East LA Gang Member - 3rd Generation Maravilla 🇺🇸 🇲🇽

I'm writing the story I have no idea why looking at all these words I'm even starting to make myself cry Junior Olympics we had a gold medal two Silvers and a bronze you tatted your stomach they booted you you want to get one of these and you want to dip it in there the names have just changed from being a tribe now that they were called gangs we're a trophy you take out a guy from Arabia that's like major points for you oh yeah huh do you need a quarter where should I get my test I'm small you know on my toes oh my toes so this is your place who's this sketchy character this is called a Diablo this is the area you don't want to drive to now take off the hat there you go it's your job in there the day you decide to relax that's the last day you're gonna see what happens if someone dirties your shoes oh man my grandfather used to tell me be home learn something from anybody and everybody laughs good afternoon guys today we're going to East L.A to meet a deep-rooted very proud Chicano native he's also a tattoo artist and a medavia member I'll tell you more about that in the video and educator should be a super interesting one uh East L.A from my limited time there is its own world within Los Angeles super interesting place you're gonna like this let's go [Music] okay guys so we're here with Daniel my buddy Andy Daniel's son your name again Michael and now we're in the heart of it right this is east L.A McDonald and Whittier Boulevard people typically like judges like all the the cholo has on high socks or whatever like you know you don't gotta wear high socks to be a cholo or nothing like that you know and these will be considered my socks anyway you never do your own tats yeah that's impossible right yeah I've done these tattoos you've made you did these hats yeah this was back in the days I mean it's all like it's not professional work or anything like that but and then there we go we're in an active neighborhood so as we're walking you know what I mean you guys just have anything you guys just walk the other way you know what I mean walk the other way yeah you guys walk the other way because it's active still you know what I mean yeah wait away from me because I would probably most likely going to be the focus on on the attention that okay so walk us through that what is that maravia is what for those that don't know so maravia is actually a town it's not um a gang per se until maybe after the 1930s or 40s when the when the city of Los Angeles or the county enforced their laws and restrictions and and actually identified us as a group of combatants or people that that were mischievous you know what I mean like the zoo suitors and and stuff like that right so the the or the pachucos the old suits you that was uh Chicana right right you know in the zusu days my grandfather's days um you know a lot of the the naval uh Personnel would come down here and they were coming and party and go to like you know bars or hit the dance halls and stuff like that and pick up women of course okay but you know you have you have um our pachucos or or Chicanos you know they're they're trying to enjoy themselves with their with their girls or their their ladies and stuff you know what I mean and some guys were very disrespectful you know what I mean and and one thing in our in our culture or with our people we're very high on respect you know whether you the way you conduct yourself whether you're looking a man in his eyes when you're talking to him um you when you meet somebody you shake their hand and you identify yourself you know what I mean it's on how you grow up you're etiquette your morals just your character you know what I mean so there will be a lot of fights that would break out the police at that time would would sign of course with a with a navy and you know them and a lot of our people end up getting thrown in jail and um yeah we just felt that we had to protect our our this is our home you know what I mean this is where we're raising stuff and to have somebody from the outside come in and and treat our people any way they wanted to it just wasn't going to happen Okay this area in East L.A is all so yeah this is so when you go to different different blocks like um would be that side of Olympic would be Ford maravia okay you've got a different game there's different like over 20 um different clicks of Maravilla you got Moriah um you got on on that side you got the projects which a lot of clicks came out of the projects Rascals maravia High Times Rock I mean it's active yeah there's a lot of you know people trying to earn their name a lot of them I call it hyper masculinity where you got a lot of younger younger teenagers that are you know trying to trying to make their bones trying to earn their name for themselves so right they want to prove to the next man how down they are you grew up here right right so when you grew up here you're part of that immediately right because that's what you grew up into yeah I mean it will depend on your family family or you know who you're surrounding yourself with my story is I'm third generation so my grandfather born in 1918 he was a the first generation my dad born in 1940 he's the second generation okay he was and um and then on third generation born in 82. and my son's just he's not a part of this he's not no he's a good guy he's a good man now you're not interested in passing it on your third generation no because now now being from a gang I