has got her tired

Focused, chasing what she desire

She don’t see the earth moving beneath her

Don’t see the record spinning round

She running, flying, seeking higher ground

She so caught up

Looking up to the sky

But she don’t see heaven

She just wondering why

She drive herself crazy

asking why? Why? Why?

Angry til she find the answers,

even if they make-believe and lies.

Sister slow down

You moving faster than you know

Sometimes there ain’t no answer to find, and no one to show

Lady, loosen your grip

Let some things be

You just be you

I can only be me

You fine as you are

Let tired feet touch ground

Feel roots grow beneath you

They push you forward

Grounded feet will not be bound

Artwork by Faustino Caigoy
http://filamarts.org/category/tags/faustino-caigoy

This story begins as the workday ends, when the sun is low and about to set above the onslaught of Los Angeles traffic.  The fall sky is yellow-orange and smeared with wisps of clouds.  Birds fly in perfect V form above the intersection of Atlantic and District Boulevards in the city of Vernon, California, and as I peer up at what’s outside my window I strain to take in the scene before the signal light changes to green.  The intersection precedes an overpass above the Los Angeles River, which looks more like a cement wash and is barely wet with a foot of still water.  Rusted railroad tracks, remnants of the city’s illustrious industrial past, run parallel to the river and an old water tower looms next to the silhouette of downtown in the distance.  As my car creeps over the bridge I notice that I am not the only one staring.  A lone photographer stands at the edge of the bridge, peering across the river contemplatively with equipment in hand.  I wonder briefly who the man is, then remember that I am in a hurry to get somewhere.  While Vernon’s 55,000 employees are filing out of the city by car, bus, and bicycle – I am just arriving.

The seal of the City of Vernon is stamped with the motto, “Exclusively Industrial.”  Two men dressed in work uniforms stand in the foreground of the logo. The man on the right, with steel hammer resting casually on one shoulder, looks over his other shoulder at the factories and trains billowing smoke behind him.  In the center of the seal, between the men and their work, is a large globe.  This is the world of Vernon, home to 1,800 businesses and less than 100 residents.  First incorporated in 1905, Vernon was touted as a pioneer in the industrial advancement of the southwestern United States.  The city has since been plagued with frequent political corruption and environmental degradation, including conflict surrounding a proposed power plant in the city.  Vernon encompasses only 5.2 square miles, and is located southeast of Downtown Los Angeles, twenty miles west of the City of Industry and less than five miles from the City of Commerce.  Though small, Vernon is the largely unknown birthplace of anything left that is still made in America.  Lucky Brand Jeans, BCBG, American Apparel, and Forever 21 clothing have headquarters located within the municipality.  Sara Lee baked goods, Tapatio hot sauce, Fiesta brand Teddy Bears, Union Ice, the famous Farmer John Dodger Dogs, and the rubber tracks that glass doors slide along, are only a few of the everyday commodities manufactured in Vernon.  Their lives are rarely even an afterthought at the cash register, but there are people behind the making of these products. We don’t see the bare bolts of industry, but in Vernon, California greed, power, and pollution are seen, smelled, and lived with every day.

Business built Vernon, and in return the city is good to business.  Vernon’s advertising sells itself as the place “where small businesses go to grow,” and “large businesses go to stay.”  They are enticed by the city’s low rates for electricity, water, natural gas, and fiber optics, plus first-class fire and police departments.  “It’s a good place to do business because the city is industrial mainly and it’s very safe,” said Yuval Eini, director of sales and engineering for the  Architectural Metals Group at C.R. Laurence Company, Incorporated. C.R. Laurence manufactures and distributes 50,000 products in the architectural, construction, and automotive industries.  Their products include the rubber tracking for Apple store doors, windows for trucks, and the metal molding for the glass walls in Yuval’s office. C.R. Laurence operates a 700,000 square foot building and is in the process of adding 300,000 more square feet to its property, making it the largest entity in the city where it first opened its doors 40 years ago.  The company operates internationally, and though Eini can’t divulge “confidential financial information” with me, he will say that it is a multi-million dollar company.

