2012

April 23, 2012

This spring, Abdullah aka “Papa Bear” came to the PNN Community Newsroom with some deeply disturbing news.

Papa Bear is a double vet who volunteered for the Vietnam War, he reports, “because my country said, 'fight for freedom.' At 17 years old, I was very proud of my country[...]. I felt that I should fight for my country and freedom.”

Papa Bear's tour ended when he nearly bled to death in combat. He says, “I was legally toe-tagged in the morgue for a day and a half. When they made their first cut for my autopsy, I woke up.” He says, “I bled to death. But it wasn't my time.”

Now he is a disabled Vietnam veteran in San Francisco. He's been houseless since Bush implemented a policy to “re-evaluate” vets and has been struggling to survive.

On top of all this, “I got Homeland Security checking me out cause of my name, Abdullah. My dad is Arabic, he's Saudi. They don't look at my record, they don't look at my life.”

“Why am I being hassled because of my name and my family? It's like, I gave my life for this country, seriously,” says Papa Bear.

After Papa Bear came back from the dead, the doctors held him for research for two and a half years. In addition to the time served training, fighting, and as a research specimen, Papa Bear now struggles with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and a host of physical problems relating to his injuries.

Homeland Security agents appeared at Papa Bear's place of work, on the corner of Van Ness and Geary, where he panhandles. Papa Bear reports, “They showed up and talked to me: 'We're homeland security. We just wanna know what you're doing.' I'm homeless, I fought for this country. I'm like, why are you guys bothering me?”

It is absurd that Homeland Security is going after this person and many others with “high threat” names. Folks, even including veterans like Papa Bear, are getting criminalized because their names are connected with racist, colonial fears of “terror.” It is especially notable that the US touts its dignifying treatment of veterans with one hand, while criminalizing the poverty that many veterans experience with the other. The double-standard of "terror" is turned against people like Papa Bear in this case, whose services were used in a national campaign of terror against the Vietnamese. Lots of vets like Papa Bear were compelled to participate in these acts, to demonstrate allegiance to the country in dehumanizing massacres... and now suspected of not being patriotic enough? After all the things Papa Bear did that he was assured were patriotic, he's still a suspected terrorist at the most basic level. What must a person of color do to be free of criminalization in this country? Was "patriotic" participation in mass-killing not enough?

Lisa “Tiny” Gray-Garcia of POOR Magazine commented, “There is this bullshit lie of the War On Terror, which is obviously full of so much mess that it's not even funny, cause I know [Papa Bear] was born here, for whatever that means—I think this is just a new level of insanity.”

Papa Bear is also getting hassled by local police forces. This month alone his blankets were taken from him, the police were called on him for pan-handling, and he got power-hosed in one of the city's nightly attempts to “clean up” the streets of San Francisco.

Papa Bear thankfully has a good chance of getting off the streets in the next six months. “I have a new agency working on my veterans benefits, and it looks good. It looks like I might be receiving my pension again.”

“With tobacco there is terrible withdrawal, it is almost impossible for a lot of people. I did, I went cold turkey, they never had any patches in those days but grass was not difficult, alcohol not difficult, but tobacco – OH MY GOD” – Anonymous

Within my childhood home, four of my family members smoked and chewed
tobacco. I have a feeling they would have expressed similar struggles attempting to
quit using tobacco. As the oldest of six siblings and cousins residing in my twelve-
person household, the affects of second-hand smoke caused each of us health
related issues as we grew older. The youngest of the cousins seemed most severely
affected.

I was born and raised in the beautifully diverse city of San Francisco. As most
residents of San Francisco can attest to, this city suffers from many health issues as
a direct impact of alcohol, drugs, and tobacco usage. For as long as I can remember, I
was living with asthma; a respiratory disease that affects many children and adults,
particularly in dense cities like San Francisco.

Asthma ontinues to affect numerous youth living in low-income areas due to high
concentrations of tobacco smokers, especially in the Bay Area. Unfortunately my
asthma has gotten worse throughout the years I have been hospitalized on several
occasions as a result of second-hand smoke inhalation on my way home from school,
work, and even in my enclosed apartment building. If San Francisco City Officials
truly wanted everyone to have the opportunity of health equity, then a decrease in
the number of tobacco retailer outlets in San Francisco would be of top priority.

Tobacco companies aggressively campaign for worldwide distribution and
advertisement. Though my dad, aunt, and uncles brought their smoking habits from
the Philippines, they were unable to leave behind their addictive habit of tobacco
use once settling in the U.S. The tobacco industry often targets families like mine:
immigrant, low-income, and brown. Tobacco industries are known for targeting
youth like myself as well as people lacking resources to stand up to the tobacco
industry to fight against the deadly addiction of tobacco use. It was for this reason
that I made the decision to make change where I could. This is why I joined the
Tobacco Use Reduction Force (TURF).

TURF is a program through the Youth Leadership Institute (YLI) made up of eight
diverse youth advocates committed toward improving the health of San Francisco
residents, particularly those living in vulnerable communities, by crafting and
passing a tobacco policy. TURF’s first round pushing for a policy limiting tobacco
permits in San Francisco was in 2008 – 2010. As a team, our experiences taught
us crucial lessons that prepared for us for our second attempt of passing a tobacco
policy in San Francisco. My personal involvement began with YLI seven years ago
as a youth advocate. Through trainings and expert interviews, I overcame daily
challenges and developed skills that helped me become a leader.

As a youth advocate working on tobacco prevention for the past seven years, I have
seen few positive health changes in my community. Easy tobacco access is an issue

in low-income communities of color such as mine. Tobacco usage is still the most
preventable death, yet people continue to abuse their health when buying these
harmfully addictive products that will potentially deteriorate their health and the
health of others. “If you are addicted to smoking, purchasing tobacco products is
basically like buying your own death”, mentioned Jesus Sicairos, a member of the
TURF team.

As Jesus put it, people are essentially “purchasing their own death”, which has been
made possible with the excessive availability of tobacco outlets on just about every
street corner in some areas in the city. In an effort to restrict tobacco accessibility
and promote a healthier San Francisco, the TURF team will advocate for a citywide
policy.

We are currently drafting a policy that will reduce the number of tobacco stores in
communities most saturated and inundated by excessive tobacco retailer outlets.
We are striving to create uniformity for all San Francisco supervisorial districts.
Our policy will create sustainable change that will benefit residents, community
members, and youth striving for better health and access to clean air.

April 10, 2012

"If there is to be revolution, there must be a revolutionary party." (Mao Tse-Tung)

We the people, the 99%, of these United States in recognition of our shared oppression under the current, corporate-dominated government do hereby propose the establishment of a revolutionary political party. Such a party would be launched outside of the established parameters and would not be dependent upon corporate financing or subjected to its lobbying influence.

