Sandwich Zine Vol 1

SANDWICH Vol. 1

Summer 2023

THE JUNE HOT LIST

by Andrea Alemán

photo by Andrea Alemán

photo by Andrea Alemán

the June hot list

photo by Andrea Alemán

Letter from the Editor Welcome to our first volume!

Sandwich consists of a hot list with six sections -- ornamentation, edibles, spirits, publication, artist, and archives.

Every month I will give you a curated list of six items you should know about.

I will provide you with step-by-step written instructions for a simple drink, and a delicious recipe. I will point out a noteworthy household item, ranging from pillows to utensils. I will do some light reading and share with you my favorite book of the month. As an art collector, I have a list of artists you should know about. Lastly, expect a brief mention of a forgotten moment in history.

Sandwich was born out of my love for art and the commingling of oddities in life. This month, I am bringing you a beautiful table lamp that will mellow out your space. Along with a commemoration sandwich recipe to cut the red ribbon; And with the sandwich, I have included a fresh skinny Margie for hot summer days.

Most importantly, this month I want to recognize artists who give me perspective and bring validation to this existence. That is why I am excited to share Pablo Neruda's romantic poetry with The Captain's Verses as our first publication. Additionally, the artist of this moth is photographer Carlos Limas.

I am specifically highlighting his INTANGIBLE series, which digitally deconstructs buildings located in the Rio Grande Valley.

photo by Andrea Alemán

As a native South Texan, I have experienced the blend of cultures that happens in the Rio Grande. This has allowed me to view life through a unique peep hole, as I myself carry the weight of not being Mexican enough nor American enough. I care for integration of Mexican stories in American history books, and that will be reflected in this zine. To close out this month, I am adding a moment in history from 1986. This story comes from a the book La Frontera: The United States Border with Mexico, by Alan Weisman.

Depicting the lives of transvestite prostitutes at club Miramar in La Zona de Tolerancia, also known as Boys Town, in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico.

Sandwich's first cover is a photograph I took of a building in Reynosa, Mexico; to which I have added a spilling bottle of Topo Chico representing the launch of the zine.

with care, Andrea D. Alemán, Editorial Director

photo by Andrea Alemán

This table lamp from IKEA is simple yet a musthave nostalgic rarity. The base is made out of steal and plated with nickel, and the lampshade is hand blown by skilled craftsmen. I have added it into my space and love the way it elevates my home, and brings an alluring warmth in the evenings.

TÄLLBYN

by IKEA

ornamentation

photo by IKEA

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As an homage to the name of this zine, this month I am sharing a delicious sandwich recipe. There's nothing better in the summer than a simple sandwich for an afternoon of board games. I shared this recipe with my grandparents last summer and they loved it so much they would make it once a week.

Provecho!

Instructions

Servings: 2 Sandwiches Ingredients 1 tomato, thinly sliced salt and black pepper 3 ounces of prosciutto 4 slices of sourdough bread 1 cup of shredded mozzarella cheese 2 tablespoons of chopped fresh sage 1 cup of baby arugula 4 tablespoons of butter 2 tablespoons of grated parmesan cheese

1. Arrange the tomatoes on a cutting board and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Let sit 15 minutes to draw out excess moisture.

2. In a large skillet set over medium heat, cook the prosciutto until crisp, about two minutes per side. Remove from the skillet.

3. In a bowl, combine the butter, parmesan, and one tablespoon sage.

4. Brush the outside of each slice of bread with the sage butter. On the inside of half of the slices of bread, evenly layer the cheese, the tomatoes, arugula, prosciutto. Add the top piece of bread.

