firehose

Let’s get one thing clear, women have always been part of the mezcal industry. Historically mezcal production has been a family affair and women were intimately wound into most aspects from selling the mezcal at markets, to preparing the meals, to handling the finances, to actually making mezcal. What seems to be the new trend is women actually getting recognition for their part.

This has been an area of interest for me since, well, mezcal has been of interest to me. As a woman, navigating the very macho world of spirits in general, and then specifically mezcal in Mexico, I can’t help but be drawn to this.

Today, women who are running mezcal businesses are few in number, though perhaps growing. Graciela Angeles Carranza of Real Minero is perhaps the greatest example of a woman at the helm of a family business who has grown it exponentially and is now shipping product around the world. Then you have Reyna Sanchez who learned how to make mezcal from family and has been producing fantastic mezcals while she works her way through the labyrinth of certification. I first met her in November of 2012 when she was making mezcal out of her cousin’s palenque in San Luis Amatlan. Through a grant, she built her own palenque and is known in Oaxaca for her madrecuishe and tepestate. You also have women like Sosima Olivera Aguilar who works with a collective in the Sierra Sur of Oaxaca and sells to bars, restaurants, and mezcalerias in Oaxaca.  And of course you have others like Andrea Sánchez López of Aguas del Corazon mezcal, and Cecilia Murrieta of La Niña del Mezcal who have founded their own brands and work with mezcaleros in Oaxaca, and in the case of Cecilia, now Jalisco.

It makes for a great story: Women are beating the odds and finding economic opportunity in a male dominated industry! But I wonder just what the reality is. After all, Mexico really is a bastion of machismo in all its subtle and explicit varieties. So, this last trip I made a point of visiting the female mezcaleros I know and searching for any that I’d been missing.

I started by telling Ulises Torrentera – mezcal expert extraordinaire and co-proprietor of Oaxaca’s In Situ – that I was interested in meeting women who were making mezcal and he made it a point of introducing me to various women at the Maestros event I went to in Oaxaca.  I was fascinated by one in particular,Oliva Ramírez Laoreano, primarily because at 22 she is very young, and because she doesn’t fit the mold of the classic off the grid mezcalero that I frequently meet. I’m used to meeting men with hardened hands and little experience with contemporary life while Olivia was texting away on her phone and just like a 22-year-old anywhere. At the Maestros event Oliva was pouring tobala, espadin and some of her cremas. The latter lends itself to lots of confusion because the literal English translation is “cream” but no dairy products are present in a mezcal crema, they are actually fruit based mezcals, usually blends with jamaica or tamarind. We chatted briefly at the Maestros event and then made plans for a visit her in Sola de Vega, where she lives.

While at the Maestros event I also met anthropologist Ronda Brulotte, a professor at the University of New Mexico who is working on a huge research project about mezcal. We got together for breakfast a few days later in Oaxaca and talked through some of the issues and questions she has when discussing women and their role in the mezcal industry. While I tend to focus on the role of women as mezcaleras, Ronda digs deeper and has been asking whether the visibility of women in the mezcal world means that the deeper economics are changing. She wonders whether mezcal is actually bringing in more money to the families that make it and whether that’s changing the economics within the family income structure and whether women are getting more power or just sitting in traditional roles. After that breakfast it was quite clear that the story that we’d all love to believe, of  a trend of women making mezcal, just isn’t that simple. We are seeing more female faces in the business when it comes to marketing and pr but we don’t have any data to show there are more women making mezcal so it’s very possible that this whole idea is just wishful thinking. That really weighed on my mind as I got ready to meet up with Oliva.