The Israeli-born Eini is a tall, handsome man with broad shoulders and the kind of hair men his age envy.  He talks to me in his office from behind his large desk, a friendly poster boy for corporate America.  Since his position oversees the engineering and marketing of new products, his office is strategically placed overlooking the factory floor and adjoining the cubicles where sales are made over the phone.  Enclosed by glass walls, Yuval can monitor all the action from his private office.  Downstairs, the loud, busy factory floor is where 300 employees in blue uniforms craft and move metal.  Take the elevator upstairs, and the offices of engineering, sales and management are another world.  It’s quiet, and the business-clad occupants are stationary at their desks.  As I tour the facility with Eini, little heads peer up at me from their cubicles with an expression of curiosity that I become familiar with whenever I’m in Vernon—what is she doing here if she’s not working?

Eini doesn’t live in Vernon, no one really does.  Instead, he commutes an hour every day to and from his home in Sherman Oaks. “Nobody considers to move to the city of Vernon,” Eini says to me, “There are very few people living there.  It’s a pretty dark city if you look at it.  You really just go there to work.” Driving around Vernon, I can hardly spot the signs of normal city life.  There are no public library, parks, shops, and hardly any restaurants.  Except for the McDonald’s, the few local restaurants and fast food joints are only open on work days between 10:00 a.m. and 3:00 p.m. What’s eerier are the missing houses and people. After the late afternoon rush to get home after work, Vernon is desolate.  Rumors abound about the city’s small resident population; Eini has heard that “the mayor dictates who rents these homes and for the most part it’s his family.  You can’t come from outside and ask to live there even if you want to.”  All of Vernon’s 91 residents must rent housing owned by the city, and the renters of Vernon’s 23 homes and one apartment building are city employees and family members of city officials.  Historically officials have argued that it was necessary to keep staff nearby in case of emergencies, but in recent years units have been rented at incredibly low rates to the friends and family of those in power in Vernon, according to recent reports in the Los Angeles Times.  Former City Administrator Eric T. Fresch who earned $1.6 billion as a legal consultant for Vernon in 2008 alone only paid $236 a month for a 3 bedroom home in Vernon from 2007 to 2009.  On the other hand, maybe that’s a fair price for living amidst the noise, dust, smoke, and smells generated in Vernon.  When I ask Eini if he notices any pollution while working in the city, his only complaint is the smell of pig that permeates the air around the Farmer John meat processing plant.

According to Eini, “It’s crazy, sometimes it’s so bad you can’t even be outside.  [The smell] is really bad, is not like cooked meat. It’s meat processing, you know. They make hot dogs and all kinds of pork and meat from these pigs that come in every day in trucks.”  The most recognizable icon of the City of Vernon is the Farmer John Meat Company, famous for both for its crayon-colored mural and for its smell.  Depending on what area of the facility you are near, odors from all stages of meat preparation waft in the air – farm, feces, blood, bacon.  Depicted on the outer factory walls and smoke stacks is a pastoral scene: sitting on a rock at the edge of a quiet stream, a boy fishes in the company of his pet dog and lounging swine.  Elsewhere on the walls a mama pig suckles her piglets, and a gigantic hog finds shade next to a bearded man slouched against a tree trunk and sleeping, his droopy hat pulled down to cover his eyes.  There is also a voluptuous blonde, barefoot in a black mini-skirt and low-cut top that falls off her shoulders.  String leash in hand, she is walking a pig that prances briskly behind her.  Perhaps she’s leading the creature to the greased pig contest, another painted scene in which two young men in overalls chase down their scrambling prizes.  A woman in the background is ahead of the boys, she’s already caught one pig by the tail. Meanwhile, a man strings up legs of ham to dry on a line.  The happy landscape is briefly interrupted by barbed wire before it gets to the cumulus spotted blue sky adorning the factory’s smokestacks.  While painting the heavens, the mural’s artist, Hollywood set designer Leslie Allen Grimes, fell from a fifty-foot scaffold and died in 1968.  On a cloudy day the bucolic Farmer John mural is a bright and sunny reprieve from the weather, and from the monotony of surrounding parking lots and warehouses.  When the sun is out, the murals are sadly artificial, faded in spots and dirty in others.  “I’m not saying we’re trying to hide what’s going on inside,” explained Dennis Clougherty from Farmer John’s marketing department.  Clougherty speaks quickly and graciously.  He is part of the Clougherty family that originally founded the Farmer John brand name before selling it to its present corporate umbrella, Hormel Foods.  The purpose of Farmer John’s kitschy mural, according to Clougherty, is not to cover up the ugly business of “harvesting” animals and turning them into unrecognizable edibles—rather, Farmer John is showcasing the “wholesomeness” that exits the facility, meat products that are the “centerpiece of breakfast, lunch, and dinner.”  Eight thousand live pigs are harvested at the facility every day.

