Let Rasquache Inspire your Fashion

Have you ever gone to an art store to buy a canvas, beads or other supplies to make art? A form of Chicana and Chicano art is quite different in which you make art with the things that you already have. It is about painting your coffee can and using it as a flower pot, or layering material to make colorful collages. This form of art is called Rasquache. This art form is very sustainable and shows that you can make beautiful projects out of every day material. It takes crude materials and makes them into works of art. It used to have a negative connotation as it was considered to be ghetto, but now it is valued for its philosophy, and its roots in the Chicana and Chicano Movement. Here is an example of rasquache. This used to be a trashcan, but is now painted with an everyday food supply picture, such as a jalapeño can, and instead of holding trash, it now holds flowers and a bush. This communicates a strong statements towards upholding sustainability. What meanings do you see?

Rasquache was very important during the Chicana and Chicano Movement because it communicated ideas regarding politics, race, and the oppression that Chicanas/os faced by the U.S.

Seeing rasquache art gave me an idea of ways that we can be more sustainable. Clothes, for example are like canvases that we can add and layer to make new and exciting clothing! Instead of throwing away a shirt, cut it into pieces and sow it into another shirt! A part of being creative is about being fearless, like these Chicana and Chicano artists, and making something exciting out of the mediocre.

Here is an example of how to make clothes that you are tired off into new art creations!

How a Little Black Dress Sent Over 200 Children to School

Hello Everyone,

What if wearing the same dress everyday would give 221 children a chance to be able to attend school? I young woman by the name, Sheena Matheiken commited to wearing the same black dress for 365 days to raise awareness of not just sustainability, but  of children’s education in the less priviledge communities. She wore the same dress for a whole year (Well, her friend made her another so it would not get smelly!)! Not just that, she also pledge that each day, she would have a new outfit to display, unique and original from any prior ones she did before. She would use her vintage accessories, as well as the donations from many different organizations, stylists and designers and even fans!  All of the money she fundraised went to the Akanksha Foundation, a non profit organization that provides education to underpriviledge children living in Indian Slums. Through this project, Sheena was able to raised over $100,000 in donations. She was also awarded Elle Magazine Women of the Year for 2009. If you are curious to see all of Sheena’s unique outfits in a cute video montage, click here. I truly admire Sheena for her enormous commitment and creativity towards confronting a big issue, such as education accessibility for children in India’s slums. Fundraising can look in many beautiful, and fashionable ways.

I want to give a special thanks to Mary, from blog, Joyful Ploys, who recommended I checked out the “Uniform Project,” after reading my “Be Green and Chic and Have a Clothes Swapping Party.“

Soap can Save the World!

Hello Everyone,

Thanks to blog, Write Where You Are, I just found out about a creative project called, Global Soap Project, that focuses on saving lives by providing soap to refugee communities. This is a great organization because it demonstrates creativity when it comes to helping others! Washing your hands is one of the best ways to prevent diseases, but many communities do not have access to soap. The other amazing thing about this organization is that they recycle soap! They take hotel bar soaps that have been discarded, cut them up, melt them, and make them into new bars of soap. Hotels discard a lot of soap, almost 2.6 million soap bars in one day! I think this organization has a genius idea of how to reduce this waste and help people that need soap have access to them.

If you would like to explore this organization, you can take a look here. You can volunteer, or donate to their cause. There are also pictures where you can see what they do in action.  For example, they took a donated meat grinder, and use that to help them cut the soap into small pellets so that they can melt them into new bars! Talk about resourceful!

Be Green and Chic and Have a Clothes Swapping Party!

Hello Everyone,

Have you ever noticed that fashion stores are turning into fast food chains? You go into them to get a $5 shirt that will in a month or two end up in the garbage, or the bottom of your closet. Fashionable items have become so cheap so people can stay up to date and seasons without going broke. When you go into those stores, the quality of some of the items are really cheap, like purses that look pretty, but are made with flimsy material that won’t let it last long. Next season, one throws away the clothes, extremely hurting the environment as numerous people also are getting ready for the next season.

So, a conscious person would sell those clothes in e-Bay, donate them to Goodwill or the Salvation Army, or in one of those clothes recycle boxes. However, there is also another alternative that is fun and can get your friends involved: A clothes swapping party!

Yes, you heard me… have a time where you and your friends bring clothes that are still in  good condition and swap them to give them another life. It should be something that you don’t like or wear anymore, that someone will be excited to try on. However, you want to keep some rules in mind so that it is the most fun experience possible, and you don’t lose any friends.

1. Make appetizers

Food builds solidarity in a group, and it also makes the event more as a party and time to hang out than simply business of getting rid of stuff. Having food gives people energy, more likely to become engaged in this activity. Having wine will also add to the personality in the party as drinking might make people more lighthearted. It is up to you how you would like to host the party, but some delicious treats is a must! Also, have music!

