clustered near the border

The Finnish!

2008-03-24T14:20:00.000-07:00

I was surprised to find such a thriving Irish culture in Tucson, but even more startled when I happened upon the Finnish-American Club of Tucson. I met with the club president, Sinikka Garcia, to learn about this small community.
The club has been around for 42 years in Tucson and has 100 members give or take a dozen or so, says Garcia. People of Finnish decent, Finnish born or folks interested in Finnish culture are welcome to join the club.
Activities include a movie night. Originally only documentaries were shown but to keep the interest of the younger members Finnish cinema movies are being shown. There are also picnics and cultural fairs. April 13 the club is having a picnic at Fort Lowell Park.
Garcia was born and raised in Finland but moved to Mexico and then the US after meeting her husband during a volunteer work camp (think Peace Corps) in Mexico. They have four children, the two sons are engineers and the twin girls followed in Garcia’s footsteps and are teachers. Garcia taught 6th grade at Catalina Foothills for 25 years and earned her master degree from the University of Arizona in 1970.
Courtesy of Joel Wästi is a photo of the club members playing Finnish pesäpallo, their version of baseball. It is a game all can play together; it does not have to be segregated by gender or age. Above is a photo of mölkky, which is like boweling, except in the dirt.

12-step culture IS in Tucson

2008-03-17T14:56:00.000-07:00

This is not your typical “secret society.” There are no secret handshakes and no burly bouncer opens the door after you say the password. But anonymity is the rule here. There are no interviews, cameras or recorders. This is a group of people from all walks of life who meet in parks, church basements, and the back rooms of bookstores. Sometimes these people only have one thing in common: addiction.
If you have not guessed it I am talking about a 12-step group. There are various types of 12-step groups from the original, Alcoholics Anonymous, to its counterpart Al-Anon. A quick Google search found over 100 twelve step groups.
Twelve step groups started in the 1940’s when Bill W. and Dr. Bob started Alcoholics Anonymous. The premise is that alcoholics/ addicts suffer from a spiritual disease. The solution is to find a “higher power” and work “steps.”
A 12-step meeting usually lasts an hour. There are different types of meetings: open discussion, step study, women’s, men’s, and “book” study. Each group is different but the primary format is the same: a person chairs the meeting, different things are read, usually a “what is (this group),” “who is (i.e. an addict),” and the steps and traditions, sometimes key chains or “chips” will be passed to recognize various periods of time “clean” from the addiction, and then the meeting starts .
An open discussion meeting is the kind you see on TV, where a group sits in a circle, a topic is brought up and people share their experience. A step study is where people study the steps. The steps are the blueprint to sobriety, if you do them and do them regularly long-term sobriety is possible. But the rule is “one day at a time,” so “if you have a day you broke the record.” A book study is where the Big Book or group’s version of the AA Big Book is read. The Big Book is a guide to how to live life sober and how to work the steps.
People who join 12-step groups find a “sponsor.” That person walks them through the steps. Once someone has completed the steps they go out and carry the message to others by being a sponsor, going to institutions, and helping others.
This is just a glimpse into the 12-step culture. More info can be found on each individual group’s Web site, to see a large list click here

The "Subculture" known as Goth in Tucson

2008-03-10T11:48:00.000-07:00

In the minds of some the word "Goth" inspires visions of fishnets, black make-up and moody music. If that thought is appealing or disgusting to you is your prerogative, but the Goth scene is alive and thriving across the US.
With Asylum, Tucson's only Industrial club, fighting foreclosure I thought it would be great to write about the Goth scene in Tucson. Tragically, the doors of Asylum were locked before their time to collect money for their foreclosure was up. I was not able to go to the club and talk to anyone or take some radical photos.
Luckily I found William (Willy) Peterson's email and shot him a quick line about what I was doing and he graciously helped me out. Peterson, 31, has been hanging out in the scene for 16 years, but has been listening to music from the genre since 1986.
I have flirted with the scene since 2001 and must say Peterson is right on when he says that the scene has changed. In the early 2000's (at least in Tampa, Fla.) no one went out to the club without at least two hours of make-up and costume arranging. Full Victorian dress (hoop skirts and powdered wig a must) or fishnet and strategically placed electrical tape were required. Today black pants, a band shirt and a pair of boots are the wardrobe of many Tucson Goths.Peterson usually dresses in all black, but blames that more on his color-blindness rather than his Goth connections. His combat boots are a must for everyday life, but special occasions call for riding boots, he says that they have a "nicer look."
Halloween found Peterson in a cowboy get-up,. rather than a stereotypical priest or "dom" outfit.
What is Goth? Peterson says it is someone who prefers Goth music. Going by that definition you do not have to dye your hair black to be a Goth. If you enjoy ,Razed in Black, Wolfsheim, E Nomine (watch video), Melotron (watch video),VNV Nation (the list goes on) or you want to move to Germany to save money on CD's you may be Goth!
Peterson has heard Goths judged as "freaks," "pale people in black," and even heard of them being accepted as simply "different." Whichever it is Peterson still identifies with the Goth scene, loves American Idol, authors Terry Pratchett, Terry Jones, JRR Tolkien and listens to Oingo Boingo. Oh and his naturally curly hair is red, not black!