Our people’s party will recognize and acknowledge the following:

* The genomic breakthrough by the Human Genome Project of the new millennium confirms the biological, singular human race to which we all belong regardless of color or other differences. In short, there’s one race, the human race, and we all descended from Africa, the Motherland of humankind. While racism persists, we will de-institutionalize it through our revolutionary education and media, fighting bigotry with international solidarity, appreciation of differing cultures, and revolutionary politics. We will become the new men and women who will forge a new, nonracist paradigm.

*  The Constitution is a flawed, antiquated, and racist document that needs to be amended and updated. 

In 1970, the Revolutionary Peoples Constitutional Convention (RPCC), led by the Black Panther Party assembled some 10,000 people in Philadelphia to rewrite the Constitution.  It was written in 1787 by British Aristocrats who were slave owners of Africans, poor Europeans, and others; excluded indigenous peoples and all women, and referred to the common people as “a great beast” and “scum.” It still authorizes States to import Persons but the tax or duty cannot exceed “ten dollars for each Person,” and although the 13th Amendment abolishes slavery, it’s still protected ”as a punishment for a crime.”  Moreover, its 27 amendments cover civil rights but no provisions are made for human rights.

* The real minority is the opulent one percent whose cumulative wealth exceeds that of at least 45 percent of the U.S. population.

* The disparities in wealth and the ever-increasing poverty and decimation of the majority, the 99%, demand revolutionary change, not merely reform.

* The current political system must be abolished and replaced by one that enshrines into law human rights encompassing the basic right to live and thrive in a modern, global reality. Such human rights, comprising our collective needs, are as follows:

1) Environmental Protection. Scientists are now certain that the earth is warming as evidenced by catastrophic floods, droughts, wild fires, and the ongoing extinction of countless species. E.g., 90% of the planet’s big fish are now extinct. Every human being is affected by global warming and its horrific consequences. We must urgently move to create sustainable, green energy.

2) Clean, fresh water. Climate change and environmental pollution are infecting and threatening our access to clean, drinkable water. Corporate profiteering and privatization of this vital resource, without which life cannot exist, must be stopped.

3) Healthy, organic food. The virtual elimination of the family farm as the main agricultural producer and its replacement by agribusinesses such as Monsanto has wreaked havoc with the food system and introduced genetically modified produce and patented seeds that have jeopardized domestic and global food production. Such arrangements must be completely transformed and reorganized to provide for the equitable redistribution of food worldwide.

4) Full employment and job security. The global multinational corporations have enjoyed a race to the bottom in low-wage labor contracts moving from one nation to another to maximize profits. We propose a universal living wage for workers worldwide to compel companies to remain in their countries of origin, save shipping costs, reduce their carbon footprints, and provide full employment at living wages to their employees.

5) Universal (single payer) health care. Health care is human right and as such should be guaranteed to every person living in the USA. Medical care should be a vital service provided by the government (the people’s revenues), not a for-profit business. Nursing homes should be phased out in favor of independent, community living
.
6) Affordable Housing. Every person should have the human right to shelter from the harsh elements, privacy, and space in which to extend or raise a family. Today’s budget cuts will virtually eliminate subsidized housing in the face of massive homelessness and critical need. The “fastest growing public housing” is prisons, and when those residents are released, they’re denied Section 8 (affordable apartments) because of their prison record -- a clarion call for recidivism, or back to slavery. Gentrification, home foreclosures and urban removal must be stopped.

7) Universal Education and Job Training. The current race to the top, a continuation of the Bush Administration’s no child left behind debacle, has practically destroyed quality education in public schools. We need to provide all our children with a free, quality education from preschool to graduate school. Such education should teach us critical thinking, encourage current events discussion and debate, as well as required studies on the histories of Africa, Asia, and Latin America, their indigenous peoples and their contributions to the arts, sciences, and literature. Job training should provide students with the latest tools and skills in construction, technology, and agriculture. Such training and education should be instituted in the prisons to assure employment upon release.

8) Affordable childcare. Businesses, schools and colleges should provide onsite childcare to employees with children and parental leave for newborns and childhood illnesses. Government subsidies should apply where needed. Such provisions have succeeded in other countries with very positive impact on employee productivity.

9) Social Security, unemployment insurance, and the safety net. In a country as wealthy as the USA, every person should be guaranteed an adequate income during hard times, illness, disability, and aging infirmity.

10) Justice and Peace. We demand an end to the current system of injustice that has institutionalized a prison industrial complex tantamount to chattel slavery. We want the immediate release of political prisoners and immigrant detainees, especially parents. We advocate abolition of the death penalty, trying children as adults, insanely long sentences and prolonged solitary confinement. We demand an end to the criminalization of drugs, racial profiling, and immigrant detention. Prisons should be transformed into places of educational productivity and therapeutic healing with the ultimate goal of being phased-out altogether. We demand that aggressive, imperialist wars be terminated and that peace be given top priority in policy making. All political prisoners and prisoners of war should be immediately released.

11) Gender Equity. Women’s liberation gave women more employment within the capitalist system at a lower rate of pay, double duty at work and home, token representation in Board Rooms and politics per se. It changed the all male pronouns and gave us more access to sports and construction jobs. But men are still totally dominant, and the abuse of females is worse than ever, beginning with the fetus (selective abortion), infants (infanticide!), and lack of respect for girls, mothers, and grandmothers. Male supremacy is alive and well everywhere, which translates to aggressive wars and no balance. Women are more than half the population, and should be at least half of all governing bodies (from city counsels to Congresses). There should be equal pay for equal work, compensation for caring and household work, and respect for women’s right to self-determination and reproductive choice. We recognize the equal human rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people to live openly with respect and fair treatment in our communities.

We also recognize that in order to finance the people’s needs, we would need to nationalize at least some industries. Since life in the modern world requires utilities such as gas, electricity, and telephone communications, we think these industries should belong to the people and provide for their basic human rights as described above.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and, accordingly, all experience hath shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But, when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. (The Declaration of Independence)

The Black Panther Party’s Ten-Point Platform & Program of 1966 had some of the same points tailored to the needs of our Black communities, closely replicated by other groups in our original, revolutionary Rainbow Coalition. In this global era we think it’s appropriate to forge an international party that embraces all cultures and ethnicities.

Comments welcome at www.kiilunyasha.blogspot.com

“People of the World Unite!”

White Sand Beaches of Market Street

By Tony Robles

A manong I’d met a

While back but whose

Name I couldn’t remember

Recently approached me on

Market Street

Hey Pinoy!