5. Heat 1-2 tablespoons olive oil or butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Place the sandwiches in the skillet and cook until golden on each side, about 3-5 minutes per side.

photo by Half-Baked Harvest

CRISPY PROSCIUTTO AND TOMATO GRILLED CHEESE SANDWICH Recipe by Tieghan Gerard at Half-Baked Harvest

edibles photo via Canva

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MAIN INGREDIENTS

LIME JUICE

photo by 4 Copas Tequila

spirits

TOPO CHICO

SKINNY MARGIE

MAKE IT YOURSELF WITH THE FOLLOWING INGREDIENTS

1 shot of Patron or preferred clear tequila 3 oz Topo Chico 3 oz Fresh Squeezed Lime Juice 1 oz Simple Syrup 1 Lime Wedge Ice

TEQUILA

oJOs dE ANdRea jEWelrY

photo by Luis Patermina

Pablo Neruda is a Chilean, Nobel Price winning poet. The Captain's Verses is a compilation of love poems about his wife Matilde. Originally, the book was published anonymously perhaps because it was showing too much of Neruda's and Matilde's intimate relationship.

Of course, Neruda wrote his poetry in Spanish but this particular edition is bilingual, translating the poems to English.

I personally enjoy reading the poems in Spanish; the words and the imagery reaches my soul with depth.

Here I share with you Lives, Las Vidas, one of my favorite poems from the book.

PABLO NERUDA

THE CAPTAIN'S VERSES

publication photo by Andrea Alemán

LAS VIDAS Ay qué incómoda a veces te siento conmigo, vencedor entre los hombres!

LIVES Ah how ill at ease sometimes I feel you are with me, victor among men!

Porque no sabes que conmigo vencieron miles de rostros que no puedes ver , miles de pies y pechos que marcharon conmigo, que no soy, que no existo, que sólo soy la frente de los que van conmigo, que soy más fuerte porque llevo en mí no mi pequeña vida sino todas las vidas, y ando seguro hacia adelante porque tengo mil ojos, golpeo con peso de piedra porque tengo mil manos y mi voz se oye en las orillas de todas las tierras porque es la voz de todos los que no hablaron, de los que no cantaron y cantan hoy con esta boca que a ti te besa.

Because you do not know that with me were victorious thousands of faces that you can not see, thousands of feet and hearts that marched with me, that I am not, that I do not exist, that I am only the front of those who go with me, that I am stronger because I bear in me, not my little life but all the lives, and I walk steadily forward because I have a thousand eyes, I strike with the weight of a rock because I have a thousand hands and my voice is heard on the shores of all the lands because it is the voice of all those who did not speak, of those who did not sing and who sing today with this mouth that kisses you.

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CARLOS LIMAS:

I N T A N G I B L E

artist

photo by Carlos Limas

Carlos Limas is a Mexican artist whose primary media is photography. I was first introduced to his art through my mother when she invited me to his AUTOPORTRAIT exhibition in Reynosa, Mexico. His work evoked eerie feelings and confusion within me, yet I was surprised by the harmony within each piece.

Limas continues to surprise me with his most recent work, INTANGIBLE. Which, I would argue, is an altered take on his previous series STILLNESS. Limas claims on his site "the Future and the Past are Intangible, one is not here yet and the other is forever gone, a constant and perpetual transition. We only exist in the Here and the Now, and we're continually slipping away through time, extending towards infinity or oblivion. The only actual evidence that we were ever here, is a single photograph, and even that will soon fade away." carloslimas.com

photos by Carlos Limas

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photos by Carlos Limas

photo by Carlos Limas

archives

LA ZONA DE TOLERANCIA

NUEVO LAREDO, TAMAULIPAS, MEXICO, 1986 Text from La Frontera: The United States Border with Mexico, by Alan Weisman

photo via Canva

Nuevo Laredo has an urgent feel; its dark sandstone and brick buildings crowd tightly to accommodate the activities required to support 350,000 rushing inhabitants, who fill its streets long into the night.

-On Sunday afternoon at Club Miramar, las chicos lounge in old heels and bathrobes with the newspaper, purging their hungovers with beans and tortillas. Some have long hair; black stubble grows swiftly on their legs. Yawning, they absently rub their jaws and are reminded of needing a shave. In the frankness of daylight, the cabaret shrivels. Like its name, meaning "seaview," Club Miramar is an illusion. What glistened by night is now peeling red foil; the sofa where earlier they drank and conversed under colored spotlights is cheap and frayed and has a wobbly leg. Flies gather around something that spilled and hardened hours ago.

