With only a two day run of Moments From The Bubble, Or: How The [Google] Bus Stops Here, a playwright-driven community action project created in collaboration with Z Space and the 1 Minute Play Festival, there’s no way we’d be able to review show before the run is over. Given what is currently happening in San Francisco (and even more rapidly the Mission), we thought you might want to see it anyway without our official endorsement.  To help inform your decision here are more details from the event description:

The drastic changes happening to the neighborhoods and communities in the Bay Area is quite staggering. I don’t think the national zeitgeist quite understands what’s happening here. San Francisco is becoming the most expensive city in the world, and it’s at the expense of everyone and everything that makes is special”, says 1MPF Producing Artistic Director, Dominic D’Andrea. Stressing that the work is designed a social “barometer” project to unearth connections in the zeitgeist via themes, ideas, and trends, D’Andrea says, “When we did our annual festival in partnership with playwrights foundation over the past two years, the topic of gentrification was so charged, so present, so immense, that we decided to come back to make an entire other project dedicated to digging into these topics, and what it means for the community. This is our artistic response to what’s happening. It’s part play festival, and part community action.

If that sounds as interesting to you as it did to us, you can check out Moments From The Bubble, Or: How The [Google] Bus Stops Here, this Saturday June 27^th at 8PM and Sunday June 28^th at 3PM and 7:30PM at Z Below (470 Florida Ave).  Tickets are $20 and available for purchase at http://zspace.org/new-work

We’re going Saturday night, so if you see us, say “hi!” Or if that’s too weird, just let us know what you thought of the show in the comments. Hope to see you at the theatre!

Displaying a bright “Class War 2.0″ banner, the group marched peacefully up Valencia and then turned on 22nd before stopping in front of Lolo Cevicheria for an impromptu rally.  The speaker made an interesting point regarding rent control that I had failed to previously consider.  Namely, that while families without the fortune of living in rent-controlled apartments are forced to move after their rent gets dramatically increased, people who do actually dwell in rent-controlled spots suffer from landlords who refuse to fix anything except for the most necessary (read: legally-required) repairs.

Many families are terrified of even asking their landlords to perform important maintenance within their apartments out of fear that they will notice some sort of technicality within their living space that would provide means for eviction.  Imagine dealing with that constant level of fear every day of your life, where any sort of misstep could be used against you.

Sadly, I just see this situation getting worse and worse.

Rie, llora
que a cada cual, le llega su hora
rie, llora
vive tu vida y gozala toda

laugh, cry
that to each of us our time comes
laugh, cry
live your life and enjoy it completely

[Photo by Nehemiah Lazo]

Soon after I arrived in San Francisco in 1993, directo from Sinaloa, a gang of immigrant locas, known to me as Las Latinillas, became mi familia in all senses. Meaning, they were supportive, caring and fun to be with but also complete bitches and a beautiful hot mess. Always in your face. They will snatch your new boyfriend, get you a green card and a job, trash your soul con canciones de Juanga and uplift your spirits ala Gloria Trevi, as they revere Selena y Los Dinos and eat pupusas revueltas at Balompie. All this, a la luz del sol.

And at night, we had Esta Noche. It was my friend Mario, well, I called him La Marieta, who took me there the first time. La Marieta was dying of AIDS at the time but as he put it, “Despues de la novela, vamos a esta noche mana, hoy canta La Ronnie Salazar.” You always knew you were at Esta Noche because of a huge self-portrait of a naked Joe Dallesandro with an eternal spotlight on his even larger penis and how can you miss the Esta Noche smell . . . a mix of tequila, piss, and Chanel N°5. Running into friends, making new friends and losing friends all happened at Esta Nasty. It was the place for new immigrants like myself to listen to our music, speak our language and just for a few hours not to feel inadequate. It was also the place for young Latinos, to come out at night and join the festivities of music, drag, stripers, and drinks. But las reynas de la noche were the drag queens!

The shows were amazing back then; I remember feeling so close to Mexico just by watching la flaca de Taina being Lupita Dalessio or Marisela killing it as Rocio Durcal with her legendary dresses. With La Senorita Cumbia and her body for days, you didn’t have a choice but to dance as if La Sonora Dinamita was in the house. But they were also good at impersonating anglo stars: Mohogany, a drag queen from Nicaragua used to do Tina Turner and Diana Ross and La Ronnie Salazar, whom my friend Mario loved, was the best Liza Minnelli ever. And of course her Madonna was so popular at the time. La Ronnie Salazar was the son of the original owner of Esta Noche and died many years ago, as did so many of our brothers that we lost with the AIDS epidemic.

[Photo by Nehemiah Lazo]

[Photo by Nehemiah Lazo]

If I had the chance to talk to la Marieta, I would say to him “Listen mana, nowadays we are dealing with a new epidemic that some people call Gentrification and because of that your beloved Esta Noche closed doors just last night. I wasn’t able to be there mana cuz I live in Eley now, but I asked Nehemiah por el chisme and he texted me this morning:

Marco: What happened last night, did you go to Esta Noche?

Nehemiah: Yes, I have the worst hangover!

Marco: I bet you do gurl, cuentame pues!

Nehemiah: It was packed and very emotional. The MC was Lulu Ramirez, Alexis Miranda and la Mitzy Lee started to remember all the other queenas and everyone was crying. Both Alexis and Mitzi had been performing there for over 28 years. At the end of the show all the queens, including Vicky Jimenez, said goodbye for one last time and started to sing Celia Cruz’ Rie, Llora . . . as you can imagine, we all sang along, it was so beautiful. La Per Sia also performed an original song named “Google Google Apps Apps”. The lyrics are like a protest against the hipsters and the techies.