He said

I recognized him but

Didn’t know from where,

When or why so rather than

Pretend I said:

Oh Manong, long time no see,

I’ve missed you so much.  How

Are you, how is your family?  Oh

How I’ve missed you, you link to

My ancestral and indigenous past

(etc. etc. etc)

The manong looked at me like I’d

Lost my mind but smiled anyway

And we were out on a sunny day

On Market Street, just the two of us

He looked at me through

Thick glasses, the wind blowing

Through his thick head of hair

Overcome with gray and flecked with

Embers of memory dust

Have you ever been

To the Philippines?

He asked

No, I said but

Told him that I wanted

To go someday

You should go,

He said, they got

White sand bitches

You mean

Beaches?

Yes, bitches.  You

Hear of Boracay?

Yes, I heard of it.

Are there any other places

In the Philippines with

White sand beaches?

Yes…but Boracay is

A resort, hotels and

Bitches all over

I looked at the manong’s

Hair that was slowly

Turning sandy white like

A beach

I felt the

Breeze in

Our faces

We were in

Boracay

This Carabao has gone home to the village

Come to me, my melancholy baby

Baguio Ifugao winds that blew away

YOUR POETRY breathing words

INTO SMITHEREENS OF CARABAO DUNG

kEARney Street manong

Manilatown Igorot

Ifugao Mountain traveler, Tagatac -seeker

Dancing and sucking between the juices

Somewhere between The fish head AND THE Ox-TAIL

LIES THE ANSWER.

BENEATH THE WInTER SNOW, maybe.

Or wait until the white snow melts in the spring,

about ten in the morning when dogs have deep thoughts.

The spirit that he celebrated lived in him throughout.

The spirit of the manong,

Of the giver, the helper, the survivor, the never sell-out, the dreamer, the provider, the visionary, the joie de vivre, the compassionate, the human.

The spirit of the manongs and the manangs, the manangs yes,

Particularly of that time

But eternal and universal at any time, any place…

Like you, my brother, even though now, you,

manilatown carabao have gone home to your village.

It was 1971, and I was 20 years old. I was sitting in bar in a small town in Maine. With a beer in one hand a guy taps me on the shoulder and says, “Would you like to make $100 a day?” That would be equivalent to a thousand dollars today. I didn’t ask any questions, I jumped on it. I took the job and found out my duties were to eat live rats and chickens to scare people. I found out other people with disabilities were put in the same situation as part of the “freak show.” Transgender men and women would go as bearded women and “half-man, half-woman.” People with scaling diseases would be called snake men and snake women. People with downs syndrome were called dog boys. Looking back, people with disabilities were being made into animals. Back then I was too ignorant to see it, I could only see pictures of dead presidents floating in my eyes. This was not the last time I was preyed on – the military also manipulates people with disabilities.

I was put in special classes for “retarded” students all my life because I didn’t fit into the cookie cutter of society. In school I was bullied and told by my teachers that I couldn’t do what other children were doing. They told me I wasn’t qualified for anything besides menial labor – they told me if I tried I would fail. A psychologist pulled a survey out of his desk drawer as “evidence” that I wouldn’t succeed.

Poor people with disabilities are often taken advantage of. Just like the Freak Show, people from the military waived money and promises in my face. The military likes to target people with learning disabilities, especially autism and dyslexia, because they think they will be better at following orders and not questioning what they’re told to do. The government sends young people video games as a way to train them to be good soldiers.  The scores are transmitted to the government. The higher the scores, they are invited to come to military bases to train. When someone is autistic, they are happy to see that someone is taking an interest in them. When they stopped the draft in 198X, they needed a new way to recruit.

The government should not have the right to monitor children or send them bribes. According to the government and the military, the lives of young people with disabilities – especially poor people and people of color – are expendable. The military needs to stop preying on the rest of the world the way they prey on people with disabilities.

Classroom curriculums should reflect all the accomplishments of people with disabilities and prevent students from going into the military. There should be more training for people with disabilities to use their alternative gifts. People with disabilities can do whatever they want – it’s the society that is disabling. We don’t need to change at all. I have written two books, I’m a staff writer for an online magazine, and I am an anchor person for a local TV show on activism. I’ve gotten two awards from the City of San Francisco and the Board of Supervisors. I decided a long time ago that the system is wrong and that most of research is generated by people who’ve never lived through it. It took 50 years to learn to use my own internal guide to heal my community.

Help Stop the Eviction of

3 Families by another Greedy Bank

The 99% Spring of Actions Continues!

Join us for a Press Conference to demand

that US Bank not evict 3 single moms

and their children

WHEN:  Thursday April 26

TIME: 12 Noon

WHERE:  US BANK, corner of 16th & Mission

For more information contact Tommi at tmecca@hrcsf.org or call 415-703-8646.  If you cannot come, please call the US Bank Mission Branch on Thursday between 12-1 to tell them not to evict the families outside:  415-575-2800

Oy! Manong!... is that you?

Aie! that pain! Lower left rear tooth is the focal point. It’s an open faucet that fills my head with pain! My head so full of pain that any capacities I’d had, for empathy or abstract cognition are drowned in pain. Pain so bad, I thought I was gonna puke. Further, the absence of an action plan addressing the issue gives rise to rampant anxiety.

On the off chance that I remember that I need help, while actually in the vicinity of some person or organization that is there to help, I do ask for help. I don’t gethelp. I get a Xeroxed referral sheet full of referrals that fall instantly into two groups: the remotely possible, and those that either categorically excluded(able-bodied, middle-aged, unaccompanied, male)me, along with those that I know are out of date. Like the listing for McMillan Center at 39 Fell.  Put another way, the maybe & the no

There aren’t many in the “maybe” group. Only Tom Waddell Clinic and Potrero Hill Health Center. Tom Waddell Clinic only offers dental services on Monday and Thursday mornings and only for six people per morning. Oh, BTW, that isn’t six morepeople or six new patients, it’s six total. So folks start lining up for a chance to be seen by a dentist at four in the morning. They wait in line, outside, in the cold until almost eight when a person opens a door and passes out the six numbers. If you’ve got an appointment but you don’t get one of those numbers, then your appointment is simply canceled, not rescheduled, even if you’ve been waiting there since four thirty in the morning. The first 19 Polk of the morning won’t get me there until six, which is simply too late.

The listing for Potrero Hill Health Center claims that P.H.H.C. offers dental health services, opens at eight in the morning and is located at 1050 Wisconsin, around the block from my pal Chris’s place where I sometimes crash. That’s an easy choice. No wait, let me get this straight. It’s a very easy decision but it’s an extremely limited choice!

I get there a little after eight. It’s in the right place and it’s open. Most of the people in the waiting room are sitting. There aren’t many empty seats. The men’s room is out of service. A few different folk stand before the registration counter. One sits in a stroller. I’m standing on pins and needles. I’m next.