I entered the Farmer John facility through the pedestrian entrance, which is marked with a painted sign that says “Caution, pigs at play.”  Two more signs greet me at the security check-in, “This plant worked 7 days without a lost time accident, best record: 240” and “this plant worked 5 days without an accident.”  A lost time accident refers to a workplace accident that resulted in an injury requiring a person to be laid off or miss days of work.  A plain “accident” is a reportable injury, something more serious.  Upon my arrival, I first meet with Joe Perez from the marketing department and environmental engineer Hector Milano who both assure me that accidents can be anything from a strained back or stubbed toe, to something more serious like “a cut.”

Joanne Chen, Quality Assurance Supervisor, gives me a tour of the facility.  Chen makes sure that “other than tasting good,” the food is also sanitary and safe.  Chen graduated from college 3 years ago, with degree in animal science.  She is originally from Illinois, and moved to California on a whim after visiting her cousin who lives near Vernon.  She’s enthusiastic and has a carefree bounce to her step.  Working at Farmer John is her first full-time job after college and she had to adjust to spending most of her time with other employees in their 30’-s and 40’-s who have families and have been working at the Vernon plant for ten or twenty years.  “It doesn’t seem that long ago,” she tells me about college, “I still remember football games and hanging out at the student center.”

Chen first shows me the bacon building that she is in charge of, where bacon is sliced, weighed, packaged, vacuum-sealed and labeled.  The work is done mostly by female employees and Chen explains to me that it’s mostly women working towards the end of the production line because the women tend to be better with “details.”

Since more women are found working at the finish line, more men work with the raw product, which still looks like pig.  After the bacon building, and without adequate preparation on my part, Chen and I head to ham.  The boxes of bacon are gone and in their place are piles of fresh pig ass.  This is not meat, it’s parts of pigs with skin and bone intact.  There is a platform in middle of the room where rows of men in white lab coats crowd around a long table, hacking and cutting. Watching the men in their long coats and hard hats, I feel as if I’m watching a scene from Frankenstein or some evil experimental surgery.  Chen hustled me quickly past to observe the cooked hams in another room.  The whole cooked hams travel down a conveyor belt until they reach an employee who pushes each ham through a saw to split it in two.  Watching him stand behind the blade, I realized that the cuts reported in “accidents” are probably not the paper kind.  After ham come hot dogs, and we take a few moments to study the mushy orange ground-up meat before it is emulsified and piped into hot dog casing.  Chen tells me she thinks the emulsified meat looks like baby food, though to me it looks more like vomit.

Finally I ask where the pigs are brought into the facility.  Joann points across the plant to the back entrance through which the pigs are trucked in.  We walk a little further in silence before she turns to look at me and asks hesitantly if I want to see the pigs and how far I would like to go in seeing what happens once they enter the plant.  I tell her I just want to see them, and put on as brave a face as I can muster.  To break the tension as we walk towards the other side of the plant, I ask Chen more about herself.  When she studied animal science, did she learn more about living animals, or was she focused on food production?  Chen tells me she focused more on the raising of animals because her original goal was to get into veterinary school.   She postponed veterinary school because she wanted to see what “the real world” was like.  She doesn’t know how long she’ll work at Farmer John’s, but she makes note of some employees who have been there for up to 40 years.  Her three years at the processing plant have gone by quickly, and she’ll decide whether she still wants to go back to vet school after another 5 years.

The pigs can be heard from far away as we approach them.  They are enclosed within a narrow pathway, like the winding line on the way to a roller coaster.  The sound of loud machines and distressed squealing can be heard coming from the building that they are lined up to enter.  An employee stands at the end, armed with what looks like a giant lime-green fly swatter.  He slaps the ground and pigs’ backs to direct them forward in the line.  The pigs are visibly panicked, bursting into mini stampedes every few moments.  Some pigs spin in circles in confusion, while others stubbornly stay behind and will not heed the man’s prompts to continue moving.  One pig cowers next to the waste-tall barrier between it and Joanne and I.  Joanne reaches down to gently pat the sow next to her, and explains that there are regulations for the way the pigs should be treated.  The ones who do not want to move cannot be shoved or dragged; the employees must let them be.  If they aren’t moving it means they’re either scared or hurt, maybe with a broken ankle.  Another straggler walks towards us, and I notice that its tail is a bleeding stub.  Overall, though, the pigs don’t look muddy or very dirty at all; they’re pink and full grown, cute.  They seem calmed by our presence.