mean it's a certain you know Persona you have to keep now now it's it's all about you know it's it's really mischievous now you know now back in the days it was all about you know respect and I mean not just discredited now but it actually meant something like we were actually um fighting for something or believed in a certain cause and um you know when you enter the jail system or the prison system it becomes something totally different and then it gets into politics and it becomes something that you start to realize that we're we're killing our own people okay you know we're killing our own people well you know if I mean if you study and you get into you know other stuff like politics of of the United States or whatever and you realize that you know we're not only killing each other but we're also being killed out here by you know the food that we're consuming um from different laws that are being passed that we know nothing about because we don't study or read books you know what I mean so or U.S Chicanos who yeah well yeah us as a people specifically you know that's everywhere in culture right now to be honest yeah this is classic old school yeah a couple of homeboys and we come oh sorry Daniel's gonna make a call here we go oh yeah huh do you need a quarter we used to come and we used to kick all the all these pay phones until we broke this and the change came out on all of them down there's probably about 15 we'd hit you kicked that hard that you could yeah you were just kid because there's nobody driving down Whittier Boulevard like at one in the morning so you would just you know kick it till you open the change thing and collect it when did you stop doing that oh man when I was like 17 years old probably okay yeah teenage yeah those are those are just youth things that we used to do you know these stores were you know they look like like good business owners but they were doing a lot of crooked stuff too back then dealing dope for us or you know just just to make a little bit more money because back then 90s yeah back in the early 90s okay so early 90s was like the hardest hitting time right now right yeah even being more because um we had um disassociated ourselves with a prison gang um that I don't want to say the name out but everybody knows who I'm talking about um we have to separate ourselves from them so you know all the money that that we were we were trying to make was it had to deal with ourselves you know we no longer had somebody that we could depend on to get us anything and we're doing stuff for ourselves you know making our own money nobody attacks us or come in here and say hey this is what you got to do or this is how much you got to pay um if you have any guns you got to Fork them over everything was ours for us so we really had to protect our protect our own you know once a place is home to you you know you always it's always home to you you know from the food from the certain smell you smell in the street the at the wet asphalt right you know from from being used to hearing the helicopter every night and it becomes weird like when you're when you're you're in a place and you don't hear that anymore you don't smell that anymore you don't wake up to oldies you don't wake up to hearing certain music in the morning or somebody coming in in a car bumping and everything's just you're not used to it you know like a person that gets used to being in jail you know some a lot of people when if you talk to them that have been incarcerated for for long periods of time you know they're scared to come out to society because they don't want to leave yeah they don't they don't want to leave and for and and I say it in this sense because you become used to used to um somebody telling you when to use the restroom you become used to eating a certain food or food habits or become privy to a lot of habits you know and out here it's unpredictable every day is is you don't know what's going to happen you don't know who you're gonna meet you don't know what situations you're going to be put in and a lot of people don't want to be put in in certain circumstances that you know they're not they can't control let's stay that you want to be in control in your environment you want to be in control of people that are around you and um you know because you're safe like that you know what I mean if there's something that's happening that you're not in control of you know something more than likely if you're not an alpha male something bad is going to happen got into my neighborhood at in 92. I was I was 10 years old okay okay so 11 11 years old 12 13 14 15 16 17 I'm gang banging and I got older grown men with these big old mustaches jumping out their car with a strap trying to kill me you know what I mean and I'm a little boy so now days it's like people can't comprehend that scenario but it's like those are that's what we had to learn to run before we could crawl when we were little you know what I mean right so when you're growing up if you're like I don't want to be in this it would be really hard right yeah it'll be super hard breaking Family Ties and everything right yeah you're I mean yeah I mean if your family accepts it but you know you're yeah it's kind of like you're breaking a tradition which is like you know this is our hometown we got to protect it and we're not looking at it as a gang thing as as a mischievous act or something that we're going to go out here and Rob these people or we're going to go out here no we're