Volume XXVIII Number 10 March 12, 2004

FrontPage Stories

Hay Esperanza Para la Mujer Hispana Tratándose de Violencia Doméstica

Por Katia López-Hodoyán

Auque hayan transcurrido varios meses desde que “Lety” dejó a su esposo que la golpeaba, hasta la fecha vive cada día bajo una bruma de dolor y de temor. El temor es su constante compañía, ya sea en el bullicio de la gente al tomar el camión, al caminar por las calles, e inclusive al asistir a misa, revisando los alrededores de la iglesia. La ironía sin embargo, es de que hoy en día vive con mayor libertad de la que le había tocado vivir en años. Siendo una madre soltera del estado de Michoacán, Lety dejó su pueblo en el año 1991, acompañada de su hijo de apenas tres meses de nacido. Esto con las miras de venirse a Estados Unidos. Poco después conoció a “Paco”, el hombre con quien se casó y con el cual tuvo dos hijos (actualmente un niño de 11 años y una niña de seis). Fué así como Lety se encontró vertiginosamente tratando de sobrevivir como esposa, madre, mujer golpeada y sin hablar inglés. Sintiéndose confundida y desamparada, Lety sucumbió a aguantar un desenfrenado abuso tanto físico como mental que la orilló a sentirse totalmente sola por toda una década. Sin embargo, no estaba sola.

Najia Zarif (izquierda) da consejo a una mujer no identificada.

Así como Lety , existen hoy mismo, miles de mujeres que son rehénes del abuso de sus compañeros, y viven aterrorizadas por el temor de la represalia inmediata y a largo plazo, del aislamiento. El Family Violence Prevention Fund (Fondo para la Prevención de la Violencia Familiar) reporta que diariamente, sólo en los Estados Unidos, existe un promedio de más de tres mujeres asesinadas por sus compañeros. El daño va más allá del abuso físico, pues deja a las mujeres emocionalmente vulnerables a las acciones y palabras de su compañero. Lety recuerda demasiado claro cómo Paco le pedía perdón después de cada golpiza, y como por arte de magia, lo perdonaba y regresaba. “Tiene una manera muy especial de convencer a las personas dice Lety de su esposo. “No solamente me convencía de recibirlo de nuevo, pero también convencía a los que nos rodeaban de que no existía problema alguno”.

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There is Hope for Hispanic Women When It Comes to Domestic Violence
By Katia Lopez-Hodoyan
Even though its been several months now since “Lety” left her abusive husband, she still carries a veil of fear and pain that looms over her daily routine. She constantly glances through the crowds on the bus, she feels unsafe on the streets and at times she even guards the outskirts of church while in mass. Ironically enough though, she experiences much more freedom in her current life than she has in years. As a single mother from Michoacan, MX, Lety left her hometown in 1991 with her three- month old son in hopes of coming to the United States. Soon after her arrival, she met “Paco.” The man she would later marry and have two children with (currently 11 years old and six). As if on a downward spiral, Lety suddenly found herself trying to survive as a wife, mother, monolingual Spanish speaker and battered woman. Feeling helpless and confused, Lety succumbed to enduring erratic physical and mental abuse that left her feeling lonely for a decade.


SPECIAL/EXCLUSIVE
Aristide Details Last Moments In Haiti, Calls for Stop to Bloodshed In First Address To Haitian People from Exile
EDITOR’S NOTE: President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who left a tumultuous Haiti under shadowy circumstances Feb. 29, has delivered an impassioned address “To the Haitian People and the World” by cell phone to a Haitian journalist in the United States working with a radio station in Berkeley, CA. In the address recorded early Friday (March 5), Aristide aims his words at Haitians, urging them to “stand in solidarity and stop the spread of death.”

Analysis
A Heroic Defense and a Cruel System
By David Bacon
LOS ANGELES - The southern California grocery strikers are true working-class heroes. Seventy thousand held fast to their strike over four and a half months, a remarkable achievement in the current “jobless recovery.” Many had to find other jobs to make mortgage, rent or car payments, yet 20,000 were still walking picket lines the day the strike ended.

