Rules in Cuba

Dear free-born, democratic country-living American friend…or stranger, here is something you can read before you once again utter the statement: “But at least in Cuba they have free health care and free education.”

Not really true. And at what cost?

Check out the photos from a 6th grade classroom in the Rocky Mountain state. They were sent by a friend whose daughter is on the hunt for a Middle School, and given that I’m their Cuban friend, they forwarded the photos.

I love them.

Check out some rules:

• No Talking Bad About the Government
• Must use Cash. No Mastercard/Visa
• Need Government Authority to Create a Group
• Anything You Write for Publication Must be Government Approved
• No Computers
• No Microwaves
• No ATMs

My friend’s note:
“The teacher has the students actually play out scenarios… She said there were some pretty unhappy students under Castro, but a few escaped.”

Oh hells yeah, I would want to escape to.

Glad my family did.

Anyway, happy to see a stark and realistic picture of Cuba’s daily reality being painted.

And, perhaps one day, I will live to see more Cubans standing up for themselves and creating change.

Cause, really, living without a DVR would suck.

If you attended, you’ll see some words and thoughts you will recognize and a new thought or two. 

Unleashing the Power of Your Voice by Breaking Your Own Rules

When I launched Bilingual in the Boonies in 2006, just a few months after leaving my job as a reporter, I emailed a link to my former editor with the subject line:

“Look Ma, No Hands!”

Blogging was liberating and exciting.

A little scary, too.

I spent nearly 20 years in newsrooms and during that time at least three sets of eyes looked at my copy before it was published.

Suddenly, it was just me, the dashboard and the publish button.

There also had been a lot of rules to follow: correct grammar, the AP Stylebook, even specific newsroom rules of style — everything from the abbreviation of states to how many words should, or could, be in my first graph. (And sometimes, a few rules depended on whom was your editor that day…)

Suddenly, in blogging, I was not bound by my newspaper’s or editor’s rules.

Know the Rules: They Give Confidence

But, I kept to many of the good rules I learned from talented and passionate reporters and editors. I believe in rules. Understanding the basics and norms of whatever you are doing gives you a firm foundation and confidence. A grip on the basics often will point toward a better way of doing things — and in your own style.

Being comfortable as a writer gave me the confidence to try a wholly different medium for writing, one that was somewhat bold and non-reporter-like in 2006.

Back then, journalists didn’t really blog. Plus, as a reporter, not a columnist, I am trained not to express an opinion – and that is pretty much the opposite of blogging.

I had to get over that and by 2009, I especially had to.

Here’s an example of the Disruptive Voice we’re talking about in this Latism session. (#latismvoice)

Personal (and Social Media) Disruption

Nashville voters were facing an English-Only Resolution that would ban city government from working in any language other than English. That meant translations for immigrants and refugees would have been a no-no.

I did a few posts blasting the resolution and a way-too long 4-minute video in the accent and character of a Cuban, Carmen Miranda Remolino, to trash the councilman. The video is painful now to watch. I want to scream “cut! edit! cut! edit!”

Well, the thing was defeated. Amen. But, that was the first time I used my big mouth and my personal blog for a cause became a broadening of what I wrote about.

It also was my intro to vlogging, something I now love and something I learned to do only after I broke two of my own rules:

1. Don’t express your opinion.
2. Cover your face from any video camera.

Know this:

The Rules You Have to Break Most Often are the Ones You Make Up for Yourself

If I had kept to the belief that I was always and forever a writer, a person who avoided the camera, I never would have taken up doing video.

But the truth is that as my blogging style emerged, and when the Tiki Tiki Blog was born to tell the cuentos of what it is like to live Latin in the USA, I had to confront the fact that some stories have to be told on video. (Despite how long Carmen Miranda Remolino went on, I got great feedback from readers and friends.)

So, for the Tiki Tiki, how could I capture the accents, the gestures, the facial expressions with just words? I can’t. So, I got a Flip cam, breathed deeply and went for it. It was scary and unknown, but a necessary way to tell the stories I want to tell.

