Frijol Burrito, Disco Lunch, and a Petrified Torta

Frijol Burrito, Disco Lunch, and a Petrified Torta

Mexicanization of America

By R. Chávez

The other day while rematiando I came across a thermos.  It was metal, plaid red and wide mouth especially made for tacos.  Just holding it transported me to a finer and simpler place in time.  The year was 1979, I was four years old.  My familia and I lived in a dairy farm near Pengrove, California, where I learned that cows didn’t chew gum no matter how many sticks of Wrigley’s I tried to get them to eat.

Around this time I commenced my life long odyssey dealing with the issues of identity, self determination, and the cultural negotiation between my pochoness, chicanoness, and my mexico-americanoness.  Society by default had thrown me head first into Octavio Paz’s labyrinth of solitude; that psychological enigmatic condition that tugs us towards our indigenous roots and the same time is in conflict with our conquering European blood. This internal struggle for identity took center stage inside my soul by the time I started attending preschool, thus navigating the American wave became a way of life.  Caramba, those early experiences encapsulated everything that I would spend the rest of my life getting accustomed to when it came to becoming American or more interestingly enough, más mexicano que la chingada. 

The first day of school my jefitos were told by my teacher that I needed a lunch pail. Never before had they seen such a thing because they had never gone to school, but I quickly grasped the concept since all the other kids had them.  Super Friends, Batman, the Incredible Hulk, Wonder Woman, Dukes of Hazard, CHiPs, the Bionic Women, etc.  The idea fascinated me of possibly possessing my own private receptacle for food and at the same time having the images of my favorite cartoon heroes accompanying me and my imagination wherever we might be.   Ah, Eric Estrada, again reliving your 15 minutes of fame in the rigormortis of some distant faded memory of a past that only I can conjure up in thoughts dating back to the 70s. 

Anyhow, I paid close attention to the unpacking sequence that the atypical American kid would undergo everyday at lunch.  Sandwich in a plastic baggy, juice or milk in the thermos, another baggy maybe with Doritos or chocolate chip cookies, Ho’s Ho’s, Twinkies, maybe an ironic apple, orange or a carrot to promote healthy living.  Later that day when I got home after a misunderstood day at school, because no one spoke Spanish, I immediately requested an Incredible Hulk lunch pail.  Please do excuse me señor CHiP Estrada, the green guy is much tougher than you, and you never did bash anyone on your show for that matter. 

So my mother went out to market.  I waited patiently that afternoon for a lime green metal lunch receptacle.  After what seemed an eternity for my four year old self, mamá finally walked in and the wait was over.  She placed a brown paper bag on the kitchen table and…¡Sorpresa! ¡Toma M! To my utter dismay there before me on the kitchen table appeared an orange-burgundy-brownish receptacle of complete hideousness and bewilderment.  The image on this metallic cat coffin depicted dancers doing the jive ala Travolta and a huge mirror ball center stage with the word Disco streaking across the surface of ugly.  I was now the regretful owner of the only Disco lunch pail in existence.  Not Popeye, nor the Love Boat or Gilligan’s Island, no señor, it was 1979 and the Bee Gees were kings and I owned the only Disco lunch pail in existence because no one else would dare buy one in their right mind, except my poor mamá, who thought the image looked great, “Que no vez que están bailando cumbia.”  I was doomed from the get go in my Americanization process.  So much for acculturation or assimilation, I was four, and this frijol was already disappointed with the American Way.  This relic (the Disco lunch pail) of Americana and the bygone era of the 70s was now part of my own personal history forever.

So, I went to school the next day, and yes, with my Disco lunch pail.  There I was pretending to be all chingón, fronting the cool.   All the children, as children are, attempted to decipher the image on the lunch pail but none of us new how to read. Anyhow, it didn’t make any sense and definitely it wasn’t a cartoon we were aware of for that matter.  Then lunch time came and oh boy that took me for a spin deeper into cultural oblivion and further away from my new American heritage.  I popped open my lunch pail and what to my wondering eyes should appear, a thermos filled with tacos wrapped neatly inside aluminum foil steaming, leche in a mason jar, and a papa cosida on the side.  ¡Dios mio! Where are you when I need you? Allí todo sacado de onda I was at the age of four. What would the gringos think? This wasn’t a typical American lunch.  I quickly closed the lid on this Disco inferno and proceeded to hide it and myself behind a bookcase.  Needless to say, this Mexicano did not eat his bean tacos that day.

When I got home my mother was quite concerned for my lack of interest in the campesino style lunch she had prepared for me con amor.  I conveyed to my poor mamá the notion that a good American wouldn’t be caught eating some sort taco out of a thermos.  Instead, I insisted on a delicious mayo, mustard, cheese, and ham sandwich.  Then my jefe chimed in all the way from the dining room, “¿Que pendejo se come tal porqueria seca sin sabor?”  Contrary to popular belief, I would dare to eat a tasteless thing in order to fit in, and anyhow, what did I know about cultura and cuisine at the age of four?  But as slowly as the world turns and the frijoles burn I would soon find out.

The next day, there I was at school trading my pomo de leche for Brady Bunch thermos full of grape Cool Ade, a pair of huevos cocidos for a set of Twinkies, and my roasted chile seco frijol refrito burrito con arroz, carne de rez y crema mexicana for a simple but yet traditional American Oscar Meyer bologna sandwich.  Today, I would dine like an American for the first time. I took a bite, chewed, swallowed and paused.  Then I took another bite and calmly looked for the flavor in my mouth.  After few seconds or so, panic set in.  What happened to the flavor?!  This so called American torta was more like petrified piece of bark from the Dark Ages.  So I quickly took a drink from the grape flavored concoction found in the Brady Bunch thermos to help with the swallowing process.  I gagged bit and quit eating right then and there.  I looked up teary eyed from gagging watched the blond headed little boy whom I traded my burrito with, enjoy every bite.  Coolly and discretely I hid the pair of Twinkies inside a globe of the moon, assuming I would attempt to eat them later.  I was disappointed with my first adventure into gastronomy which had ended in catastrophe.  There had been no wild burst of flavor or no real ingredients. Everything was processed just like the gringo soul.  De a mentiras.

After that day many a gabacho preschooler would line up to work a deal on a trade for a gourmet mamá Chávez burrito or a set of tacos.  From there on after, the food situation became a method of Mexicanizing all who would be interested; I knew what was going down. The Disco lunch pail became legendary; the goose that laid the golden egg, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, a cash cow, culture in a can.  I realized the hustle at the age of four, consumerism, capitalism, and supply and demand.  I had something the gringos wanted and they were willing to give away whatever for it and if it didn’t come to them a las buenas then they would take it a las malas, true to the American way.  Knowing this, I decided at the age of four to stick to the beauty of my culture and not be misguided by the “sin cultura” of the American maze of nothingness and defend it in my own little way.   Hence the Americanization of me stopped where it started.

Once getting past the glitter of the Disco ball trends, bell bottom politics, and suit wearing squares, in this country you have to work with what you got and I got cultura.  It is much deeper and flavorful than processed prepackaged artificial Americanization.  I have enjoyed my mama’s burritos y taquitos to this very day and I wouldn’t trade them for nothing in the world.  No petrified tortas for me. Nel pastel.  La cultura se siente no se vende y no dejen que se las roben. And as for America, carnalitos y carnalitas aqui estamos y no nos vamos. ¡Arriba la Raza!