The Opening Act

ZAPATISTA ARMY FOR NATIONAL LIBERATION
MEXICO

August 2019.

Testing, testing…

One… two… testing…

Testing one two three… testing…

“¿Hello, hello, hello, how low?”

From the… wait a minute! Did the Sup just quote the Nirvana track “Smells Like Teen Spirit”? What’s he trying to do, address a particular generation Or is he talking to those who regret having promoted what now plagues them? Or is he suggesting that this was Kurt Cobain’s version of the Joker’s “Why so serious?” Or maybe it’s self-criticism because of that “I’m worse at what I do best” thing? A subliminal message for CompArte?

Hmm…Maybe it has something to do with SKA. What? Ska wasn’t around then? Country Rock and Roll? El Piporro with images from that classic of interstellar filmography, The Ship of Monsters?[i] Hmm…an unconscious reference to Puy Ta Cuxlejaltic?[ii] Or a greeting that challenges the wall which the federal government intends to erect on the Mexican Isthmus in order to separate us from the peoples of the north? Nah, must be something else.

For sure, Alakazam the Great[iii]:

Look, ladies, gentlemen, and others
Nothing to see here, nothing to see there, but wait, all of a sudden, boom:

The Zapatista communities (re)appear…

(To be continued)

From the mountains of the Mexican Southeast
El SupGaleano,
Performing as opening act for Subcomandante Insurgente Moisés, while he drives (SupGaleano that is) fast and furious down the highway to hell, and “for this gift I feel blessed…”[iv]

Mexico, August 2019

[i] “El Piporro” was the nickname of Eulalio «Lalo» González Ramírez (1921–2003), a Mexican actor, comic, musician, songwriter, screenwriter, and film director who starred in La nave de los monstruos (The Ship of Monsters), a 1960 Mexican comic science fiction film. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ship_of_Monsters

[ii] The name given to the Zapatista film festival held in November 2018, meaning “Caracol of our Life.” Caracol is literally conch shell or a spiral, but also the name for the five seats of Zapatista self-government.

[iii] 1960 Japanese musical anime film, based on the Chinese novel Journey to the West. See the plot line at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alakazam_the_Great

[iv] Lyrics from “Smells like Teen Spirit”: “I’m worse at what I do best, And for this gift I feel blessed…”

Videos:

Nirvana – Smells Like Teen Spirit

Eulalio ‘Lalo’ González «El Piporro» – Ojos De Pancha

AC/DC – Highway to Hell