I ask what they do then with pigs that won’t move.  She says they “catapult them.”  As images of air-born pigs fly through my mind, she turns to me and points to the spot between her eyes. They shoot them in the face, she tells me as she points to her forehead.  What they “catapult” the stragglers with is basically a gun that shoots a “ball” that is really a bullet; they die immediately and with no pain.  Men are walking towards us, and she says she thinks that’s what they’re going to do now.  We turn to leave automatically.  “I don’t want to see that,” she confesses to me.

I ask Chen if they use gas to kill the pigs.  She shakes her head no; Gas is used for cattle, she explains, but pigs are shocked with electricity.  “They pass out,” she tells me, “They don’t know what’s going on.”  I nod, but something about the cries coming from inside the building tells me that they do.

To Farmer John’s credit, the facility qualifies for local, state, and federal permits, meaning it complies with all regulations.  Due to additional pressure from retailers and its parent company, Hormel Foods, Farmer John also surpasses the minimum legal requirements.  Hormel Foods has sought to reduce its usage of electricity, natural gas and water, and production of solid waste by 2% every year since 2007.   This processing plant operates under a Title V Clean Air Act permit.  Title V facilities are major sources of pollution, generating at least 10 tons each of hazardous air pollutants every year.  Farmer John is currently applying to remove itself from the Title V category, which lumps the company in the same polluting class as oil refineries.

The neighboring city of Huntington Park is nick-named “asthma-town” because of the high asthma rate of its residents, a rate that is assumed to be linked with the city’s close proximity to Vernon and its pollution.  A 2004 study conducted by researchers at the University of California, Irvine found an association between asthma symptoms in Huntington Park youth and air pollutants called Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs).  Huntington Park, one of the most densely populated cities in the state, has a population of 62,497 mostly poor and working class Latinos.  Carlos Arceo, now 33 but who lived in Huntington Park until he was 12, remembers growing up with a lot of kids who had asthma.  He recalls his childhood being happy but “grey.”  Arceo now works for Public Allies Los Angeles, a chapter of a national nonprofit that works towards social justice.   “Now that I understand it politically I realize just how much pollution and neglect I was living in,” Arceo reflects, “I didn’t notice it back then, I was just a kid.  There was a factory literally half a block away across the street from my house that did industrial bleaching, so we would always see the clouds coming over into our home and we never really made anything of it.”  In addition to stationary sources of pollution, trains and hundreds of diesel trucks travel in and around the Vernon area daily.  The apartment building Arceo lived in as a child was next to the train tracks and a block away from Santa Fe Street, two of the major thoroughfares from other parts of southeast LA to Vernon.  “There were constantly big big trucks driving along Santa Fe, which I lived a block away from, because they were heading to Vernon,” Arceo remembers.  Every morning he would cross Santa Fe and walk alongside it to get to school.

Until nine months ago Arceo’s father, Manuel de Jesus Arceo, worked in Vernon cremating pets for D & D Cremation Services, an operation that is part of the rendering plant, West Coast Rendering Company.  The plant where his father worked “is one of the areas that smelled really, really bad,” says Carlos, “his company is one of the foulest smelling ones there. So it was really real for me, my interaction with Vernon, because my dad would come home and he would go straight into the garage and take off all his clothes there. Then he would walk into the house and shower immediately to get all that stuff off him.”

When Manuel Arceo arrived at work, his first task was to remove the ashes from the four crematoriums that were generated during the previous shift. He would put the bones in a grinder and then put the ash and dust in bags to send to clients.  After drivers picked up deceased pets from new clients, Manuel would then receive them and place them in the crematoriums.  During his 12 years at D & D Manuel cremated cats, dogs, llamas, horses, snakes, lions, zebras, sea and desert turtles, lizards the size of a finger, bears, birds, a bald eagle, and most memorably a whale picked up from a San Diego aquarium.  Manuel has a sense of humor about his former job, “People like to spend money on stuff like that and I don’t know why” he says as he shakes his head.  I interview Manuel in his home, with his son present to help translate although Manuel speaks pretty good English himself.  “That’s where’ you’ll go, Butters,” Manuel chuckles, addressing his daughter’s dog that sits on Carlos’ lap.