just we're just trying to protect like protecting your your body from a form of cancer you've got a foreign person that comes in here from a rival neighborhood and he moves into this apartment complex you know more than likely he's going to start a neighborhood or or start influencing the kids that are in the uh that go to the school around and those kids are going to start to claim his stuff and it's like damn all of a sudden you got a foreign neighborhood in here which this is our righteous neighborhood that's not going to happen the more they come in and the more they want to control and then right to protect or lose all control right yeah you lose all control they start selling drugs in your neighborhood they start doing whatever their Spirit entails that they they think they want to do being an alpha male that's what they're going to do and you gotta you gotta stop that so if you're a beta male just say all the everyone's a beta male they're done in these neighborhoods oh yeah you either the Rival group is going to come in and take over 100. it's a dog eat dog world right here okay yeah how's the hierarchy right now is it very clear who's at the top and who's not um I mean yeah but then again no because now um a lot of the the general the general most of the generation of young kids have kind of in our situation or our Cultura like speaking on people know as Hispanic or Latino they kind of lost their Heritage and culture you know you got like let's say the word um you know I don't know if I can say it or not but the N word right yeah you got a lot of young youth using that that turn yeah and back in the days to each other right and back in the days if they can get away with that I mean now and then you got younger youth using the the word you know the b word and calling each other like in a in a friendly way you know they think that it's a friendly way but and in our days that's not nothing you don't ever call a male that you don't ever use that word yeah yeah you're gonna get cracked in your mouth or even worse I've seen people get shot over it okay and that's just something you don't do bro okay guys so as an outsider during the day it's sunny out the streets look fine people walking out and about yeah when you say it's active like at any time it can just change yeah the other situation could change I mean as far as back in the 90s um and that's what's crazy about it you know I tell my kids and they probably trip out there used to be 30 of us walking in the middle of the street you know banged out wearing big pants size 48 50s big ass jerseys go straight wrong um this move this this used to be a liquor store right here okay it's in the movie it's a good movie It's called sideways um it's a cool Chicana movie now you guys might want to check out it's a nice mural right here bro I'm sorry okay no problem so this is the Aztec serpent ER oh cool yeah so you guys are very artistic yeah fair to say I mean I see these murals everywhere but this is called the Diablos this is the dead ends and a lot of homeboys used to congregate back in the 90s back there so you know you got different dudes that come over here and want to visit or or you know that's just the area you don't want to drive through back in the days what changed things why did they get better A lot of gang injunctions um a lot of homeboys you know the laws change and you've got the three strikes that came out now and um you know three strikes you're in prison yeah you could still let him up you could steal a bubble gum and you're getting live Daniel on the car you said we went by this park over here what's that Park so that's Belvedere Park right there Belvedere Park and you're saying there are what kind of drills we used to do dry Brite drills where you actually have to get down you know because they were doing a lot of drive-bys back then and just in case you know the kids wouldn't get hit or anything like that um also how to do them and and um Griffith Middle School or Elementary School where you know you get under the desk just like earthquake drill but okay so drive-by drills get under the debt like in my parents age it was the new the h-bomb drill right like okay right right here it was earthquake and and gun shooting drills when you think about it you're telling a kid to be careful because we're you know bullets go to a go to another a nicer area and tell the kid that and they're probably not going to want to go to school you know what I mean so school is pretty rough here um yeah for the most part everybody's you know somebody's either related to somebody that's a gang member or or you know trying to start up a gang or a tagging crew or you know stuff like that growing up when I was younger and stuff um I I was really into martial arts so I had been training since I was five years old um Judo to taekwondo okay um I got a sponsorship actually um I ended up going to a lot of competitions through the Junior Olympics I won the gold medal two silver medals and a bronze um Junior Olympics yeah wow yeah doing that and um I ended up getting they dropped my sponsorship um after I got my tattoo on my stomach yeah or after they noticed I got my tattoo yeah so I ended up you know choosing a different path I got discouraged they didn't want me being they didn't want me being an influence on the other kids you know that we're going there you know right here you got the maravia projects okay what's what's going on there um so this is a product now they put an injunction on us