Your one-stop shop for all things Latin/Hispanic/Mexican
From this blog’s London correspondent (formerly this blog’s West Coast correspondent) come Britain’s “Cool,” gluten-free Hey Ho to Mexico “tortillas,” which is apparently what the Brits call any corn-based produce that comes packaged in a plastic bag featuring pyramids and sombreros.
These are not your regular [fake] tortillas, mind you, these “bring you a true taste of Mexico,” because as everyone knows, there is only one.
Hat tip: London correspondent: Kent German
It was only a few years ago, when U.S. Hispanics were deemed too fat and dumb to join the U.S. Army. But things are so much better now, apparently.
In its latest sneaky move to beef up enlistment, the U.S. military this week said it will be expanding a program to offer “fast track to citizenship for immigrants with special language or medical skills.”
According to a New York Times report, said program — known by the flamboyant name of Military Accessions Vital to the National Interest (yep) “seeks to increase to 3,000 enlistments this fiscal year and 5,000 in the 2016 fiscal year, up from the current limit of 1,500.”
And yes, while foreigners accepted to enlist have been legal immigrants on temporary visas, the program now welcomes “young undocumented immigrants with deportation deferrals.” Because… why bother deporting people when you can just send them to a dangerous war zone? I mean: duh.
Remember that hot Latinas wine?
Well, there’s even a better — or, rather, worse — version of that thing. It is called “Culitos” (literally “Little Assholes”) and I will not be buying it any time soon.
¡Guácala!
Hat tip: @Bathtubmedia
Jimmy Kimmel and Mexican sidekick, Guillermo, will have a shot of tequila every time someone says the word “piñata.”
WARNING: They are actually in Austin’s piñata district, so you can imagine what happens next:
The Internet is an oasis of information, entertainment, endless time-wasting and — more importantly — thought-provoking inquiries.
Take Username_2000, a ‘Daily Mail Online’ reader in Los Angeles, California, who took to that empowering tool known as the “comments box” to ponder a likely burning question upon discovering the existence of Jimena Sánchez, a Mexican sports reporter who has come to be known as The Mexican Kim Kardashian.
Here’s Username_2000’s question as posted in the Daily Mail Online. (I’m leaving this here in case any one of you, loyal followers of this blog, feel like venturing a reply.)
I’m sure he’s still scratching his head. Poor thing.
Hat tip: Óscar Gutiérrez*
*Who else?
The anti-immigration, anti-gay, climate-change denier, Canadian immigrant Christian (aka Ted Cruz) today confirmed he will be running for President in 2016, which is like sad, since I don’t think he is even remotely aware he has a zero chance of going anywhere with that.
Still, that has not deterred Cruz from launching a Spanish-language campaign, Ted Cruz para Presidente, highlighting his own condition as immigrant and pretty much making us believe his story is just exactly like the story of all immigrants in this country.
Yeah, right…
Oh, and by the way, if he is so proud of his origin, how come he is not himself addressing potential voters in Spanish?
Awwww Mexico…
The land of the collective smooch and the “coold cocnuts” is also the Global Headquarters of mustachioed, sombrero-clad disgusting politicians.
In the latest Kafkaesque episode of our never boring political telenovela, Mexican Mayor Hilario Ramírez Villanueva this week jumped to the spotlight after a video emerged showing the moment he whipped up the skirt of a young woman he was dancing with.
According to several reports, the footage was captured during the mayor’s lavish 44th birthday party for which he reportedly paid a whopping $1 million and which we can only assume featured plenty of booze, drugs and babes.
Ramírez Villanueva has shrugged off his critics and has denied spending that much on his birthday bash. He even asked [politely] Jorge Ramos to refrain from mentioning his mother –this, after the Univision anchor confronted the Mayor and asked him what he would think if someone did the same to his progenitor.
Watch the interview below [in Spanish]:
St. Patrick’s Day was already this blogger’s favorite binge-drinking U.S. holiday, and now there’s even more reason to celebrate.
Paul Crowley, age 81, and grandsons will be taking advantage of the Mexican-themed celebration to host the grand opening of O’Crowley Irish Tacos & Juice Press Smoothies in Lindon, Utah.
According to the local press:
Irish tacos […] are made with shredded potatoes and can be topped with onions, cilantro, avocado and the regular lettuce, tomato, cheese plus sour cream and.. salsa verde.
I don’t know about you, but I’d love to try grandpa’s Irish tacos. They look like they would perfectly fit in one of these awesome taco truck taco holders.
… if I only lived in Utah.