Manuel acknowledges that he would rather be doing his job than the work of other employees who do the animal fat-rendering.  Rendering, which is the larger operation at his former workplace, turns inedible animal byproducts into materials that can be used for other industries.   West Coast Rendering is one of the few plants that renders cats and dogs, and is paid by Los Angeles County to dispose of the carcasses.  The plant receives hundreds of thousands of animals and pets every year.  Before the rendering begins, drivers pick up dead animals from shelters and animal hospitals, sometimes from as far away as Fresno.  The animals are accepted in almost any condition they are in and placed in drums to be shipped back to Vernon.  Sometimes the refrigeration in the trucks doesn’t work and the drums overflow with the decomposing animals and maggots.  Once the trucks arrive in Vernon, employees unload them.  No matter what stage of decomposition the animals are in, they are all placed into a machine that grinds the bodies down to bones and meat.  The meat and bones are then placed into another machine that cooks the raw meat with steam.  Grease and tallow that rises to the top of the cooker is removed and used as the fat ingredient in pet food.   After the steam cooker, the remaining product is placed into a third machine that compresses it down to a fine powder.  The end product is meat and bone meal that can be put in animal feed or shipped to countries in Asia where it is used as bait for fish and shrimp.

When Manuel first started working in Vernon, he only planned to stay there for six months, “but you got to work,” he says, “we got to pay the bills.  I have kids in the University.”  For his work Manuel was paid a livable wage complete with benefits, but he recognizes that the same is not the case for all of Vernon’s employees, particularly undocumented immigrants who lack leverage against mistreatment by employers. There are employees in Vernon who work ten to twelve hours every day including Saturdays, are not paid well, do not receive benefits, and are not paid for overtime.  Manuel left D & D in February 2010 once he was able to save enough money to buy his own truck and become a commercial truck driver.  He recently went golfing with the man who filled his old position, and found out that the new employee is making only half of what Manuel was paid.  “They deserve more,” says Manuel, “especially for that kind of work.”

The work environment of rendering plants is also hazardous.  Manuel remembers Armando, his former coworker at D & D.  “He was about to die,” Manuel tells me.  Armando was hospitalized for weeks while doctors could not find a diagnosis other than suspecting that he must have been bitten by a mosquito or fly that was infected with bacteria from the decomposing animals.  That explanation made sense to Manuel since some of the animals that enter the facility come in plastic bags labeled with rabies or other illnesses.  Those animals are not treated any differently from healthy ones, “they put them in the cooker, in the grinder, process them the same way.”  To doctors’ surprise, Armando made a full recovery.

After taking a “Toxic Tour” with a nonprofit in Huntington Park that works towards environmental justice, Manuel’s son Carlos realized another hazard his father was exposed to.  A few times each year, Communities for a Better Environment (CBE) conducts tours to visit refineries, chemical sites, and development projects that are complicated by the presence of hazardous substances, pollutants, or other contaminants.  The southern California Toxic Tour is concentrated in southeast Los Angeles, and includes the City of Vernon.  The tour stopped at the highest polluting mercury plant in the United States, which is next to the West Coast Rendering plant were Manuel worked.  When asked if he noticed any effects the exposure to such pollutants might have had on his family Carlos mentions three of his uncles who worked in a meat packing factory in Vernon, “One of them passed away when he was thirty-five years old and he died of a stroke,” Carlos tells me, “I have no idea what that means, you’re making me think about that right now.”

According to Communities for a Better Environment, the Los Angeles air basin has unsafe levels of particulate matter in the air.   Particulate matter can cause difficulty breathing, lung damage, changes to the body’s defense systems, and premature death.   It is estimated that air pollution takes 5,500 lives in that region each year. CBE finds the city of Vernon fully responsible for the contaminants affecting surrounding communities.  Whereas Vernon is “exclusively industrial,” Huntington Park is almost exclusively residential.  Huntington Park and the cities of Maywood, Bell, and Southgate border Vernon and are also boxed in by the 110, 710, 105, and 5 freeways.  The 6.4 mile stretch of the 710 freeway that passes through these communities generates 51.8 tons of truck emissions every day, and Vernon has the only McDonald’s I’ve ever seen with a drive-through for semi-trucks.  Freeways and toxic sites are disproportionately located in Southeast LA, a community that according to Carlos Arceo is “historically neglected.” It’s a community of immigrants and people of color, and a place where there’s a lack of information and resources.  “Until recently,” Arceo explains, “there haven’t been too many people out there trying to organize the community,” but CBE is working to change that.

