Because men and women from both places are interested in the same thing: living peacefully, freely, without fear of the future, with work and the opportunity to succeed.

© Farrar Straus and Giroux

Sabers and Utopias: Visions of Latin America
By Mario Vargas Llosa

"But the United States and other countries in the West should understand that solidarity and friendship do not signify vassalage or servitude, but respect and mutual understanding, and this demands a constant effort to understand reciprocal reasons and problems.
This will be achieved only when knowledge replaces the web of prejudices and myths that still greatly distort the images forged in the mind of the South about the North and vice versa. But now, besides the great wave of democracy in Latin America, there is another powerful instrument to achieve this difficult deed of communication and understanding. It is the other factor that can contribute to radically renewing relations between the Anglo and Latin American cultures. I am referring to that world that is so present and that has had such an important role in the modern history of the United States: that of the "Hispanics."
The Latin American community in the United States is, in many states, a presence as alive as it is in Miami. And it is increasingly conscious of its historic tradition, its language and culture, which affects all of North American society. As in Florida, California, Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, or New York, the Hispanic influence can be seen in culinary habits and ways of dress, in music and religion, and in the way Spanish-language usage has slipped into businesses, shows, services, schools, and street life. It is possible that, long-term, given the traditional ability of metabolism and freedom that it has forged, the United States will integrate this community, as it did with Italians and Poles. But the process will be long and it can be expected that when it peaks, integration will have achieved the feat of opening the minds and spirits of many North Americans to the realities—instead of the myths—of Latin America. Or, at least, to have incited the curiosity and interest of the United States in getting to know them, such that instead of the hate that seems like love, or that hateful love that is still the norm, an equitable and productive relationship can finally emerge between the people of the continent.
This is a task that the "Hispanics" of the United States are already carrying out, although they are not even aware of it. In contrast to politicians, prisoners of rhetoric and of calculations, and diplomats whose life is played out rather removed from the average citizen, they do know the hustle and bustle of men and women on the street. Those in their new homeland and in the homeland they left behind, because of political persecution, know how hard life is, or, simply, the legitimate desire for an improvement. And in contrast to expatriate intellectuals, who have to perform acrobatics to justify their ideological positions, the average immigrant can act with authenticity and dignity.
He knows both cultures in that intimate way born of direct experience, what is lived, and this has taught him—counter to what they say about stereotypes—that despite the different languages (and that in the North there is abundance while in the South there is poverty), the differences are not that big. That beneath the customs, beliefs, and prejudices that make groups distinct, there are basic similarities. Because men and women from both places are interested in the same thing: living peacefully, freely, without fear of the future, with work and the opportunity to succeed. The "Hispanics" of the United States—20 million strong–can be the bridge that gringos and Latinos cross to recognize each other and be reconciled.
(pp. 111-3 "The "Hispanics"; Lima, January 4, 1992)

"This is something that we liberals should celebrate with serenity and happiness, not triumphalism, and with the clear conscience that, although what has been achieved is notable, what still remains to be done is more important. And also that, since nothing is definitive or fateful in human history, the progress obtained in recent decades for a culture of freedom is not irreversible, and, unless we know how to defend it, it could come to a standstill, and the free world could lose ground, due to a push by two new masks of authoritarian collectivism and the spirit of tribalism that have come to substitute communism with the most hardened adversaries of democracy: nationalism and religious fundamentalism."

"Of this kind I'd like to point out an emblematic case: that of Robert D. Kaplan. In a provocative essay, he maintains that, contrary to the optimistic expectations about the future of democracy prompted by the death of Marxism in Eastern Europe, humanity is on the path toward a world dominated by authoritarianism, revealed in some cases and, in others, hidden by institutions of civilian and liberal appearance that, in fact, are mere decorations, since true power is, or soon will be, in the hands of large international corporations, owners of technology and capital that, thanks to their ubiquity and extraterritoriality, enjoy almost complete impunity for their actions. "I submit that the democracy we are encouraging in many poor parts of the world is an integral part of a transformation toward new forms of authoritarianism; that democracy in the United States is at greater risk than ever before, and from obscure sources; and that many future regimes, ours especially, could resemble the oligarchies of ancient Athens and Sparta more than they do the current government in Washington." His analysis is particularly negative regarding the possibilities of democracy managing to take root in the third world."
(p. 153; 157 "Liberalism Across Two Millennia"; Berlin, May 12, 1998)

The way in which a country strengthens and develops its culture is by opening its doors and windows, widely, to all intellectual, scientific, and artistic currents.

