Ojo: The "Cholo Word Of The Day" is simply for fun. This is not an academic exercise, therefore I do not spend much time checking for espelling or grammatical errors. Most of the words are not only used by "cholos," but by many people in S. Texas - and their usage can vary. c/s

Monday, July 18, 2005

Ay Emilia! Stay Away.

Hurricane Emily sure is causing headaches for folks along the Gulf of Mexico. I'm lucky, I have fun hurricane stories. Today my pops called me during class to ask if I still had contacts at the local t.v. station because the city was ignoring him. He wanted them to pick up all of the debris (tree branches, rocks, dirt) next to the house (the local community college is building a parking lot) so that the winds would't send all that mugrero crashing over to the house. The city manager had already returned his call by the time I got in touch with him, before my Dad could sick the news on him. I thought it was hillarious. (this is for another post, but he would have never of thought of doing that before I became a reporter and the debris would have probably never been removed -- see, going to college does pay off).

I called home this evening and my folks told me that they had started boarding up the windows, moved all of the lawn chairs and other chingaderas that could fly away into the storage room, and cleaned out the garage to make room for a car. I think the tabla from the window to my old room stayed covering the window for about 6 years and finally fell off last year. We'll see how long those boards last this time - kinda like christmas lights.

When I was a kid, and since we lived in El Campito where the houses weren't very sturdy, we used to go to a shelter everytime a Hurricane came. The red cross ran the joint and chingos of poor families would trickle in as the rains got worse. The red cross provided food and blankets, sometimes. It was interesting. I remember looking across the hall (at the h.s.) and seeing hundreds of people just laying on the floor with their blankets. Every now and then someone would cough and then a flashlight would turn on. My older siblings made friends with the red cross volunteers and they'd become part of the volunteer team. My dad would meet every damn person there while he was walking around the halls whistling. I think I just watched and ran around the school which I thought was huge. Then, the hurricane would be over, and ya. Otra vez. Back home.

We stopped going to shelters when I got to 8th grade I think. I think I missed them for a while. Seeing all of the people there was kind of cool, even though I didn't realize we were there because we didn't have a house that could withstand the storm. I just hope people don't have to go to shelters this year. I hope Emilia stays away.

7 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

Damn, keep us updated. Hopefully they'll be all good. I heard it's starting to get crazy even way over in Monterrey.

9:29 AM

 
Anonymous Anonymous said...

It's 2:11 pm in Kingsville Tx and its just starting to rain .Thats cool because it is so dry .

12:12 PM

 
Blogger Aleksu said...

This is so weird, Emilia visited my family in Cancun just a couple of days ago.

Everyone is doing fine, thankfully.

5:17 PM

 
Blogger Mariposatomica said...

Texican hope your family is doing well and safe.

7:28 PM

 
Blogger Unknown said...

hope all goes well.

8:23 PM

 
Blogger The Art of Brownsville said...

The RGV has survived Emily. No extensive damage and a roof collapsed in Bville, but no harm done. After the storm, we all stepped outside and it looked like a giant toddler rattled all the trees. The streets were littered in debris but there was a nice breeeze. Pero para manana, va hacer chingos de calor con muchos mosquitos! I can already feel the comezon. Eeek!

11:24 PM

 
Blogger john_homan said...

chingaderas...that's my favorite Spanish word. When I don't know what it is, I can just throw that out there and get away with it most of the time, appearing the dumb gringo who doesn't know any better...

8:09 PM

 

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