It is an irony for me that this year the Tiki Tiki and I have been recognized for our videos — not our writing. So, the attention has come for something that I did not know a lot about two years ago, something that forced me to break rules I had established for myself.

The videos bring traffic. I optimize them just as I do blog posts. The videos also bring comments, and they have helped create the community that — blessedly — hangs out with us at the Tiki Tiki’s social media channels. In addition, videos and the Tiki Tiki help win me freelance work, so that’s not bad.

And so, back to the good rules: This new love of video means I have had to study things such technique, editing, software. It means I have watched a whole lot of vlogs, videos and business videos and heck, even commercials, which are great for teaching you to get a point across in 30 seconds. Knowledge is possibility.

And all the good stuff that doing video has brought has happened because I had the confidence to open my mouth, broke my own self-imposed rules and took a chance. When you break down your own barriers, new stuff appears for you. New paths and passions.

Breaking past fear and rules means the authentic appears, and that’s the voice, the person, whom your readers and viewers really want to know.

What Rules Do You Need to Break to Unleash Your Voice?

• What self-imposed rules are keeping you from telling it like it is?
• What rules are keeping you from expressing yourself with a more authentic voice, or in a different medium?
• What rules do you need to break in order to experiment and grow?

PS:

You don’t have to go off and Find Your Voice. You already know what it sounds like. Your Voice is the person who talks inside your head, the sound of your Spirit — the one who tells you to try new stuff, but whom your outside voice, your public persona, often quiets.

Let that Voice out, scary as it can be, and many right things will happen.

#Latism11 Links

If you want to search through the Web to find more of what was said at the panel, search #latismvoice or #latism11.

Here’s a cool list of Latism11 tips sent via Twitter curated by Frankie De Soto.

Happy Happy Joy Joy

A few weeks ago, I escaped on an overnight to Atlanta with a good friend. She had an appointment down there, 4.5 hours south of Nashville and I basically invited myself.

The plan was to eat and shop…and we did, though I did not score anything much. I do not count the $39 Ikea blanket as a fabulous score, despite the reasonable price. I marked it as “necessity.” I got one cool dress, but my goodness, there was disappoint to discover II can’t even score big with the clothes in Atlanta. Something is wrong with me and I think it is a combination of age 44 and extreme cheapness.

However, success was found in solitude, in the disconnect from the daily routine — the lunch-making, the car-line, the working, the cooking, the dog walking. I know you know.

When my girlfriend left for her appointment early in the morning, I was left in a hotel room all by myself for five hours.

I had coffee, watched the morning shows — which I rarely ever do — I read the free newspaper in bed. I went to the gym and worked up a sweat. I took a long shower. I sat at the desk, fiddled with Twitter and Facebook, jotted down writing ideas, read about Angelina in Vanity Fair. I wore fuzzy socks.

In my college world religions class, I learned about a culture who believes that when we die, our soul travels up to the top of the Universe and is suspended for all eternity in its own Bubble of Bliss. There are others in their own Bubbles of Bliss all around you, but you don’t know it, and if you did, you wouldn’t care anyway, because you’re in your own Forever Bubble.

Hotel rooms are my own Bubble of Bliss.

I didn’t think about this much until I started attending blogging conferences. For as much as connecting with my tribe is wonderful, heading back to a hotel room alone is just about as sweet.

Writing down all this hotel love, I am struck at the memory of thinking a friend of mine odd for her hotel habit. She told me about it maybe seven years ago, or so (Our daughters are the same age). Every once in a while, when she needs to disconnect, to recharge, she leaves the husband and kids at home and checks into a local hotel. I remember her telling me that she sleeps well, she reads, she watches movies.

I don’t think I got it then, but I so get it now. (The woman is genius, really.)

As the Atlanta escape ended and my girlfriend and I got back in her Mama Fab Van and headed north to Nashvegas, I was recharged (an a little high on free hotel coffee).

