Category: Special Events

Once again, I had the wonderful occasion to dress up. I used my previous Halloween costume, which was the Black Angel.  Since my friends were throwing a Hollywood-themed birthday party, my Black Angel costume magically transformed into a Lady Gaga costume, but once I walked through the VIP stage door entrance, people added to the characters I could possibly be: Madonna, Cruella Deville, a hooker (suggested by one desperate man I wouldn’t have sex with even for money!) and Dennis Rodman (by some guy who obviously needs his eyes checked since I’m WAAAY more attractive!).

Only a handful of people actually dressed up as characters and I managed to take a picture with most of them. What I liked the most about the guy who dressed up as Pan, was his attractive tail; so I showed my attractive capoeira and bikram yoga toned ass.

I cornered the birthday girl in order to take a picture.  I’m not sure which glamor doll she was dressed as, but soon after our picture, she and a woman dressed as Mata Hari, got too close to one another and experienced a wardrobe malfunction that took a few minutes to detach.

Next I posed with a friend who originally wanted to dress up  as Erik Estrada from “Chips,” but at the last moment, the costume shop called him and said that the helmet had been misplaced. He quickly threw together an appreciable “Blues Brothers” costume.

Most of the party goers were salseros. Many who I recognized, but had forgotten their names. I used to be an avid salsera myself, but then I burned out on the whole scene and switched to tango. As a matter of fact, for my 40th birthday celebration, I created an all-day itinerary so that friends could choose which event(s) they wanted to attend.  The birthday boy came during the beginning tango class and continued to take tango lessons long enough to meet the birthday girl. After dating for a few weeks, he introduced her to salsa and they both stopped dancing tango and pursued salsa!

 Another friend, who looked like she was a sexy native American (I’m not sure which one) posed with me in my favorite shot of the evening. I normally don’t like having my picture taken from an upward angle, but this actually worked. I think the wig helped destroy any illusion of me having a double chin. Or the photographer was far away that I didn’t create one.  

I don’t know if the pseudo-Oscars were given away at the end of the night for any special categories since I left around half past midnight. I normally don’t go out on Friday nights; so even though the party was jumping, I had already had full day of teaching high school Physics, followed by yoga. Besides, as wonderful as my costume was, my waterproof leather boots were not good for the lightining speed turns involved in salsa.

This past Saturday, I had the opportunity to speak out against something that has been one of my biggest challenges to educating my students here in Austin, the lethal effects of high-stakes testing. The Citizens United to Amend organized a rally in order to change the legislation that equated money with free speech and declared corporations as people. This action has far-reaching ramifications and the speakers at the rally came from vastly different organizations to encourage the crowd to call on their representatives to do away with this law.

As I approached the State Capitol, I saw a huge crowd of people gathered at the north side, which was the opposite location of where I expected them to be. As I came closer, I saw several banners with assault rifles on them. I walked slowly through the crowd of second amendment enthusiasts to the south side of the Capitol where a dramatically smaller crowd of about 100 people stood.

I felt inspired, listening to the other speakers encouraging us to do all we could to get big money out of politics. I knew that the president of Education Austin was scheduled to speak, but I did not realize that another teacher was also on the line up. I briefly worried that she’d say the things I’d planned to say, but her speech was dedicated to speaking against corporate-funded charter schools and their lobbying groups.  

I was the third educator to speak and unlike my predecessors, I didn’t have my speech (pasted below in its entirety)  memorized. Instead, I read my one-page, single-spaced speech off my smartphone, which wasn’t too smart an idea, given the fact that I was facing direct sunlight.  Nonetheless, I delivered my speech with as much verve as I do my usual spoken word performance. As soon as I was done, the crowd applauded, several people congratulated me and a cute little blonde girl handed me a piece of paper, which I figured was an announcement for an upcoming education rally. I thanked her without reading it and folded it into my pocket for later.