The drive to Sola de Vega is beautiful – especially because it was the rainy season when everything is verdant. Coming from drought stricken California I felt like a broken record – it’s so green, oh my god look how green everything is, it’s just so, wow, green. Located in what is called the Sierra Sur, it is mountainous and reknown for tobala. Like all road trips, there is always a hitch, this one being we had no cell service and had to stop at a miscellenea to use a landline to figure out where were supposed to meet Oliva. I point this out to anyone wanting to do excursions outside of Oaxaca to more remote areas of Mexico – always have a communications back up plan, and consider making sure any cell plan is with Telcel as Carlos Slim seems to have negotiated contracts for the most coverage. We were supposed to head to a supply store and, after some initial confusion as to which exact supply store, we found one other and headed out to the palenque she was using.

In addition to Oaxaca’s own Mezcalista, Ana JB, and I there was Oliva, her brother, her uncle, and a cousin. Thankfully the drive to the palenque was only about 25 minutes and the road not so badly rutted. Located in a beautiful, narrow valley, the palenque was simple and, at this time, still inactive. There was one wood fermentation barrel, four clay distillation pots, and a chipper to crush the cooked maguey. I want to get back to the chipper question later, for now I have a clear appreciation for their utility given how labor intensive mezcal making is. Some people claim that doing all the shredding by hand or with the tahona creates a clear difference in flavor so I really want to set up a tasting to evaluate this question. There was also plenty of maguey in the surrounding fields. The palenque is apparently certified and I am sure that factored into the reason Oliva wanted to use space.

View inside palenque in Sola de Vega

Clay pots in Sola de Vega

July is when people are usually planting corn so most mezcal production is on hiatus for these smaller guys. The palenque is owned by a great uncle who has been making mezcal his whole life. Oliva is learning from him and her grandfather. Her brother, who is younger, probably about 18 or 19, has been helping as well, providing the much needed muscle for this back breaking work. The two of them are without doubt, the most beautiful palenqueros I have ever met. Most of this was explained by Oliva’s uncle, who did most of the talking about the project. It is his hope to create a cooperative of female mezcal makers, a noble concept, which he was clearly passionate about.

I have to admit, I was skeptical of all of this. Was Oliva actually making mezcal, or was she reselling her great uncle’s mezcal? Was she a front for a great story or is this the beginning of what could be a great economic driver for women in the cooperative? And if it is a legitimate project, how many other female mezcal makers are actually out there to make up a cooperative? Then there were other questions – Oliva had studied psychology in school so why would she return home to make mezcal? As I spoke with her uncle, she was quiet and not engaged, and when I asked her why she wanted to do this she really couldn’t answer.

I ended up buying a couple of liters of espadin from her great uncle. A strong, what I call mezcal del campo, I paid 200 pesos to his wife before climbing back into the car to go to Oliva’s house near the center of town to taste her mezcal.

Maguey starts, Sola de Vega

This was where everything changed and Oliva became completely engaged and animated- where she and her brother showed me the maguey starts they had going in the yard next to the house – a mix of tobala, tepestate, and sierra negra. We then sat down at the table, Oliva got glasses and began pouring – first cremas and then espadin and tobala. I am not a huge fan of the cremas, but I have to say, hers were pretty delicious and would make great cocktail mixers as well as playing key roles in the kitchen. I mentioned how they would be great reduced to syrups and poured over roasting meat or used on bread or tortillas with cheese. She immediately pulled out some queso and we began tasting the different combinations of the jamaica and tamarindo. And then there was the straight up mezcal which was quite tasty and showed skill and talent. Ironically, I would have bought the cremas, but she was down to very little until they started making mezcal again. We made do with the tobala, and I made her promise to get us the cremas as soon as possible.

Mole

We stopped for a quick meal before hitting the road home. We heard thunder in the distance and light rain danced on the tin roof as we chowed down on mole and tortillas and coffee. The sky was darkening as we climbed into the car and began the 2.5 hour journey home, chasing a storm the entire way back to Oaxaca.

Nokia is 150 years old – The New York Times.

Although Microsoft bought Nokia’s cellphone arm in 2014, the Finnish company is still very much in business. In fact, Nokia is celebrating its 150th year since it started as a wood-pulping business. Its name comes from the town where it established a mill in the 1860s.

Nokia was the leading maker of mobile phones in 1998.

