Tales from la Vida – A Latinx Comics Anthology Edited by Frederick Luis Aldama
I am super excited to have contributed art & story to this anthology. In the Latinx comics community, there is much to celebrate today, with more Latinx comic book artists than ever before. The story worlds of these artists reach and transform visual and storytelling genres. Tales from la Vida celebrates this space by bringing together more than eighty contributions by extraordinary Latinx creators. Their short visual-verbal narratives spring from autobiographical experience as situated within the language, culture, and history that inform Latinx identity and life. Tales from la Vida showcases the huge variety of styles and worldviews of today’s Latinx comic book and visual creators.
Frederick Luis Aldama is the author, coauthor, and editor of over thirty books, including recently Long Stories Cut Short: Fictions from the Borderlands and Latinx Superheroes in Mainstream Comics. He is Arts & Humanities Distinguished Professor, University Distinguished Scholar, and Director of the award-winning LASER (Latinx Space for Enrichment & Research) at The Ohio State University.
My compliments to Jason Gonzalez (La Mano del Destino) for the incredible cover art. Check out his work here: www.CastleAndKeyPublications.comLook for me in Chapter Six!
I got on the plane today at Chopin Warsaw Airport. This is the end of my vacation. I had so much fun and cannot wait until next year’s vacation.
Formerly known as Okecie International Airport, the airport bore the name of its Okęcie neighborhood throughout its history, until its renaming for Polish composer Chopin in 2001.I arrived in San Diego in the afternoon. It was hot compared to Poland!These are most of the souvenirs that I picked up on my trip.
Today is the last day of our vacation, tomorrow we board our plane back home to the United States. We chose to spend our day with Chopin.
Poland uses Polish złoty for currency, it is really pretty. Don’t worry, the amount I took out is only around $75. I figured I would buy some souvenirs on my last day!Our first stop of the day was to see the Chopin Statue. The monument to the outstanding Polish composer Fryderyk Chopin (1810–49) is the best-known Polish sculpture in the world. Situated close to the Belvedere Palace on Aleje Ujazdowskie, it was designed by Wacław Szymanowski, a prominent artist, sculptor, and musician from the turn of the twentieth century. In 1940, the monument was destroyed by the Nazis. It was broken into pieces and sent to foundries to be melted down. The reconstructed monument was unveiled in 1958.The bronze monument depicts the Polish composer sitting under a weeping willow. The branches of the tree are falling as if swept by a strong wind to create a picturesque setting. Above Chopin’s head, they take the form of a hand palm. The artist’s figure seems to blend with the tree, while his coat is flapping in the wind. Chopin was shown as a musician seeking inspiration, slightly tilted back, engrossed in the sounds of nature with his eyes half-closed. His right hand is raised in the air – as if above the keyboard of an invisible piano, just when the artist is looking for the right tone. The whole composition reminds of a monumental harp.The park has a Chinese Garden, situated in the northern part of the Royal Łazienki, it was designed according to existing historical models from Prince Kung’s Mansion in Beijing. Here I am with my cousins enjoying the Chinese Garden, it was beautiful.
Scenes from a walk, leaving the park.
More scenes from a walk through Warsaw. This was a children’s playground. The gate has an angel at the top.The see-saw has a religious figure on the top.I thought this playground was cute.Afterward, we took an Uber ride to the Chopin Museum.Where’s Waldo now? Oh, she’s standing next to one of Chopin’s pianos in Poland.After the museum, we went for a walk in the old part of town.On the right is the Royal Castle in Warsaw that formerly served throughout the centuries as the official residence of the Polish monarchs. It is located in the Castle Square, at the entrance to the Warsaw Old Town. The personal offices of the king and the administrative offices of the Royal Court of Poland were located there from the sixteenth century until the Partitions of Poland.
We stopped for lunch at Gosciniec Polskie Pierogi, where I had fired potato dumplings, with stewed pork, mushrooms, and peppers. It was so cold, I also had a warm elixir made with hibiscus, raspberry, orange, cloves and rum. It was good.After lunch, we continued our walk exploring Warsaw. The Old Town was established in the 13th century. Initially surrounded by an earthwork rampart, prior to 1339 it was fortified with brick city walls. The town originally grew up around the castle of the Dukes of Mazovia that later became the Royal Castle. The Market Square was laid out sometime in the late 13th or early 14th century, along the main road linking the castle with the New Town to the north.The Mermaid of Warsaw is a symbol of Warsaw, represented on the city’s coat of arms as well as in a number of statues and other imagery. There are several legends about the mermaid. The City’s literature and tour guides say the mermaid decided to stay after stopping on a riverbank near the Old Town. Fishermen noticed something was creating waves, tangling nets, and releasing their fish. They planned to trap the animal, then heard her singing and fell in love. A rich merchant trapped and imprisoned the mermaid. Hearing her cries, the fishermen rescued her. Ever since the mermaid, armed with a sword and a shield, has been ready to help protect the city and its residents. Sometimes this legend is expanded to say the Little Mermaid in Copenhagen the Warsaw mermaid’s sister and they went separate ways from the Baltic Sea. Another legend states she helped a prince lost hunting and he founded the city in her honour. I LOVE THIS!I always pick up chocolate from my trips to bring back for my family. This chocolate was so beautiful, it reminded me of chocolate postcards.Ended the night at “Bydlo i Poidlo Meat-ing Place” where I had the house burger with a Polish beer. It was a 7 oz burger with plum jam, nuts, goat cheese, lamb’s lettuce, and walnuts. It was delicious.