Illustration: The Economist
Much has been written this week about the precipitous downfall of Venezuelan TV host Rodner Figueroa, who was fired from his high-paying job in Univision after making an inexcusable, racist comment about Michelle Obama live, during the superpopular daytime show El gordo y la flaca. More specifically – without mincing words – Figueroa compared the First Lady to someone from the cast of the Planet of the Apes movie.
Click here to watch the video of what he said exactly (in Spanish.)
Sure, Figueroa said something horrible. Yes, Univision did the right thing by reacting quickly and firing him “immediately” barely hours after he made the now infamous commentary.
But what many fail to see is that “The Figueroa Affair” is by no means new, nor shocking, at least for those of us who intimately know the ugly inners of Latin American – and U.S. Hispanic – media. As anthropologist Arlene Dávila wrote recently: “Sadly these types of comments are very common in Univision, and rarely regulated.”
While this is indeed true, is by no means limited to Univision. Take any television show in the U.S. (Univision, Telemundo, Azteca America, MundoFox;) Peru (SurPerú;) Mexico (Televisa, TV Azteca;) Venezuela, Colombia, etc. and you’ll see what I mean.
I grew up in Mexico City, and was always intrigued (not really shocked back then) to see that people on TV didn’t look at all like most people I saw on a daily basis. I mean, even the maids were all like, well-coiffed, blond actresses!
Wether it was telenovela stars or Cuban-born TV hosts, everybody looked (and still does) like they were all hailing from Scandinavia.
I dare you find a Black actor or actress (yes, there are Black people in Latin America;) an Indigenous Mexican (oh, yes, we have plenty) unless – of course – they are shown as objects of ridicule.
Want more? Take this promotional spot from Mexico’s media giant Grupo Televisa pretty much portraying Africans as a bunch of savages. Oh, did I mention Televisa is Univision’s partner, co-owner and provider of content?
See? Per the above examples, Africans (i.e. blacks) are savages, and Indians are pretty much non-existing. Thus, it was only natural that a local residencial developer in El Salvador this year used a light-skinned, blond family of three to pitch its “super affordable low-cost housing,” even though only a 0.1 percent of the population of El Salvador looks like these three.
Sure, pummeling Rodner Figueroa as if he were a Kim Kardashian piñata might feel like a good thing to do right now: It will make us feel great about ourselves as defenders of a racism-free world.
Just don’t forget: He is not the isolated racist weirdo they might have you believe in this wonderful universe that came to be known as Hispanic Media.
It’s always good to see marketers learn from their past mistakes. Remember the Brown is the New White t-shirt from Macy’s?
Well, no more of that. Instead of launching ethnically-relevant products to please Latino shoppers, Macy’s seems to have changed course and it’s now using tall, unmistakably non-Hispanic blonds to pitch a … are you ready?… “mariachi-style” suit. According to Macy’s own blog, the new collection doesn’t stop there. It promises tons of other Mexican-themed things, including –what else?– plenty of sombreros.
I don’t know you, but I feel like living la vida loca lived by these nice ladies up here, so don’t judge me if the first thing I do when I go back to New York is rush to 34th Street & Broadway. Who doesn’t want to look that fabulous?
¡Ajúa!
Hat tip: gbujanda
Surprise! Alex Martínez has taken over the streets of Sabadell, Spain to celebrate the great Gabo on the very wall of my friend’s house.
Bravo, Alex Martínez!
Photo: Laura Martínez, March 6, 2015, Sabadell
I have no idea how much money the Colombian government has put into its latest coffee campaign, but their creatives could use a little help. Besides the name of the campaign, which is supposed to be a pun (Bean Bag –Not Big Ban– Theory, get it?) there’s nothing much more here, except a long video, featuring a gringo showing us around Colombia.
The only positive thing I can say about the Bean Bang Theory is that it makes it clear what I’ve been saying all these years: It’s Colombia, Not Columbia.
Awwww, Mexico!
Not content with inventing the Coc Nuts Coold the Apelbii’s and the Crossfit Taquería among many other binational wonders, Mexico is now introducing a new concept in sugary treats: The cupcaky, which I can only guess is a close relative to its gringo counterpart, the cupcake…
Oh, and I’m sure this thing is damn good, since it costs five times more than a conchita and three times more than a dona.
How can anybody not love Mexicans?
Photo via: Ricardo Trejo
Turns out Ecuador isn’t the only Latin American country using the Super Bowl as platform to pitch its wonders. Mexico is doing a similar effort with its first Super Bowl ad ever, an adorable spot pitching –what else?– avocados. Because, let’s be honest, which American in his/her right mind would spend a Super Bowl Sunday without guacamole?
However, it looks like America’s love for avocados is not limited to big NFL events. In January 2014 alone, Americans reportedly ate 70 million pounds of avocados.
And that is a whole lot of guacamole!
via: Avocados from Mexico
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