2. Ask people whose style you like, and like yours

As part of swapping, your friends need to bring clothes they don’t wear as well! And it helps when you like each other’s style, or have around the same body shape and sizes.

3. Try having your biggest mirrors around available

Having mirrors helps with the trying out of clothes, and the feeling that one might be shopping ethically as it feels as if one is changing in a dressing room.

4. Be a good sport and be prepared to laugh at your fashion victim clothes

The more dedicated to fashion you are, the more likely that you will have an eccentric piece that will be the target for light-hearted ridiculing. It only adds to the fun of the day!

5. If two people want the same piece, flip a coin.

Don’t try to have a vote from the group, or based on who it looks better. It is day to have fun and not build tension or break friendships.

6. Be confident 

Some of your items that you are trying to get rid off might look better on someone else. Don’t worry about it, clothes are created for the body, not the other way around. And also, this shirt is now going to go into a new home to have a longer life.

7. The item swapped is not yours anymore

This one sounds obvious, but some things that I have experience when people give clothes away, is that the piece is still called, “So and so’s” shirt or bag, or what have you. Please refrain from doing this, maybe during the party, but the day after or weeks after it can be irritating as the new owner is not allowed to feel like the owner.

8. Be surprised to see what others give away

Something that you might not like will be someone else’s new favorite. Don’t judge your giveaways before your friends have a chance to see it and vice versa for your friends.

9. Make sure everything is clean, ironed, and items taken off the pockets.

Also, don’t bring things people usually don’t like to share, like underwear, bras or socks.

10. Don’t take it too seriously

Some people might walk away with things that they do not like as much. The purpose of this is to have fun and spend time with friends, not to get too involved and compare quality that one brought with someone else.( Or you can have price range turns, or piles)

I also found this helpful video on wiki-how!

how-to-host-a-clothing-swap-party

If you don’t like the idea of having a party, there is a great website called SwapStyle where you trade clothes with people all around the world! http://www.swapstyle.com/

Ideas from:

Blanchard, Tamsin. Green is the New Black: How to Change the World with Style. New York: Harper Collins, 2007. (139)

Read for your Health!

Hello Everyone,

Do you like reading “Shape”magazine, “Health” magazine, or my blog? ( I hope you say yes to my blog!) UCLA has a magazine archive written by UCLA students supervised by health professors from the School of Nursing, and Medicine that is available online to everyone. What I like the best about this magazine are the amazing, colorful pictures! I know… I am a sucker for colorful, detailed photography! I also like how the content of the magazine seeks to answer questions that many people have towards health issues, such as “How to stay healthy while traveling abroad” or “What vegetables are better eaten raw or cooked.” I invite you to check it out here. I recently applied to be one of the writers, so hopefully I get in!

Wish me luck!

Hitler’s Inspiration: United States’ Treatment of Undocumented Immigrants

Hello Everyone,

You might be wondering why I included this post on this blog that focuses on beauty issues and Chicano and Chicana history. I believe that part of being virtuous is by being aware of history, and how it has affected present day. Like my professor used to say, “A country that has forgotten its history, loses its destiny.” Only when you know more about history can you clearly see where your place is in the world. Additionally, learning about history is extremely important when thinking of what it means to be beautiful, because notions of beauty is extremely racialized and can have political implications. It is of no surprise as why white women’s features are praised by dominant society when you learn about white supremacist history that Europe and the United States has had, and how it has spread all around the world. You might be surprised to know that the use of a deadly pesticide in the Jewish concentration camps was inspired by United States detention camps in El Paso, Texas for undocumented Mexican immigrants. Mexican immigrants were seen as filthy, and as agents of diseases such as typhus to the United States. Therefore, United States immigration agents felt justified when they sprayed deadly chemicals on Mexicans that had the potential to kill them.

Hitler Quote:

“Compared to old Europe, which had lost an infinite amount of its best blood through war and emigration, the American nation appears as a young and racially select people. The American nation itself, motivated by the theories of its own racial researchers, [has] established specific criteria for immigration…making an immigrant’s ability to set foot on American soil dependent on specific racial requirements on the one hand as well as a certain level of physical health of the individual himself.”

-Adolf Hitler, praising the U.S. Immigration Act of 1924*

Hitler is praising the rigorous measures taken to make sure that only fit, and mentally able immigrants stepped foot on United States soil. One of those measures was to spray all immigrants with numerous different deadly chemicals, but the main one was the deadly, Zyklon B.