The woman behind the counter (and Plexiglass bandit barrier) says something like “How can we help you today?” I say “I need to see a dentist.”  First she tells me “Oh, we don’t do that here.” I recall standing there for a sec with my mouth hangin’ open and my world starts to spin at the edges. I think I said something else. Then the story changes to ‘emergency dental only’ which means “extractions only” and she’s asking me which tooth it is, as though they are eager for me to be rid of my teeth. The whole world’s beginning to spin, now. Maybe it’s me. My modest hopes of X-rays and a cleaning, of keeping my teeth, seem remote, now. I feel like I’m Oliver Twist and I’ve just asked for more gruel. I tell her “I’m on Healthy SF”, playing my last card. She informs me “Oh, we don’t take HealthySF” and I’m in a SF City & County PUBLIC HEALTH CLINIC!?!

I make an inarticulate noise. A City & County health employee jus’ told me a City & County health clinic won’t accept the City & County health plan. WTF? My world spins hard now, ‘cause this is to fuckin’ much! She politely asks if I’d like to wait to be seen and I honestly don’t know and can’t decide due to how wigged out I am. How long might I be waiting? How am I gonna pay? What’re they gonna do? Will they stop if I tell them to? Um, I don’t want to be here anymore. I say “I gotta think” and my feet can’t feel the ground as I’m walking out the door.

 (Author's note: The Filipino word Manong is a term of respect reserved for an elder)

White Sand Beaches of Market Street

By Tony Robles

A manong I’d met a

While back but whose

Name I couldn’t remember

Recently approached me on

Market Street

Hey Pinoy!

He said

I recognized him but

Didn’t know from where,

When or why so rather than

Pretend I said:

Oh Manong, long time no see,

I’ve missed you so much.  How

Are you, how is your family?  Oh

How I’ve missed you, you link to

My ancestral and indigenous past

(etc. etc. etc)

The manong looked at me like I’d

Lost my mind but smiled anyway

And we were out on a sunny day

On Market Street, just the two of us

He looked at me through

Thick glasses, the wind blowing

Through his thick head of hair

Overcome with gray and flecked with

Embers of memory dust

Have you ever been

To the Philippines?

He asked

No, I said but

Told him that I wanted

To go someday

You should go,

He said, they got

White sand bitches

You mean

Beaches?

Yes, bitches.  You

Hear of Boracay?

Yes, I heard of it.

Are there any other places

In the Philippines with

White sand beaches?

Yes…but Boracay is

A resort, hotels and

Bitches all over

I looked at the manong’s

Hair that was slowly

Turning sandy white like

A beach

I felt the

Breeze in

Our faces

We were in

Boracay

            ¡Silencio!  Al Robles is missing

It’s way too quiet around here these days & we miss him

This one of a kind poetic daredevil

Transplanted culture personified  …  Adobo con Bebop

With an awe-inspiring playful impish smile

That always let the best in us know we were at home

Lifting up tradition anytime it lost its balance & tried to fall

Trading the tallest of tales in the park

Conjuring strength in ageless Spirits older than time

Or locked in a musical trance, happy to be completely

Under the spell of a Bobby Enriquez tune @ Bajones

A Pinoy Homeboy on a mission

The strength of his soul reborn with every Poem

A loveable rascal defying description

            ¡Silencio!  Where is he?

Al, the Fillmore Flipster

Stalking creativity with a vengeance

Finding pieces of creativity & truth everywhere

In everything

The eternal essence of intelligent existence

Leading him on, dancing word circles all around him

There were days when none of it made any sense, but

Then it was funny & beautiful, ridiculous or ugly

More than once it was both inspiring & tragic

Historic landmarks in the making, a blossoming

Myth building Poems, tons of Stories needing to be told

And they came pouring down like an unstoppable flood

A furious Waterfall

Out of the mouths of angry misused Farm Workers, and

Found themselves all tangled up in the irony of

A meal of Pilipino Soul Food

With a side of Mangos & Collard greens for dessert

            ¡Silencio!  If you were you listening

You could see the tongue in cheek brilliance in the way

He tasted every word as they rolled out of his mouth

In the way he digested the ambiance of Poems being born

And followed the rhythm of words as they came swaggering

Dancing in the streets of North Beach & Cesar’s Latin Palace

Squashed inhibition & found a good part of his heart in the trance

Of hotter than hot Jam sessions @ Jimbo’s Bop City

Al, a Fillmore Flipster, a clever predictable trickster

The undisputed Poet Laureate of Manila Town

Who comfortably wrapped himself in a mixture of

Smiley Winters, Kulingtang, Flip Nuñez & Sarah Vaughan

            ¿Silencio?  The Muse is in mourning

But there will never be enough tears

To wash away the legacy of his vision

The spiritual pride & integrity of his Poetry

Lives in the resurrection of the I-Hotel

Hides behind the hungry laughter of city slick Hustlers

Is buried beneath stolen visions & the exposure of

Soulless big time urban magicians who sell fantasies

To the disillusioned

His powerful word magic conjured

The reclamation of otherwise unacknowledged young men

Young men who’d left their all a world away

On the other side of a sea of broken dreams

But never forgot to take the time to heal, rejoice & laugh

As they partied, gambled, danced the Cha Cha & romanced

Nights & sore backs away @ the California Hotel

Held up the economy on Columbus & the clubs on Broadway

And almost wore out the pavement up & down Kearny & Grant

Then came to on the same old farms picking fruit the next day

            ¿Silencio?

NO!  There is no sadness strong enough

To erase the hipness of his vision

Al Robles, our Fillmore Flipster, our eternal trickster

Magnificent Manong!

It will never be over & we will not be silent!!!

I don’t wanna go to school, I hate it! Everyday it’s the same thing. I have to endure being bullied, like when I was in the third grade I ran to the restroom crying because I had had enough. I stayed in there because I didn’t have to worry about the bullying in there, the name calling, pulling my ponytails or saying ugly things about me, that was my safe haven. As I sat there I felt nobody liked me or loved me.

My classmate came and asked if I was okay but I didn’t answer her I continued to cry so the teacher followed a few minutes later asking the same question of course I answered her with no ma’am. She asked if she could come in I said no.

In America bullying has become a real serious problem and children just like me so many years ago endure the harsh treatment everyday.

Because you don’t always know who to turn to, you keep it to yourself. Kids are bullied for many reasons, it could be because the color of your skin, it could be because you’re considered by societies standards poor/less fortunate, it could be because your hair is longer than someone else’s, the problem is so wide spread and there are many reasons why. In some cases it’s not kid on kid bullying, you can be bullied by teachers and other staff the ones who are supposed to help you and even at your place of employment.