Their most recent victory has been against the proposal to build a new 943 mega-watt power plant in the city of Vernon.  Vernon’s existing Light & Power Plant was built in 1932 when John Leonis, a rancher, merchant and founder of the city unhappy with Southern California Edison’s rates for industrial electricity, organized a bond measure to authorize the construction of an independent power source.  Vernon now offers its residing business electricity and natural gas rates that are ten to thirty percent lower than other utility providers.  The proposed power plant was meant to keep rates low and increase city income by selling surplus energy.  The power plant also would have created over 5.5 billion pounds of greenhouse gases and 1,763,059 pounds of other pollutants annually.  More than 10,000 students would have attended school within a one mile radius of the proposed power plant site.

Nearby residents and community organizations mobilized to attack the proposal in the media and in court, and the proposal was withdrawn in September 2009.  The abandoned proposal was celebrated as a victory by the little guy against big corporation, but CBE remains wary of a supposed 330-watt plant that is meant to be a compromise.  The city has yet to file an official proposal for the smaller power plant.

Environmental woes are not Vernon’s only problem.  Corruption in the city has been chronic since its inception.  The city’s founders were ranchers Thomas J. and James J. Furlong, along with rancher and merchant John B. Leonis.  It was Leonis’ business sense that made its mark on the city.  His grandson, Leonis C. Malburg, served on the city council beginning in 1956, and became mayor in 1974.  After staying in power for over 50 years, Malburg was convicted in 2009 of voter fraud, conspiracy, and perjury.  The scandal surrounding Malburg made clear that one elite family has essentially ruled the city of Vernon ever since its inception in 1905.  In 2010 more serious offenses in were disclosed, calling into question whether Vernon should be allowed to be incorporated as a city at all.  Southern Californians were shocked by the disclosure of inordinately high salaries for Vernon city officials.  Eric T. Fresch, who worked as city administrator and deputy city attorney in 2008, made more than $1.65 million that year.  He also received $643,000 from the city from January to July 2010 for “outside legal counsel.”  Donal O’Callaghan, former city administrator who drafted the original proposal for the 943-watt power plant, was charged with corruption for personal use of public money, and with conflict of interest for giving city contracts to entities whose officers included his wife.  O’Callaghan resigned after the accusations were made; he was earning a $380,000 salary.

Even before Yuval Eini began working in Vernon a year ago, he could tell from his initial business trips to the town that there was something problematic with its make-up.  “This kind of set up for a city is subject for corruption,” Eini says, “It’s a small city and there’s no objection.   Basically, [the mayor and city officials] control the police, they control everything there. The fact that they just found about this now, it’s not surprising.”  Because there is so much money to be made taxing industry and only a small population, all of whom work for or are personally invested in the city, Vernon rakes in uncommonly large revenue while having hardly anyone to account to.

According to research conducted by the University of California, the average American household spends $17,000 on food, clothes, body care, and other household items, products  which could have been manufactured and shipped out of Vernon.  At the same time, many of the families who live and work in south east LA’s hot bed of industry have an average household income of less than $15,000.

Working long hours amid death, disease and pollution in Vernon, Manuel Arceo was able to build the foundation for a better life for himself and his family.  The Arceos moved from Huntington Park to the neighboring city of South Gate when Carlos was twelve.  His father still lives in their small home near Vernon.  Carlos partly attributes his career in social justice to the influence his parents had on him.  They were involved in community work through a couple’s counseling network called Marriage Encounter, and emphasized to their children the importance of education.  “We don’t want you to have to work as hard as we do,” the Arceos’ told their son, encouraging him after high school to enter higher education rather than find work.  Carlos attended UC Berkeley, but now lives a 5-minute drive away from his parents with his wife and new baby.  “I don’t see myself moving far from here, despite the challenges,” Carlos asserts, “I think it’s a responsibility and I think we can resolve the issues.  So I’m sticking around.”