© Farrar Straus and Giroux

Sabers and Utopias: Visions of Latin America
By Mario Vargas Llosa

wild how inevitably history repeats itself.

"Fujimori's trial lasted almost seventeen months, was televised, was attended by journalists and international observers, and the accused enjoyed all the guarantees to a defense. The three-member court, presided over by a prestigious criminal attorney, magistrate, and university professor, Doctor César San Martín, whose conduct throughout the proceedings was of a calmness and uprightness recognized by all sides, issued a sentence that should be published and read in schools across Latin America—abridged, because it is almost 700 pages long—so that new generations learn, through concrete events and identified people, about the tragedy of human suffering, public insecurity, criminality, distortion of values, lies, and contempt for the most basic civil rights in modern society in a country, and within the corruption and degradation of institutions of a dictatorship like the one Peru experienced between 1992 and the year 2000, when Fujimori, failing in his attempts to be reelected in rigged elections, fled to Japan and quit the presidency via fax."
(p. 38 from "Warning to Dictators"; Madrid, April 15, 2009)

"But it is vain to attempt to reason thus with those who have made the logic of terror theirs. It is rigorous, coherent, and impervious to dialogue. The greatest danger to a democracy is not terrorist attacks, no matter how painful or onerous they end up being; it is accepting the rules of the game that the terrorist tries to impose. There are two risks to a democratic government in the face of terror: to become intimidated or to go too far. Passivity in the face of attacks is suicide. To allow instability, psychosis, and collective terror to spread is to contribute to creating a climate that favors a military coup d'etat. A democratic government has the duty to defend itself, firmly and without any inferiority complexes, with the assurance that by defending itself, it is defending all of society from a greater misfortune than what ails it. At the same time, it cannot forget for a second that all of its power depends on its legitimacy, that in no case should it go beyond what laws and "ways"—which are also the essence of a democracy—allow. If it goes too far and commits abuses, jumps over laws like a bullfighter in pursuit of efficiency, relies on misdeeds, it could be that it defeats the terrorist. But the latter will have won, revealing a monstrosity: that injustice can lead to justice, that the path to freedom is dictatorship."
(p. 55 from "The Logic of Terror"; Lima, December 1980)

"Let's briefly summarize what nationalism consists of in the realm of culture. Basically, it asks one to consider what is one's own absolute and unquestionable value and to devalue all that is foreign as something that threatens, undermines, impoverishes, or degenerates the spiritual personality of a country. Although such a thesis withstands the most shallow analysis with difficulty and it is easy to demonstrate how prejudiced and naive its reasoning is, as well as how unrealistic its aims—cultural autocracy—are, history shows us that it takes root with ease and that even countries with an ancient and solid civilization are not immune to it. Without going too far afield, Hitler's Germany, Mussolini's Italy, Stalin's Soviet Union, Franco's Spain, Mao's China all practiced cultural nationalism, trying to create a culture that was pure, cut off from and protected from the hated corrupting agents—foreignism, cosmopolitanism—through dogma and censorship. But in our days, it is in the third world especially, in underdeveloped countries, where cultural nationalism is preached more stridently and has more followers. Its defenders start from a false assumption: that a country's culture is, like natural resources and the raw materials held by its soil, something that must be defended against the voracious greed of imperialism, and kept stable, intact, and unpolluted, since its contamination with anything from the outside would adulterate it and make it vile. To fight for "cultural independence" and to become emancipated from "foreign cultural dependence" with the goal of "developing our own culture" are habitual formulas in the mouths of so-called progressives in the third world. That such catchphrases are as hollow as they are cacophonous, true conceptual gibberish, is not an obstacle to the many people finding them seductive, due to the air of patriotism enveloping them. (And in the realm of patriotism, Borges has written, the people only tolerate affirmations.) They allow themselves to be persuaded by them, even the media who believes themselves to be invulnerable to the authoritarian ideologies promoting them. People who say they believe in political pluralism and in economic freedom and that they are hostile to the idea of only one truth and omnipotent, omniscient states subscribe nonetheless to the theses of cultural nationalism without examining what they mean. The reason is very simple: nationalism is the culture of the uneducated, and of these, there are legions."