Once “later” came, I remembered the paper, took it out of my pocket and much to my surprise, it was a flyer about the pro gun rally! I don’t know if her parents intentionally wanted their daughter to give a teacher a pro gun flyer or if they had encouraged her to hand them out indiscriminately. Either way, I’m glad she gave me the reminder to complain about the enthusiasm of arming educators.

Of all the crazy ideas that I’ve heard since living in Texas, intentionally putting weapons in the hands of educators is one that hits very close to home. Not only would that increase school shootings, but the increase in liability alone should make this bad idea undoable. Yet, if anyone actually figures out a way to make this bad idea cost-effective, public school will become one of the most dangerous places to send one’s child. The next “logical” step will be programs where future teachers could earn their combined teaching and gun license!

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Over twenty years ago, one of the prevailing mantras that new teachers were told was that one did not go into education for the money. You entered the profession because you cared about kids. Today, we need to make sure that everyone, not just new teachers, hears that message.

With the growing number of corporations getting into the education business, we educators, parents and students need to be vigilant that the quality of education is not sacrificed for the sake of making big business even richer at the cost of our students.

Isn’t ironic that there’s always money to administer standardized tests, hire test coordinators, buy computers for students to take an electronic version of the test, but never enough money to hire more teachers to lower classroom size or even fund an adequate number of science experiments? The only hands-on activity that Texas public school students are absolutely guaranteed to do is bubble an answer document to a standardized test.

 That’s because the state of Texas will have spent over a billion dollars from 2000 to 2015 to Pearson Education. With that much money directed to a standardized testing company, it’s no wonder why I’m forced to teach to the test. The truth is, for the most academically vulnerable students, the best strategy to improve their education is to lower the classroom size so that every student receives more one-on-one interaction with the teacher. Academic achievement is not accomplished through an increasing number of money-making high-stakes tests.

When corporations use their money to influence how public schools are run, they effectively silence us, the public. Our tax dollars that are earmarked for education should be used in a manner that best educate our students. As long as we remain silent, corporations will continue lobbying to safeguard their latest cash cow.

Over the past four years that I’ve been a teacher with AISD, I have watched my classroom size grow, the teaching staff shrink and more of my time consumed in preparing for and proctoring standardized tests. I’m forced to merely touch the surface of certain topics with the rationale that students only need to know enough to pass whichever standardized test that’s currently being bought.

The objectives should not be the limit of knowledge, but rather the basis of what students learn.  I struggle to give my students more, but I’m confined by time constraints, assessment schedules and very limited resources.

What I can do, however, is speak up. I speak for my students who don’t realize how their education is being shortchanged. I speak up for parents who, whenever I call, they are always willing to do anything in their power to help their child be successful. And I speak for my fellow educators who give 110%, knowing full well that they will not be paid a cent more.

Every birthday is special since I can measure where I was the previous year and where I currently am. It’s just amazing the things I’ve done and looking forward to doing since the last birthday. This time around, I scanned the paper and saw that one of my favorite Brazil bands was playing at a free venue. No need to plan an elaborate party…just go to where one would occur!

I took advantage of having Labor Day off to make my own birthday cake, white chocolate and pomegranate cheesecake.  I was anxious to make it again since I had some improvements I wanted to try out the second time around. So, I’d eagerly look in on the cheesecake chilling in the freezer, waiting to be devoured on Friday’s celebration.

I only heard from one friend who was meeting me for dinner and dancing, but several others showed up and we started with dessert first. Half of my friends got up to forro. Nonetheless, everyone agreed that the band was very good even if they didn’t care to dance. I was amazed that none of them had ever heard of the band prior to this. In a way, I’m proud that I introduced them to a new band in this vast “live music capital of the world” sea.

After all was eaten, danced, and talked, I returned home to watch a movie. A little earlier than I’d cared to get up on a Saturday morning, I went to the capoeira studio to meet the guy who was dropping off the chairs for Sunday’s Austin Writers Roulette. I then returned home to take a mid-morning nap and get some other things done before returning to the capoeira studio to rehearse for our big show later Saturday night.