where homeboys you know you can't be walking in that uh on that you know the sidewalk or in there because you'll you'll you'll get arrested you know as as being a uh uh yeah well I will not you okay why um because of the injunction that that's in in place um we can't be around other gang members or you know we're certain attire that pertains to our neighborhood a lot of kids after school we used to walk over here and my uh my friend Lino Zamora would hook us up with um ice creams his parents will get mad or his Uncle will get mad because he was always giving the paleta shops away right here you got the the Maravilla handball courts where back in the days um before me before I was born my dad's era all the homeboys you know from eloyo Lopez Maravilla the projects um would come here and play um handball with the homeboys and compete competition and along with removing the mail from the household you know in our communities where you get people put on welfare and you know you could live in the projects of the female with the children but they remove the male the male's not allowed to live with a with a with his kids so who who's raising these men to be Warriors or alpha males or hunter-gatherers you know I can't teach my daughter how to be a woman and she definitely can't teach my young males to be a man you know what I mean so that's kind of messed up you know we're in this system that we're forced to to live in bro along with the narratives that they're kicking off you know with um you know all the the politics with Gobo for this and go vote for that while the decision's already been made for us you know they're making the decision um a certain group of people better better put in the strings you know what I mean and sending our young children to take over these land and build a democracy in other people's lands that are keeping their people they're still alive you know foreign they might be bad or negative but for the most part the majority of these people living in these land just want good they just want imagine somebody coming into your house and kicking in the door you know and saying that you're a combatant when you're not you just you just you live a certain way you keep these old traditions alive you know you you're actually gonna go and pick up the husband that's gonna marry or the male that's gonna marry your daughter which they still told those Traditions bro we don't we tell her we tell our women that they're they're they're they're women oh they don't need a man you know you got a women could do everything a man can do when in actuality not to downgrade women at all women are beautiful but they shouldn't be doing things that males do you know what I mean we should be raised to be that alpha male to protect our women and our children and raise you know protect our family vote Point Blank taco truck situation so they have fish taco shrimp tacos tacos you want to get one of these and you want to dip it in there you got a soft taco so you might just want to pour it on there but usually it's meant to just dip in there some lemons what is this that's the broth that's made in usually you eat it like in a stew or a soup but this this time what they do is they take the meat out of the stew they put in a taco it's funny because it ends up ends up going back in you end up dipping it how do these look here look they look good bro guacamole sauce or something oh that's a good one fire junior fire yeah that's firebomb this thing I could go here on your kid what about my head good right so good yeah what is it about the the truck that makes a better Taco it's fresh I don't think it I don't think it lasts very long it's very accessible to people on the sidewalks and you can just pull up it's almost like a drive-through so a lot of the times it's made fresh and it doesn't last very long on the truck you know a lot of the food will be gone by the end of the night so it's fresh you just dip it in wrench it a little bit take a bite delicious unbelievable this is like just this is go all right guys if you're in the neighborhood this is the food truck [Music] so this guy right here he pulled up this guy in the Mercedes he came in kind of aggressive and then he he looked at Daniel Daniel looked back at him Daniel was about to sit down but where Daniel was going to sit down at his back was going to be against him never so what Daniel did is he went around and he stood he stood up I thought you were standing up the whole time yeah because of that dude yeah but I was I already knew so I was already watching just in general bro I never said my back towards the door but that's like that's the crazy part that's how you know I where I grew up that's that's something you did he always looked out everywhere and I do this all the time but if you go into places you're back in your car just in case you're ready to go exactly so it but it's just something not because you feel like you're going to be indeed it's just something that's already in you you gotta take it like this bro like it's it's we're rare out here like to be to be blunt and honest with you um where you gotta really be strategic because it did the day you decide to relax or be comfortable that's the last day you're gonna see like really in reality there's always somebody trying to make a name bro and you know and you don't want to get God especially by a young kid I mean oh there's a guy with maravi on back of his head did you see him yeah give me the strap I'm gonna go pick it up or