Posted by pancho from customer-148-233-78-77.uninet.net.mx (148.233.78.77) on Tuesday, January 28, 2003 at 2:36PM :
I have a sculptor friend, a Jew. Good sculptor, good friend...let me use his studio in Berkeley when I needed to.
He took his family on vacation about three years ago to Mexico, a litttle coastal town called Melaque...where weīd been before. Itīs just south of the site of the infamous "Mexican Land Swindle".
He happened to notice a very unusual manhole cover, about 24 inches in diameter on the main cobblestone street. On a background of criscrossing lines, there was a Star of David. A very unusual patern to find in such a place...almost as if it was an intended slur...the sewers of Mexico being notorious.
Whether he liked the design, or was offended and wanted it removed...he bought another one from the city, without that pattern, which by the way was on no other...and got a couple of people to pry the old, shit-encrusted one out of its place. They had to wear rubber gloves and doused the cover and each other in Clorox till their eyes burned.
He brought it back, dónīt know what he told Customs and put a lovely patina on it and mounted it in his studio...an altogether handsome piece.
I canīt help but compare his response to even a shit cover, but one with a Jewish emblem on it..the reverent care and trouble he took to salvage it and even transform it into "Art"...and our own forlorn, $200,000 bronze, larger than life-size monument of a "beloved" queen, eagerly anticipated by a city like Chicago. The one gathering dust in a corner for six years and counting, while a sewer cover is lovingly transformed into "Judaica".
Itīs the shits...any way you look at it.
Assrin Pride Indeed!
-- pancho
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