My capoeira teacher had an ambitious plan for the Brazil Independence Day celebration that took place at a downtown club. The event organizer had given us a 30-minute slot and the graduado students choreographed two dances, my capoeira teacher put together a capoeira choreography and then we ended the show, playing benguela, regional then solos. It was the most ambitious, impressive show we’d put together so far. I was so happy to be part of that community at large. The other members of the line up included five bands and the samba school.

A few capoeiristas complimented my playing ability, teasing me about how I avoided roda on Thursdays, but happily played during presentations. All I can say is that I’m attempting to avoid injury as much as possible. At my age, nothing heals like it used to!

Once again, I stayed up a little too late and had to wake up a bit earlier than I cared to, but I definitely needed to go to yoga this morning after missing it on Friday. So, rounding out my birthday weekend, I’m hosting the roulette and all I really want to do is take a nap.  Yet, the show must go on. I’ve got a wonderful line up for the “Beauty in Other Cultures” event and I trust that this show is going to be the best of three that we’ve had so far. As a matter of fact, this show has the most diversity among the participating artists.

Thank goodness school’s on Monday…I need the rest.

Recently, an indy filmmaking friend of mine sent out a casting call for extras. I forwarded the email to my capoeira group, my professional writing group and my Austin PR list. Out of nearly 200 people, only one other person answered the call for yesterday’s shoot at the Republic Square farmers’ market. When I introduced my capoeira friend to my filmmaking friend, her eyes lit up and she immediately invited him to play a little capoeira for the opening scene.

He jumped at the opportunity to make his cinematic capoeira debut. Yet, capoeira isn’t an individual sport.  Fortunately, one of the lead actors in the film also knew how to play capoeira since yours truly here was not about to get extra funky. After all, sweat was already streaming freely down my back just by me standing on the scene. I planned to go to two tango lessons after the film shoot.  For once, I’d be the smelly tanguero in class! (I shared that with another tango student just before our first class and he said that I’d get another free pass at being smelly since I didn’t hit the funky mark.)

I did, however, make my capoeira lead singing debut, both off and on camera. I managed to get the crowd doing the three rhythmic capoeira soul claps as I sang. One other woman in the crowd was brave enough to repeat what I sang as a response to my lead. Unfortunately, she sang the lyrics a little incorrectly, but something’s better than nothing!  At any rate, I figured I could always email my  filmmaker friend once they start postproduction.  She can always record the song over, using two female capoeiristas–I just hope that the whole scene isn’t deleted.

Regardless, I have another opportunity to make it in the final cut since I stood behind the principal actors during the crowd scene. I’d love to see the footage of how we did pretending to see an imaginary helicopter overhead, pretending to listen to a motivational speech and then cheering on one of the main characters.

I now have a newfound respect for actors. It’s very challenging to “get into character” with just a little backstory of what we were doing/reacting to in the scene. Nonetheless, I’m excited to see how much magic is worked in postproduction. Plus, I’m recruiting writers, photographers, and lyricists for the upcoming “Beauty in Other Cultures” roulette in September!

This weekend, I actually challenged my culinary skills by trying out two new recipes and getting a private cooking lesson. For my friend’s upcoming birthday party, I chose to make a cheesecake.  Since her capoeira nickname means “pomegranate” in Portugese, I looked up the recipe for a white chocolate and pomegranate cheesecake. For my private cooking lesson, I chose an all-time vegetarian favorite, couscous and vegetable stirfry, since the lesson would focus on the proper way to chop veggies. Lastly, one of the characters in the novel that I’m currently working on, makes up her own recipe for blueberry pancakes; so I chose this morning to see if the recipe actually resulted in a pancake!

