Virtual Reunion

[an update on my life written for a virtual reunion of my fellow interns from last year]

I still attend Holy faith and still go salsa dancing whenever possible (aka whenever Sara will drive). I still have compost, I still bus it or bike it wherever I go--I swear Metro should pay me I promote them so much, and Kenneth Hahn is still my favorite park. I’ve learned how to cook for 12 -15 people on a moment's notice- no prob, how to throw a block party- street closure and all, I can tell you exactly how much a 20x30 canopy costs and where the best deal in town is- thank you very much. Things are not always all peaches n cream however: work is so VERY challenging and i can't tell you how many times I just think i cannot do it anymore. I miss home and the little family i do have more than ever (especially with the passing of my grandma last January), and I struggle with finding the balance&peace Elizabeth Gilbert does even though I did make it to Rome in May and ate the best pizza and gelato in the world like she did.

But let’s see, besides catching up with you lovely people, looking back there were some definite highlights: November of last year I moved into an Synchronicity LA, an intentional community started not too long ago by a bunch of recent APU college grads. It is in Harvard Heights- tucked in between West Adams, Koreatown, and South LA. It is the highlight of my life these days and I love that I come home to such welcoming creative energy every night after days at work that are less than enjoyable.

As for CHC, I am still there fighting oil companies and working to reduce diabetes and obesity in South LA through more parks, etc. Highlights from the past year included presenting at two professional conferences last November one in long beach and the other was the American Public Health Association in Philadelphia. Also last May, I was responsible for bringing a series of State-sponsored hearings to Hermosa Beach and Baldwin Hills on the drilling going on in our communities.

Also, a big part of this past year has been an intention on my part to process and grow my interest in racial justice- I really needed an outlet to process my experiences living and working in inglewood/south la and also finding a way to integrate conversations on racism into my work at CHC. I've gotten pretty involved with LDIR: Leadership Development in Inter-Ethnic Relations -taking their two month training last Nov/Dec and I continue to participate in their study group on various racial justice topics and their program development team. These are often really hard conversations, but something keeps drawing me to them!

And lastly- I have to mention cuz i was super involved in planning it and according to some, it will go down in Harvard heights history- we had this little block party a few weeks ago. Check it out: http://good-times.webshots.com/album/578380146lqsQMu?start=0

Big Oil Rally

Tax Big Oil Rally Video Footage

So there is this little thing called an Oil Severance Tax that requires oil companies pay for the oil they take from under the state's land and water. CA is the only major oil producing US State that doesn't have this tax. It is something I've had my eye on and it just makes so much sense to me, especially in light of all the struggles this state has year after year in balancing its budget. So a few large groups have decided to try to build a movement to bring attention to this idea during this year's budget cycle (CA is already behind schedule). The first action was a massive Rally in Beverly Hills last week.

So I started my trek to the rally on the 705 bus from Crensahw and King in South LA up North to Wilshire and then West on the 720 bus into Beverly Hills and UCLA territory. I don't get to that part of town too often so the gradual entrance into Beverly Hills was a little more shocking than I was expecting. For one thing all the buildings are just super glitzy and glam- gold trim and gold lettering. Glitzy apartment buildings and offices. Our little bus surrounded by a Lexus this and Corvette that. I got off the bus and stepped into a Starbucks to use the bathroom and grab some water. I stood in the bathroom line with a middle aged dad with his son that looked about eight. He handed a piece of paper to the boy with him and said, "Look, that's your savings money--do you see the money we just put in there!?" He went on to explain that was just one of his accounts and he has money in another account.

I then made my way to the Federal Building where I met up with about a thousand others (literally). I just walked across the street, but I felt I had jumped into a pool of cold water on a hot day. I had just entered a parallel universe in that space and time. The contrast from the high class Beverly Hills Image where eight year olds have multiple savings accounts to the crowd of mostly non-white working people who just want to keep their jobs and their kids in school, hit me hard like brick wall.

We were a foreign mass in that strange land. Coming from our communities and our jobs that the high powered execs in these high powered high rises never have to think about or travel to.


We marched up to the steps of Occidental Petroleum and spilled some black slime on the steps. We demanded--"Big Oil, Pay your fair share!" "It's up to the community to tax big oil"

I plan on staying involved....stay tuned for the latest... ;)

http://www.rand.org/pubs/reports/R2975/

Pope, Peter, and the Sistahs

While all the buff figures of God, Jesus, and the prophets on Sistene's ceiling were quite lovely with all their equally-buff holy attendents painted at their side and St. Peter's million-foot-tall bronze alter with ten-foot-tall cupid-like angels surrounded by over 200 white marble pillars certainly did impress me--sorry Michelangelo-- my FAVORITE view of the church this past week has been at a lesser known more humble location outside of Rome, just out of reach of the last Metro stop.