Zyklon B, a commerical form of hydrocianic acid (HCN) was used on immigrants to sterelize them from any bacteria. It is extremely poisonous and fatal when absorbed through the skin over 50ppm. The use of Zyklon B as a pesticide on the U.S.-Mexican border inspired Dr. Gerhad Peters to mass produce this chemical in Germany to kill “unwanted pests.”  These unwated pests were the Jews during the WWII in the concentration camps. The same gas that were used for undocumented immigrants was being used in higher doses for the Jews! The Germans would use Zyklon B in concentrated doses in the gas chambers to kill millions of Jews, gypsies, homosexuals, communists, and other human “pests.” Even though in the United States it was not used to kill immigrants, it was used to kill lice and other supposed diseases. The delousing camps, concentration camps for Mexican immigrants to get fumigated were made in El Paso, Texas in 1917. These camps would not only spray burning chemicals such as Zyklon B at immigrants, but they would also force men and women to shave their heads, and go through mental tests such as puzzles and “simple addition sums” to make sure the immigrant was not an imbecile or persons with abnormal sex instincts (homosexuals). If the immigrants would show any sign of sadness, numbness, or slowness to answer, they would be considered mentally unfit to come to the United States.

Raul Delgado, who came as a Bracero in 1958, describes how it felt to get deloused by U.S. custom agents at the Eagle Pass Border. The Bracero program was set in place in the United States to bring in much needed labor to work on United States agriculture.

“They put me and other braceros in a room and made us take off our clothes. An immigration agent with a fumigation pump would spray our whole body with insecticide, especially our genitals. Some of us ran away from the spray and began to cough. Some even vomited from the stench of those chemical pesticides being sprayed on us and the agent would laugh at the grimacing faces we would make. He had a mask on, but we didn’t. Supposedly, it was to disinfect us, but I think more than anything, they damaged our health.”**

It would be of no surprise that many immigrants after that test would be saddened, angry, and slow to answer. The  treatment they were receiving, even though the United States was recruiting them for labor, was beyond cruel. It was so inhumane towards immigrants, that even Hitler praised the United States, and implemented this idea for his own concentration camps.

*Gerhard Weinberg, ed. Hitler’s Second Book: The Unpublished Sequel to Mein Kampf by Adolf Hitler, (New York: Enigma Books, 203) p. 109.

** Raul Delgado File, Proyecto Bracero Archives, Centro de Trabajadores Agricolas Fronterizos, El Paso.

Taken From:

Romo, David Dorado. Ringside Seat to a Revolution: An Underground Cultural History of El Paso and Juaréz: 1893-1923. El Paso: Cinco Puntos Press, 2005. (139-142)

Liver Love Part 2: How to Recover from a Sugar High or Hangover

Valentine’s Day is coming, and whether you have a special someone or not, there is a big risk you will overindulge in the candies and other goodies. I especially love chocolates, but lets face it, chocolate has a lot of sugar!

Have you heard of the term, “Sugar Hangover”? This is what happens the day after candy and sugar galore, often resulting in an upset stomach, headache, lethargy, brain fog, skin problems, joint pain, mood swings, allergy symptoms, and of course, regret.

Fortunately, there are several things you can do to recover from a sugar hangover:

• Quit eating sweets. You cannot recover from a sugar hangover if you continue to eat candy the next day!  Try eating healthful protein every two to three hours, eating a good breakfast, and avoiding starchy foods, desserts, and sweet drinks (soda, sweet coffee drinks) that spike blood sugar. Starch is another form of sugar! So try avoiding potatoes, bananas and white bread. Instead focus on quality proteins, leafy vegetables, and good sources of fat (olive oil, avocado, coconut oil, salmon, etc.)
• Got Water? This is one of the best things you can do to recover. Staying hydrated with clean filtered water will help flush your body of toxins and aid in recovery. I wonder if green tea will be even better as it is a natural diuretic.
• Love your liver. Like alcohol, processing an overload of sweets burdens your liver. Help your liver flush these toxins with liver detox nutrients as milk thistle, dandelion, N-acetyl L-cysteine, beet root, panax ginseng, and more. Don’t these sound familiar? You also use these nutrients for an alcohol hangover that I described in my last post here.
• Restore your intestines. Sweets cause inflammation, promote overgrowth of harmful yeast and bacteria, and irritate the gastric lining. This can lead to painful ulcers that don’t let you sleep at night! Try eating plain yogurt as it will help your liver restore its good bacteria.
• Get a gentle workout.  Try doing a brisk walk, a swim, dance or some other gentle exercise will get your lymphatic system pumping and blood flowing to help flush toxins and rejuvenate your cells. You want to avoid extremely vigorous exercise until hangover symptoms subside so as not to further promote inflammation
• Take Chamomille: This relaxing tea is anti-inflammatory reducing the inflation caused by an overload of sugar.

Taken From:

http://midlifewithoutcrisis.com/2011/12/how-to-recover-from-a-sugar-hangover/