I was in middle school and everyday my teacher ”the coach” teacher picked on me because due to my religious beliefs I couldn’t dress out for P.E. he made a point to harass me every chance he got in and out of class and after reporting him things only got worse to the point I just learned to deal with it as does so many people do. But in the end he was fired.

As I think of it now the United States of Amerikkk was founded on bullying, in how the Europeans traveled to America where the indigenous peoples were doing just fine. But because it wasn’t to their standards, they(the indigenous people) needed to be refined and better structured….in other word to be more like them. But I say who made them politically/un-politically correct in their way of thinking.

I remember in high school there was a fellow student named Drew, Drew was a very nice and soft spoken person but because he was considered special needs he was timid and they picked on him everyday. He was thrown in the trash cans, he was stuffed in the lockers, many times other kids knocked books out of his hands and one time they set his desk on fire with him in it. One day he talked to me about how he felt, it was sad. What was even more sad was I could relate to him.

There are those who don’t deal with being bullied very easily. Some choose suicide as a way to deal with the agony of being the target of someone else’s bullying which equals to FEAR. Some choose to kill because that’s the only way they know how to ease their discomfort.

The point is bullying is a very ugly attachment to have to oneself. It is fueled by FEAR. Fear will cause you to do things that you wouldn’t ordinarily do; but I have to ask what are you really afraid of? What gives you the right to treat other people in a way that makes them feel uncomfortable and miserable? We can ask this question over and over again and may never get the answer that will soothe the memory and agony of being bullied whether it is in your past or still present. I always wondered did I have a sign plastered to my forehead that read PICK ON TERRILYN TODAY which was everyday. Many years later and thanks to facebook most of the people that picked on me daily got the opportunity to make things right….they apologized.

April 24, 2012

Yo soy la hija de los ancestors de estas tierras
Yo soy el elgado de las raices debajo del asfalto
Yos soy la medicina que cura tu veneno
Yos soy la semilla que nutre la tierra
Yo soy el aire. El fuego el agua1
Yo soy el barro , la luna, la marea, la madre la hermana!

Yo soy la heredera de la medicina sabia y genuine
Yo soy la sabia la energia magiaca de la fotocintesis
Yo soy tu abuela que en las plantas te hablan
Yo soy el olor del copal en tu alma

Yo soy el poder del cambio en las palabras
Yo soy la vibracion que eleva a los cahidos
Por que soy la extencio de la enrgia sagrada
Soy un cuerpo de 33 anios que canaliza 500 sobre su espalda

Yo soy machete, Montania, Pluma y raiz!
Yo Soy dos espiritus, soy tu dolor de cabeza
Porque entre mas golpeas mas fuerte se hace mi malesa
YO SOY LA HEREDERA DE ESTAS TIERRAS

Yo soy la hija de los casadores, de lospescadores, de los obreros, de las obreras!

Yo soy el Papel de los despapelados, la manta del friolento,
Yo soy la ventana para nombrar el golpe el llanto la muerte y el sufrimiento
Y despues sanarme con mi propia semilla a pesar de que extermines a msi hermanos
Vibracion de vida que se vuelve muerte, muerte que se vuelve palabra que funda un para siempre, esta tierra es mia para siempre!

Yo soy la Hija de los ancestors que habitaron estar tierras
Que cuidaron estas tierras, yo soy la hija del que invento el fuego. Del que camino herrante hasta encontrar las cuatro estaciones y sembrar con el vientre de su mujer

Yo soy la hija del purepecha o del Maya, o del tolteca, yo sola messica,
El maiz, la historia tu raiz, yo soy del color de la tierra para recordarte
Que ya estaba yo aqui antes que le pusieras nombres que solo te representaran a ti

No voy a pedir permiso y tus terminus de esclavitud ni los pienso repetir!
Yo soy la hija de los ancestros duenios de estas tierras!

Yo soy la hija, la madre la abuela, la Heredera!

I am the 000.25- the smallest number you can think of in your mind, I didn't even make it to the 99 ....I am the mamaz, daddys and babies living in their cars, criminalized day laborers living in SRO's shelters, jails cells and houses made of card-board....excerpt from I am the 000.25 by tiny aka Lisa Gray-Garcia

Co-madre/Co-editor's note: On May 1st, Migrant, Poverty, disability, indigenous and youth skolaz at POOR Magazine marched, sang, chanted, prayed, decolonized and resisted all false borders and celebrated all the un-seen, unrecognized and criminalized migrant, indigenous and poor workers across Pachamama. Corporate media only reported the so-called violence of the day. We were there, the violence was crafted and planned, and supported by thousands of po'lice officers from multiple counties, standing, following and implicating, tasing and profiling. one of our youth skolaz at POOR- (my son Tiburcio) learned and collaborated with all of his elders in struggle, teachers and care-givers and wrote this report

Pt 1: Working Skolaz
 
May 1st was really fun.  We marched 28 blocks (From Fruitvale BART to Downtown Oakland) for the migrante people who had to cross the border in order to find work.  Also for the bottle collectors "recladores" who have to push shopping carts out in the beaming sun or the blistering rain.  We celebrated the Mariachi performers and the street vendors on this day.  The so called word work, don't only use it in a way that supports us, but we want to spread it out to all.  Not only in the Bay but to the world.
 
Pt. 2: Migrantes from my family
 
In my great ancestors there is a lot of migrante people such as mama Mimi who was Roma and migrated her from Ireland.   The other person, my great Grandpa Roberto migrated here from Puerto Rico.  My other great grandfather Joe, migrated here from the philipines My biological father is the son of chinese and mexican migrants and my tio Tibrcio is an indian revolutionary from Yucatan.

Roll out the red carpet

Here comes the Queen

Regaining her thrown

Wait! Wait! Wait!

