how important the ritual was to prehispanic peoples. Two opposing teams would attempt to bounce a rubber ball through stone rings inset in the walls of the court, with the ball representing the sun. The entire game was a ritualized battle between the forces of light and darkness, and to an agricultural people that is no small matter.

The game was also associated with fertility and the earth’s productivity, as the captain of the loosing team was sacrificed - his blood fertilizing the earth and giving strength to the Sun God. It was considered an honor, not a punishment, to be sacrificed to the Sun so that the world would continue. Another factual error contained in the script would be the desire of the slaves to escape “Tenochtitlan with a fortune in gold.” The Mexika referred to gold as “the excrement of the gods,” and it was just a medium of exchange, no more valuable than other objects of trade and barter. What the Aztecs truly cherished and considered priceless were turquoise and feathers - but a movie about escaped slaves making off with with a fortune in feathers doesn’t sound like a box office hit, so history must be rewritten Hollywood style.

It is said that Cortés once told the Aztecs that the conquistadors “suffered from a disease of the heart which is only cured by gold.” Apparently Hollywood film studios and distributors suffer the same ailment. One can only hope that the above mentioned movies will never see the light of day, and if they are released, will be greeted by a storm of protest. The glorious civilizations constructed by the indigenous people of Mexico, from the magnificent splendor of Teotihuacan to the extraordinary empire of the Aztecs, is certainly cinematic material, and it all deserves to be made into a major motion picture. But justice and history both demand the tale be told by indigenous people, and not by those who conquered them.

Cornerstone Theater Company, in association with CA Youth Theatre, presents a limited engagement of ALWAYS RUNNING, by Luis J. Rodriguez. This one-act stage adaptation is written by José Cruz González and directed by Mark Valdez. The international bestseller, subtitled LA Vida Loca: Gang Days in L.A., comes vividly to life using text directly from the book. It is based on Rodriguez’s explosive memoir depicting the realities of Chicano gang life in East L.A. Cornerstone Ensemble member Jonathan Del Arco portrays Rodriguez’s journey from young gang member to poet and social activist. The show was originally created as part of Cornerstone’s Educational Program whose mission is to promote reading, inspire writing, and introduce theater to young people. Appropriate for ages 13 and up. November 4 - 13, 2005 (only 6 performances.) Friday & Saturday at 8pm, Sunday at 4pm. The Ivar Theatre. 1605 Ivar Avenue Hollywood, CA 90028 (between Hollywood and Sunset, one block West of Vine.) $10 general admission. To buy tickets call (323) 461-7310.

The Los Angeles Times wrote an article on September 16th about ABC television’s decision to provide Spanish closed caption translations of major programs. Titled Lost in Translation, the piece mentioned that ABC’s hit show, Lost, would be made available “in the language of Cervantes.” It seems a number of people at the Times are in need of some cultural sensitivity training. Xicanos and Mexicanos do not speak the language of the 15th Century Spanish writer Miguel de Cervantes, any more than the Los Angeles Times writes in the language of William Shakespeare.