I prepared the cheesecake a few hours prior to my cooking lesson.  Although I’ve been making cheesecakes for years, I was pretty excited about trying out this new recipe since, for the first time in life, I had to buy a springform pan and I would make use of my blender. All of my cheesecakes either have graham cracker or oreo cookie crusts. For this version, the recipe directed me to put the whole oreo cookies into the blender.  After 1o seconds, all those cookies were pulverized.  Pleased with the results, I called Mom to let her know this wonderful time-saving step. I then read to her the tip of putting hot water into a casserole pan at the bottom of the oven while the cheesecake was in the middle.  Once the cheesecake finished baking, the instructions said to turn off the oven, crack the oven door and let it cool.  The water bath was supposed to prevent the cheesecake from cracking.  Not only did the cheesecake crack, but the crack formed an interesting shape. Even later on, when my friend helped me to decoratively hide the crack, it took on an interesting design, which reminded me of a jumping woman.

For the coucous and vegetable stirfry, I bought a sweet potato, a red onion, yellow squash, zucchini, roma tomatoes and collard greens. I’ve been on a collard greens kick for two weeks now and I swear that that leafy green is causing me to crave fried chicken! My friend brought over his special set of knives and his own wok. He taught me the proper way to hold the knife and chop round veggies, especially onions.  Whenever he quizzed me how I normally chopped up certain things, my answer was the same: I put them in the blender.

As he chopped away, I made the dry spice mix (in the blender, of course) and prepared the pearl couscous, which I prefer over the regular, smaller-grained couscous. Had I known before hand that there would be a battle over adding fresh mint to the stirfry, I would have simply blended it with the other spices instead of setting it beside him to hand chop as he’d done with the garlic and onions that were sauted before the other ingredients were added. I gently handed him a “branch” of mint that consisted of 5 or 6 leaves. He accepted the compromise since the original recipe called for 1/2 cup of mint.

The  next day the double chocolate cheesecake was a big hit at the birthday party . Not a soul knew that the milk chocolate on top had been added merely to disguise the split. As a matter of fact, I think the next time I make that cheesecake, I’m going to assume that it’ll split and have a white chocolate sauce for to cover it and then cover that with the pomegranate sauce with white chocolate shavings. In addition to eating the food I prepare, I find it’s  entertaining to test out new recipes and modify them to suit my creativity.

So, Sunday’s blueberry pancake experiment truly took the cake, so to speak.  In the current novel that I’m working on, The Adventures of Infinity and Negativa, Infinity describes to her twin sister how she prepares the batter:

           “Well, my favorite way for making blueberry pancakes is to use twice as much flour as milk. And then I mix in a fourth of the amount of milk in oil.”

            “Milk and oil. Fascinating,” Negativa said, shoving in a mouthful of pancakes.

            Gaining momentum, Infinity continued. “I follow a one to one ratio for cups of flour and eggs. Then, for every egg, I’ll use an equal number of tablespoons of sugar.  And for every tablespoon of sugar, half the number of teaspoons of salt, but double the number of teaspoons of baking powder. And get this,” she paused, waiting for Negativa to raise her head from her feeding frenzy to make eye contact, “with a total disregard of mathematical measurement, I’ll toss in as many fresh blueberries as I care to and gently fold them into my mathematically precise blueberry batter!”

Since I was preparing this only for myself, here are the measurements I used, following the above formula:

1 cup of flour

1/2 cup almond milk

1/8 cup (= 2 tablespoons) oil

1 egg

1 tablespoon sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons baking powder

handful of blueberries

I definitely had “experimental error” in the form of overshooting the prescribed amounts of flour, milk, and salt.  I’m usually not too precise with my cooking measurements to begin with, but my end result was a tad saltier than I generally like. That little problem was remedied if the pancake was dripping with syrup. Needless to say, I’ll have to try it again, showing more attention to my measurements. In the end, the result was an edible pancake that rose beautifully, despite the slanted burner it cooked on. Next time I have a private cooking lesson, I want to learn how to flip a pancake although I think making several smaller pancakes will probably be my best bet.