Highlights at the Sistene Chapel included seeing the infamous Adam & God-Touching-Fingers fresco. While it is one of the best known works of art in one of the best known chapels in the world, Nancy reminded me it was also recently featured on an episode of Arrested Development where characters reenact the scene at a renaissance fair: George Micheal with a body suit posing as Adam and George Senior getting a break from prison in order to be God.

At St. Peter's Basilica (the place where Peter was crucified upside down and buried) what stood out to me was that 1) Peter was the first pope- somehow not emphasized in all my Protestant education 2) the obelisk in St. Peter's square was an Egyptian monument to pagan Gods that the Romans stole and put a cross on top of it. "Roman" artifacts and monuments from conquered people is a theme here.

And my favorite history-making site in the Church this week is here at Suore Della Sacra Famiglia de Nazareth (Convent of the sacred family of Nazareth) where we are living among the first graduating class of a first-of-its-kind masters program developing leadership among the sisters, the women, of the Catholic church around the world.

About 25 sisters from all over the world (Sri Lanka, Uganda, Kenya, Nigeria, etc) are finishing up a masters program they've been working on for a year and a half through my dad's department at Duquesne. They will graduate at the end of June with a Master of Science in Community Leadership . In their home communities they hold management positions in schools, hospitals, HIV clinics and other community institutions.

The fiesty sistahs in permanent residence at this suore are mostly from Poland. It's been a pleasure getting to them as they tease us for locking ourselves out of our room and for liking the Jiffy set out at breakfast. I couldn't believe my eyes yesterday when I saw one of them standing in the midst of a huge billow of smoke conducting some sort of controlled burning on the grounds.

Everyday a new sister extends her arms to Nancy and I first excitedly asking "Are these the friends of 'their Jim'" and then asking when we will be visiting their home country. I'll take this welcome of the up-and-coming Sistahs of the Church over the Pope's marble column embrace anyday.

Naples, the blog

Our one day in Naples is summed up by the back of a guy's T-shirt. As we were leaving the city I passed a man, the back of his shirt said something like "Your heart is free, now all you have to do is follow it." I'm not really sure what it means to "follow your heart" or for me to follow MY heart. But leaving Naples, I couldn't think of anything else.

The day started at with the 8:30am train ride from Rome/Roma to Naples/Napoli. By 11:30 Nancy, my dad, and I were seated at L'Antica Pizzeria da Michele on Via Cesare Sersale, claimed to be The Best Pizza in the World by Elizabeth Gilbert in "Eat Pray Love." Nancy has read the book a million times and was the force behind our Naples side trip and our ensuing treasure hunt. Nancy's wild heart has the most beautiful ideas and I love that I get to be let in on them...and sometimes make them happen.
From the pizzeria (which we three agreed did indeed have the best pizza we had ever tasted) we found the first gelateria we could find, sat on a stoop and ate our cones of chocolate and fruit-flavored heaven. Napoli is the birthplace of pizza and ice cream--what else are ya gonna do when you visit? From there we took the Funiculare Centrale to a higher part of the city where we eventually found ourselves on the roof of a 6th century Spanish castle- San Elmo's Castle- looking out at the most amazing view of any city I've ever seen. The Bay of Naples spread out before us, Mt. Vesuvius in the distance, and a 360 degree view of magnificent red, orange, peach flats, apartments, domes speckled with green hillside.
On this epic Napoli journey, we met the liveliest Italians we've encountered thus far on our trip. One of them was a jovial sparsely-toothed man named Giovonni with a cameo factory/shop on the very tippy top of Naples next to San Elmos Castle. He is the third generation to work in the shop and he was so kind to notice our lostness and to lead us right to the castle (and his shop). Who knew Naples is known for their cameos? And who knew Giovonni's brother, a little man that looks like Jack Nicholson, carves them out of conch shells from The Sea of Zanzibar off the coast of Tanzania?

And if this wasn't adventure enough, the entire day my dad was following his passion, his "heart", taking pictures every other step. His joy is to capture humanity on film and will let no danger, traffic regulation, or faux pas get in the way. Most of the day he was balancing precariously on the skinny traffic medians waiting until the exact moment vespa drivers noticed him taking their picture to click the shutter. This is great even though it makes it a little hard to stay together. Nancy and I walked ahead of him and would glance back at him occasionally- Nancy looking to make sure we didn't lose him and me looking to make sure a native didn't finally run over him or strangle him with his Nikon neck strap.