For others whose livelihood depends on Vernon, remaining there is not a matter of choice but of necessity: often for them, the city provides the only opportunity to find work.  I drive home from Vernon, relieved to have escaped.  The stench of pig has stuck with me all day; I shower and douse myself with perfume because the smell of my skin reminds me of the flesh at Farmer John’s.  Curious, I search online and find perfume warehouses in Vernon.  As I scroll through pages of business listings, I wonder how much in my life comes from Vernon and whether I’ve really left the city behind.

Bare feet in wet sand

Not afraid of the waves

Don’t forget who you are.

Anger and hurt

Fire and love

Compassion and warmth

Don’t forget who you are.

Visions for my community

Dreams for myself

Plans to make it happen

Don’t forget who  you are.

I will make it happen

I’ve made it this far

Because of who I am.

in Heaven where the weather is mild

In Heaven where I pray

I may meet you one day.

Forgive me and dad for the struggles we have

God loves you when we can’t.

God will provide with each coming tide

Yaweh bring you home

and you won’t be alone.

Grow strong in spirit, child,

in Heaven where the weather is mild

In Heaven where I pray

I may meet you one day.

~December 2011~

One day I will be a Lola
& wear my flower print duster

As I write this reflection in my underwear and big t-shirt, I look like I just took a shower.  But I didn’t.  I just walked home in a thunderstorm.

This morning Christina and I woke up at 10:00 in our apartment in the Garden District.  In the middle of getting ready we stopped to grab long island iced tea and a mudslide from the nearest mom & pop shop that sells liquor, and went back home to enjoy our drinks while finishing our make-up.

Once we were dressed, and a little tipsy, we were ready to head out.  It was sunny still, and hotter than yesterday. It is so hot that Christina’s teal nail polish is melting off.

We took the St. Charles Street Car to Canal St. and walked to Cafe Du Monde in the French District.  There we ate beignets buried under a mountain of powdered sugar and shared a cafe a lait.

Then it was time for what we came to New Orleans for – jazz!  We attended the Louis Armstrong Satchmo SummerFest jazz festival and listened to brass bands and a rendition of “What a Wonderful World.”

The Festival was held at the U.S. mint, a historical landmark that also houses the Lousiana Civil Rights Museum.  What an amazing exhibit!  I could feel the emotions in the room as black, white, and 2 Filipina visitors stood together to revisit the history of race, racism, and white privilege in this country. Christina and I had a passionate discussion with Darren and another man (I’m sorry I can’t remember your name) who had a raspy voice like Louis Armstrong.  Louis was upset because we were standing next to a display that showed bundles of cash stacked up to represent the net worth of households of different races.  White and Asian net worth was stacked high.  Black, Latino, & “Other” was not even a 10th as high.  He was mad because of how people of color suffer in poverty, and because he believed the stereotype of the “Asian Model Minority.”  I explained that the model minority was a myth, that there are poor Asian immigrant and refugee communities who have been forced to leave home and come to this country because of war and lack of economic opportunities.  He was appreciative, and told us that Christina and I were the first Asian Americans he’s ever had a conversation with.  We decided together that misconceptions like the model minority myth keeps people of color divided and pitted against each other. Louis and Darren are native to New Orleans, and from the 9th ward, the district hardest hit and slowest to recover since Hurricane Katrina.  He told us how sad it still is, even two years after Katrina.  We also talked about Japanese internment and reparations, and he showed us his anguish about slavery: “We’re still paying for that.  No one ever gave us reparation.”

Christina and I hugged and parted with Darren & Louis, and stepped out of the museum back into the festival.  The ground was wet, the sun had left and rain had come while we were away!  We listened to a brass band play and sing “Who Dat Called the Cops?”  We bought ourselves a couple beers, mine was Abita Purple Haze, and then it started to rain again!  So we gave each other a twirl around and danced in the rain, beers in hand.

We listened to a whole set by the New Birth Brass Band before grabbing lunch from one of the festival vendors.  We bought crawfish etouffee from a man who thought we were so beautiful “it hurt [him] to take our cash.”  Too bad it didn’t hurt him enough to earn us a free meal.  We ate under the cover of a big oak tree and had a conversation with a flapper woman dressed in purple feathers who had just danced in the Zulu parade.

By this time the rain had turned into a full blown thunder storm, and so it was time to head back home to get ready for dinner.  We walked, laughing, through the rain.  We splashed through the French Quarter to the street car and made our way home.