Last night was a confirmation of just why I love life in Austin.  One pivotal member of the tango community, especially the part of the community that takes classes at EsquinaTango, has been suffering health problems along with the accompanying exorbitant costs. As a creative fundraising idea, one of our regular milongas was turned into an entertaining cultural event where all the proceeds went to Tom.

A committee was formed to plan out the evening, which consisted of Indian themed cloth to decorate the space, a group of Bollywood dancers who practiced especially to perform for the evening, Indian food and of course, our tango teachers performed. 

I arrived just in time for the tango and Bollywood performances, which meant that I totally missed the tango dancing for the evening. Nonetheless, I had danced about 6 luxurious hours of tango in the past week; so I didn’t feel that I missed out on too much.  Besides, when I entered, the tango line of dance looked far too crowded to be much fun.

I went to the back room to change shoes and returned to the dance hall to pour myself a glass of wine and enjoy the performances. I was so delighted to see Tom again and he seemed in such good spirits that so many people would come together in his honor.  Here’s a man who tirelessly gave a lot of his time and carpentry skills to renovate the space that we all have come to love.

We were forewarned not to expect a speech from him, but Tom was so moved by the turn out and mix of people that the room hushed to hear his wise words, advising us that if we enjoyed multicultural events such as the one we were currently attending, then we should do all that we could to support our little tango school. I couldn’t agree more.

Not only did the tango and Bollywood communities had come together, but many of us reached deep into our closets to retrieve our Indian attire for the event. So often at milongas, people stick to dark colors, especially black, and usually contrast black with either white and/or red. What a visual relief to see bright greens, blues, yellows and oranges. The festiveness of the swirling colors added to the positive fun energy.

After the performances, the crowd thinned since most of the pure tangueros left. Those of us who stayed did our best to dance to Indian music, which had quite a range from traditional to hip-hop and reggaeton. A few salsas and cumbias were mixed in, but every single song inspired sweat-drenched movement.

Before I left, I cooled down with a glass of water in front of a fan and I also suggested to one of the tango teachers that Esquina should have an ethnic-themed milonga at least once a season. Monthly would be a little too often, but we should not wait until one of our members needed help. We should be proactively embracing the talent and cultural population that we have.

This year’s family reunion had a wonderful surprise: pictures of the original twelve Strange siblings, especially my guardian angel since I’ve been traveling around the world and living in Austin, my Papa, Floyd B. Strange.

And I was especially moved to see my grandmother, who married into the Strange family, was the first Avon lady in Cascade, VA, could spin entertaining stories while cooking up delicious food, Mama Bea, Beatrice (Adams) Strange.

As I studied the sepia-toned pictures of my ancestors two generations before me, I was filled with a sadness that I only had a thin volume summary, given the wealth of life experience these twelve siblings and their spouses represented. One result of the closeness of the dozen siblings is that we’ve just celebrated our 71st Strange family reunion.

Last year at the family reunion, I made my novel reading debut, which had been a bit nerve-wracking since I could scarcely find an excerpt that contained kid-friendly language. I chose to read a BBQ scene since it dealt with food, a highlight of our family reunion. I sold several books based on the double-entendre with (meat)balls. As a matter of fact, one of my cousins informed me that she loved reading Tribe of One so much that she completed it in two weeks.  She kept laughing about all of Salome’s antics.

This year, instead of doing another reading, I gave all members of my immediately family a Tribe of One t-shirt in order to “represent.”

Yet the main two reasons I attend our yearly family reunions are to catch up with relatives who I hardly ever talk with throughout the rest of the year and to eat too much delicious food that will take me about a month to exercise off!

There are some fabulously creative people here in Austin and occasionally, several of them get together and do wonderful, enlightening things. One such occasion was the special lunch that I attended this past Thursday at 11th Street Station. For the second weekend in a row, the Black Arts Movement festival had lined up a selection of Black artists, starting with political poet, Amiri Baraka.

As usual, the morning had gotten away from me. When my cell alerted me that I had 15 minutes to get to the restaurant, I raced around the apartment to get ready. I put my game face on as I walked to the back room  of the restaurant, but to my relief, Baraka had not arrived. Fortunately, I had a chance to reconnect with another writer and meet a large round table of others.