"The way in which a country strengthens and develops its culture is by opening its doors and windows, widely, to all intellectual, scientific, and artistic currents, stimulating the free circulation of ideas wherever they come from, in such a way that its own tradition and experience is constantly put to the test, and corrected, completed, and enriched by those who, in other territories and with other languages and in different circumstances, share with us the misery and greatness of the human adventure. Only thus, subject to this continuous challenge and encouragement, will our authentic, contemporary, and creative culture be the best tool of our own economic and social progress."
(pp. 92-3, 96 from "Elephant and Culture"; Lima, November 1981)

A commitment to deep work is not a moral stance and it's not a philosophical statement—it is instead a pragmatic recognition that the ability to concentrate is a skill that gets valuable things done.

Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World
By Cal Newport

Newport's definition:

Deep work is the ability to focus without distraction on a cognitively demanding task. It's a skill that allows you to quickly master complicated information and produce better results in less time. Deep work will make you better at what you do and provide the sense of true fulfillment that comes from craftsmanship. In short, deep work is like a super power in our increasingly competitive twenty-first century economy. And yet, most people have lost the ability to go deep—spending their days instead in a frantic blur of email and social media, not even realizing there's a better way. 

As of late, I've been so frustrated and disappointed in my inability to produce and to experience deep work. There are many factors contributing to this—some of which feel more in my control than others—but distraction is high on the list. Over the next month I will experiment and make some adjustments.

Instagram has been the biggest offender. Not only have I spent so much time mindlessly scrolling but, over time, as the platform has evolved, I've struggled to share of myself without feeling immense pressure and self-consciousness. (Someone I know recently articulated this feeling; I called it Instagram paralysis.) It's so easy to feel this way when the algorithm validates its users by the number of likes, comments, and views they receive.

So, I'm leaving Instagram for 30 days. More than anything, taking a hiatus is a conscious effort to redirect my time and attention to interests and projects I don't make enough time for. (Thus, eliciting feelings of guilt and failure—it becomes a vicious cycle.) I'd like to give more IRL love to my people, too. To find spaces for deeper connection. And maybe I'll finally make headway on that project or two I've been thinking about for a year?

Social media has been a wonderful resource and outlet for creativity, education, and connection in my life. Abandoning it permanently, as Newport suggests, is not an option for me. (Ashley C. Ford's recent tweet about making a "grand exit" echoes my perspective.) But I hope disconnecting from one platform for a month provides the discipline to achieve a healthy balance that prevents drastic withdrawals in the future. I also hope for the confidence to share & connect with others more authentically and fearlessly, in person and on social.

Things live by moving and gain strength as they go.

© 🙏 https://www.brucelee.com/podcast/

Friday morning I woke up feeling dread & insecurity & decided to start the day by listening to something positive. I opted for the Bruce Lee podcast—episode #99 (Someone Real)—hosted by his daughter Shannon Lee and cultural anthropologist Sharon Ann Lee. Every so often, I need to get all Lion King "remember who you are" with myself, and this episode helped me do that.

Friday also happened to be the 45th anniversary of Bruce Lee's death. Coincidence? This fact came to light after Maria Popova shared never-before-published words in his honor. So inspirational & I appreciate his musings on will power, emotion, reason, imagination, memory, subconscious mind, & conscience.

Excerpts below but see Brain Pickings for more.

Emotion—

Realizing that my emotions are both POSITIVE and negative, I will form daily HABITS which will encourage the development of the POSITIVE EMOTIONS, and aid me in converting the negative emotions into some form of useful action.

Imagination—

Recognizing the need for sound PLANS and IDEAS for the attainment of my desires, I will develop my imagination by calling upon it daily for help in the formation of my plans.