So here I am, listening to Etta James and waiting for my hair to dry.  It’s almost time for dinner – we’re having boudin sausage, deep-fried alligator, and wood-fired oysters!  After dinner comes more jazz at the Spotted Cat.  There is more jazz in this city than I can soak up in a lifetime.  Guess I’m coming back next year!

Drink deeply
Breathe the air
Live in the moment.

Those are the words the loves of my life left me with before I left for Peru, and that´s what I´m going to do here.

It´s 2 am in Lima and I don´t board my next flight to Cuzco until 4:55.

After the eight hour flight from LA to Lima, I believe in fate again. I believe in fate. I believe in God. I believe in good people. Before I left, my mom asked me what my seat number was. My family is superstitious so whenever we go to a casino we always make sure to park in column D for “dollar” or C for “cash”. I was assigned to seat 24L, which I thought was lucky since the 24th is my birthday and my mother´s maiden name is Librea.

Sitting next to me, in seat 24J, was Lourdes. If you talked to me before I left, you know I was scared shitless. Lourdes, an adorable Peruvian lady, told me not to worry. She gave me advice, ordered me tea (because I´m possibly coming down with swine flu :/), helped me find my baggage, walked me through immigration and customs, introduced me to her family, and guided me to my next terminal. It was like i had my mom with me.

Lourdes was also superstitious with numbers and letters.  She was happy to be seated in 24J because her grandson’s name began with the letter J, just like me.

I’m drifting somewhere in the Mediterranean Sea.  This cruise wasn’t what I expected.  Embarkation at Southhampton – I was a speck of brown in a long line of grey English heads.

Then once on board we were greeted by more familiar brown faces – Mexican, Thai, and the smiles and songs of my people.  I think I’d feel more in my place with the crew, working hard and still smiling big.  But then who’s to say a Filipino can’t live large?  Eating and sleeping the days away between trips to Rome and Monte Carlo?

“Wherever you go you will always be a Filipina,” Tita Ning told me.  She’s right.  I’m no European.  The ancient ruins and grotesquely overbearing cathedrals I visit here are not my past.  My roots are with the sea that carried my people to every corner of the world – upon Spanish galleons and princess cruise ships.  And I’m proud.  My ancestors, my kababayan are strong and relentless as the pounding waves, bright and hopeful as the approaching horizon.

My only wish is that more often the tides would change.  That this ship might catch the horizon, the tomorrow when seamen can go home for good, survive and thrive from labor on their own land – sa atin.

Ate Kathy, Tito Milan, Ferdi, Max, Tito Solomon, Kuya Michael, Fireman A, Lolo Ernie, Lola, Journey, Tito Dennis, Tita Maribu, Tita Marie… Sana I’ll see you again.

for touching pen to paper

ink gliding so softly i can hear my thoughts

There’s something to be said for listening to jazz

late into the night while I’m in my underwear and my room is a mess

Must be something in the Los Angeles air

that doesn’t quite want you there.

You’re just tough enough

or stubborn enough

or angelic enough

to stick it out.

Something about writing a poem

tells me that I’m in love

and I’m an artist poet dreamer again

This was posted to a facebook group called “InZombiac”.  4 people like this photo.
On August 25 at 8:23pm ·Gregory Paneroshe commented: “she’s too hot to want rights.”

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=44504990&o=all&op=1&view=all&subj=2231388586&aid=-1&id=6018007&oid=2231388586#

I’m interning with GABNet LA right now, and I know the woman in this photograph.  GABNet is a women’s mass solidarity organization with campaigns against the trafficking of Filipino women and children and against the US-led war of terror.  It is an organization that empowers women.

I don’t know how to explain how it makes me feel to see the image of an empowered woman made made a mockery of.  To say that this shit makes me hella mad isn’t enough.

A good friend emailed me the link to this image with the message “a reminder that people in these kinds of pictures are STILL people… people we can know very well, and then we realize these things are fucked up and hella offensive”

We have a lot of work left to do.

—

UPDATE:  A victory!  The photograph above was reported to Facebook and taken down.  After informing GABRIELA Network about the misuse of their slogan, they were able to secure a copyright to the phrase “A woman’s place is in the struggle” so that we can take legal action against anyone who exploits the phrase in the future.