final Irish post

2008-03-03T17:13:00.001-08:00

I will say farewell to the Tucson Irish community with this last entry.
Elizabeth “Beth” Solinsky was born and raised in Dublin and now resides in Tucson. She is married and has six children, and two of them climbed up slides backwards at McDonald's Play Place, while we talked about Solinsky’s journey from Ireland to the US.
Solinsky, moved to Texas in 1982 after she graduated from college as a Montessori teacher. The economy of Ireland was not doing too well at the time and she said that 50% of her classmates found employment overseas.
She only planned on of staying in the US a couple of years, but one job turned into another and then she met and fell in love with her husband.
She followed him out to Tucson, Ariz. with thoughts of finding a thriving Irish community being zilch.
“I was surprised to find as much as I did here in Tucson,” Solinsky said, “I came to this place in the middle of the desert thinking there is going to be nothing here, I have been quite suddenly surprised.”
In Houston, the Irish community is bigger, but in Tucson it is tighter nit, said Solinsky.
Her children, who have been home schooled, have all taken Irish dance and music lessons. The elder Solinskys spent eighth grade in Ireland and the 11 year old is showing interest in doing the same.

2008-02-25T13:05:00.001-08:00

Right down to his tattoo on his arm, modified from an eighth century brooch, David Bedell Jr is 100% Irish American.
Bedell, 53, grew up listening to his dad, who he credits his interest in his heritage to, singing old Irish songs. Listening to Irish bar music is something Bedell does today; I met him while he was enjoying Round the House.
Many Americans are mutts, a mixture of heritages, but Bedell has Irish blood on both parental sides. He can trace his roots in the US back to the civil war. Unlike many Irish fresh off of the boat, Bedell’s great-great-great grandfather, on his mother’s side, did not join the military. John McCabb was a blacksmith and his profession allowed him to start-up life without needing the army’s offered bounty.
On Bedell’s father’s side his family came to the US about 1900 from county Cork, where they were descendants of William Bedell, Angolan Bishop. Bedell’s grandfather was a junk dealer and sold homemade beer on the side.
His parents met in high school and married after World War II.
Bedell is proud to carry on his Irish heritage, by passing it on to his daughters, telling his family story and especially in carrying on the Irish tradition of teaching. He is a high school English Literature teacher and is a strong proponent of reading classics and great authors.

Part One of Tucson's Irish

2008-02-18T12:12:00.001-08:00

This is part one of a three part series on the Irish community in Tucson.
According to the census information in 2000 46,811 Tucsonans documented themselves as being of Irish decent. An additional 117 people were born in Ireland. The estimate of Irish in Tucson was 55,085 in 2006, according to census information.
Tucson’s link to the Irish even goes back to 1775 when Irish blooded Hugo O’Conor founded Tucson’s Presidio for the Spanish.
Sharon Goldwasser, 51, is the fiddle player for Irish music group Round the House. While she is not Irish she plays Irish music for the love of it.
Goldwasser grew up in Southern California and moved to Tucson in 1980. She had played the violin for five years, but had given it up for the guitar and the recorder. In Tucson she became interested in Contra dancing. She was what one would call a “starving grad student” and was allowed into the dances free if she brought an instrument. Soon she wanted do more than sit around on the side lines with her case and jumped into the melody. Thus her fiddling career began.
Today she continues to study and perform the fiddle. By day she is a 7th grade science teacher and by weekend she plays “in the band.” Goldwasser and her fellow band mates Dave Firestine (mandolin, bouzouki and banjo), Mark Robertson-Tessi (guitar, bouzouki and mandolin) and Claire Zucker (vocals and bodhran) perform once or twice a month at the Auld Dubliner in Tucson and at special events, including weddings.