& not new, but also good—

You will never get more out of life than you expect
Keep your mind on the things you want and off those you don't
Things live by moving and gain strength as they go
Be a calm beholder of what is happening around you
There is a difference a) the world b) our reaction to it
Be aware of our conditioning! Drop and dissolve inner blockage
Inner to outer ~~~ we start by dissolving our attitude not by altering outer condition
See that there is no one to fight, only an illusion to see through
No one can hurt you unless you allow him to
Inwardly, psychologically, be a nobody

The nonconformism of living in a battle with what is possible and what is real has made Latin American life intense, adventurous, unpredictable, full of color of creativity.

© Farrar Straus and Giroux

Sabers and Utopias: Visions of Latin America
By Mario Vargas Llosa

About a month ago, I saw this book on display while visiting a Barnes & Noble & knew I'd want to get back to it soon. I just started reading Mario Vargas Llosa's The Feast of the Goat, which is historical fiction based on 20th century Dominican Republic under the dictator Rafael Trujillo.

However, given the atrocious policy concerning immigrants at the U.S. border–possibly the worst crime this current administration has committed IMO–I put Feast on hold & decided to read this first. Often these days I feel my personal problems so frivolous in comparison to the suffering the U.S. has inflicted on innocent families and their children. It doesn't suffice to donate money or express my sadness/anger/frustration on social media. (Forget in person, few want to discuss.)

It's of little external impact, but the action I most wanted to take ASAP is educate myself.

Wow. Mario Vargas Llosa is a great writer. And wow. Am I ignorant. So little I know about Latin America, as a Latina American. So humbling.

"Rejecting reality, fixating on substituting it with fiction, denying what has actually been experienced in favor of something else that is invented, confirming the superiority of dreams over objective life, and behaving according to such a premise, is the oldest and most human of attitudes, that which has generated politicians, soldiers, scientists, artists, and the more attractive and admired saints and heroes, and, perhaps, the main engine of progress and civilization; literature and the arts were born of it and are its main nourishment, its best fuel. But at the same time, if the rejection of reality escapes the confines of the individual, the literary, the intellectual, and the artistic, and contaminates the collective and the political—the social—all idealism and generosity entailed in this position disappear, confusion replaces it, and the result is generally that catastrophe in which all attempts at utopia in the history of the world have ended.
Choosing the impossible—perfection, a masterwork, the absolute—has had extraordinary consequences in the creative sphere, from Don Quixote, to War and Peace, from the Sistine Chapel to Guernica, from Mozart's Don Giovanni to Mahler's Second Symphony, but wanting to model society without concern for limits, contradictions, and variations in humanity, as if men and women were docile and easily manipulated clay capable of being adjusted to an abstract prototype, designed by philosophical reason or religious dogma with total disregard for the concrete circumstances of the here and now, has contributed, more than any other factor, to increasing suffering and violence. The 20 million victims who, in the Soviet Union alone, paid for the experience of the Communist utopia are the best example of the risks run by those who, in the social sphere, bet against reality.
The nonconformism of living in a battle with what is possible and what is real has made Latin American life intense, adventurous, unpredictable, full of color of creativity. What a difference from bovine and calm Switzerland, where I pen these lines. In these atrociously placid days, I have recalled that ferocious declaration by Orson Welles to Joseph Cotton in The Third Man, the Carol Reed film written by Graham Greene: "In a thousand years of history, the civilized Swiss have only produced the cuckoo clock" (or something like that). In reality, they have also produced fondue, a dish lacking in imagination, but decorous and probably nutritious. With the exception of William Tell, who, was far as everything else goes, never existed and must have been made up, I doubt that there has ever been another Swiss person who perpetrated that systematic rejection of reality which is the most widespread Latin American habit.
A habit thanks to which we've had a Borges, a Garcia Marquez, a Neruda, a Vallejo, an Octavio Paz, a Lezama-Lima, a Lam, a Matta, a Tamayo, and we've invented tango, mambo, boleros, salsa, and so many rhythms and songs that the whole world sings and dances. Nonetheless, despite having long ago left behind underdevelopment in the matter of artistic creativity–in that field, we are rather more imperialistic—Latin America is, after Africa, the region in the world with the most hunger, backwardness, unemployment, dependency, economic inequality, and violence. And small, sleepy Switzerland is the richest country in the world, with the highest quality of life any country can offer to its citizens (all of them without exception) and to many thousands of immigrants. Although it is always bold to assume the existence of historic laws, I dare to propose that social and economic progress is in direct proportion to the vital boredom signified by complying with reality and inversely related to the spiritual effervescence that comes from rising up against it."
(pp. 62-3 from "Down with the Law of Gravity!"; Davos, January 2001)

But just as elemental, I believe, was the man’s almost unlimited capacity for empathy, for feeling the lives and loves and hopes of others.