Couldn’t really do much today because we had to get on the train for the last stop on our vacation.
Our Airbnb delivered us breakfast. I brought the pop tarts from the US.
Scenes from a walk.The bridge from Schindler’s List. Pilsudski Bridge over the Vistula River, is at the end of Krakowska Street (the direction of crossing the bridge had to be reversed in the movie to avoid modern structures being seen).Another scene from a walk.
Last-minute goodies from the train station.On the train to Warsaw. Goodbye Kraków.Arrived in Warsaw at 4 PM.Our last Airbnb of our vacation. It was so nice, up on the 9th floor with a balcony.A neat picture that I took of my cousin Caro looking out our 9th-floor window.By the time we got settled, it was kind of late so we just we out for pizza and Polish beer.Half & Half pizza. It was good.
Our train arrived in Kraków around 7 AM. We got ready and our driver picked us up at 10:30 AM to take us on our tour of Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp which is located in the medieval city of Oswiecim, about 66 kilometers west of Krakow (approx. 2 hours away).The grounds and buildings of the Auschwitz I and Auschwitz II-Birkenau camps are open to visitors. The guided tour took 3 hours to see both camps. It is not recommended for people under 14 years of age.Like other Nazi concentration camps, the gates to Auschwitz I displayed the motto “Arbeit macht frei” (Work brings freedom).Zyklon B was the trade name of a cyanide-based pesticide invented in Germany in the early 1920s. The product is infamous for its use by Nazi Germany during the Holocaust to murder approximately one million people in gas chambers installed at Auschwitz-Birkenau, Majdanek, and other extermination camps.Block 11 was the name of a brick building in the Auschwitz concentration camp. The Block was intended solely to punish prisoners through torture. It was at Block 11 that the first attempts to kill people with Zyklon B were implemented. I have to admit, walking through this building and looking at the prison cells made me nauseous and gave me a stress headache as well. I felt better once we exited.Gallows in Auschwitz I where Rudolf Höss was executed on April 16, 1947. Höss introduced pesticide Zyklon B containing hydrogen cyanide to the killing process. To the right of the trees, stands the house where he lived with his wife and kids.In the course of the war, the camp was staffed by 7,000 members of the German Schutzstaffel (SS), approximately 12 percent of whom were later convicted of war crimes.Approaching the gatehouse which is the main entrance to Auschwitz II (Birkenau) on the shuttle.The railroad siding inside the camp called the ramp. The ramp is where Jewish people went through the selection process. The railroad tracks extend about a mile into the camp, all the way to the gas chambers II and III.Never Again.After our tour, we came back to Kraków and had dinner in the Main Square. This is the view of The Wawel Castle, a castle residency located in central Kraków, built at the behest of King Casimir III the Great. The castle, being one of the largest in Poland, represents nearly all European architectural styles of medieval, renaissance and baroque periods.Kraków Old Town is the historic central district of Kraków.On the right is Krakow’s most important church, the brick Gothic 14th century Church of St Mary, alongside the Main Market Square. This is the church that was seen in Schindler’s List.Today the Old Town attracts visitors from all over the world. The Old Town district of Kraków is home to about six thousand historic sites and more than two million works of art. Its rich variety of historic architecture includes Renaissance, Baroque and Gothic buildings.Moreover, the Square in the city center is a place where many famous people and many important events were and are commemorated.
I made the best of my last day in Prague by hanging out around the Town Square. I got up early and walked up to the St. Charles Bridge so I could enjoy the bridge all to myself, I was surprised to find people out there already, they were mostly photographers trying to capture the sunrise.
The St. Charles Bridge is a historic bridge that crosses the Vltava river in Prague. Its construction started in 1357 under the auspices of King Charles IV and finished at the beginning of the 15th century.The avenue of 30 mostly baroque statues and statuaries situated on the rails forms a unique connection of artistic styles with the underlying gothic bridge. Most sculptures were erected between 1683 and 1714. They depict various saints and patron saints venerated at that time. Beginning in 1965, all of the statues have been systematically replaced by replicas, and the originals have been exhibited in the Lapidarium of the National Museum.View of the Vltava River. It is the longest river within the Czech Republic, running southeast along the Bohemian Forest and then north across Bohemia, through Český Krumlov, České Budějovice and Prague, and finally merging with the Elbe at Mělník. It is commonly referred to as the “Bohemian sea” and the “Czech national river”.I always see brides getting their wedding photos taken all over Prague early in the morning when there aren’t any people out in the square or the bridge. Today I saw 3 brides in the Town Square. I also always see couples taking their engagement photos as well.After getting ready, I had another Trdelník ice cream cone. This was the “Chimney King” with vanilla ice cream, nuts, a brownie, chocolate sauce, and salted caramel.