just light them all up oh that's it you can come slipping but if you notice that guy never got off his car though again at the same time you got people like we're a trophy you take out a guy from maravia that's like points major points for you oh you know right now we're pulling up to a red light we don't pull all the way up to the car you don't pull all the way up now between you so you can get away in case anything you know people trying to block you in somebody just has to spot you or if you're known out here or something oh we just see marvelous get him don't ever feel your safe person just here you have your kid with you either people don't care that you got your kids back in the days that was a rule you never disrespect somebody with their kids or their lady or just in their family in general you know um we used to have meetings back in the days where a person over 45 would be considered a veterano uh uh you don't mess with um older men okay or something you know that doesn't that doesn't stand these days that doesn't stand like getting it's like anything goes these days you know those people we call it pleasure or class or you know we used to have meetings where you know we got set down they sat us down you know us younger younger homeboys and you've got a bethanos that come in and and I come in like that but you got any older homeboy you know if he wants to take the time to put you up on game or some wisdom on how to conduct yourself then you better take that as you know Embrace that you know that he's actually taking the time to school you and that's where you start to develop your your character and how you how you are the type of person you are bro and you that goes with you a long way you know it's a part of survival too because you could you know get busted in the jail system and if you don't know how to conduct yourself or act you're gonna get stabbed you know you better know how to address people like I said you the first thing you you shake their hand you look them in their eyes you identify yourself um again I'm not a gang member I you know I never joined a gang but I was around it everybody else was doing it around where I grew up um but you know like I said knowing people I saw more structure back then it was more structured you know there was more rules which I you know I don't see that amongst the kids you know I don't see that anymore I don't know if it's the music I don't know I really don't know what it is but it just it's a little different than it it's almost like there's no rules you can do whatever you want the social media has really messed up our our people bro where you got all these women half naked um you can make a right right here bro my bad um you got all these women showing their bodies man and that body that's supposed to be for your man somebody that you love you know someday you're gonna have kids and someday you know you're gonna be in love and you're gonna wish you never put out a picture like that no you're gonna wish you never gave it up to that dude and the same thing for guys as well you know so why would you want to live make a left right here why would you want to live your life of regret of who you had a kid with or who you slept with you know so try to make every every decision that you make is is something that you're gonna take with you you know a form of um a form of um you could say wisdom or anything you know that you're gonna you're gonna take what you in your lifetime and then go straight and then you're gonna pass it on to your kids Amy hole like or or son don't do this or I was in that situation one time and or don't talk to your girl like that or make sure you walk your girl on the inside of the street because if you walk around now go straight if you walk around the outside of the street that means you're selling her you're giving her away there's different little things yeah there's different little things that you know people gotta know and he just comes up to us and he goes what are you guys doing like nothing's just hanging out what are you doing man like I should be talking to strangers yeah and then he goes yeah I see you riding your bike and I'll be careful out here he goes yeah my mom doesn't pay attention to me you know like they're just on their phone all day like yeah that sucks man yeah it's messed up so this is your place yeah it's my little my little Sanctuary at my house me my son oh I left mine okay wow my little half court half court oh yeah you're a basketball player yeah you know Judo though that's that's a good skill all right so the big screen what's going on cams of the property yeah I'm gonna have a camera system set up I get it I get um you know strangers that come in it's like uh you know I have it's my home but it's also a place where I do my business so who's this sketchy character stop him close the door we're gonna have to hit him up man all right guys we're going in kitchen to the left and then marvelous is my little tattoo studio right here Tattoo Studio 's dad how'd you learn how to do this um so back in the days my uncle was a well-known artist they used to call him Pajaro means bird in Spanish and um he's a tattoo a lot of um a lot of homeboys um he taught me a lot of kopura which is culture and Spanish about our heritage and stuff like that and that's when I first used to tattoo only I never did no other no other work and stuff a lot of my stuff was done with the homemade machine and I learned how to tattoo in dots actually first um dots