Anthony Bourdain. My heart ached hard, for days. Still does. That night I felt lucky to find joy with friends after moments of tears and remembrance, but the subsequent days I found myself in a very somber place (add to his death the general state of the world). Journaled a bit the day after and mostly lamented how unfair so good and compassionate a person could feel so much pain and despair while there are monsters who mosey along wreaking havoc without consequence.

He seemed eternal. Few celebrity deaths have affected me so. And of course, I'm not alone. I took a bit of a social media break & didn't catch all of the tributes. I really appreciated the below two. Feel better about reading others now that some time has passed (if anyone has recs). And speaking of, feel my heart heavier seeing how fans have arrived in droves to pay their respects at Les Halles.

Eddie Huang Remembers Anthony Bourdain

"If he had a premonition that your reasoning stood on shaky ground or that your anger was misplaced, he intuitively got closer and offered a meal. Food was his equalizer – a seemingly innocuous hard-hat activity that set the table for thoughts and revelations traditionally ignored by mainstream journalism. He'd wind his way into your personal space, taking note of the things you held close, and slowly but surely offered other ways to hold them."

"But the rabbit is gone now. You don't realize how much someone means to you when you're chasing them like a greyhound. They're your inspiration, your role-model, your North Star. I don't think any of us would be the people we are without Tony setting the standard not just as a writer, not just as a host or spirit guide, but as a human that always made it his duty to pick someone up that was down. He single-handedly made us care about each other all over again through food."

Eddie Huang is the fucking man. If you haven't yet read Fresh off the Boat, do.

Tony by David Simon

A mammoth piece worth reading in its entirety.

"A lot of people will tell you that on meeting Tony – despite how extraordinary a being he was – they somehow felt as if they’d known him for years. In part, this was the natural result of having so much of his wit and intellect bleed across our television screens. But just as elemental, I believe, was the man’s almost unlimited capacity for empathy, for feeling the lives and loves and hopes of others. He listened as few listen. And when he spoke, it was often to deliver some precise personal recollection that was an echo or simile on what was still in his ear. He abhorred a non sequitur; for him, human communication — much like his core ideas about food and travel and being – was about finding the sacred middle between people."

“In a time of crisis, the peoples of the world must rush to get to know each other.”

Havana's Symphony of Sound
By Reif Larsen

"The country’s complex identity is inherently bound up in the duality of this proximity, in its ability to feel both so close and yet so far away at the same time."

"So then why go to Cuba and dive into the cross hairs of both diplomatic and acoustic uncertainty? Because this is why we travel. As José Martí, Cuba’s talismanic national poet and philosopher once wrote, “In a time of crisis, the peoples of the world must rush to get to know each other.” No one can predict what will happen to Cuba in the coming years, which is why you must rush there now. As in, right now. To visit is to witness a rare bird about to fly the coop."

"We were constantly called out by strangers: “Where are you from?” People beamed when we told them. “We love the U.S. I have a cousin in Queens. It’s cold there, yes? I would die. Please tell everyone that Cuba is beautiful. No Mafia, no war. Just Mojitos and salsa dancing.” Hand on stomach, the dance was demonstrated, the toe expertly twirled in the dust."

"And you come for the sound. Havana is a land of sound. Never have I been to a place whose identity is so entangled in its auditory fingerprint. The guttural putt putt of eight cylinder Cadillacs built before my father was born; the ocean rising and slapping at the Malecón like a newborn babe; the dip and pull of the timbale’s bell chattering at a bar across the street, tin tin — tin tin tin; the shuffle of a man demonstrating salsa for you on the sidewalk; the swish and chop of a broom on a doorstep; the plush boom of the ceremonial cannons fired every evening from the Fortaleza de San Carlos de la Cabaña; the clink of ice cubes in the most delicious mojito de piña you will ever taste."

Cuba is beautiful. The favorites of my photos after the jump. One day I'll be a decent photo editor, but for now I Vsco'd the shit out of these.