“Mother Love” collage 23/09/2007
Posted by dlatman in Collage, art, food, hawai'i, love, nature, travel, u.s., women.add a comment
This collage was inspired by my travels to the beautiful island of Kauai in 2004, during my year of work and travel throughout the Hawaiian islands. As one viewer stated, “It looks like you had an intense time.”
I absolutely loved exploring Hawai’i. The colors, tastes, smells and natural landscape were so stunning that it sometimes felt like I was experiencing my senses for the first time. There are delicious fruit and sweet flowers everywhere, many of which I had never heard of or seen before. The central image is the orange mamey sapote, a unique tropical fruit which I described in the last post. I pasted purple flowers in the right-hand corner because Kauai reminds me of the color purple.
Hawai’i is a powerful place in part because the land itself is so new, literally being created right now; but also because of the fantasies visitors like to project onto it. I wanted to believe that Hawai’i was a tropical paradise where nothing bad ever happens, and (un)fortunately, that’s simply not true.
For example, I hitch-hiked a lot there because it’s more common and acceptable than on the mainland. Usually it was okay, but one time I got a ride with people who were drunk and angry. Luckily, I got out unharmed, but the situation could have ended up a lot worse. I put the pink dice in the collage to symbolize the importance of luck in determining situations like that one.
In Hawai’i and especially Kauai I learned that tropical paradise is a real place with real problems, like a really bad ice (crystal meth) epidemic. In Kauai I had the scary hitch-hike ride, almost joined a coconut cult, and lived with a guy who gave me a painful and disgusting staph infection, of which I still bear the scars.
Through those painful experiences, symbolized in the screaming mouth and fossils (I pasted a human skull onto an animal body so the tail could wrap around like an umbilical cord), I became stronger and smarter. That’s what “Mother Love” is about. Part of me, like my naivete or idealism, had to die in order for a better self to be reborn.
beach girl graffiti, Puerto Rico 13/09/2007
Posted by dlatman in Graffiti, art, books, fun, history, music, nature, shopping, travel, u.s..3 comments
UPDATE 3/8/08: The NY Times reports on a recent case involving animal cruelty in Puerto Rico. I didn’t realize this at the time of my visit, but animal rights activists have been discouraging tourism to the island because of the government’s inhumane treatment of unwanted and stray animals. It seems that this recent case, which involved rounding up and killing pets in several housing projects, has spurred Puerto Rico to consider improving policy on animal welfare.
Here is a picture from the awesome, unique island of Puerto Rico, which I visited last month with my mom. This picture was taken on the beach in Isla Verde, part of the sprawling suburbs of the capital city San Juan.
I thought Puerto Rico was an interesting mix of tropical beauty and American capitalism. On the tropical side, there is the amazing El Yunque National Forest, with waterfalls to swim under and lots of hiking trails. There I heard the adorable one-inch coqui frog’s unique call.
The part about commercialism is evident in Puerto Rico’s abundant strip malls and industrial factories. Many American pharmaceutical companies and clothing manufacturers have moved their plants to Puerto Rico to enjoy tax breaks. Evidently, these factory jobs don’t seem to pay great wages, since according to the 2000 US Census, nearly 50% of the population lives under the poverty level. Learn more about the Puerto Rican economy here.
But please don’t get me wrong, I love shopping as much as the next girl. I went a little loco upon finding a cutesy kitsch store featuring very cheap plastic accessories and paper goods with adorable Korean anime characters on them. All my girl friends back home love my $2 Pink Hana calendar/planner, yet I can’t find anything here with her image on it, and an internet search for her company “DreamWorld” yields scant results. Any input?
Puerto Rico has other music besides Menudo and reggaeton. I saw graffiti for an experimental hip-hop group from Santurce called Mad Steelo. Their songs are worth a listen; they have a smooth flowing style, with a mix of traditional and electronic sampling, using mostly Spanish lyrics.
My mom and I had wanted to visit Vieques, the island which the US Navy used as a bomb testing site for sixty years, but is now marketed as a tourist destination for its beaches. However, mother nature had other plans for us, as Hurricane Dean swept through the Caribbean towards the end of our vacation. Oh well, we had more time to explore San Juan by bus, and visit the sketchy market in Rio Piedras where I finally got to eat the unique mamey sapote, a tropical fruit I’ve been wanting to taste for several years.
If you are looking for a personal perspective on Puerto Rican history, or just a good read, I recommend “When I Was Puerto Rican” by Esmerelda Santiago. This brilliant memoir explores growing up in rural and urban areas of Puerto Rico during the 1950’s and 60’s, including exposure to clueless American policy makers during “Operation Bootstrap.”
Puppets & Peace 07/09/2007
Posted by dlatman in art, fun, nc, peace, spirituality, u.s..add a comment
This picture was taken during last year’s Paperhand Puppet Intervention’s show, “As The Crow Flies: Tales from Four Directions” at Forest Theater here in Chapel Hill, NC. To see more pics from the show, click here.
I liked this segment not just because of the awesome 40-foot Buddha that later walked through the aisles, but because of the story they conveyed:
Gautama (who later become Buddha) sat under a tree in the forest and vowed not to move until he reached enlightenment. During the next several weeks, Mara (considered an evil spirit, illusion, or simply a nuisance) and his daughters or helpers tempted Gautama with desire, lust, aversion, and so on.
Gautama remained calm during these trials. He sat and meditated while the demons whirled about, threatening and attacking him. The future Buddha remained so calm and centered that the thunderbolts Mara threw from the sky became lotus flowers. Mara and his followers eventually grew discouraged and left the forest; while Gautama has reached Enlightenment and becomes the Buddha.
This story reminds me to hold my ground when everything around me is going crazy. It is also similar to the Christian story of Satan’s temptation of Christ in the desert. Finally, it even reminds me of Tammy Faye (Bakker) Messner’s urgings to love your enemy, which she preached through puppets on her children’s TV show in the 1970s.
And speaking of puppets, you can still check out Paperhand Puppet’s current performance, “A Shoe for Your Foot” this weekend at the NC Museum of Art in lovely Raleigh, NC. You can read an article I wrote two years ago for The Daily Tar Heel about Paperhand here.