are like so I did it with marker but today you could use a paper okay so it's like um tracing paper and this will actually put the pattern on for you so since uh somebody wanted this flower on them so you get the flower and you would put it on the the tracing paper and um you would Trace out your your outline of the of the flower that whoever wanted this in the back of the paper it's right there okay so back in the days we used to use um deodorant now we have uh it's called stencil stuff you just rub this on on the on the client and then you put this on the on the person it sticks just like a yeah just like the drawing and then you just start so Chicana tattoos are always just black and white correct um not necessarily but uh originally yeah we like um we like black and white more traditional um some people want color I mean if you're gonna get lips like a lot of homeboys get lips on them their girlfriend's lips their wives and you go red or some people want Dodgers tattoos since being from Los Angeles that I'd support our favorite teams and you'll get a dodger blue ink and so this is an important part of Chicano culture or or what would you say really Tatooine is a it's a a write-up passage like any tribe uh when you when you get into our our culture and stuff you know you go into you'd see tribes with different ink you know on their faces and all those tattoos mean something right and it's the same thing today you know the the names have just changed from being a tribe now they were called gangs but essentially we're tribes bro um you know protecting our land or whatever our our we've been raised to believe our belief system you know that's where we are but they still have meaning and and and where we have to hold those tattoos at a a high standard bro how important is the tribe to you it's my everything it's my family bro it's everything you know it's your culture you got to keep these um these Traditions alive you know you can't let the system raise your kid you know if you want to instill it's like a king or a queen and they're passing down the kingdom to their kid you want to you want to make sure your kid is going to keep your Traditions your laws your standards your morals how you conduct yourself and because that's going to be the future of your of your your bloodline Generations before you kept you in right right right and your son you've decided you've stopped that chain you said times changed that's why right so I've stopped the whole ideology of of what would be called the bad stuff on on killing off our people like going at it with other gangs you know because now you're fighting a war with you don't you don't know this battle that you're fighting you know a lot of these fights that that were fighting over people like might have been over a girl you know a a gang member or a homeboy from another neighbor and being with a girl that you liked or or something like that or right in your neighborhood and you know that would be a pretty ignorant thing to to kill somebody over right you could ask most of these gang members today you know how did this how did this um beef start with this neighborhood they don't know they're just gonna say oh after that neighborhood and I don't care and it's all about my neighborhood but that just think about the ignorance of that have you been in prison uh I've been in jail jail what is do you did you sense that people regretting like doing his stupid deed oh definitely I got homeboys that um you know they didn't they I got a home but I'll give you an example somebody did something in jail and um somebody got killed and this youngster wanted to be so down for their neighborhood and says oh I'll hide the shank for you he got popped with it he got caught with the shin and now he's doing live what's the sharing a prison life okay yeah okay so because he wanted to be down and show the homeboys that you know he's not a rat or anything and now this guy that he had nothing to do with this this thing that took place now he's doing life he's never gonna get out you know this is my grandfather right here um and then this is my dad well that's his prison ID actually my grandfather used to tell me Miho learn something from anybody and everybody meaning that if you see a poor guy out there or a person addicted to drugs take something and learn something from that on how not to be addicted to drugs or how not to become poor or how to do better or a rich man you can learn something from them but take something from anybody and anybody and get this bag that you have of life of life's trials and tribulations and take that with you because you're gonna need something out of that bag the same instance where my grandpa used to have a big old can of nails and miscellaneous stuff everything used to have buttons in there and old coins and stuff like that there was something in there he could use you know whether it was a screw that fit into a door or something there was something that he used and it's like you know if I create a metaphor to go through life it's better to have a bag full of those lessons that come from all different walks of life everything bro then just your walk a lot and just your walk alive yeah I agree that's why I do these videos to be honest I learned everything every video I learned something right today I'm learning yeah music right like you you were talking Andy about what you guys are into mute for music so what was yeah what I was talking about was like the oldies so a lot of the