Author Archives: perezmic

Ecuadorian Slang

Nationality: Ecuadorian
Age: 19
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: 4/1/16
Primary Language: Spanish
Language: English

“Estrampandose, which I just learned from my mother, is an um Ecuadorian term that I heard my family say before. It has two meanings, either like it’s like you’re falling apart and you’re like collapsed. Like, you fall and you collapse, and it’s like, ‘Se estrampó.’ She like almost died when she fell, type thing. What I do all the time. Or it can mean, like, hardcore making out, like, to the point that it hurts. So, it depends on the context, but that’s a word. Estrampandose.”

It seems this word is similar to the English slang of “She ate it,” which people use in reference to someone falling. As in, “She ate the floor.” But the second meaning is what’s very interesting. When you take the word estrampandose, it sounds like the Spanish word trampar, which means “to step.” So how does this connect at all to making out? It totally makes sense in the case of falling because when you fall, sometimes it’s because of a misstep. In the context of the  making out, it seems the word has totally been turned into slang.

But also, why wouldn’t Ecuadorians just use the regular word for falling? To fall, in Spanish, is caer. I guess it’s because estrampandose has more flair to it? Like the source said, they use it to describe a nasty fall, not just any fall. It’s applied in situations like she described, when someone basically almost dies from how hard they fell. Of course, that was probably an exaggeration, but estrampandose captures the exaggeration better than caer does. The word is far more grandiose, which I guess might be why it developed in the first place. The people felt they needed a bigger word to describe falling, so they came up with that. And then, somewhere along the line, it also came to describe making out. Curious evolution, indeed.

Bolas/Empanadas de Verde

Nationality: Ecuadorian
Age: 19
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: 4/1/16
Primary Language: Spanish
Language: English

“Okay, so basically, ummm, una bola de verde is a platano ball, but you will put meat or vegetables or chicken or whatever you want inside of it. Ummm you can put, you can make it in like bola form which is, like, you put it in soup, ummmm, or you can, like, fry it, and it’s an empanada de verde. So good. So good.”

This traditional Ecuadorian meal is quite mouthwatering. It translates directly into “Ball of Green” or “Empanada of Green” depending on which form you use. For the bola or ball form, you take a green plantain or platano, as it’s called in Spanish, chop it up, and flatten the pieces. Once they’ve been flattened, you take ground meat or vegetables, put it on top of the flattened plantains, and wrap the plantains around the filling, rolling it into a ball. Then, you deep fry the filled plantain balls until crispy. The other method is to flatten the whole plantain, put the filling on top, and then fold the plantain over itself, creating a whole moon shape. Then, you put this in the oven and bake it, turning it into an empanada.

Plantains are an Ecuadorian staple. Because they grow so easily in Ecuador’s climate, the country has an abundance of them, and they make hundreds of recipes using plantains. However, most people use them when their still green. The greener the plantain, the less sweet. Sometimes, if people want the dish to be sweeter, they’ll wait for the plantain to ripen longer, and they’ll use it once it’s yellow or blackening.

Burning the Past Year

Nationality: Ecuadorian
Age: 19
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: 4/1/16
Primary Language: Spanish
Language: English

“So, in Ecuador, around New Year’s Eve, around the holidays really, we have this tradition of burning el año viejo. And what that is is that artists from around the country will each work on, uhhh, these piñata-type things, uhh, and they’ll be different characters, and the characters will range from Kung Fu Panda, Bugs Bunny to Donald Trump, Obama, uhh, like political figures to cartoon characters like they cover the whole spectrum,and their life-size and little and and they cost, they cost money to get these. And inside they have explosives. Umm… *laughs* And on New Year’s Eve, ummm, what everyone will do was, is that you’ll gather around el año viejo, umm, and at midnight you burn it, uhh, so you light a match and the thing will go off. Umm, and it’s supposed to be like quemando like burning all of your grievances from the past year and like starting anew from like the ashes. So that’s what we do. It’s fun.”