And so Marieta, they did close Esta Noche and I really don’t know what’s going to happen with your boyfriend’s painting. Let me see if I can get it and will bring it to your cemetery in Baja California Sur.”

- Marco Castro-Bojorquez and Nehemiah Lazo, 2014.

This afternoon/evening from 4-7pm Prensa POBRE/POOR Magazine is hosting an event at 2940 16th Street to support locals who have been evicted, displaced or otherwise affected by the ongoing overvaluation of San Francisco property. The event will feature performances by a puppet theater, engaging activist Fly Benzo (a local rapper from Hunters Point, whom I have worked with before) and a reading from Born N’ Raised in Frisco, a book compiled and workshopped in part by Lisa “Tiny” Gray-Garcia and Tony Robles. Art will be available to purchase, and there will be food offered at a sliding scale.

Check it out. Discuss, debate, plan and proceed.

[via The Bay Guardian]

You can complain about how Tacolicious on Valencia Street is ruining the flavor of the hood and gentrifying the fuck out of the place all you want, but just be grateful that we don’t have an Urban Taco Fabricator like they do in LA.

Yet.

[Via Vice]

It was nearly twelve years ago that a Mexican political activist declared, “I would shoot my son and daughter if they ever order a green burrito.” At long last, El Farolito has caved to the times and has started offering spinach and whole wheat tortillas.

[via Lindsey]

[via lurk.skate.sf (love this guy today!)]

Youtube user nico1001nico made a nice short documentary about Mission gentrification from the perspective of the small business owners. For the most part, they don’t really seem to mind the changes happening. There’s less crime, better business, and more diversity.

Micah from Black & Blue delivers the most scathing line, when asked what she’d like to see changed: “More low income housing, more services available to the poor, and less trust fund babies moving into the neighborhood.”

The most baffling quote comes from Connie, the Latina business owner, describing her dream of 24th becoming the next Noe Valley. For serious?

Previously:

Dregs One on Gentrification

Update: Video removed by the creator. Probably pissed off too many trust fund babies.

Update 2: Aaand it’s back. Not sure what’s changed:

SF native and hip hop artist Dregs One just started a series of videos called “The Wake Up Report“. The first subject? Mission and Fillmore gentrification. Oh boy, here we go again.

Nothing too new here: he drops the H-Bomb a couple of times, there is a cameo by the Bay Area Derailleurs, and some extremely awkward interviews with inarticulate folks in Dolores Park. He doesn’t get too nasty towards transplants, but it seems like his big beef is that the new folks don’t really make an effort to integrate into the community or learn it’s history. I assume opening your fancy restaurant on Valencia street doesn’t count as integrating and debating which Taqueria invented the Mission burrito doesn’t count as history.

Mission Loc@l posted a video (well, audio slideshow, really) behind the scenes at Arinell.

If you’re still on Windows 95, here’s the gist: employee Neil Aviles talks about eating “tons” of pizza (“like 3 slices… in 4 hours”… I’m pretty sure Andrew Sarkarati has broken that record), dudes passing out in the store, failed crank deals, mission gentrification, and yuppies.

Oh no he didn’t just drop the Y-bomb! Careful Neil… I got in trouble for that this week.

I would like to take this opportunity (opportunity in this case taking the tepid form of yet another genuflecting photo-fest to wheat paste) to pass along my experience last night at what might be charitably referred to as the topsy-turvy Alice in Wonderland opening party for the former Bryan Square, then former Coach House lofts and Bryant Commons…  now Union, at Bryant and 20th Streets.

7×7 certainly did their homework [7x7, oddly, co-hosted the opening party - Kevin], if by homework one is referring to attracting the most vapid, frazzled and unfriendly looking group of Marina moms one could imagine.  There were two DJ’s forlornly spinning to an empty room, servers trying to convince the uuber-skinny to try uuber-tiny snack foods, and some of the most ghastly staging imaginable.

So in order to get approval to build what are certainly better-than-average and more expensive than average condo’s in the hallowed ground that birthed the howling mobs of MAC, the builders agreed to a family friendly approach, meaning little in terms of smaller units for gay couples, singles and hipsters.  Instead there are lots of bathrooms and lots of (tiny) bedrooms.

But the units are nice.

But the upper floor with view units were not open for inspection.

But I only live a few blocks away so I plan on inspecting those shortly.

I came away with this sense of dread, that this corner of the Mission is about to go from being genuinely hip, to “Marina chick notions of hip” in short order.

All cuddlers welcome, cute cuddlers only though. – 25 (mission district)

Date: 2009-10-04, 10:49PM PDT

Hello, we are four handsome young gentlemen who are looking for some lovely young ladies to come over and keep us company. We have a spectacular entertainment set up. Let me walk you through it:

An Xbox 360: We can play video games, watch dvds, talk to our friends over the headset, WIRELESS controller.

Netfix streaming: Yup, thats right. Over 500 movies at our fingertips ladies. Anytime. All day with that shit.

A Flat screen TV: Say what??

Dolby surround sound speakers: We cans hear all kinds of shit.

Airtunes: My fucking laptop WIRELESSLY connects to the surround sound speakers. Music all day ladies, all day.

So much more: couches, table, dvds, hallway, kitchen, bathrooms, backyard, cherry tomatoes.

Our ages vary from 24 to 25, we live in the mission.

One of us has a queen size bed with 400 thread count sheets, in case you get tired from all the FUN!

Family Circus lovers a must.