And a recharged me means I connect better with my family and the creative goods flow better in my work.

And well plus, I’m always happier when someone else makes the beds.

Author is coming to Nashville.

Hey, American South, look what is happening: A new cuisine is emerging, born of Southern and Latino cultures.

Que?

Tamales stuffed with greens, corn ice cream topped with hot praline sauce, brownies with chile, sweet potato and plaintain casserole.

Welcome to El Nuevo South.

The ingredients of our people are joyfully intermingling with traditional Southern staples and celebrated in a new cook book, The New Southern-Latino Table: Recipes that Bring Together the Bold and Beloved Flavors of Latin America & the American South, by Sandra A. Gutierrez.

The 150 original recipes explore the melding of cultures, ingredients and cooking techniques of more than 20 Latin American countries with that of the traditional American South.

We can only say Wepa, Y’all, to that.

Gutierrez, a food writer and culinary instructor from Cary, N.C., will be in Nashville this month during the Southern Festival of Books. She will be on a panel entitled “Meet Me in The Kitchen — Recipes for the New World Cook” from 12 p.m. to 1:30 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 16 in Room 30 of Legislative Plaza. (Be sure to check the online schedule just in case anything changes between now and then.)

I spoke to Gutierrez, who was raised in Guatemala and the United States, about the book and she shared some of her original recipes on the Tiki Tiki. So, head over there, print them out and share, share, share them. (And then buy the book.)

You also can connect with Gutierrez at her site, Sandra’s Kitchen Studio, and on her Facebook page.

From "The New Southern-Latino Table: Recipes that Bring Together the Bold and Beloved Flavors of Latin America & the American South." by Sandra A. Gutierrez. Used by permission, University of North Carolina Press.

 

 

Hallmark came to Nashville last week and I snagged an invite to a small gathering they had with local bloggers.

It was mostly conversation about celebrating the little things in life, and getting to know a little bit more about how they go about creating the cards and products that help us express words and feelings.

I learned some of them have titles such as “emotioneer” and I would love to be a Hallmark “font specialist,” as I have a thing for fonts. I love how they evoke emotion by the very simple point of whether there is a serif or not, whether it is curly or long or not. Anyway, I can’t design a lick, so that is out. I have to stick to writing.

Quickie disclosure: I am working with Hallmark over on the Tiki Tiki on the Life is a Special Occasion campaign, which means they sponsor essays in the ‘del alma” section. (Here’s the last post on “dichos of encouragement.”)

OK, one of the things we did during our gathering in Nashville was to announce what is a most special occasion in our lives. Hallmark gave us a t-shirt and a purple Sharpie.

See what I wrote: “Singing in Spanglish with my Daughter…is a Special Occasion.”

I explained I often have to trick Maria into speaking Spanish with me via games and song. And when she sings along with me to anything from Julio Iglesias to Marc Anthony to In the Heights, I am delighted, elated, overjoyed, proud.

This super cool tee — a blank one — and other cool Hallmark stuff will be given away soon on the Tiki Tiki. Watchea for it.

And, if you want to see the beautiful and talented Nashville crowd — the Center of the Blogging Universe — and what they wrote, check out the photo gallery.  (The photo of me was taken by the talented Kevin Cozad, a Hallmark photographer. Imagine that job! Wepa!)

Now, tell me:

What makes a Special Occasion for You?

Maria says:

“Ay, carajo, it’s hot!”

Guat?

And then, I realize. We’ve been listening to the soundtrack from the musical, In the Heights — love and hope in Latino Washington Heights.  The line my kid so expertly and correctly gave me from the back seat comes from the song “Paciencia y Fe” and sung by an elderly Cuban abuela.

I go into a nervous laugh. I explain that “carajo” is not the most polite word. It means “damn,” which we don’t use, alright beba?