Nokia’s first telecommunications product, a digital switch for phone networks, didn’t come until the 1970s.

But by 1998, Nokia was the leading mobile phone maker in the world.

Its latest phones were the must-haves of their day; the Nokia 8110 was the ultracool product star of the 1999 movie “The Matrix.”

And its footprint in Finland was outsize, at one point representing 4 percent of gross domestic product, 70 percent of stock market capital and 21 percent of exports.

Nokia held its lead until 2011, washed away by a tsunami of smartphones from Apple, BlackBerry and Samsung. After the sale last week of its mapping service, the company is now focused on telecom network equipment.
One enduring legacy is the Nokia ringtone, which was the default setting on billions of mobile phones.

Borrowed from “Gran Vals,” a 1902 Spanish guitar composition, the tune can still make people turn and look for a ringing phone today.

The Don Cheadle-helmed biopic was picked up by Sony Pictures Classic, which labeled the trailblazing trumpeter, songwriter and genre-bender as an "iconic singer." 

I would very much like to play this version of Skyrim.

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The Netherlands has an intriguing piece of legislation in the works to stem recruitment by the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in the West. Until Aug. 15, members of the Dutch public can comment online on a new bill, which proposes cutting social security and student-grant payments to any citizen who plans to join a terror group or marry one of its members.

Social benefits in the Netherlands, widely known to be generous, require cumbersome administration when they need to be stopped. The proposed law would give the government the power to instantly cease payments as soon as proof surfaces that a recipient has left the country and joined ISIL. At least 160 confirmed (link in Dutch) Dutch residents have left the Netherlands to join terrorist movements in either Syria or Iraq, according to a Nov. 2014 report by Dutch intelligence agency AIVD.

And if ISIL-sympathizers return to the Netherlands, the same bill would also protect their right to have social security benefits reinstated. In mid-June, the Dutch counterterrorism agency NCTV said 35 such people had left ISIL and returned from Syria to the Netherlands (link in Dutch).

The bill was drafted by the Dutch minister for social affairs, Lodewijk Asscher, whose reputation is already strained among young Dutch Muslim people. Asscher says it is a means of curbing travel to ISIL strongholds, like Raqqa, Syria, as well as keeping government funds from trickling into ISIL’s hands. After the period of public review, the bill will be considered by the Dutch Council of State, the country’s highest governmental review body.

To prevent extremists from traveling to Syria, other Western countries have taken up measures with somewhat more stick and less carrot.

In May, the UK’s Metropolitan Police service blocked a 16-year-old young woman’s plans to flee to Syria from her home in London after an undercover operation revealed that she intended to marry an ISIL member. That same month, German, Swiss, and Turkish authorities cooperated to prevent an 18-year-old French man from leaving Europe to join ISIL in Syria. He was intercepted by police in Istanbul (link in French), detained in Geneva, and eventually extradited to France. Such interceptions, however, hinge on reports of intent and involve police force.

Last year, former US Congressman Frank Wolf, a Republican from West Virginia, proposed a bill that could give a 20-year prison prison sentence to anyone traveling without permission to a “country of conflict concern.” Wolf’s bill died, but this past April, representative Rob Wittman, also a Republican from West Virginia, revived it for review in a congressional committee. In March, the German cabinet approved a similar bill.

Back in the Netherlands, the mainstream media has not reacted much one way or the other to Asscher’s proposal. As for the public’s response, only two people have thus far used the digital forum to comment.

Follow Tina on Twitter at @tinamirtha. We welcome your comments at ideas@qz.com.

Activist and Don't Shoot PDX leader Teressa Raiford was one of two protesters arrested during a demonstration held Sunday. 

Protesters gathered Sunday afternoon to recognize the one-year anniversary of the death of Michael Brown. The unarmed African-American teenager was shot and killed by a white Ferguson, Missouri police officer August 9, 2014. 