Mexico’s Forgotten Disappeared: The Victims of the Border Narco Bloodbath
(Part II)
By Mark Getty
Upholding the Law of the Jungle and Social Disorder: Police, Drug Traffickers and Dirty Warriors
In the Mexican borderlands, hardly a week goes by without news of current or former policemen being linked to organized criminal activity. The recent exposure of members of the Chihuahua State Judicial Police (PJE) as the probable murderers of 12 men whose bodies were recovered from a “narco-grave” in Cd. Juárez is but the latest case in which lines are increasingly blurred between law enforcement authorities and gangsters.

A New Home for La Prensa San Diego!
After 28 years in the same location at 5th and Grape, in central San Diego, we now have moved our offices to National City. It was a move long overdue, the constant drown of the airplanes overhead, the traffic, the occasional accidents at the busy intersection of our block, parking which was always a problem, the roof leaking with every heavy rain storm, the heater that never worked in the winter and the air conditioner that worked better with the windows open, all this and more, yet we will miss the old place – it was our home and the birth place of La Prensa San Diego.

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Stories

St. Patrick’s Day, March 17
Saint Patrick’s Battalion, the Batallón San Patricio: Mexican War Heroes
 By Roy Cook
The war between the United States and Mexico had two basic causes.


A New Voice for the Latino Community in Mid-City San Diego
By Patricia Hodge
They come from different backgrounds, different life-styles, and different ethnicities but their mission is the same: to help the Mid-City San Diego neighborhood.


LA COLUMNA VERTEBRAL
Por German Velasco
Mario Sol, vocación de servicio
Las luces del estudio están encendidas, los maquilladores hacen un último retoque y rápidamente se retiran mientras se escucha la voz: “Preparado Mario, tres, dos, uno, al aire”. Las noticias en Español en la Capital de los Estados Unidos, tienen nombre y apellido: Mario Sol.


Más becas disponibles para estudiantes bilingües que deseen emprender una carrera en el sector de la salud
Hay más de cincuenta (50) becas de $2,000 disponibles para los estudiantes biculturales de habla hispana de la escuela secundaria que deseen empren-der una carrera en la industria de la atención médica.


A home-boy serving in Afghanistan
By John B. Dendy IV
KANDAHAR AIR FIELD, Afghanistan - The son of a San Diego couple says you have to pack heavy when leaving home to go fight the war on terrorism in this country.  The climate he’s in is bitterly cold, snowy and icy during the winter, while in the summer, it’s just the opposite — like living in a convection oven infested with vipers and cobras.

Community Notes:
San Diego Attorneys Offer Free Legal Advice at Library’s Sixth Annual Law Day Event on March 13
Free Legal advice from local attorneys will be offered Saturday, March 13 as part of the City of San Diego Public Library’s sixth annual Law Day. Each year, hundreds of San Diegans take part in the event and receive private counsel on such topics as bankruptcy law, family law, civil litigation, personal injury, medical malpractice, consumer protection, immigration, criminal law and other legal issues.

Editorials

Editorial:
Hispanics Want To Know, Is It Safe To Walk The Streets of National City
The National City Police Department and the residents of National City have a tenuous relationship at best. This point was driven home when the citizenship voted overwhelmingly to establish a police review board, not once but twice! This message did not fall on deaf ears. The Police Department has tried to bridge the cavernous relationship between itself and the citizens it is sworn to protect and serve.


Commentary
National City Eminent Domain Threat Spreads East to 805
By Ted Godshalk
On March 2, 2004, the City Council of National City, acting as the Community Development Commission (CDC), was prepared to expand its power to use eminent domain on all properties in all commercial and industrial zones in the city. By means of an amendment to the National City Redevelopment Project Area.” Eminent domain is simply the city’s use of the court system to condemn property and remove residents from their homes against their will. This new power would possibly affect the lives of residents in over 900 homes in the redevelopment areas extending from the San Diego Bay east to Interstate 805.


Commentary
A “10-Point” Response to the National City’s Mayor’s State of the City Address
By: Herman Baca
Amidst the smoke, mirrors, hype, puff and spin provided by business interest, contributors, city employees, and carpetbaggers, National City’s (NC) millionaire kid mayor Nick Inzunza announced in his State of the City address (3-09-04) that all is well and, “the 60,000 people in National City feel truly inspired that the city is changing.”