But, I tell her the truth: Her Cubans use it a lot. Hell, if we lived in Miami, she would learn that her relatives use it at least a dozen-and-a-half times a day, for emphasis, for cursing, even for expressing delight. Her people carajo, carajo, carajo all.the.time.

But little girls in Tennessee, and even in Miami, aren’t supposed to use carajo.

Unless they’re singing an award-winning song of patience and faith in their very own kitchen.

Too bad, really. Because, carajo, she sounded so cute when she said it out of the blue, and oh so appropriately. Porque de verdad hay un calor del carajo here right now.

Calor! Calor! Calor!

The opening lyrics of Paciencia y Fe, from Lin-Manuel Miranda’s wonderful play, which we saw in Nashville this year.

Calor! Calor! Calor!
Calor! Calor! Calor!
Ay Mama!
The summer’s hottest day
Paciencia y fe
Paciencia y fe
Ay carajo, it’s hot!
But that’s okay
Mama would say,
“Paciencia y fe”

And the delightful Carnaval del Barrio, which we sing on a daily basis. We especially love to sing the line: Since when are Latin people scared of heat? And we get really, really loud when it is time to alza la bandera.

I am in the kitchen, putting dirty dishes in the sink.

My husband and daughter are in the dining room cracking up and repeating “The Giants Win the Pennant! The Giants Win the Pennant!” over and over and over again.

I have no idea why this cracks them up so much.

He tells her sports stories, press box stories (he has spent a lot of time in press boxes) and she cracks up. Often.

He also plays War with her, sets up tennis in the garage and submits to her WWF-style wrestling.

I’m the one who tells her to hurry up, to brush her teeth, to eat her beans.

I’m also the one who often tells her to “Hang on, Mama has a few more things to do on the computer.’’

I’m just not fun. (OK, sometimes he’s the hammer, but you know my hammer strikes more often…)

It is time to let some things go so that I can have the time to do nothing but crack up with my kid a little more often.

The list I created is not that long, but the public part of it is that I am shutting down the Boonie Blog for a while.

The goal is to let it simmer until the New Year, which feels like enough time to get done the things I need, and want, to get done.

Chief among the tasks is re-doing the Los Pollitos Dicen website, selling out existing inventory and adding new stuff. So, if you’re looking for some bargains, sign up for the newsletter. An update and sale is forth-coming.

I’m still going to be hanging out at the Tiki Tiki Blog and my Twitter streams — @carriefweir | @tikitikiblog | @lospollitos — will be active. Those, I can do from my phone, whether in line at school or at the grocery store checkout. Amen.

If you’re new here, there are plenty of archives.
If you’re an old friend, thanks for understanding.

Hasta 2011.

Besitos…and I leave you with two musical Cubanitos, Raul Malo (also of Nashville!), singing  Me Voy Pa’l Puebo, about a peasant whose heading to the country (like me)  and Pitbull with Shut it Down… “Sube, sube hasta las nubes…Pa’lante, ‘lante!” (Thank you, Latina-ish for the title!)

Seen in NYC, August 2010.

So, Maria has started school.
The First Grade.
Oh, what a big, big girl…

I realized this week, as I dropped her off, that in the three years she has been in school, my New Year’s Resolutions kick in.

I don’t wait until January.

My constant list:

• I will finally finish the scrapbooks
• I will go to the gym more
• I will clean out the closets
• I will find more freelance work

And on and on.

And yet, there’s never enough time.
Or is it that I need a resolution to make more time?

Latina Bloggers in the Meat Packing District: Melanie from Modern Mami; Ana, Spanglish Baby; me; Sylvia, Mama Latina Tips; Jeannette from Todo Bebe.

Little more than two years ago, I wrote a post titled Looking for All the Latina Bloggers. The post was inspired by my attendance at a great conference that was sorely lacking in Latinas. I later determined, as best I could, that there were three of us out of a couple hundred. Que-que? Why so few? I already knew of lots of Latina bloggers, but they weren’t at the conference, and they sure weren’t getting the swag, ads, and corporate sponsorships our non-Latina blogger friends were raking in.