The production of trdelník has a long tradition in the Slovak town of Skalica near the borders with Czech Republic. The original recipe was brought to Skalica at the end of the 18th century by the Transylvanian cook József Gvadányi, a retired Hungarian general. Check out this clip, I took it inside the Good Food Bakery shop.
After having my ice cream, I crossed the St. Charles Bridge again to visit the post office where I mailed off my watercolored postcard to a friend in the United States.On the way back I stopped at the John Lennon wall. Once a normal wall, since the 1980s it has been filled with John Lennon-inspired graffiti and pieces of lyrics from Beatles’ songs. It is located in a small secluded square across from the French Embassy, the wall received its first such decoration following the 1980 assassination of John Lennon when an unknown artist painted a single image of the singer-songwriter and some lyrics.
After my visit to the wall, I crossed back to the Town Square for lunch. I had “Old Prague Ham”. Old Prague Ham is a type of brine-cured, stewed, and mildly beechwood-smoked originally from Prague in Bohemia (Czech Republic). Check out this short clip of the cooking process.
Old Prague Ham is traditionally served in restaurants and from street vendors with a side of boiled potatoes and often accompanied by Czech beer. This is how I had it. It was delicious.Before leaving Prague, I had to have one more Trdelník chimney cone! This was a pistachio cone with orange prosecco ice cream. I ate this by the bridge, you can see the lovers’ locks on the gate in the background.Goodbye Prague, I had a lovely time here. Now it’s time to board the train for our next destination.
We arrived in Prague today around 8 AM. We took the metro to the Old Prague Town Square to check into our Airbnb apartment and then had the best time ever in Prague.
Old Town Square is a historic square in the Old Town quarter of Prague, the capital of the Czech Republic. It is located between Wenceslas Square and Charles Bridge. Our Airbnb apartment was located in this square.The Astronomical Clock in the middle of Town Square. The oldest part of the clock and astronomical dial dates back to 1410 when it was made by clockmaker Mikuláš of Kadaň and Jan Šindel, then later a professor of mathematics and astronomy at Charles University. The first recorded mention of the clock was on October 9, 1410. Later, presumably around 1490, the calendar dial was added and the clock facade was decorated with gothic sculptures.This was our Airbnb apartment.This is the view out of our apartment windows. We are very close to the Astronomical Clock.The first thing I did in Prague was to visit the Alphonse Mucha Museum.Alphonse Mucha, was a Czech painter, illustrator, and graphic artist, living in Paris during the Art Nouveau period, best known for his stylized and decorative theatrical posters of Sarah Bernhardt. He produced paintings, illustrations, advertisements, postcards, and designs which became among the best-known images of the period.Moët & Chandon Crémant Impérial, 1899.The Mucha Museum is the only museum in the world dedicated to the life and work of the world-acclaimed Czech ART NOUVEAU artist Alphonse Mucha (1860 – 1939). You can see many of his drawings and posters here.On the left: Fruits. On the right: Flower. Both are from 1897.The first Absintherie that I visited today.I had distilled Absinthe and a “Merry Berry” which was made with fresh blueberries, blueberry jam, sage, lime juice, and sugar.
Here’s a short video of the absinthe, it was beautiful. I didn’t really like it but I already knew I wouldn’t and that’s why I also ordered the Merry Berry.
After the Absintherie, I walked down to get a “Chimney Devil”. It was an activated charcoal ice cream with coconut inside a trdelnik cone.Banknote designed by Mucha: 500 crowns. Mucha was keen to do whatever he could to help the creation of the new state and readily agreed to design the first Czechoslovak stamps and banknotes. The first banknote came out in 1919 and many others followed in later years. Besides banknotes and stamps, Mucha designed all kinds of paraphernalia for the state, from the national emblem to police uniforms.After eating ice cream, I took a walk across the St. Charles Bridge. It was amazing.Here I am with the medievil Astronomical Clock.After walking around the St. Charles Bridge, I went with my cousins for an absinthe shot at another Absintherie.It had beautiful murals painted all over the bar.Here I am with my cousin Caro, looking for the green fairy.Another beautiful mural.This time I had the “beetle” shot (Bohemian style) and a “Raspberry Bramble” which had Absinthe, lemon juice, fresh raspberries, and raspberry syrup.
The Bohemian-style absinthe is poured into a glass, and a sugar cube on a slotted spoon is placed over the glass. The sugar cube is then soaked with absinth and is set on fire. The cube is then dropped into the absinthe, setting it ablaze. Then water is poured over the flame until it goes out. Check out the bartender preparing it in the video clip below.