oldies like Al Green Temptations there's kids nowadays they're they're in their 20s and they're bringing back oldies yeah oh really yeah they're bringing back all these look at his shoes the way he's wearing his shoes they're always clean yeah wow you gotta make sure do you remember spotless do you remember I told you you always got to keep your shoes clean yeah so he comes from that what happens if someone dirties your shoes oh man it's a crime huh yeah you don't do that you want to blast me with what no no no like uh get a tattoo yeah meaning Blaster you're getting tattooed all right guys they're uh they're trying to get me to get a tap what do you think should I get a tat where where should I get my tattoo something small you know something started off with something small I don't know baby steps yeah on my toes no on my toes like make sure your shoes impeccable you know you know the laces you work on those laces don't you they're perfect you know you always want to match too so you know you get your your if you're gonna wear brown for the day or whatever you just be packing it out okay so you go to dry cleaning for this huh yeah so you make sure you know you wear a pair of black Levi's it's gonna make your shoes pop with this Pendleton Pendleton's or you know what you want to what you want to get they're really made good it's wool um or if you're gonna wear blue not everyone's hanging on to this the youngsters are like I said they're bringing it back you know which is pretty cool oh that's nice with some hard Levi's oh you know the game is all we're killing yeah and I need some fashion tips look at this yeah what would you do I need some shoes that pop huh well yeah because you're wearing dark and a girl really doesn't want to see a guy in the jacket you know wear a nice shirt bro yeah yeah my wife you're right she doesn't want to see this jacket late night it's probably the Charlie Brown's right right no what these these jackets are here every gangster wanted to have these right here the tickets look like you're yeah they look like your state issued um jacket when you hit the yard in prison why would you want to remember that um well I mean homeboys it's just a white dress you know it looks it looks dope it looks nice that is nice you know what some Dark Shades on some Hardy buys you know you got every color to match whatever fashion is a big thing for you guys yeah big thing some old shoes we used to wear are Stacy Adams yeah make sure those are shined up nice yeah what size do you wear bro I'm large usually so oh no wait you're wearing what color pants you're wearing that is dope though I like that but let's just try it on and see how it looks bro oh yeah that's perfect oh yeah girl see you with that oh it's over oh yeah so if I walk these streets like this it's just turned off right now oh it's fine press press the back of the screen just the back it's just the auto it's like special batteries but it's still wrong as long as that red light is blinking okay okay so here we go this one's fresh yeah they're brand new and they're clean yeah fit right in actually look at that your pants are a little bit tight but we'll work with it you know what I mean a little too like hipster tied or something yeah that's our references we've kind of kicked up your ass yeah that's what we say bro yeah I think you got to work on the pants look at that no this is nice I like it and this Hat's from Andy yeah Andy's awesome Instagram page this is his logo I like it yes it's styling no take off the hat all right now you looked yeah Cherry drop on your eye there you go do a tear drop in here yeah but it looks dope see we got your little Style on already you're tight with the pants I am pretty tight yeah only because you're doing like yeah I'm going to work what do you think about Andy's pants it wouldn't work after it okay regular Levi's people change this hurts [Music] where'd you do that um what was uh over here by uh oh by the Pinot they showed you the pine right the bigger the big tree yeah you try to come over here on some some politics the dude's like six one too like he could have said you know let's get down or something but wait so uh the you have your trash cans oh he's coming in at you yeah and you just level them yeah so why why he knew you yeah so this is what happens when you try to get into Daniel's home the big guy's coming at him and the people like to cover up the tattoos but look at that's crazy takes off all your tattoos it's called luminous I don't know it's a spray and it just covers like it's pretty dope on can't see no tattoos on me wow sure works good huh you're young looking man was the gate there um yeah another Gables right there yeah the trash can and everything yeah so you try to cook a little closer all right guys we're gonna do a photo shoot for a bit Skies here and Southern California we're in the middle of winter even though this is right in the middle of East L.A and there's bars on some of the windows I'm sure I'm a bit naive but it feels quite tranquil and peaceful a lot of Working Class People a lot of authentic people raising their families living in a part of a city that I'd say most tourists never ever come to so this is I'm into like poetry like stuff like that right I used to deal with music and like you used to write like like to write songs but I never produced anything or anything like that so this was a song I mean this was a poem that I did when I was when I was addicted myself um addicted to what to