Burning el año viejo or burning the old year is a tradition that I’ve heard of in another societies, as well. In Cuba, for example, people will make effigies out of straw that represent the past year, and they will burn them on New Year’s Eve. Ecuador seems to take it a step further, though, by bringing in artists to make special effigies. It seems the burning has become less rigid in their culture, since they’re burning even cartoon characters or whatnot. The symbolism has been lost. It sounds more like a celebration, something to do out of habit, than something that’s supposed to be symbolic. In fact, it almost seems like a joke, especially if they’re burning effigies in the shape of political figures such as Trump or Obama.

Yet nonetheless, the source acknowledges the sense of burning away “grievances” and whatnot. So while the tradition may not look the same as it maybe did in the past, it still holds the same meaning. It reminds me of the phoenix when it bursts into flames and is born again from the ashes. Perhaps it has some kind of connection to there.

Gold Is A Girl’s Best Friend

Nationality: Indian-American
Age: 20
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: 4/10/16
Primary Language: English

“On my mom’s side of the family, because my mom’s side of the family is really rich, um, in India, like, her father’s, like, an advisor to someone super important, and he’s a professor at this like super prestigious university. And they have, like, slaves, and it’s just weird to think of my mom’s family being rich in India when we’re middle-class here. Ummm, but, so, I guess, I think it’s a South Indian tradition, but I know it’s definitely a big thing on her side of the family is when your eighteen-year old daughter or when your daughter turns eighteen years old, you like give her gold, like, just like, whatever every singly side person in my mom’s side of the family sent me something gold for my birthday when I turned eighteen. A lot of gold! It was all like earrings and like necklaces and stuff like that, and I don’t wear any of that, and my mom wouldn’t give it to me because she was like, ‘You’re gonna lose it.’ Umm so I just have all of this gold at home that’s like mine, and yeah, that’s a thing. In Indian culture, like jewelry and like umm that sort of stuff is really important like to the point of being sacred. Ummm, like you have, I don’t know what it’s called, but like the giant ummm nose ring that connects to the earring umm like that is a sacred thing that they wear in like wedding rituals and stuff like that, ummm. So just like, jewelry’s really important and the eighteenth birthday is obviously really important, and I feel like that’s where the tradition comes from.”

 

On top of the jewelry being sacred, this tradition sounds like something that’s done for dowry purposes. Once a woman turns eighteen, she’s of proper marrying age, right? So if she’s of proper marrying age, she’s going to need a dowry and property for when she gets married. The gifting of jewelry and gold marks this transition into womanhood, honors whatever sacredness comes along with this tradition, and also prepares the woman with a dowry in the case of marriage. It just goes to show how much the culture depends on money to reflect who you are as a person. It’s very different from our society. While we do look up to people who have money, it doesn’t seem to reflect on our character as much as it does in India.

Top Place to Go On a Date in Shrewsbury

Nationality: Indian-American
Age: 20
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: 4/10/16
Primary Language: English

“Okay, so, umm, the guy who created the pill, um, invented it in Shrewsbury, Massachusetts. And there, the first factory where, um, they started, like, getting manufactured or whatever is in Shrewsbury. Umm, and now it’s like a thing, I guess, where you like take your significant other on a date to the factory where the pill was first made. So, that’s a thing people do in Shrewsbury. Or, like, not my generation but like, people who are, like, slightly older, that’s what they do.”

 

It’s an interesting and funny story. You can understand the connection between dates and the pill factory, I guess? It seems odd, but the way I see it, dates lead to love which lead to sex which leads to a need for the pill. Perhaps whoever first started this trend was hoping to have a happy, birth-free relationship. It’s cutely ironic and sounds like something that was meant to be a joke, but perhaps became mainstream after one couple did it.

What’s also interesting, though, is what the source says about this not being part of her generation. It’s something that occurred among an older generation and then died before her generation go to following in their footsteps. Perhaps it’s because the factory was still in use during this older generation’s childhood. They may have seen and known of the factory, probably even heard about it once a week, what with what they were manufacturing. So when it shut down, it was more relevant for that generation to sneak in and see what was going on and, eventually, start going on dates there.

The source’s generation, however, would’ve grown up never knowing about the factory. Had they not researched it or heard about it, they might never have known what was made there. If they don’t know what the factory was for, then it loses the attraction as being a “hot date” spot. The irony and comedy of it is lost.