De/Vision's Thomas Adam

2008-02-11T11:20:00.002-08:00

The music starts and Thomas Adam steps up behind his keyboard. The crowd, not a single person lacking a least a stitch of black clothing, begins to clap and then roar as Steffen Keth saunters onto the stage. He starts by doing a sort of drunk- man shuffle and then breaks into some hip action that would put Elvis to shame. This man can dance, though not with the trained and synchronized puppet movements of a US pop star. Keth also does not move like most other Goth/ Industrial/ Synthpop front men, he does not randomly hop around. The music seems to be in him, making his dancing visually poetic, sounds cliché, I know but the man has moves!

That is how the Tucson show of De/Vision’s US tour begins. What follows is much dancing and much, as Thomas Adam would put it, nice electronic music played by two German guys.

After a sound check, when everything worked and before the show, I sat down with Adam to talk about touring in the US.

This is the first US tour for De/Vision, but not their first time in the states. They filmed a video in Houston, Texas. Adam has family in Tucson, Ariz. and has visited here before as well.

He spoke of the similarities and differences of touring in the US and in Europe. The venues that De/Vision plays in the US are smaller. A point of contention with the band, particularly the tour manager, is the technology is not as advanced in the US clubs as it is in Europe.
Adam sites an example that on stage he only has mono sound rather than stereo sound. This lack of surround sound removes from the show, “some of the frequencies get lost,” he said. I’m sure both Adam and Keth were cursing US technology when the show stopped for over five minutes because the keyboard stopped working!

“The concerts we’ve had so far were really nice,” said Adam, “the people, the audience, was very happy to see us; we’ve finally made it to the US!”

He said that the fans have been really welcoming, and that they are very much like the fans in Germany: they dress the same, they act the same. No one has tried to climb up on stage yet!

With US politics Adam is very well versed. He even has an opinion on who should be elected our next president: Barack Obama. He feels that Obama is the only hope to change the view that world has of the US. It’s not that American’s are not liked, he said, but that US foreign policy is a bit frowned upon.

One thing that shocks Adam is the whole concept of bars CLOSING at 2 a.m.!

“I was really surprised last night in Austin. I was talking to some of the fans after the show, I had a whiskey coke in my hand and this guy comes up to me and (claps) ‘you have to drink, give me your glass you can’t drink alcohol anymore;’” said Adam, “It was like a bad joke to me.”

He goes on to mention an article he read about laws in the US and how in some locations, oral sex is illegal.

“What happened to the land of the free?,” said Adam. “This would never happen in Germany, there would be a revolution.”

I laughed at that and he looked me in the eye and said “I’m serious, they would kick the politicians out of the country, they would burn down the government.” I must admit it is scary to hear a German say that the US is becoming a fascist state.

Adam said that Germany has homeless, but wonders about our homeless veterans. His voice rose when he spoke of how a solider may come home “sick” and deserves food, shelter and care. Don’t fear my fellow Americans, we are not alone; he saw the same thing in Russia.

On a lighter note, Adam says that the US scenery is beautiful and that the food is, well, Texas steak is good (sorry everyone I warned him about Rocky Mountain Oysters).

Interviewer or Student?

2008-02-04T04:06:00.000-08:00

The first landmark Maria Fernanda Leyva gave me was a water tower and next was the Circle K, where I was supposed to turn left. The brick house I was going to was hard to miss, she said, just look for the two dried-up trees. Despite the great directions I, of course, got lost. I drove through a comfortable neighborhood twice before I found the address I was looking for. I almost missed the peeling sign that designated it as my destination. Even though I had meandered I was still 30 minutes early, which gave me time to be acquainted with Miisi (cat in Yaqui). Miisi decided that my empty lap was an invitation and spent the next half-hour having his full belly rubbed, oblivious to the crew working on the heating system on the roof.

Leyva, 63, is a Pasqua Yaqui Elder. She is an administrator for the Language Development Program on the Pasqua Yaqui Reservation. Her main job is to teach the Yaqui language, the bridge to the tribe’s past and culture.

