All About the Trokiando Subculture in Texas
A Trokiando subculture has bloomed in Mexican-American communities in Texas, thanks to the social media savviness of its younger members.
Written by Alex Reale
Reviewed by Kathleen Flear
Table of Contents
It is a truth universally acknowledged that some cars inspire community, and some don’t. You don’t often hear of Honda Civic owners getting together to praise the convenience of parking, or to see who can transport their groceries the most fuel-efficiently.
Jeep people, by contrast, have the
Jeep wave
, and anyone with a Volkswagen Beetle knows that they’re inspiring legions of school-age children to punch each other in the backseat. One thriving
truck
community that has sprung up, due in large part to its youthful social media savviness, is the Trokiando subculture in Texas. Mexican-American roots
This Texas trucking subculture has its roots in Mexican-American lowriding communities that sprang up in the 1940s in Southern California, reports
Remezcla
. Lowriding, with its vibrant colors and majestically slow pace, spread across the American southwest over the following decades, notes
MotorTrend
. Texas towns like El Paso and Odessa became famous sites for cruising in your lowered Chevy among cheering crowds. Combine this cultural substrate with a penchant for pickups and you get a whole new Southern car experience.The trokiando community may have some lowriding ancestry, but the two groups wouldn’t have a lot to talk about, car-wise. Gone are the
modified Chevy Impalas
: “trokiando” is Spanish for “trucking.” The so-called takuaches (literally, “possums”) of trokiando, who often sport ranchero-style clothes and accessories, are not into the deliberate calm of the lowriders. Instead they take their trucks out for exuberant spins, ribbing each other with the affectionate term “cuh” (short for “cousin”) as they burn rubber and attempt absurd terrain.
A modern car culture
If you spend some time looking at takuache or trokiando content on Instagram or TikTok, you’ll get a window into a community that doesn’t take itself too seriously.
Their Fords, Chevys, and GMCs are driven into comically large puddles, undergo bizarre upgrades (imagine the face of a Camaro transplanted onto a 4x4,) and spew constant clouds of smoke in service to various burnouts. Though the hijinks are irreverent, and occasionally dangerous, the overall feeling is buoyant. The trokiando folks are really into their trucks, and they really want to see what they can do.
Trokiando is growing day by day, and like all good things, its days sans influencers are coming to an end. A few teenage content creators are transcending the bounds of their communities to become stars, uploading video after video of their custom trucks so that the whole world can watch.
It’s a thoroughly 21st century version of a car community. The takuaches are sharing the joy of trokiando with all of us.
Insuring your truck
Rethinking your pickup’s insurance after you’ve binged on takuache videos? The
Jerry
app is a good place to start. A licensed broker, Jerry does all the hard work of finding cheap quotes from the top name-brand insurance companies and buying new car insurance. Jerry will even help you cancel your old policy.And to ensure you always have the lowest rate, Jerry will send you new quotes every time your policy comes up for renewal, so you’re always getting the coverage you want at the best price. This level of service is why Jerry earned a 4.6/5 rating on the App Store and made it the top insurance app in the country.
4.7