But, we’ve come a long way.

I just got back from Blogher, my first Blogher convention, and there were a few dozen Latinas that I knew of, and hung with. (Ay, que fun!) There also was an all-Latina panel, organized by a group called Latism and focusing specifically on creating content for Latinos, marketing to Latinos and reaching out to Latino blog publishers — the latter being of high interest to the non-Hispanic marketers and publicists in the session. We can be a confusing group of gente, after all.

My trip, and that of six other Latina bloggers, was sponsored by Vme TV, a national network of Spanish-language programming that I respect (no half-naked dancing girls) and one of the first American companies to reach out to Latina bloggers in the same way other American companies have reached out to “mommy bloggers.” We were there to help educate and spread the word about Vme’s programming. Easy. Fun. A win-win for them, and for me, and the relationship will continue with their ads running soon on the Tiki Tiki Blog.

Below, I’ve posted a round-up of links and stories on Latina bloggers that have come out of the Blogher event. Take a few minutes to spin through them and click through to the blogs listed. The voices are varied, the women interesting, and inspiring.

Some cool stuff.

I got my face all done pretty-like for a Yahoo! Shine interview on Reinvention. My video should load in a couple of weeks and I will update this post with it.

Matt Lauer, a few feet from me, in the Plaza.

The Today Show invited bloggers to attend a morning taping so we got up close with Meredith Viera, Matt Lauer and Al Roker in the Plaza and in the studio. They were gracious. We also got to go into the control room, which was a blast. One of their producers, the lovely Alicia Ybarbo, also interviewed me along with Melanie of Modern Mami and Ana of Spanglish Baby on the rise of the Latin blogger.

There were a bunch of parties sponsored by big names. I went to a few and got a bunch of swag. So much that my amigas who know I often reject all the mierda laughed their rears off when they saw me with four bags of stuff…two bags were not mine, but I joked that my eyes were spinning red and white like a cartoon character.

I have to say that my favorite things were hanging with friends, new and old, seeing the Vme folks and learning about their plans, the Today Show experience, an amazing brunch at the Loews Hotel (those people know class..and fancy cheese!) and filming a Spanish video spot for Spanx. Yes, I told the world about my underwear…and it was fun.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

The Explosion of the Latina Blogger from Wired Latinos.

Latina Bloggers Courted by Spanish TV Network from She Posts.

Bloguera Power from RL Public Relations.

Latinas in Social Media: The Power of Familia and Sisterhood by Angelica Perez-Litwin at Modern Familia.

Click here to see Roxana Soto from Spanglish Baby in the Yahoo! Shine Reinvention interview. It is in Spanish, but it looks like all, or most, of the others are in English. Roxana is a smart, passionate and dynamic woman and I was lucky enough to hang with her this weekend…especially at the Wax Museum on Time’s Square…what happens at the Wax Museum, stays at the Wax Museum though.

Pa’lante.

What I can look like when I work it.

What I usually look like when I don't work it. Too-busy-to-try-look.

Ponytails daily!

What I do when I get tired of not working it. Cropped!

I have been told it takes guts to cut off your hair. I guess it does. Honestly, for me, it takes more guts to walk around in a ponytail all the time. I have felt dragged down by the pelo, so off it came. I feel lighter, happier, hipper…and when you’ve just turned 43, hip is a good feeling to work toward.

Only my husband and daughter have turned their noses up about it. They are getting used to it though.

Sometimes, you gotta knock it all off and start all over again…it’s a cycle-of-life, re-growth thing…And, I have been feeling in the mood to knock things over, get rid of things, purge, lighten up, since the floods hit in May. For some reason, my movements toward change always begin with a shearing…this is the fourth time in my adult life that it all has come off.

Something good always comes out of it…I am waiting to see what this cycle brings.

Have you ever chopped off all your hair? Ever felt the need to knock it all down and start again? (And I am not talking hair…)