The pack turned on her

Black Panthers going gray

The human & animal Kingdom eating their elders

Malcolm Samuel, Brad Loma, Kiilu Nyasha, Queen, Mama Khandi,

Black Panthers in their golden years

Living, Fighting & yes dying alone

Panthers roaming the streets in wheelchairs

Looking for their brothers and sisters

Caught up in police sweeps

Snatched up by homeland security

Left to die in prisons and shelters

Look how we treat our seniors

Queen Mama Khandi stripped by the state

Like X, state barged in splitting up Khandi’s family

Son placed in foster care

Incarcerated because she is an activist

Came back home to find eviction notion

Section eight and disability income revoked

Same story for Malcolm Samuel in Berkeley

Sitting in his wheelchair on the avenue easy target for police

Died in prison from lack of medical care

Their stories I will continue to share

On CD, Brother Malcolm Speaks

Tore up wheelchair, slept in doorways

Talked about his days as a tailor for the Panthers

From homemade black suits to sweat shop salvation army’s rags

Where is the file on Brother Brad Lomax

Brought the Black Panthers into the disability movement

Only a few knows about his work

His file is under secrecy

The Black community building for its own

Racism and capitalism ate away Lomax’s goal

Today the Oakland disabled Black community still searching for its own

Brad Lomax left out of two histories

Panthers are in every city

Let the film role capturing the beautiful revolution of Kiilu Nyasha

We all are getting older pass this poem to someone younger

On the wheels of steel respect the panthers in your community

By Leroy F. Moore

24 Abril, 2012

Scroll Down for English/ Espanol Sigue

Es un viernes. Tras las dos horas habituales de viaje en autopista llego a buscar a mi hijo. Toco en la puerta . Mi ex me pregunta que que quiero. Yo le recuerdo que alli vive un hijo nuestro. Ya yo habia pagado toda la pension alimenticia. Ella me dice que si no tengo una orden de visitacion, adios. “Papi”, grita mi hijo, desesperadamente, por la ventana. “Diego, por favor, no olvides que Papi tea ama” , le digo. Han pasado trenta y seis meses desde entonces y ahora estoy estancado en la pobreza, en San Francisco; en la tierra invadida donde criminalizan a los padres que estan sumidos en la pobreza.

Un cancer fue todo lo que quedo del sueño Americano de la familia nuyorrican de mi madre; Fue una epidemia que cunsumio sus cuerpos, sacrificios y el amor que alguna vez compartimos. Yo pense que quedaria un hogar al que yo pudiese traer a mi hijo. Mas solo queda el amor por el dinero, la voz de mi hijo que retumba en mi cabeza, “Papi” y un retrato que sonrie maliciosamente, en el Facebook que dice: “Aqui estamos los cadavers que quedan de tu familia junto a tu hijo. Ahora, sin ti, tendremos la oportunnindad de infectarle con nuestros sueños.”

Si, soy un imigrante y Papi boricua. Puedo ir a la Guerra, pero no puedo obtener un estipendio para pagar la pension alimenticia, ni estudiar, como los “Daddies” californianos. Soy un Papi y no un “Daddy”. Los “Daddies” desarrollan nanotecnologia que lavara tu cerebro. Los Papis tienen la dicha de esperar una hora en fila para comer una comida fumigada con temores a la pimienta imaginaria que dicen esterilizar a los hombres.Los “Daddies”, entre tanto llevan a sus hijos a ver animals marinos deprimidos, presos en picinas y a escuchar a sus mamis cantar. Mas, los hijos de los papis solamente escuchan, traumados, las voces de sus madres por altoparlantes estridentes que le preguntan que donde demonios esta el irresponsible de su padre. A los Papis no nos dejan ser padres.

A los Papis nos conocen como tecatos drogadictos, enfermos sexuales, convictos; como aquellos que traen la violencia al hogar. Eso dicen las cifras “oficiales”. En el entretanto, Las Mamis luchan por su cuenta y el estado les dice que no pueden cuidar de sus niños estando solas y terminan por quitarselos de todas formas. Me pregunto a donde estaran los Papis del Mundo.

Muchos de nosotros estamos sin hogar, lo que significa que estamos en peligro de ser tachados como criminales. Sam Drew, Tiny y Joanna Letz han escito sobre el tema en la Prensa Pobre, en el articulo “Who’s Poverty? Who’s Crime? Ademas, en el “Informe para la conferencia consultiva de Plan nacional para el maltrato de menores” Para implantar esas iniciativas concertadas, en el Condado de Alameda se creo una oficina del/ de la Coordinador/a de la Prevencion de la violencia , con recursos y personal para “conectar” y coordinar los diversos esfuerzos, dar seguimiento a las diversas iniciativas propuestas, ofrecer informacion , adiestramiento, desarrollo de recursos y actividades, y monitoreo de resultados de acuerdo a los planes establecidos.

En otra seccion de este llamado informe da a entender que segun los supestos expertos uno de los factores principales de la violencia en los hogares es la presencia de los hombres, pues hay estudios que incluyen a puertorriqueños y demuestran que la poblacion masculina es la mas violenta de la unidad familiar. Si consideramos la realidad de las politicas descritas y tomamos en consifderacion las tendencias nuevas de criminilizacion significa que que el estado norteamericano estereotipifica oficialmente, persigue y criminaliza a los Papis latinos. Asi es que el cancer destruye-familias y me ha separado de mi hijo.

Mas aun, aunque existen otros enfoques de prevencion para la violencia que se adaptan mas a la sensibilidad cultural de America Latina, en Estupidos Unidos se justifica el hacer de un lado tales metodos “informando” que los mismos“…responden a los differentes niveles de desarrollo y consensus que cada pais ha alcanzado con relacion al tema.” En otras palabras, los puntos de vista mas compasivos de las dinamicas familiares complejas de Latino America, que crean politicas de prevencion para la violencia, no deben usarse para Puerto Rico, ni para otros lugares en Estados Unidos donde hay concentraciones Latinas, ya que quienes lash han no estan tan desarrollados y por ende, no tienen un valor significativo.

Yo, sin embargo, hago un llamado a todos los Papis del Mundo, contra quienes estan discriminando, porque somos indigenas, negros, hispanos, o cualquier otro grupo sumido en la pobreza. Sepan que necesitamos luchar por nuestro derecho de ser padres. Y las Mamis, por favor tengan fe en nosotros, pues habemos aquellos que aun amamos a nuestros hijos. No permitan que el gran tirano blanco se interponga entre nosotros. Recuperemos la tierra, que es nuestra. Mas primero, recuperemos a nuestros hijos. Diego, mi hijo amado, no me olvides por favor

Ingles Sigue/English Follows

April 24, 2012

It was a Friday. I drove the usual two hours to pick up my son. I knocked on the door and my ex answered through the window: “Whadda you want?” “Do you forget that I too have a son here?” I said. I had paid my child support in full. “Do you have a court order saying he can visit with you? No? Then bye”, she said. “Papi! My son said peering desperately through the window. “Diego, please, never forget that Papi loves you.” This happened thousands of miles away, three years ago. Now I am stuck in poverty in San Francisco; in the solen land where all poor fathers or “Papis” are criminalized.

Cancer was all that was left of the dream that my mother’s Nuyorrican-family once had; of the “America dream”. It was the sickness that seems to have consumed their bodies, their sacrifice, and the love that we felt for each other. I though that we would, at least, have a home to take my son into. Instead, all that was left was greed and my son’s voice in my head saying “Papi!” and a Facebook picture of son next to the cadavers of what used to be my family. A smiling picture that says ” We get to infect him with our dreams now that you’re not here”.

