Why I love East Palo Alto pt.1

I am putting this on Craigslist today in the Rants and Raves section.

I am a native of East Palo Alto, born right on Veterans’ Boulevard at Kaiser. My family has been based here in the Peninsula for over 60 years. My moms’ family came from Tennessee in 1940 and my dad’s side came from North Carolina in 1955. In other words, “we been living ‘ere!” I am now in my mid thirties, and after being gone from my hometown for over 10 years, I returned to work here. That was over 7 years ago, since I came back to teach at a small school on Runnymede street. I taught a class of 2nd, 3rd and 4th graders in the same classroom that I had when I myself was a kindergartner and 3rd grader.
I had, in my classroom, a young lady whose grandmother was my school principal when I’d been a student there. I had others who were the nieces and nephews, cousins of old schoolmates and kids that I’d grown up with. I was a member of a very small staff, with a principal and vice principal who dealt with me, an inexperienced but sincere teacher, like their very own son. The foundation of the school was family, centered around the students. I have been blessed to work with the youth of this community now for almost 8 years and it’s been the best 8 years of my career.

Now I work as a counselor and instructor at an adult school, still here in the community. I also live in EPA. The past few days, I’ve been out in the streets more particularly in the mornings and early evening. I am experiencing some very deep level memories. The other day I stood outside the yard of a house that I had played in as a child. The family that had lived there was close to my family. The two kids Mwosi and Kai were good friends of mine. I have a picture of me pulling Mwosi to her feet, she has an afro, a red dress, white sweater and a “Free Angela” button.

My family was then and remains now very involved in community organizing, education and politics. I miss that part of EPA, it may not have been true, but it seemed like the emphasis was on creating a great place for all of us to raise our families, to have a community that was controlled from within, and that was a place where we could enjoy ourselves. East Palo Alto at that time was a very bohemian place to live. We attracted a lot of characters, very creative people came to make their homes here. We had world class drummers, such as Baba Milonga Casquelord and Sakisa Thompson as well as world class intellects and organizers such as Dr. Mary Hoover and Dr. Faye McNair Knox, Ed Becks, Kwame Toure, Dr. James Garrett, the list goes on and on. East Palo Alto has a lot of history worth uncovering, documenting and sharing. (I have been working on that for a few years….)

In any case, this morning I remembered more about the great times that I had here as a kid. Swimming at the pool, drumming in the park, gardening with my grandmom and her neighbors and shooting bb guns in my neighbors backyard. East Palo Alto was then, a place that held so much joy and wonder for me. My childhood here was very happy.

I grew up in an East Palo Alto that had crime, but even the criminals had some kind of honor and code that they respected. Even they watched out for the kids and other people that were trying to do something positive. Today, that code still exists but not everyone honors it. I am deeply sorry that Officer May fell in the line of duty. But what makes me even more sad is the dozens of youth that fell in the streets before him. Too many of them didn’t even get a fair start in life, in this the same town that made me who I am, too many youth are not getting a fair chance.

I love the fact that my neighbors speak Spanish and play horrible ranchero music on the weekend. Directly across the street from me is an Indian family that celebrates so big, when they do it, the whole block is filled with their cars. I love the fact that there are enough Fijians, Tongans and Samoans in my community that it is actually possible to go a local restaurant and get real authentic Tongan food.

I could go on, but this is enough to tell anyone why I love my town, East Palo Alto.