Comentario:
¿Reelección o No Reelección?
Por: Paco Zavala
En los últimos días se ha escuchado con insistencia las intenciones de modificar la Constitución Política de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos, en lo que concierne al aspecto correspondiente a la elección de los diputados y de los senadores que constituyen la Cámara Alta y la Cámara Baja.


Commentary
Huntington’s Disease
By Andrés Lozano
Often, truisms added do not account for the truth. Inspired maybe by a B movie-flick, professor Samuel Huntington foists upon us a fresh conspiracy theory: Mexicans will soon overtake American civilization! Wow! To this purpose, he amasses an ill-fitting jigsaw puzzle applicable to every immigrant wave since the Pilgrims anchored at Plymouth Rock. Professor Huntington would have been a celebrity among the Wampanoag, yet fails to fathom the simplest of facts: All identity is transitional, progress is nobody’s monopoly and change is the only fixed fact of life! Otherwise, we would still be talking in Latin, Greek or Sanskrit. More Hispanics are learning English, mixing and melting in California, Illinois and Texas than WASPS are learning Spanish, mixing frozen Margaritas and melting Nachos.


Comentario
Mal de Huntington
Por Andrés Lozano
A menudo, una lista de claridades no suma la verdad. Inspirado quizá en algún pésimo culebrón, el profesor Samuel Huntington nos impone novedosa teoría de la conspiración: ¡En poco tiempo, los mexicanos someterán a la civilización americana! ¡Guau! Para ello, mal embona rompecabezas aplicable a cada ola de inmigrantes desde el anclaje de los puritanos en Plymouth Rock. El profesor Huntington habría sido celebre entre los Wampanoag, mas se le escapan hechos esenciales: ¡Toda identidad es transitoria, nadie monopoliza el progreso y el cambio es el único hecho fijo de la vida! De otro modo aún hablaríamos latín, griego o sánscrito. Más hispanos aprenden inglés, se mezclan y funden en California, Illinois y Texas, que anglosajones mezclan y funden margaritas congeladas y nachos.

Etc. Etc. Etc.
Entertainment, Reviews, Sporting news, and other tid bits

Galería de Arte es un “Tesoro Escondido” en el Sur del Condado
Recién Remodelada Galería Comienza Nueva Era con “La figura humana
Comenzó en un pasillo oscuro de Chula Vista High School hace ya más de cuatro décadas. Su primera exhibición fue un montaje de pinturas y fotos de un artista desconocido de National City, misma que ofendió y enfureció a la facultad, funcionarios, y amantes locales del arte. Nacida en los turbulentos años de los 60, sus exhibiciones eran controversiales y generaban protestas y manifestaciones. Más de 40 años después, la Galería de Arte del Colegio Southwestern (SWC, en inglés) sigue la única en el Sur del Condado de San Diego y un gran centro de actividad cultural.


Art Gallery is “Hidden Treasure” of South County
Newly Remodeled Gallery Begins New Era with “The Human Figure”
It started in a dark hallway of Chula Vista High School more than four decades ago. Its first exhibition was a one-man show of paintings and collages by an obscure National City artist that offended and outraged most of the faculty, administration, and local art lovers. As a true child of the turbulent sixties, its exhibitions were controversial, generating public demonstrations and stirring much lively discussion. More than 40 years later, the Southwestern College (SWC) Art Gallery, the only one in South San Diego County, continues to be a mecca of cultural activity.


Reseña:
Fantástico Viaje por la Jungla en: Un Viejo que Leía Novelas de Amor
Por: Paco Zavala
En un verdadero encuentro con la naturaleza en forma literaria Luis Sepúlveda, el autor de ésta extraordinaria novela “Un Viejo que leía novelas de amor”, hace una minuciosa y exuberante descricpión del entorno en que se puede llegar a vivir en la selva amazónica ecuatoriana, aprendiendo, cazando, viviendo y disfrutando del contacto directo con la naturaleza.