Yes, I am a migrant, Puerto Rican Daddy. I can go to war, but I can’t get a child support stipend and a chance to study like California Daddies do. I’m a Papi, not a Daddy. Daddies develop nanotechnology that takes over brains. Papis get to make hour-long lines to get a plate seasoned with St. Peter psychosomatic sterilizer. Daddies take their kids to watch depressed marine life imprisoned in pool-jails and listen to their mother’s sing. Papis sons’ just get a trauma when they hear their mother’s at the top of their lungs saying “And where the hell is your irresponsible father? Papi’s don’t get to be Daddies.

Papi’s get a rep for bing no good junkies, sex-offernders, ex-cons, the ones that bring violence into the home. That’s what the numbers say, In the meantime, the “Mamis” struggle on their own, and the state says, you can’t take care of your child on your own, and they end up taking the kids away, anayways. Where are the Papi’s of the World?

Many of us are now homeless, meaning in danger of being criminalized. Sam Drew, Tiny and Joanna Letz, of Poor Magazine have spoken of of the evident dangers poor people are in, in their article Whose Poverty? Whose rime? Also, in the National Plan of Consultive Conference for Child Abuse Report it states: “In order to bring together previously agreed initiatives for violence prevention, there was an office created in the County of Alameda called Office for the Violence Prevention Coordinator, with resources and personnel to “connect” and coordinate the various common efforts, to follow-up to the diverse proposed alternatives, offer information, training, resource and activity development, and monitoring of results according to established plans. “

In a previous section of this “Report” it allows the implication that according to supposed expert opinions one of the main factors for violence in the family is the presence of men, because there were studies that indicated that Puerto Rican men have proven to be more violent than any other group within the family structure. If we look the reality of such policies and consider the new criminalization trends, it means that migrant Latino Papis are profiled, targeted and criminalized. That is how this family-destruction cancer operates and is what has kept me from my son Diego.

Furthermore, even though other, more culturally-sensitive violence prevention focuses have been developed in different places of Latin America, AmeriKKKa justifies their overlook by “reporting” that “…the difference between the focus of iniciatives of the US and Latin American countries (the differences in methodologies...) “respond to the differing development levels and varying concensus that each country has achieved in reference to the topic at hand”. In other words, more compassionate views of the complex family dynamics of Latin America, when it comes to developing violence prevention policies, are not to be used as models for Puerto Rico, nor other Latin-populated areas in the US, because their creators are not as developed and therefore, not of value.

I, however, call upon all the Papis out there that are being discriminated against because of you are Indigenous, Black, Latino, or of any other poor group. Know that we have to fight for our right to be Daddies. Mamis believe in us, we love our kids too. Don’t let the Man get in between you and your man. Let’s take our land back, but first, let’s take back our kids and our right to raise them in real community. Don’t give up! Diego, my son, please don’t forget me.
 

From Port-au-Prince to Puebla: Poor People of Color Resist!

 My heart is the drum that makes my feet  dance to the beat… I sing my poetry in Spanglish … I love…fight…struggle… with  knowledge.. I pick the drum  as my weapon to fight for liberation..and revolution.. My brain is from Mexico y America. My   feet are from Africa..

 Our faces Black& Dark Brown like mama Africa, our noses round beautiful like the mountains of the Americas, our pyramids and temples from Egypt to Yucatan, Mexico can’t lie of the connection between my black and brown brothers and sisters.

In high School my teacher once told me that my people were savages, I was taught to hate the color of my skin and the shape of my nose.

Until One day I found myself in the Legion of Honor museum in San Francisco, who was built by the descendants of the people who slave us and stole our land,I was there  to witness an exposition of Aztec and Mayan artifacts, when I seen my nose and face engrave in those great artifacts I knew my people were not savages.

To witness the Olmec head, to see the traits of my African people, I knew we have more in common than the suffering our ancestors  share under colonialism.

To learn about Yanga the first African slave people who free them self’s from Spanish rule in Veracruz, Mexico and created families with indigenous people from the area.

More than 500 years and we are still here breathing  and thriving by any means necessary, and is time we celebrate our resistance and our people.

The

first week of May is the *150th ANNIVERSARY* of The Battle of Puebla (la Batalla de Puebla) when Mexico accomplished its historic defeat over the French occupying army. This victory could not have been accomplished had the Caribbean island of Haiti not proved to be such an inspiration in resisting colonial rule. In 1804, Haiti’s slave rebellion successfully created the first black-led nation to have conquered their colonizers and the first independent nation in all of Latin America.

The people of Haiti and the people of Puebla share a common bond—in Puebla, mestizo soldiers were outnumbered two to one while Black Haitians faced Napoleon’s heavily armed military—but both oppressed peoples prevailed in what many refer to as two David and Goliath victories.

.

 One of the main reason, that we decide to organize this event, was to conscience sly bring black and brown people together, as many us know and experience black and brown people are still one the most oppress people in Amerikka  making the majority in prison population, in homicide, in poverty ,ect ,ect, you named it.

And to live pimp free-

To really be truly free-

Is to redesign systems based on eldership, ancestors, Pachamama

And We

To deconstruct all the simple answers of why

we kill each other,

starve our mothers,

shoot and kill our black and brown brothers

incarcerate so many others

excerpt from Living Pimp-Free by tiny

“Pimp-free organizing isn’t affirmative action, which leads to no action, which leads to default segregation and po’lice perpetration. Pimp-free organizing is the recognition, love, respect and honoring of our multi-racial identities, spirits, languages,  culturas y traditions. Our West, East, South and North African peoples teaching with, being with our, Ohlone, Miwok,  Salvadereno, Mayan, Aztec, Roma, Taino. Samoan, Tongan, Philipino, and Yucatec peoples .living, breathing, feeling and understanding, in the deepest sense that our differences is what makes us beautiful and hard, powerful and humble, loud and silent,” Lisa Garcia aka Tiny co-madre de Prensa POBRE

In POOR Magazine we destruct and speak about the separation done  by systems within capitalism that are use to  separate us by Race,Gender,class  and struggles, for the benefit of this system to keep functioning .

We also see the importance to keep building those bridges among communities of color, that many sheros & Heroes have done in the Past and present.

It was beautiful and powerful to read the letter from Sub-comandante Marcos from the Zapatistas EZLN to Mumia Abu-Jamal  to congratulate on his birthday and to stand in solidarity with all political prisoners in Amerikkka.

Sub-comandante Marcos:

We are also “people of color” (the same color as our brothers who have Mexican blood and live and struggle in the American Union). Our color is “brown,” the color of the earth, the color from which we take our history, our strength, our wisdom and our hope. But in order to struggle we add the color black to our brown. We use black ski-masks to show our faces, only then can we be seen and heard. Following the advice of an indigenous Mayan elder, who explained to us the meaning of the color black, we chose this color. Old Don Antonio used to tell us that from black came light and from there came the stars which light up the sky around the world. He recounted a story of a long time ago (in the times when time was not measured)

Through the Americas black and brown people were use to build this civilization where we are found ourselves  captives under capitalism or kill daily, persecuted. More than 500 years of genocide to our people, have fell to exterminate us, and on May 4,2012 we will celebrate our ancestors and that we are still here fighting and resisting.