Like I said, I left Napoli thinking about the art of "following the heart," as the T-shirt said, or how to be in tune with whatever that thing is that whispers "Do this please! Now!" I am glad I do have great examples in the people around me...thanks Nancy, thanks Dad, thanks Napoli!

Community in the News

An article in the local Harvard Heights "Neighborhood News" Publication. A bunch of us were hanging out at a neighbor's house on Friday night. They had hardcopy newsprint booklet laying around, I started flipping through and to everyone's surprise, found this article! No one knew about it! Super exciting!
http://www.theneighborhoodnewsonline.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=384:synchronicity-la-an-intentional-living-community&catid=37:community-news&Itemid=57

An article written back in February highlighting our community along with long standing LA Eco Village. I visited LA Eco Village back as a freshman in college. I slept on the wood floors in one of their guest rooms alongside a bunch of other APU students on LA 101--a weekend of visiting CBOs and non profits in LA. Who would think, six years later--my community would be mentioned as the same breath as them!?!? http://shareable.net/blog/happy-together

Another First

Last Friday was pretty incredible. I seemed to surprise everyone at CHC, including myself, by arranging a meeting at our office with Assemblymember Nava (representing Ventura and Santa Barbara counties). I had heard that he had passed legislation to improve oil field safety and that he had a general history of environment-focused initiatives. So I thought he would be a perfect fit to visit our group. I wanted him to speak to a group that I convene in my “spare time”—the LA Oil Organizers. I say in my spare time, because CHC is not funded to do work with them, it’s just something that I really see a need for. Plus there is so much energy in the group, they practically run themselves.

I just wrote him a letter requesting his visit and then followed up with his staff. It took a little back and forth with the staff, but for the most part, was no biggie! It was a little bit of a long shot because we are not constituents of his district. But I just had a feeling that he would be interested because our interests aligned so much.

The highlights of the meeting for me: 1) The whole week everyone in the office was asking me “HE is actually coming, not just his staff?” 2) When the Assemblymember walked in quite informally without a staff person and subway sandwich in hand 3) When I could feel him winning the hearts of people in the room as he described his battles with offshore drilling 4) When after we charted about nine different concerns that were brought to him, he said that he was learning from us because this was the first time he was hearing a lot of these concerns. 5) When my exec director, who said she was only going to pop her head in, decided to stay for the whole meeting

;) Fun times.....

White girl back home

Last week I visited the church my mom attends, not too dissimilar to the churches I grew up in.

I let my eyes wander around the sanctuary during the sermon and pretty quickly notice there were hardly any non-white people within my line of view. The only non-white person I could see was a young black girl, who was sitting on an elderly white man’s lap. Granted it was “low Sunday” after Christmas, when attendance is traditionally low, but there were probably still a good 300+ people in the vaulted sanctuary.

Leaving the service, I search and search, incredulous there really could not be any non-white people besides an adopted African American child at this church on this Sunday morning. In the coat hanger hall I see too young Chinese girls…with their white parents. I really start looking around hard now. I look into the fellowship hall with people of all ages and hair colors and sizes…but all pretty monochromatic skin color.

Finally, I see one older Asian couple as we are exiting.

I have made this realization before, it really wasn’t a big surprise: I am white and I am from white-dominated suburbs of Chicago that are less than perfect when it came to inviting, celebrating, and realizing diversity.

In the recent past, I would have been angrier: “Can’t these people see how white they are? How can they stand being with people just like them every Sunday? How are they going to find out about all the different theologies and interpretations out there, like feminist theology and liberation theology, when they only have one kind of person at their church?!?! How are they going to care about anyone’s reality except their own?!? Don’t they know Jesus wouldn’t go to an all white and all rich church!?!”

I felt out of place and missed my church back in LA where I get to say the Lord’s Prayer in Spanish and wonder at the delicacy of Nigerian headdresses on a weekly basis. I never felt quite right, like I belonged, in the churches growing up—maybe that’s why I ended up way out in a place that does not resemble Chicago suburbs one bit. But I did feel closer to the people at my mom’s church than I had before. I sincerely believe the leadership is searching for wisdom and truth and spirit and beauty. And so am I….

Some questions I would love to hash out with those in that church and others:
1) What does it mean for myself to be a product of a “monochromatic” church and to now spend my days in predominately African American, Latino, and Korean parts of Los Angeles?
2) What does the existence of monochromatic churches, of any color, mean for myself and others who are committed to addressing injustices and disparities among different ethnicities?
3) What does a monochromatic church, of any color, mean for the kind of faith that is nurtured in that environment? What does it mean for the entire Christ-following Christian faith to have pockets of people growing and disciple-ing in this way?
4) At times, white people have been charged with bringing back to our mostly white communities messages of how our privilege affects others. What would that look like in mom’s church or in my church growing up?