Consumerism

The back door of a truck that is a mobile women's clothing store. The words are a play on a Supremes song that is more than 50 years old. I wonder how many passers-by got the reference. In any event, more stuff doesn't get you love or anything but  a passing buzz.       

Mexican Music, Mexican-ish Food

I've still got a backlog of raw images to edit and I haven't even started on what I shot last weekend. It occurred to me to take some time off during this holiday weekend. Do you think it's likely?

The first photo is the singer in a Mexican band. She was really into it and I enjoyed her passion. I speak a little Spanish and I understood some of the song. Like a lot of popular music, it sort of boiled down to "ooh, baby baby."

The restaurant in the second picture was new to me.  It sounds like heaven. To hell with the cardiologist. Enjoy life.   

I've Been There

Another hip shot.  Actually, I've walked by there several times but have not actually been in it. Not really my kind of place.  

We can figure out the sticker to the left. Check. I think the one on the right is Paris. Check.  The lower right has to be Wales. Check. The flag just below the buckle is that of the City of St. Louis. Well, obviously. There is still an awful lot on the list.   

Canción Mexicana

A Mexican festival needs Mexican music. I'm a bit amazed by people who play this kind of accordion. A piano keyboard gives a performer reference points to the notes. This instrument just has dots strewn across it. Must take a long time to learn.      

We The People

We're all Americans. I don;t care if some of us wear a hijab, a rapper wears a backwards baseball cap, a Hasidim wears a wide-brimmed black hat, a biker wears a bandana or John Wayne wears a cowboy hat. 

Makes me think of this picture from the Women's March with a similar spirit.              

Clowning Around

This person in the first picture was pretty out there, aggressively sticking his face in my lens here and there through the afternoon. It was the kind of clown that can give clowns a bad reputation, scaring children and such.

The second one makes me think of a kachina. I don't know if that was the intention. We will be spending some time on the Navajo and Hopi reservations in September. I'll think about it some more then.

       

Shoot From The Hip

As my friends know, I like to shoot people in the crowd at public events. But sometimes it is so packed that it's almost impossible to do. You could park yourself on a corner to shoot people coming towards you but even that may not work if you can;t get a long enough view.

There is another way to go about it. Sometimes I will walk through a crowd with the camera at my hip, finger on the shutter button. If I see something interesting I point the camera in the general direction, click and hope for the best. Almost no one notices. Surprising how often I get a good result.     

The Squared Circle

They always have wrestling at Cinco de Mayo, the faked and staged American commercial version. Often it's the Mexican variant, lucha libre, with its colorfully masked contestants. Not this time, at least while I was there. But anything goes, as long as it looks violent but really isn't. It is a field trip in cultural anthropology.       

Whack The Piñata

A surprise at the Cinco de Mayo festival: an effigy of The Donald (may Scottie teleport him to another galaxy) with the head fashioned into a traditional Mexican piñata. Wouldn't you like a whack at that? James Comey knows what's inside.

There were two identical heads sitting on the ground. Looks like the plan was to perform the ceremony three times. I would have loved to have photographed it but there was no indication of the time and no one to ask. It might have been cathartic.

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Primal Scream

Entertainment at the Cinco de Mayo festival, if you find this entertaining. A heavy metal band, not at all Hispanic, with a crazed bass player. I have to admit to listening to some of this stuff when I was young, Led Zeppelin turned up to 10 and so forth. Then I got bored with it and learned that there are other ways to howl.      

Oda a la Alegría

It's the beginning of May. The Lou has the double dip of the People's Joy Parade and the Cinco de Mayo Festival. There's nothing like the PJP anywhere. No bureaucracy. Anyone can join who shares the spirit.  And lots of people do.

Cinco de Mayo isn't a big deal in Mexico. It marks the unlikely victory of the Mexican army over the wannabe French imperial forces. (Did you know that France was briefly the colonial power in Mexico? It was a bad idea.) In the US it has become a celebration of Mexican-American culture and an excuse to swill large amounts of Jose Cuervo and Corona. (I prefer Sol or Pacifico when drinking Mexican suds.) There's tons more of this to come.

¡Alegría, hermosa chispa de los dioses
hija del Elíseo!
¡Ebrios de ardor penetramos,
diosa celeste, en tu santuario!        

