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San Diego’s Lowrider Women: Carolina’s Hopper

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By Barbara Zaragoza / South Bay Compass

Two kinds of lowrider cars stand out: show cars and hoppers. Marisa Rosales and Jose Arevalo are good examples of lowriders who have worked for two decades to perfect their show cars.

Carolina Hernandez, on the other hand, is the lowrider with the hopper—a car whose front hood can bounce up in the air.

‘Hopping’ cars has been an art form since the 1960s. It wasn’t fully perfected, however, until the mid-1970s. Back in the day, they would put a beer can next to the car and if your car was able to hop higher than the beer can, you gained celebrity status among lowriders. Nowadays, when hoppers get together casually or at competitions such as Extreme Autofest, they can hop their cars up to eighty inches high.   [Read more…]

Women Lowriders in San Diego County: Marisa Rosales and The Hudson

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By Barbara Zaragoza / South Bay Compass

Lowriding is an art that also pushes car technology to the limits. Car Clubs members are like family and lowriders spend decades restoring cars to exactly how they looked and rode in the 1960s and 1970s.

Are there problems in the lowriding community? Yes, but probably not the ones you think. Lowriders, with their images of voluptuous girls on the front hoods, still remains a manly art form. Yes, nowadays diverse males from all ethnic and socio-economic groups join together in these car clubs, but they are still predominantly male. In San Diego County, Mayra Nuñez explains there are about seven women lowriders total, each in different car clubs.   [Read more…]

Anatomy Of A Lowrider: The Standards, The Art, The Technology

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To join a car club or win awards at car shows, every lowrider needs to adhere to strict standards. Standard #1: the car must be impeccably clean.

Jose Arevalo, born and raised in National City, explains the standards while giving me a tour of his car.

Arevalo is a member of the Switch Car Club, established in National City in 1980. “How switch came together was, six of us guys played baseball together down in Las Palmas here locally. As we turned fourteen or fifteen years old we started getting cars. The club right there, the Latin Lowriders, were older guys, so we kinda looked up to them. They are the kind of group of people who showed us standards. Things that you do. How to act. How to be correct. During the early mid-1980s, Switch flourished and grew to be from 6 guys to 36 guys. From the early 80s to the late 80s we were one of the top clubs in San Diego.”   [Read more…]

Lowriders in San Diego: Jose Romero Tells The History

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By Barbara Zaragoza / South Bay Compass

Low-RI-der. We all know the 1975 song by Jerry Goldstein, but do we really understand the history, art and technology lowriders have contributed to our American culture?

I’m here to find out and Jose Romero is first up to tell us a little bit about lowriding history.

Jose Romero, a member of the Klique car club, the oldest continuous running car club in San Diego, has been lowriding for over 40 years. He explains that lowriding is a talent he’s had since childhood.   [Read more…]

Lowriders Return To Highland Avenue in National City

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And the National City Mayor is joining them

By Barbara Zaragoza / Southbay Compass

After many decades of clashes with the city council and police department in National City, lowriders again take Highland Avenue by storm, this time packing the parking lot of Foodland Mercado on Highland Avenue for Taco Tuesdays to show off their hoppers and show cars.

On Tuesday, July 28th even the National City Mayor, Ron Morrison, attended. He strolled past the vintage cars and posed for a picture with lowriders from several different car clubs.

Mayor Morrison said, “This is like an art fair because these cars are more like art than anything else.”   [Read more…]

Filipino-American Community Wins Big In Chula Vista Districting

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The Chula Vista City Council unanimously approved the boundaries for 4 election districts on Tuesday, July 14th, a historic moment for the second largest city in San Diego County that has held at-large elections until now.

In 2012, 62.7% of voters passed Proposition B that mandated Chula Vista be divided into four voting districts. The City then created a temporary Districting Commission and appointed seven volunteer commissioners. …

As a final step, the Districting Commission sent the map to City Council, which could approve the map or vote to send it back to the Commission for revisions.   [Read more…]

The Filipino-American Tour of the South Bay

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By Barbara Zaragoza / South Bay Compass

Ethnic enclaves are generally defined by a cluster of stores and eateries that feature culinary delights from a specific country from abroad. Within that cluster of businesses, you’ll usually hear that foreign language being spoken. In addition, there will often be a religious organization (usually a church) in the vicinity where the members of that ethnicity go to worship, but also come together as a community to support one another.

So how do you like my definition?…It’s imperfect for sure, but I am fascinated by residents who identify with more than just one country and one “ethnic” label.   [Read more…]

An Inside Look at A Green Alternative in Otay Mesa, San Diego’s First Legit Pot Shop

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By Barbara Zaragoza / South Bay Compass

Eye On The Locals: I’m a curious person and when I see something historic happening in my community, I feel an urgent need to document and ask questions. When A Green Alternative opened in Otay Mesa on March 20, 2015 — only two blocks from a major U.S.-Mexico port of entry — I couldn’t help but find out more.

A Green Alternative is the first medicinal marijuana dispensary that has legally opened in the City and County of San Diego. It’s a historic moment, highly controversial and located in my neck of the wood–the South Bay. So I walked right up to the storefront security guard and asked for an interview.   [Read more…]

The San Diego-Tijuana Boundary Monuments

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By Barbara Zaragoza

In 1848, the U.S.-Mexican War ended with the signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. The treaty stipulated that Mexico relinquish 1.2 million square miles of its territory to the United States in return for $15 million. It also assigned a Joint U.S. and Mexican Boundary Commission to determine the exact location of the new boundary line.

The Commission consisted of a large caravan of men, including a commissioner and a surveyor for both sides. The drawing of the boundary line took two years to complete–from 1849 to 1851. The Joint Commission erected 52 boundary monuments with #1 overlooking the Pacific Ocean in what today is Border Field State Park.   [Read more…]

Sweetwater Reservoir

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By Barbara Zaragoza / South Bay Compass

Editor Note: The ongoing drought conditions in the region have impacted the availability of our water resources. The Sweetwater Reservoir is one of those resources.

While some may claim that the South Bay is filled with concrete and suburban McHomes, city planners have done much to preserve our green spaces. The Sweetwater Summit Campground is a wonderful little example.

You might consider it lackluster IF you are looking for “Disneyland” entertainment, but this low-key regional park hosts a playground with water works, 500-acres of trails and roaming animals that include the southern pacific rattlesnake, the coyote and the bobcat.   [Read more…]

When Home Doesn’t Feel Like Home

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The Human Face Of Border Crossers

On Friday, May 8th The Front Art and Culture Center in San Ysidro presented a first reading of Raul Castillo’s Border Crossing, a play that explores the nuances of the migrant experience.

Micah Parzen, CEO of the San Diego Museum of Man, commissioned the piece as a way to launch a deeper conversation about immigration. He asked the La Jolla Playhouse to find a playwright and also contacted the National Conflict Resolution Center to collaborate. He then worked with The Front—located less than a mile from the largest land port of entry in the world—to host a trial reading with six actors sitting in a circle surrounded by an intimate audience.   [Read more…]

The Russians In Mexico

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By Barbara Zaragoza / South Bay Compass

Vestiges still exist of Los Rusos or the Russian immigrants who came to the Guadalupe Valley in 1905. You’ll find a small house, a restaurant and a winery at Familia Samarin about 15 miles north-east of Ensenada.

This vanished ethnic enclave once brimmed with a wide street where inhabitants spoke Russian and wheat fields stretched through the valley. This fascinating community disappeared within a generation, but several websites exist that document their life in Northern Baja.   [Read more…]

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