CULTURA

Rome - Valentino Clemente Ludovico Garavani, legendary Italian fashion designer, has peacefully passed at the age of 93. Garavani opened a fashion house on Via Condotti in Italy. Known by the V logo, Valentino served as the creative director and influencer of the house from 1959 until around 2008. "Valentino Red" became a symbol of the fashion icon. His love for the color seemingly stemmed from the opera Carmen, a Spanish bel canto, that filled a stage with impressive red cos

Martin Luther King Jr. made history at thirty-five when he became the youngest recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. The Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded him the 1964 prize "for his non-violent struggle for civil rights for the Afro-American population." He was the twelfth American to receive it and only the second African American. His response to the honor revealed everything about his priorities. He immediately announced plans to donate the entire $54,123 prize to advancing

Jill Stein is a doctor who abandoned her medical practice to run for president. The Harvard-educated physician became the Green Party's presidential candidate in 2012, 2016, and most recently in 2024. She positions herself as the answer for progressives exhausted by Democratic incrementalism and Republican extremism, championing Medicare for All, student debt cancellation, and opposition to military interventionism. Her pitch appeals to voters convinced both major parties hav

ICE is here. The inevitable is happening here in Starr County and all across the Rio Grande Valley. Social media is filled with photos of people being detained. There is impotence. There is anger. There is fear. And sadness. That suffocating feeling in the air has a name: anomie. South Texas is a border region. The people who live here know immigration enforcement. But this is different. Now people are being detained at gas stations, at stores, at churches. Now filming an arr

When Northgate Market floated the idea of a gigante concha rolling down the streets of Pasadena for the Rose Parade, it wasn’t just another pretty float — it was a dare to one of the most traditional stages in the country to make room for us. It was an invitation for Mexican-American families, from East L.A. to the Rio Grande Valley, to see something deeply familiar placed unapologetically at the center of the national gaze. Because let’s be honest: that giant pink concha was

Got a ringing in your ear for the last two days? A wheezing in your chest that won't go away? Forget ChatGPT. Forget WebMD. One message to the group chat and you expect a clear diagnosis. Who cares if your cousin just finished their first semester as a medical assistant. He should know this shit by now. Right? In any Mexican-American household, when a kid announces their acceptance into any medical program, the entire extended family exhales in collective relief. Finally, som

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld stepped to the podium on September 10, 2001, and declared war. Not on a foreign enemy, but on the Pentagon itself. "The topic today is an adversary that poses a threat, a serious threat, to the security of the United States of America," he told the audience. The enemy? Pentagon bureaucracy. The evidence? $2.3 trillion in transactions the Department of Defense couldn't track. This was a financial black hole representing roughly 25% of the enti

Dystopian fiction has always been absurdly far-fetched. No wonder school boards keep banning these books. Too unrealistic for classroom consumption. I blame Tolkien for starting all these dystopian novels with his silly little book Lord of the Rings about Frodo and a Fellowship on a quest to destroy a magic ring. Like who in their right mind would want to destroy a ring with power. That ridiculous premise set the tone for everything that followed. Take Margaret Atwood's The H

People treat kindness like a loan shark treats money. Everything comes with interest, invisible repayment plans, and the nagging suspicion that someone's keeping score. Accept a compliment and watch the mental gymnastics begin. Someone says your hair looks great, and suddenly you're offering detailed credit to your stylist, the humidity levels, and possibly divine intervention. This isn't etiquette. It's a pathology masquerading as good manners. Decades of transactional think

Before Televisa packaged melodrama for screens, Mexican families leaned toward radios and built entire worlds inside their heads. One voice. Sound effects. Music. Everything else came from imagination. That was how Porfirio Cadena entered homes. Not as an image, but as a presence. “¿Por qué se hizo criminal el ojo de vidrio?” The question crackled through speakers starting in the 1950s, crossing Mexico and pushing deep into the United States. The line landed in kitchens, pati

Every December, South Texas transforms into a retail battleground where American holiday shoppers face friendly rivals: Mexican nationals armed with shopping lists and crossing permits. Paisano season officially kicks off on Black Friday. Late November, early December is when families from across Mexico descend upon border cities like Laredo, Roma, Rio Grande City, McAllen, and Brownsville. They come bearing cash, dragging empty suitcases, and wielding determination that woul

Parents accumulate their children's artwork the way receipts pile up in kitchen drawers. Both multiply without effort, serve no practical purpose after creation, and eventually become someone else's problem. The difference is nobody pretends CVS receipts represent profound emotional artifacts worthy of permanent archiving. Schools operate as assembly lines for disposable art projects. Elementary classrooms generate staggering quantities of construction paper turkeys, handprin

I'm watching caravans of vehicles with Mexican plates stream across the road all morning long. The Rio Grande Valley's retail corridors look like Black Friday stretched across an entire month. Parking lots overflow. Cash registers sing. Store managers scramble to restock shelves emptied by Mexican nationals doing their Christmas shopping north of the border. Está hasta a la madre. Everywhere you turn, there are Mexican nationals standing in line to buy what American people ca

I was sitting at my desk preparing to write about Abraham Quintanilla's passing when a Facebook post wishing AB Quintanilla a happy birthday stopped me cold. The algorithmic irony felt almost intentional. Birthdays and death sometimes occupy the same day. Sometimes the universe decides that the anniversary of your arrival should also mark someone else's departure. My best friend died of cancer on her daughter's birthday. My daughter Valeria lost her father on her birthday. Li

A Tribute to Mr. Ricardo Abel Pérez If you were a Roma High School student in the 80s or 90s—or even if your footsteps touched campus decades later—you knew the voice. It wasn’t just heard. It rose. Above the brass of the Mighty Gladiator Band. Above the drumline’s thundering cadence. Above the roar of the stadium on a crisp Friday night. Warm. Booming. Steady. Unmistakable. “Interception by number 34… passing the 40… the 30-yard line… and he’s—touchdown, Roma Gladiators!” An

The Rio Grande flows slow and brown past Roma and Rio Grande City, curling around Starr County like an ancient scar. On quiet nights, you can almost imagine the murmur of voices carried on the wind—men, women, and children whose lives were cut short not by war in foreign lands, but by racial terror at home. When people speak of lynching in America, their minds often leap to the Deep South—to Mississippi or Alabama, to Black men hanging from oak trees under the gaze of grinnin

Growing up on the border meant two lives divided by a river that never stopped flowing. Being the daughter of a father from Laredo and a mother from Garciasville, the question when I got to college—where are you from—was always complicated. When I said Garciasville, the reaction was always in awe: no way, you have your own town?! My childhood was simple and beautiful, but describing life on the outskirts of a small city in a quiet county was difficult to explain to friends in

It’s here. The game everyone’s been waiting for — Roma vs. Rio Grande City. Gladiators vs. Rattlers. Two towns. One border. One championship atmosphere. Down along the South Texas border, football isn’t just a pastime. It’s a season of life. When the Roma Gladiators square off against the Rio Grande City Rattlers, the entire community knows it isn’t just another game on the schedule. This is the game. The rivalry runs deep, fueled by history, geography, and pride between two

When Donald Trump and Melania stepped off the plane in Kerrville, Texas, the sun was high, the wind was still, and the Stetsons started coming off like clockwork. One by one, the Texas officials who walked up to greet them—boots polished, belt buckles gleaming—fully removed their cowboy hats as they approached the First Lady. It wasn’t a performance for the cameras. It was instinct. A muscle memory passed down by generations. Gentlemen take off their hats in a woman’s presenc