VAMOS AL CINE
Objetos en el espejo están más cercanos de lo que parecen
Johnny Depp desafía las apariencias en Secret Window
Por Jose Daniel Bort
La cara del actor favorito de todo el mundo (después de su aparición en Piratas del Caribe) se refleja en el espejo retrovisor de su SUV. El foco cambia y vemos la figura de su rival amoroso y el famoso letrerito que aparece en algunos carros. Este instante resume el tema y el sentimiento que une la nueva película de Depp, Secret Window.


VAMOS AL CINE
Viggo no planea su carrera
Mortensen deja que la vida le enseñe el camino
Por Jose Daniel Bort
No cabe duda de las cualidades del actor Viggo Mortensen para protagonizar una historia. A sus 45 años, está en la plenitud de su madurez como hombre y como actor. Sin embargo, antes de la trilogía de El señor de los anillos que lo hizo famoso, Hollywood no estaba tan convencido de ello.
sta se puso una vez más de manifiesto para hablar de su participación como el investigador de homicidios Mike de Marco.

Dependencia Sexual, a mature and sophisticated storyline to an immature and closed-minded reality
By Raymond R. Beltrán
A Rigo BoSD underwear billboard, with half nude, hard body models, acts as the needle by which 26-year-old Bolivian director Rodrigo Bellott weaved a stream of sexually dependent stories together in his first feature film, Dependencia Sexual. As a needle would, this billboard pricks at the five protagonists, who battle with the bipolar reality of wanting to keep the sacredness of their bodies in a lascivious, obscene world.


Grotesque On More Than One Level, El Nominado puts a mirror in front of American reality television
By Raymond R. Beltrán
Television show ratings are dilapidated due to the watered down entertainment industry’s hunger for the next gimmick, but when the first gunshot is fired, you’ll be stunned, the year will be 2006 and reality television shows will have taken over the airwaves. Far from being all fiction, Gabriel Lopez and Nacho Argiró’s movie, El Nominado, takes viewers into the future of a corporate world that’s gone mad over low television show ratings and a society infatuated with the influx of a bandwagon sham of reality television entertainment. Who agrees the future is now?


Mosaico de Actividades Culturales en Tijuana
Por: Paco Zavala
El lunes pasado, 8 de marzo, se celebró en todo el mundo el “Día Internacional de la Mujer”. Para enmarcar ésta memorable fecha en la que se rinde homenaje a la mujer en sí, no importa su edad: niña, jóven y adulta en todo el mundo se organizaron festividades, conferencias, protestas, marchas, eventos artísticos, culturales, políticos, deportivos, misas, actos religiosos, en fín, alegra mucho que todo esto se dé en un marco de cordialidad y de convivencia social y familiar. Pero aún falta mucho camino por recorrer, siento la impresión que este día aún no tiene el apoyo suficiente para difundirlo y que tenga la relevancia y el valor que realmente amerita.


Bullfight World
By Lyn Sherwood
The Days of Wineskins and Roses: Matador Antonio Lomelín Dies in México City
Matador de Toros Antonio Lomelín, 59, was found dead, in his bedroom, Monday night from a heart attack.


Gonzales Going for Record
By John Philip Wyllie
Castle Park High School sophomore Veronica Gonzales has just one year of track experience under her belt, but she is already closing in on the school’s 12:12 two-mile record. That mark, established by Mandy Johnson several years ago, could fall as early as this weekend when Gon-zales and her Trojan teammates compete in the El Centro Invitational. Johnson remains the first and only Castle Park Trojan runner to compete in the state’s women’s cross country finals. Off to a promising start, Gonzales may one day duplicate Johnson’s feat.


Mexico’s Women’s Soccer Team Olympic Bound
By John Philip Wyllie
Heading into last week’s women’s Olympic soccer qualifying there was no reason to believe that Mexico had any realistic chance of participating in Athens’ Summer Olympic Games. With only two berths available to the many teams representing the North and Central American countries and the powerful United States and Canada competing in their group, Mexico’s chances of qualifying in women’s soccer seemed about as likely as a person winning the lottery on two consecutive days.


Super Sunday For Pechanga Casino
By Fiona Manning
In a fight card worthy of a big Las Vegas casino, it’s California’s own big resort-style Pechanga Casino and Entertainment Casino in Temecula, which is holding one of boxing’s most highly-anticipated genuine grudge matches this Sunday.

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