When our guest of honor finally arrived, most of us local writers, who were mostly poets, had arrived. After taking a brief opinion poll that chicken and waffles were the way to go, Baraka first asked how many of us were published. Then he asked how many of us were self-published. I’ve heard so many mixed messages, concerning self publication, but I was initially surprised by Baraka’s reasoning: institutions never published writers whose work deals with bringing down those very institutions; therefore, it was up to us to make sure that our work is published. He told us about how he had self published his own two-page newspaper back when he was in middle school, writing every copy by hand.

Baraka then wanted to go around the table and hear which poets had influenced us. Fortunately for me, the outspoken writer to my left, suggested that discussion begin with the poets on the other side of the table, which meant that I would blessedly go last. I estimated that I would have at least 30 minutes to think of an intelligent answer.  I felt like one of my students who had not done the reading all along and now the teacher had given us a pop quiz.

Name the poet who has had an influence on my writing?! Now, I occasionally read poetry, but the greatest influence on my writing has been traveling and living in other countries. I write to document significant moments in my life. I write fiction so that the main characters talk and think through the everyday drama of their experiences.

As the enlightening conversation unfolded, my anxiety of being an unprepared student subsided. I sat there, drinking in the other artist’s experiences, which were all the more interesting since we all had the additional connection of being “community caregivers”: teachers, teen counselors, financial counselors for low-income adults, event organizers, anthropology graduate students. 

Baraka led us down another conversational path when he stated that presently, there was a whitewashing of the political history of  the 60s. We all agreed that in general, the quality of education had lowered. One guy, who was orginially from Chicago, testified about the dumbing down of education. As soon as he came to Texas in 1988, he hit a huge barrier of not fitting in. Not unusual for the new kid, but he vividly recalled being teased for using big words, reading a lot and so on.

After he shared his story, I was nearly bursing out of my skin to share my background. I explained that I began writing so I could remember every detail of my Peace Corps service in Tanzania as a Biology and math teacher. I then summarized my international teaching experience and concluded with the fact that I’d taught my students outside the States at a much higher level than what is expected here in Texas despite the zealous emphasis on standardized testing.

Before the lunch had ended, I exchanged information with most of the local artists in order to send them information about the Austin Writers Roulette. The few artists whose information I had not received, I caught up with later that night at Baraka’s performance. Two of the local artists opened for Baraka and I was blown away at how I had never heard of such great talents until that day. I hope they will make time in their busy professional and performance schedules to participate in the roulette.

Once Baraka came to the stage, three local jazz musicians accompanied him–a pianist, an upright bassist and a drummer. Their music provided an aural backdrop that rose, dipped and punctuated the selections Baraka read. He started off with about 20 “low-kus,” which was his variation of haikus. The short pithy poems did not follow any numerical format. My favorite one dealt with the fact that rich people ate more than poor people; so rich people are full of more sh*t. He ended his hourlong performance with an epic poem about 9/11, which occurred when he was poet laureate.  

As beautifully packaged as Baraka’s political, poetic messages were, I also experienced nearly the extreme opposite when I attended Paul Mooney’s performance on Saturday. My friend had wanted to sit closer to the stage, but I did not want to tempt a comedic berating from a man infamous for his raw humor. Although Mooney dabbled with some polticial jokes, such as the ridiculousness of Trump questioning Obama’s citizenship (“Trump forgets that he and Obama both came from a white vagina!”), my personal favorite was, “My grandmother told her granddaughters ‘Don’t you come back home broke ’cause a dry purse and a wet p*ssy don’t go together.'”

Although Mooney never once mentioned Tupac, the bandana around his bald head caused me to recall the political messages of the slain rapper. I don’t believe that association was coincidence.

This weekend was a fantastic reminder that despite the grimness of politics, be it work, local, state, national or global, I can always write about it and share my observations through artistic expressions.