The people of Haiti and the people of Puebla share a common bond—in Puebla, mestizo soldiers were outnumbered two to one while Black Haitians faced Napoleon’s heavily armed military—but both oppressed peoples prevailed in what many refer to as two David and Goliath victories.

We hope this celebration of community can inspire us to begin to form the strength in what is possibly the most insidious Goliath to date—the United States of America. Only united can people of color be the most powerful David we can be.

Rebecca Luisa (Machetes)

Please join us for a night of poetry, music and resistance as we build Black-Brown solidarity in paying homage to our warrior ancestors who struck back even when the odds were against them!

From Port-au-Prince to Puebla: Poor People of Color Resist!

446 E 12th St, Oakland, CA 94606

• • Friday, May 4, 2012
  • 7:00pm

It was a day that took 40 years.  I didn’t know Kathy Galves.  I’d never seen her purple house in Noe Valley off of Church Street.  I never knew a house could breathe, didn’t know that a floor could speak, that windows could pulsate and expand like thirsty leaves pressed between seasons.  Kathy Galves an African descended elder thumbs through her life—her possessions.  40 years, that’s how long Kathy Galves lived in her house, that purple one in the middle of the block.  Kathy Galves remembers the neighborhood when elders conversed, whose names were as familiar as birdsongs—names worthy of remembrance beyond mere street signs and park benches.  It took 40 years to get to Kathy Galves’ house.  She’s not hard to spot, wearing bright colors, her face full and deep with stories shaped by rivers.  She’s probably the only one of her kind in the neighborhood—an African descended elder homeowner.  With the foreclosure crisis that has plagued communities of color—particularly the city’s black community—Kathy Galves must seem like an aberration, a misnomer to the young, mostly white newcomers to the neighborhood who peer through google bus windows with google eyes and I-Pads, I-Pods and a thousand other things that begin with the letter “I”.  Kathy Galves, African American elder, 40 year Noe Valley resident and San Francisco native gets ready to leave her home for good on a day in April. 

Flyers were posted throughout Kathy Galves' neighborhood announcing the foreclosure sale to be held at her house.  Kathy’s face was on the flyer, in black and white along with information about the sale.  I arrived with POOR Magazine co-editor Lisa Gray-Garcia AKA Tiny and our son Tiburcio.  In front of Ms. Galves' house was a table with various items for sale—lamps, a tape recorder, handbags, record albums.  Boxes were stacked next to a metal trash dumpster.  The boxes were filled with years of documents with Kathy’s name printed in numerous places.  I thumbed through the record albums.  I recognized many of them—jazz artists that my father had loved.  I slipped one disk out of its jacket.  The record was black and shiny, without a blemish. 

We made our way into the house past boxes stacked high and rooms filled with books, pictures, clothes, tables topped with trinkets, mementos and kitchen items.  We got to the front room where Ms. Galves was sorting through racks of clothes.  As she was sorting through 40 years of things, people filtered inside the house—some obvious hipsters, the face of gentrification—going through the kitchen, peering at furniture and kitchenware and other household items.  I walked through the various rooms.  In back were books about black life in the bay area.  I saw a title on a shelf called, “Black Rage”.  I felt strange walking through the hall where life had been, where life still was and was being torn and extricated, scoured by hipsters that hadn’t been on earth as long as Ms. Galves had been in her home. 

Kathy greeted us with a wide smile as she appeared from behind her rack of clothes.  “I’ve lived in San Francisco all my life” said Kathy.  My family was from Memphis and I also have Cherokee blood.  The floors creaked under the weight of her African-Cherokee feet, firmly planted like the indigenous Ohlone roots of the city.  She spoke of her late husband, whose hands painted and plastered the walls and created mantels that adorn this sacred house.  Ms. Galves loved to cook.  She spoke of the barbeque that she and her husband often shared in the kitchen.  She was a woman who lived quietly and humbly, didn’t try to cut corners, living honestly and honorably, a woman with a gentle soul and kind spirit—attributes that are not quantified in the predatory and unaccountable world of real estate speculation.

She told of how the bank had sold her mortgage to a bank that had foreclosed on her house after it had offered to work with her to resume payments.  She was told she could change her mode of payment only to be entangled in bank bureaucracy, being told one thing then another until the bottom fell out.  Now she has only 2 days to clear her belongings from the property.  She purchased her home for 30 thousand.  The bank would like to sell it at a minimum of one million dollars.  Wells Fargo had intended to sell the property on March 21st, a day after members of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors stood on the steps of city hall calling for a resolution to halt all foreclosures in the city.  The following day Ms. Galves received a one-week postponement of her eviction.

Ms. Galves is an elder with significant health problems that have been exacerbated by this tragic situation.  Her blood pressure had spiked to very dangerous levels which has led to problems with her kidneys, heart and lungs.  Despite this, she refuses to be dispirited.  “They’ve unleashed a hydra” she says, serving notice to the banks that wreaked this damage upon hers and so many others.  “I’m going to fight, I’m going to go to hearings and tell people my story.  I’m not going to let them get away with this”.

Despite losing her home, Ms. Galves still smiles.  Her last day in her home was like the first day when we walked through the door.  Each step, each window, every inch of floor and wood contains her name.  It will not be erased.  She could wear a mask of anger, no one would blame her.  But she smiles and holds herself with a dignity and strength that is much more powerful than any foundation that a house may sit on.  It is the strength of spirit which is stronger.  With it she will prevail.

There's a new store in town. It's called "Free Store". All items in the store are free. You should see the look on customers faces when they come in and realize that all items are free. If possible you may bring in something to trade or donate. This idea is not new, it goes back to the 60's, when most communes had one. Today it's mostly been forgotten, but thanks to Occupy and some of it's members there is a free store at 1020 Sullivan ave. in Daly City at the corner of 87th near the I.H.O.P. restaurant.

Free Store is open one day a week on Sat. from 12 noon until 5p.m. Expect a nice assortment of clothes for all, toys, electronic equipment and kitchen and bathroom accessories. Shock and amazement from unexpecting newcomers is not rare. This reporter has seen 5 people ask what items cost and the staff asks, "What does is the name of the store?" It may be closing in a few weeks so we're all hoping to get the word out to others across the country to do the same thing. This idea provides an educational dynamic as an alternative to capitalism, not unlike the good old trading posts. You will see a picture with this article of what the store looks like.