um well pills starting off with Vicodin and then I was addicted to um it got into fentanyl oxycodone which you people think that they're using oxy right but they're actually using fennel and they don't have no idea you know so thank God I got over that and I was able to beat that battle you know it's a lot of it comes it's a psychological battle but um a lot of people that you know you might have a family member that you don't know is addicted or somebody that you care about and you know they like they know how to disguise it real well you know so this one is called nobody knows okay um it says nobody knows what I do sometimes I feel that they haven't the slightest clue you see I wake up each day with one constant thought on my mind of when the last time it was that I Got High people talk to me and sometimes I even answer them back it's crazy how these pills have me as if I was on crack I don't even look like I do drugs I shower every day and make sure that I look nice but if anyone knew the amount of pills I'd taken in the last week it would look just like a bag of rice I'm sitting here and I'm writing the story and I have no idea why looking at all these words I'm even starting to make myself cry you see I could sit here and blame everything on my mom and dad and how I was a dick how they were addicted themselves and in and out of prison but truth be told I had my grandpa in my life and most things he tried to teach me I wouldn't even listen you see drugs used to be fun for me and you used to make me feel great but now the only feeling that these pills bring me is pure hate hate for the person that I become and hate for the people that I've lost but I'm still willing to get high at any cost I can't even tell you how much money I've spent on these things or things that I've sold to get my pills but I can tell you that I've been able to remain a functioning addict because of my tattoo skills I don't say this to brag about anything or boast I say this because there might be someone out there that you know that might be living the same way an addiction is something that's affecting most of the population at the end of the day most people addicted honestly want to give up and quit and give it all up but it's harder than it seems when the closest to the closest people to you can doubt you and be so mean it just pushes you to get high again and not care anymore so we just shut down get high again and shut the door I don't know who's reading this or if anyone out there would even care I guess what I'm trying to ask for are saying these few words is maybe just a little prayer you see I've always been a man of faith and believed in prayer and goals so please pray for someone addicted because nobody really knows it's amazing you're an amazing Rider yeah I hope that you know you're able to affect some people with that with that go talking about how long have you been clean um for some years now bro for like about eight years nine years okay so but it's a it's a struggle you know it's a struggle and and your mind when you have you know there's people that you know that sell drugs or there's people that you know that are addicted themselves and stuff and it's it becomes a battle anybody can tell you hey stop doing that or or whatever but it's really going to take the willpower and the strength and and the love of others to be in your life that you're gonna say you know what I care about being here more there's there's a better purpose for me than just to wake up and get high every day you know all right guys end of the road thank you Daniel thank you thanks Andy without Andy reaching out on Instagram there's no way I would ever get into these communities Daniel thank you for bringing us into your life a little peek at your world you know for those of us that have never really been in it it's very fascinating so thanks for opening up not everyone can do that and I want to drop Daniel's Instagram link below also the link to his tattoo shop he does beautiful tattoos it's one of those I'm not gonna call Mom and Pop because it was just you back there but one of those style of businesses where it's very authentic and uh you get a real experience and Andy gave me this hat and there are very few hats I like to wear this one not only fits well but it's his logo check out his Instagram page he does photography all over the streets of mostly East L.A mostly in China culture but all over la but better than most Instagram Pages I've seen in a million times better than mine so check out his link below follow him he has these pictures that make you stop and think for a second make you reflect they're very they're very powerful and for me I don't want to just skip through stuff these days I want to get something so that's Andy's page thank you guys for coming along appreciate the support and the interest until the next one does she have some beef with you is that why she's trying to get the cats over [Music] foreign [Music]

Channel: Peter Santenello

Views: 2,902,940

Keywords: Eastla, chicano, mexican culture, cholo, chicano culture, lowrider lifestyle, mexican gang, mexican hood, mexican food, mexican la, gta, gta san andreas, chicano gang, boyle heights, los angeles, chicano art, peter santenello, pachuco, lowrider, chicano tattoos, mexican tattoos, maravilla gang, maravilla, mexican mafia, daniel ayala, daniel ayala maravilla, daniel ayala marvelous, daniel ayala interview

Id: Y1Cxefu3b3s

Length: 42min 55sec (2575 seconds)

Published: Sun Feb 13 2022