When I initiated this interview with Leyva I had hoped that I would come away with a story of how her people, yoeme, blend with the other cultures near the border. She did give me that, and many other story ideas that I would love to incorporate into bigger pieces. But when I drove away I realized that the story for my blog was her and how she touched me. Leyva was doing what she does, teaching history, but instead of her pupil being a native, her student was me. The experience was unlike one I have ever had with an instructor. I sat with her, in the trailer that the children’s summer program is taught in, for an hour and half. I was asking questions and doing my best not to clasp my hands under my chin and sit wide-eyed with interest.

I could spend days researching the Pasque Yaqui tribe. I could read about the Deer Dancers and about Anselmo Valencia and his contribution in getting the Yaqui’s federally recognized. None of that compares to talking to Leyva.

If you could imagine a pond, not a ripple on its surface, and then you see a duck paddle across, its wake so small that it does not even make a single wave on the shore. That is what it is like conversing with Leyva. She does not make grand gestures with her hands or with her words. She does not act like someone who demands respect, but she subtly earns it. When Leyva passed some of her knowledge on to me and asked me not to repeat it, I did not respond with a calloused, “well you are on the record.” I turned off my recorder and listened. She still gave me one the most quotable and fun interviews to date.

Leyva learned Yaqui , Spanish and English from her grandmother, and parents. In addition to her family’s version of sign language she also knows American Sign Language because she has a sister who is deaf. She studied languages at the University of Arizona .

It is a four year commitment to teach a “speaker;” a fluent speaker and future teacher of the “old language.” Since 2002 four speakers have been trained through the Language Development Program, Leyva said.

In 1991 there were 500 speakers in the state of Arizona . Today, not counting Leyva’s pupils, there are only 74, she said.

Tucson vs New Orleans

2008-01-28T02:15:00.001-08:00

This blog is about different cultures clustered near the U.S. / Mexican border, specifically in Tucson, Ariz. For my first entry I spoke to James Cook, 29, who moved to Tucson to start over after Hurricane Katrina flooded his native New Orleans, La. I thought that Cook would have an interesting view on the culture in Tucson since he was coming from a part of the United States that was culturally and geographically different.

Cook said that Tucson is “adequate.” He said that there is a possibility that he could settle down here, as long as he gets to travel frequently. When Cook talks about New Orleans though, he mentions the word “home.”
“There is something exceedingly relaxing and wonderful about being able to go down to the river, like at sunrise and drinking a cup of coffee;” he said, “You’re not going to find that here in Arizona. The closest I’ve found to that is finding good hiking here.”

Cook’s journey to Tucson involved rafting down the main streets of his city, pushing bodies out of the way, laying down in a makeshift medical unit in the prison, sitting on a school bus for 24 hours, Dallas, Oklahoma, and then Tucson.

While all this was going on Cook said that he did not really process it, all that went through his head was “Good God I need to get to some dry land!”

Cook and a group of friends voted to move to Tucson. Coincidentally courses at the University of Arizona will allow him to continue his education. Today Cook is enrolled at the UA as a doctorate of philosophy student studying ancient history, specifically Egyptian history.

Cook said that there is “a strong South West American culture and a strong South West Mexican culture [in Tucson] and anything else is just a sprinkling of cultures.”

He sees each of the two main cultures as having different values and politics, but sees them living in harmony.

“Any of the clashing is due to superficial details that are drawn out of proportion. I think it’s understandable to have a certain amount of racial pride and there is a lot on both sides. But they have a lot more in common than they do apart,” Cook said.

He said that dress, mannerisms and responsibilities cross cultural boundaries when people grow up in the same region because these things are formed by geography.

Cook said the issues in New Orleans are vastly different than those in Tucson because in New Orleans they are about divisions of economic class rather than cultural or racial.

He said that people from different economic backgrounds can have identical interests, such as going to the rodeo, but that they will enjoy it from different perspectives, the difference between front-row box seats to the nose bleed section in the stands.

Cook used the example of the rodeo; all economic levels will be there, but not all cultures.

“I don’t think you can compare accurately an economic clarification to a cultural one;” he said.

Speaking of the rodeo, the only thing about Tucson that still perturbs Cook is men who are not cowboys dressed in hat, boots and spurs.

“Unless your job is a cowboy, it’s not cute. New Orleans has a strong pirate culture; we don’t dress like pirates;” he said.