The evening before, everything was primed for fantasy. By night, Club Miramar's girls are among the most striking in the Zona. The weekends are special for them: Crew-cab pickup trucks filled with American college boys and whitewing dove hunters bang up the dirt streets, KC lights flashing and horns a-honk, beer cans and cheers streaming from the windows. For two nights, all is drinks, flutter,

and masculine attention. For a little while, disbelief is suspended, and in the dark las chicos are female.

Besides club Miramar, the Zona--Zona de Tolerancia, also known as Boys' Town-- has a few other transvestite houses, such as The Dallas Cowboys just across the way. Most of their clientele are ostensibly robust Texas heterosexuals who are somehow titillated by the idea of a companion hooked on hormone shots and silicone.

-The road to the Zona is unpaved and pitted, to slow anyone trying to escape whatever mayhem the night may inspire. It leads to a walled compound with a guard booth manned by a Nuevo laredo police office. Inside awaits a city of women in doorways and men in the streets. Prostitution is legal in Tamaulipas, but the Boys' Towns all along its border have closed in recent years, save this one.

-Outside, the colored lights filter through the smoke of tacos sizzling in curbside braziers. A vendor garnishes the melody of "Tea for Two" with augmented chords on a guitar warped by grease drippings from his deep-fryer. The crossed legs of prostitutes well beyond ripeness are visible in the portals of low row houses, where they rent oneroom cribs and try to continue making a living.

-In the cabaret, girls receive $25.00 per half hour, paying $4.00 to the house and another dollar to the towel man, but in the cribs the asking price is $10.00 and they often settle for half or less. Some lie on their narrow beds, glancing without much hope at passerby, or sit in the door, their heads turned to watch a black-and-white television atop a dresser.

Hungrier ones clutch at the window shoppers, sometimes scoring, sometimes picking a pocket.

During the cold months, they gather in the dirt streets around buckets containing charcoal fires.

-[The owner of Miramar] explains about the weekly checks at the gynecological registry the city maintains inside the compound. Within [the club], male government functionaries sit behind desks piled with forms and carbons; women in Grecian sandals, cowboy boots, mesh socks, slit dresses, microshorts, or just tattoos wait on benches, smoking and gossiping. The girls complain that the exam is too cursory--a cervical mirror for forty-five seconds and a blood test every six months. But when officials in San Antonio started pressuring Mexico because of stubborn gonorrhea strains traced to Nuevo Laredo, doctors were invited down and

found the Zona to be clean. Their patients later admitted they had gone with street whores first.

The transvestites are the ones who have [the owner] worried. VD soared along the border when American soldiers returned from Vietnam, and now the United States is inflicting an ew curse known as el Síndrome de Inmuno Deficiendia Adquirida, el SIDA. Mexico is possibly more terrified about AIDS than the U.S. When the conquistadors arrived in 1519, there were twenty-five million Mexicans.

Within a century, only a million remained, most succumbing to diseases introduced by the Spaniards, like smallpox and measles.

-Night arrives; boys from Amarillo and Texas A&M pile out of vehicles, urinate on the bumper, emit war whoops, and stagger off toward [the clubs].

College students, truck drivers passing through Laredo...all along the border, even where the Boys' Towns no longer exist, Mexican women are receiving American men and their dollars in their beds. Irresistible Mexico, embodied in her trapped whores, ravished for centuries by aggressive foreigners who lusted after her: At times, she has resigned herself and made the best of it. Hijos de la chingada, children of the violated one. Even at her most powerless, Mexico always has her allure.

Like women, she survives and endures.

TRANSVESTITE PROSTITUTES, CLUB MIRAMAR

photo by Jay Dusard

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