Vice published an interesting article a few months back on a recent Mexican fashion and music trend: Kids who call themselves “Colombianos.”
Colombianos dig Colombian “cumbia” music and, apparently, lots and lots of hair gel. Now if they would only wear those boss Mexican pointy boots to go with their elaborate, sculpted hairdos. That would really complete the look, if you ask me.
Late last month in Mexico City, Alejandro Jodorowsky organized the “March of the Skulls” to disperse negative energy caused by the death toll of the nation’s drug war. Nearly 40,000 Mexicans have died drug war related deaths in the past five years. The advance billing for the November 27th event described it as “the first act of collective psycho-magic in Mexico” and it attracted nearly 3000 people who donned skeleton masks, face-paint, tops hats. Some marchers carried black versions of the Mexican flag and shouted “Long live the dead!”
From the Los Angeles Times:
The “maestro” arrived at the palace steps about 1:30 p.m., causing brief havoc among the gathered calaveras as people jostled to get near him. The white-haired Jodorowsky, fit and agile at 82, wore a black sports coat, a bright purple scarf and a detailed skull mask.
Along with his family, Jodorowsky led the calaveras up the Eje Central avenue to Plaza Garibaldi in a mostly silent demonstration. In the late 1980s, he filmed some key scenes of “Santa Sangre” at this plaza, homebase for the city’s for-hire mariachi bands. On Sunday, it was easy to imagine another “Santa Sangre” scene being filmed during the march, but this time from a dark and unfamiliar future.
Someone decided the group should sing a song. It became “La Llorona,” the Weeping Woman.
Jodorowsky was displeased with the group’s initial interpretation, so he asked for another go at it. A mariachi band joined in as accompaniment.
“There are 50,000 dead beings,” Jodorowsky said through a bullhorn, before the sea of skulls. “They are sheep. They are not black sheep. We must have mercy for these souls that have disappeared. Let’s sing this song with lament, as if we were the mother of one of these persons. Understand?”
Then he asked that all those present cross and link their arms with those of the strangers around them. The group did. They chanted “Peace, peace, peace!” until Jodorowsky asked that everyone let out a big laugh. Laughter and applause followed.
You have to love that the wiley shaman did the old “c’mon you guys can do better” routine and made them sing it again!
After the jump, a news report about Alejandro Jodorowsky’s November 27, 2011 Psychomagic event in Mexico.
The feared Mexican drug cartel La Familia was behind the shooting down of a police helicopter, authorities say and they were given a tip-off about a big meeting that was to take place in the group’s stonghold area of Michoacan. That information led to a police shoot-out that the killed eleven suspected members of the cartel, and 36 others, including three known top leaders were captured.
The Mexican police also confiscated several jewel-encrusted or gold-plated automatic weapons. From the BBC:
“They were hiding in Jalisco, waiting for instructions from their boss and planning an attack on a group which calls itself the Knights Templar, with which they’re at war,” Mr Rosas told reporters at a news conference.
The police commissioner described the Knights Templar as an offshoot of La Familia, which had split from the cartel after the killing by security forces of La Familia leader Nazario Moreno in December 2010.
Police said they seized 70 long-range weapons and 14 pistols, many of them encrusted with gold, silver and precious stones.
They also secured more than 20,000 rounds of ammunition and 40 bullet-proof vests.
Fighting between rival factions of the La Familia cartel displaced at least 2,000 people from their homes in Michoacan state this week.
Imagine having so much money that you could have a gold-plated automatic weapon! That’s some real James Bond shit. Perhaps Harry Winston and Tiffany’s need to get in on the “luxury” arms trade? They’re leaving BIG money on the table if they don’t!
Previously on DM: Logo narco: The branding of Mexican drug cartels.
Celebrations are underway marking the 200th anniversary of the start of Mexico’s War of Independence.
On 16th September 1810, a priest, Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla declared Mexico’s freedom from the Spanish colonial government, in the small town of Dolores. Hidalgo’s call to arms became known as the Grito de Dolores (the Cry of Dolores), and led to the first of many rebellions against the forces of the Spanish Crown, which resulted in Mexico’s independence in 1821.
They don’t make priests like Hidalgo anymore - an intellectual revolutionary, who spoke out against Church and Crown, lived openly with his lover, fathered several children, smoked, drank, and gambled. More importantly, he was an egalitarian, who believed in the sharing of wealth. Hidalgo was eventually caught, excommunicated, tried for treason, and executed in 1811. However, his clear-sighted actions inspired a nation to reclaim its liberty.
These incredible photographs show some of the events taking place for Mexico’s bicentennial celebrations.
More can be seen here
The Vice Guide to Film uploaded this video guide to Mexican narco cinema. The genre focuses on “cocaine, guns, girls and trucks.” Vice went to Mexico to explore the budding new genre. Fun stuff, inspired by Mexico’s current drug cartel mayhem.
(Pictured above: Jesus Malverde, the patron saint of drug trafficking!)
The above clip from Mexican television exposes a new wrinkle in the drug-smuggling game sure to be popping up on next season’s Weeds: the use of turkeys as drug mules. According to my Google-translated Spanish, traffickers apparently anesthetized the turkeys, then “introduced into their bodies” all the illegal merchandise (in this case, roughly 3 kilograms of baggied heroin).
The birds were next transported via bus to Trujillo, where their unusual weight drew the attention of Federal agents. Thankfully, though (and you can see it in the clip), a veterinarian was summoned to withdraw the baggies, sparing the turkeys further harm (for now). WARNING: the above clip is NOT for the squeamish.
Engrossing article this week by Marc Lacey in The New York Times: Mexico’s Drug Traffickers Continue Trade in Prison. In it, Lacey describes the nonchalance with which prison guards in Mexico grant “revolving door status” to that nation’s most notorious drug traffickers. The guard-trafficker relationship has, in fact, grown so cozy of late that prison cells have become de facto bases of operation for the traffickers’ criminal empires. What were once “Centers for Social Rehabilitation” are now better known as “Universities of Crime.”
Fortunately, there’s American money on its way to fix things! As part of its counter-narcotics assistance program, the U.S government is sending Mexico a grand total of…$4.0 million. Cue this. In the accompanying surveillance video, watch and see what all that money’s gonna try to fix.