CHISPAS! IT’S THE END OF THE YEAR!

What up Latinopians! Well here we are at the end of 2013 and what a year we’ve had. Your Tia Tenopia is reeling from the many blogs and videos we produced this year. As you know, we now have eight regular bloggers and we now have 285 videos on Latinopia. Your Tia is looking forward to 2014 and the new things we’ll bring your way! As the end of the year, we are completing our Best of Latinopia Videos with two videos of which your Tia is really proud.

In Music, we feature the Conjunto Hueyapan and their rendition of the traditional Vera Cruz jarocho son, “El Ahualulco.” The Conjunto is made up of two generations of the Herrera family and was founded by patriarch Fermín Herrera back in 1973. This is really cool and great traditional music–don’t miss it!

In literature we feature poet Xochitla Julisa Bermejo and her poem “Our lady of the Water Gallons.” This is not a poem about flowers and pleasant landscape, this is a gritty poem about real life and death issues affecting immigrants throughout the Southwest. Yearly, hundreds of thousands of Mexican and Central American immigrants cross into the United States seeking a better life. Hundreds die of exposure and dehydration in the Arizona and Texas deserts. Xochitl volunteered with the humanitarian group No More Deaths which provides bottled water in the desert for those who would otherwise die of exposure. Her poem is a heartfelt reflection of her activism.

And of course our regular weekly bloggers Angela Ortiz, Sergio Hernández and Lazaro De la Tierra return with new blogs. Angela has a new photo for us, “Morning,” Serg has a New Years’ wish for us, and Lazaro’s Zombie Mex Diaries continues with a raid on the Oñate zombie compound.

We’ve given our monthly bloggers a few days off but in January look forward to new episodes of  Tales of Torres with Luis Torres, Bravo Road with Don Felípe Ortego, Political Salsa y Más with Sal Baldenegro, Word Vision with Harry Gamboa Jr., and Mirándolo Bien with Eduardo Díaz.

Your Tia Tenopia wishes you all a Própero Año Nuevo and looks forward to see you all here next year.

Latinopia, Adelante!

OOXX

Tia Tenopia