The protest briefly blocked traffic at the intersection of Southeast 82nd Avenue and Southeast Division Street. Up to 100 people were involved, police said. 

Raiford, 44, and Diane Chavez, 43, were arrested and booked in the Multnomah County Jail on charges of interfering with a police officer and disorderly conduct. Both were released Sunday evening, according to the Multnomah County Jail booking log. 

Raiford and other local Black Lives Matter activists had planned multiple panels and performances this weekend. 

According to Alyssa Pagan with Don't Shoot PDX, the group headed out to the street after a panel discussion held at the APANO/Jade Multicultural Space this afternoon. Protesters planned to block the road for four-and-a-half minutes to represent the hours Brown lay in the street after he was killed, Pagan said. 

Raiford was standing in the street to lead protesters who had moved to the sidewalk, Pagan said. The group then witnessed police putting Raiford in handcuffs and into a car. 

A man has been critically injured in Ferguson, Missouri, in an exchange of gunfire with police at a rally marking the anniversary of the killing of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown.

Police said he was armed with a stolen gun and they had been tracking him. They blamed the violence on a small group of people.

Four officers have been placed on administrative leave.

Photos from the scene showed a young black man lying bloodied on the ground.

He was face down and handcuffed. In a video posted on Twitter, a man can be heard urging the police to "please, get him some help", as the injured man lies still.

The wounded man's name and age have not been released by police. The St Louis Post-Dispatch identified him as 18-year-old Tyrone Harris, having spoken to his father, the paper said.

The father, also named Tyrone, told the paper at around 03:00 local time that his son had received surgery.

The shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson by white police officer Darren Wilson in August 2014 sparked demonstrations across the United States.

Although Mr Wilson was cleared of wrongdoing by a grand jury and by the US Department of Justice, the teenager's death fuelled a national protest movement against the use of excessive force by police officers.

Disneyland might be the Happiest Place on Earth™, but Disney Japan’s Twitter account is one of the most oblivious places on the internet.

Take a Disney Japan tweet from yesterday:

It reads, “Congrats on a trifling day” in Japanese. Under that, it read, “A very merry unbirthday to you!”

Yesterday was the 70th anniversary of when the U.S. Military dropped an atomic bomb on Nagasaki. Ceremonies were broadcasted on nationwide Japanese TV, and there were numerous news articles published online and in the papers. Trifling, it was not.

This isn’t the first kind of Disney Japan Twitter screw up. As My Game News Flash points out, last year on August 15, the account sent out this tweet:

It reads, “Are you enjoying summer vacation?”

August 15 marks Japan’s surrender, ending World War II.

On March 11 of this year, there was this tweet:

“Bring on spring.”

March 11 marks the Great East Japan Earthquake , and the day is observed yearly by a moment of silence and TV specials.

“Giving you mid-summer sympathy.”

On August 6, U.S. Military forces dropped a nuclear bomb on Hiroshima. Again, like the other dates, this event is commemorated each year.

Japanese people would be as aware of these dates as Americans are of September 11.

My Game News points out that Disney Japan’s Twitter account typically does not post messages like this (instead, the tweets are typically PR, introducing movies, TV shows, events or products), making these questionable tweets stand out even more. Why were these dates selected, people wondered.

We’ve learned that a child in Los Angeles is sick with the plague . That sounds anachronistic, but the plague has long been a resident of the American southwest. And it first came in through San Francisco.

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“WHO DID THIS http://t.co/hcLYGDiPk2″

medievalfantasist:

This is the best thing to ever happen to Twitter.

Definitely a highlight of my day.

:)

Via SFGate

Oakland technology entrepreneurs and philanthropists Mitch Kapor and Freada Kapor Klein will spend $40 million over the next three years to help make Silicon Valley more diverse and inclusive, giving specifically to companies with leaders from underrepresented communities.