Cantante

A mariachi singer at the Cinco de Mayo festival. (Cinco de Junio is not far away, is it?) This brings back a memory. We visited Mexico City once, many years ago, so long ago that we regularly used a travel agent. We told her we wanted to go there. She refused, saying that we would be kidnapped, held for ransom and then killed. So we used another travel agent.

We had no idea when we booked it but we were there over Independence Day in September. The luxury hotels were empty and dirt cheap, so we stayed at the Four Seasons. The hotel booked us for dinner on Independence Day night at La Hacienda de los Morales, perhaps the most elegant restaurant in town. There were many connected rooms. Mariachi bands moved from one to another, each group with a different look and sound. I will always remember the band dressed in white with silver and black silk trim, with a tenor barely more than five feet tall belting out La Bamba like Ritchie Valens never did. Unforgettable.                  

Hoops

Dancing to their own internal music. California and Cherokee Streets.

Yesterday was opening night of our opera season so out late. I may have a Madeleine Monday about opera tomorrow. It needs some thought.

Late Saturday night note: Opera Theatre of St. Louis' opening production was the old chestnut La Boheme. Everybody who likes this stuff has heard it so many times before. This production was a triumph, one of the best we've heard in our 37 years as subscribers. Fresh young singers, perfect for the roles of impoverished wanna-be artists of 19th Century Paris. Lots of people, including us, had dinner on the lawn outside the theater (American spelling in this instance) before the show on a perfect spring evening. Oh, and then there was the traditional opening night champagne reception after the performance. Last night was an example of why it's good to be a St. Louisan.         
       

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun

Dress code: you have to be blond, dress in red or black, wear big dark sunglasses and have a drink in your hand. As often noted, St. Louis loves an excuse to imbibe in the street.        

Pretty In Pink

Faces on Cherokee Street during the Cinco de Mayo Festival. Too little time to write comments on my friends work - we're back in the new dimensions in overwork trap.

It occurs to me that since the next CDP theme day was my suggestion, I better go shoot something with contrast in it. We're going to Kansas over Memorial Day weekend. Maybe I can compose something that compares its state government and sanity.              

El Toro

The mechanical bull is a fixture at the Cinco de Mayo festival and a near certain path to humiliation for the riders. You find these in bars all over the country, too. My Flickr pictures that have received the greatest number of views and likes by far were taken of one of these machines in a bar in New Orleans. A rather tipsy young lady was riding and, due to the violent motion, some of her garments were, um, falling off. You can find them easily enough if you like.                 

Bread And Circuses

Moving down the street from the cheerful if wacky People's Joy Parade to the Cinco de Mayo festival, held on whichever Saturday is closest to the date. Fake American wrestling and horrible if typical excuses for food. Kind of fun, though, if you can loosen your laces.                  

Difference of Opinion

In Mexico, Cinco de Mayo is a relatively minor observance, marking a victory of the local armies over the French, the erstwhile colonial power, in 1852. In the United States it has become a big deal, a celebration of Mexican-American culture and a perfectly good reason to drink tequila in the street on a blazing hot afternoon. In St. Louis the party was held on la Siete de Mayo for commercial reasons. Swilling tequila at work on a Thursday is often frowned upon.  

Daughter Emily, Madeleine and I went down with cameras. Of course everyone is welcome and may express themselves if done in a peaceful manner. In this case, however, thesis and antithesis will not lead to synthesis. Hegel loses out on Cherokee Street.                 

Wham!

As I understand it, state and federal law prohibits mass entertainment in the form of death matches between gladiators and wild animals. So, America has to improvise. We came up with so-called professional wrestling, which gives viewers a similar thrill without any real danger to the participants. This is a down-scale version but you get the idea.

That's not to say, though, that we don't have some spectacles with real risk of horrifying injury. Think of Joan Rivers' plastic surgery, the National Football League and riding motorcycles.
                        
Love that inflatable "alien" in the right rear of some of these shots. Welcome to our world.                          

Wrestling In The Street

Something else new at Cinco de Mayo, American-style fake wrestling. You would think the organizers would present Mexican lucha libre battles.

Anyway, the combatants hurl themselves into the ring, bellowing like wounded bull elephants. They snarl at each other. Eventually they fall into a series of scripted throws, gouges, illegal kicks, sometimes throwing each other out onto the pavement. Each seems about to triumph at times, only to be thrown off by a burst of strength from the opponent.

I can't help but notice that the man in the middle photo looks like he's singing Wagner. Maybe Alberich. If so, the first guy could be Siegfried.

More of this to come.