On the road

By the week of June 9, my book about Mexico City, First Stop in the New World, should be in stores across the U.S. Hence, for the next three weeks or so I will be in el norte promoting it.

I will be appearing on various radio programs, but also making appearances to talk about the book and sign copies.

Here is the schedule of events:

Thursday, June 12 Idlewild Books, 7pm 12 West 19 Street (between 5th and 6th Avenues) New York

This event is sponsored by the Mexican Cultural Institute and a cocktail reception will follow.

Monday, June 16 Mount Pleasant Branch Public Library, 7 pm 3160 16th St. NW Washington, DC

Tuesday, June 17 Housing Works Bookstore Café, 6:30 pm 206 Crosby Street (one block east of Broadway between Houston and Prince Streets) New York

This event will be a conversation between the great Guatemalan-American novelist Francisco Goldman and me. There will be beer.

Saturday, June 21 Mexican Cultural Institute (co-sponsored by Cervantes Center), 5pm 125 Paseo De La Plaza, Suite 500 Los Angeles, CA 90012

Thursday, June 26 Martinez Bookstore, 7 pm 1110 N. Main Street Santa Ana, CA 92701

If you're around any of those places, please come. And if you know anyone in those cities, please spread the word. As far as the blog is concerned, I hope to keep updating it while I'm on the road. In any case, keep watching this space.

The only way to travel

Twice a week, one of my neighbors lovingly, achingly, painstakingly washes and waxes this Nissan 240 SX on the sidewalk outside the building. In the year or two since he rented the apartment, he has never moved the vehicle. It’s not for driving; it’s a fetish. Note that he has removed the headlights. I believe he did so because he is afraid that otherwise someone will try to steal it.

Bombshell from Caracas

The first time I saw her I thought I was dreaming. I’d had more than my share of alcohol when I arrived at a night spot called Bar Blu, and onstage saw a drop-dead gorgeous woman with cinnamon skin, encased in a little black dress with deep cleavage. She was playing “All of Me” on the trombone, and playing it well. In the entire history of jazz, how many women trombonists can you name? How many that look like this?

Pamela is from Venezuela, and she came to Mexico with her husband Moncho five or six years ago. She plays with an exuberant trio each Wednesday night at La Morena, a seafood restaurant on calle Michoacán in the Colonia Condesa. These days they are often booked to play at private parties, and at other restaurants and bars, but Pamela’s start in Mexico was not easy. In fact, she and Moncho spent their first New Year’s Eve here sleeping in the Parque Hundido, one of the city’s most beautiful parks.This was because she had fought with the manager of a discotheque, where she had been contracted to play. The manager – a woman – insisted that Pamela put on something besides the miniskirt she was wearing before going onstage. “No one tells me how to dress,” said Pamela. Three employees threw her out on the street.“It’s not the first tough moment we’ve had,” reflects Pamela. “Moncho and I love each other deeply, have two beautiful daughters and beautiful friends. I communicate with nature, the sun, the moon, the flowers, the universe, and I get over my problems quickly. That’s why we slept in the Parque Hundido,” she adds, laughing. “There’s a lot of nature there.”

Literary W**back

JM Servin Revista Replicante

Given how much raw material there is on the streets of Mexico City, and how many novelists make it their home, it is surprising how few of them use the place as content, backdrop or subtext to their narratives. One possible reason is that most of the city's authors are from privileged backgrounds and of too delicate a temperament to have prowled the city with much dedication.

A notable exception is J.M. Servín, who takes a gritty view-from-the-sidewalk approach in his fiction. His novel Cuartos para gente sola (Rooms for Singles) culminates in a street brawl between a desperate man and a dog that has been trained to battle other canines. (The book was published in 1999, two years before the release of the film Amores perros, parts of which were also set in a dog-fighting milieu.) In 2007, Servín published Al final del vacío (At the End of the Void), a post-apocalyptic novel set in a near-future Mexico City. In his not exactly overheated imagination, the streets are full of demolished buildings, citizens can only go to the bathroom in public conveyances, and the streets are controlled by adolescent delinquents known as Dingos.

My favorite of his books is Por amor al dólar (For Love of the Dollar), his memoir of the years he spent as an illegal immigrant working in gas stations, restaurant kitchens and as a diabolical baby-sitter in the New York tri-state area. The tone of the book is bitingly funny, with a nihilistic sensibility along the lines of Celine. A word to editors and literary scouts: Given how hot a topic illegal immigration is, I cannot believe this one hasn't been picked up for translation.

Fashion, etc.

Are these boots made for walking, or what?

When I saw the sweater with the legend "morally bankrupt," for some reason I thought of an ex-girlfriend. Unfortunately, they weren't selling the garment in her size. Although these photos were taken in a small town in the northern state of Durango, the sweater with the English-language legend marks a popular trend in Mexico City. Years ago it was a form of status to wear a T shirt emblazoned with the logo of John Deere, the Dallas Cowboys or UCLA. Lately, however, those garments became old hat, and today it is common to see people wearing shirts with more rococo sayings, like "My therapist says it's all your fault," "Born free but now I'm really expensive" or "From zero to nasty in 7.5 seconds." I've often wondered if the people who wear them know what they mean.

For those who don't speak Spanish, the sign says, "fresh chicken, recently sacrificed." You think they go for Satanic rituals before Sunday dinner in Durango?