Mitch Kapor, a Silicon Valley pioneer who invented Lotus, and his wife, Freada, have spent much of the past decade at the forefront of expanding opportunities in the tech world for women, African Americans, Latinos and other minorities. The couple oversee a family of organizations in the philanthropic and socially conscious investment world — Kapor Capital, the Kapor Center for Social Impact and Level Playing Field Institute — all trying to increase diversity in Silicon Valley, whose leading companies are overwhelmingly male, white and Asian.

The organizations will officially announce plans Tuesday at the first White House Demo Day, which Mitch Kapor is scheduled to attend in Washington.

“Genius is evenly distributed across ZIP codes. Access and opportunity are not,” said Mitch Kapor. “With this investment, we’re doubling down on tech diversity because it’s good for individuals, communities and the economy as a whole.”

“A commitment to diversity and inclusion is nothing new for us, but we’ve often felt largely alone pursuing these initiatives,” he added. “We’re delighted now to have so many fellow travelers — including kids from low-income communities of color who are interested in careers in tech, entrepreneurs from all backgrounds building real businesses that solve real problems, and investors who are recognizing that some of the best financial returns can go hand in hand with diverse entrepreneurs and impact businesses.”

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Covered sweetmeat dish

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

It is a “crisis within a crisis.” That’s how prime minister Alexis Tsipras describes the massive influx of migrants to Greece, straining the resources of a country that is already strapped for cash.

Nearly 50,000 migrants came to Greece in July—more than the whole of 2014. So far this year, more than 130,000 illegal border crossings have been made in Greece, according to Frontex, the EU’s border agency. The vast majority of migrants come from Syria and Afghanistan, seeking asylum in the EU after a treacherous journey in overcrowded, makeshift boats across the eastern Mediterranean—now the busiest route for people seeking a better life in Europe:

Even Greece’s shattered economy is better than what Afghans, Syrians, and others leave behind. But most migrants hope to travel further into Europe in search of jobs, stability, and states more receptive to asylum claims. But if they’re caught or rescued in Greece, in most cases they must be processed there.

The UN recently described conditions for migrants in popular Greek landing spots as “total chaos,” with a severe lack of food, sanitation, and shelter. But an EU plan to distribute migrants more evenly across the bloc has stalled, with many countries rejecting proposed quotas.

This weekend alone, the Greek coast guard pulled another 1,400 people out of the sea, according to reports. Tsipras recently called for urgent assistance from the rest of the EU: “This problem surpasses us,” he said.

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Syrian refugees who arrived on the Greek island of Kos this weekend on a small dinghy celebrated by taking photos with a selfie stick. The moment of joy and relief after a risky journey from Turkey was captured by Reuters photographer Yannis Behrakis.

As the overcrowded boat approached the beach, tourists were bathing and tanning.

Over the weekend, Greece’s coast guard rescued more than 1,400 migrants in 60 search missions on the Aegan Sea. More than 50,000 migrants and refugees arrived in Greece in July, which is more than in all of 2014. The country’s prime minister Alexis Tsipras called it a “crisis within a crisis,” referring to the country’s economic woes. Many of the migrants make their way to the Greek islands from Turkey, and then continue their journey to more affluent EU countries.

As many as 70% of the migrants who arrived in Greece in July were Syrian.

Terrence Steven (Steve) McQueen

The FBI Vault

Richard Charles Holbrooke

The FBI Vault

iguanamouth:

bertb0t:

antique-symbolism:

bertb0t:

antique-symbolism:

Imagine a dragon at Antiques Roadshow, appraising its hoard

Imagine the dragon hoards monetarily worthless things like newspapers or old bones and the person appraising it getting more and more nervous about telling the dragon their stuff isnt worth anything

Imagine that the dragon knows this and just likes watching the person squirm.

The dragon actually hoards uncomfortable situations

by Greg

Sanders’s newly hired press secretary, Symone Sanders, an African American woman, warned the crowd before Sanders took the stage in Portland of the possibility that his event could be a disruption there, too. She told the crowd that Sanders was about bringing people together and urged them to chant, “We Stand Together” if protesters took the stage. But that didn't happen.