Patchee Loy Na

On my first visit to Fruitvale I found a vibrant, tight-knit neighborhood that felt far removed from the big city that contained it. International Blvd. between 33rd and 36th Avenues was filled with, what to many, were reminders of home, south of the border. Dress shops catering to girls turning 15, bakeries smelling of cinnamon, and little ‘tienditas’ selling calling cards, snacks, and other cultural knick-knacks all made the area feel like the center of a small town.

Back then, people I spoke with complained about crime, a lack of funding for the police and city services, and of high levels of victimization (like muggings and assaults), because of their race and the possibility that they were in the country illegally, and would not report the crimes.

Months later, I have discovered that those two perceptions of the neighborhood are both absolutely true, but the breadth and nuance of the opinions and realities between these points is greater than I imagined.

Take, for example, the issue of police. Many residents complain about a lack of police, and of patrol officers who drive around in cars, but never walk the streets, where they could meet residents and get to know members of the community. To make matters worse, residents say that the patrols are infrequent at that.

Many other residents believe that the police victimize their community. When residents hear that tens of thousands of dollars are being spent seeking a gang injunction, they complain that it is a waste of money. They believe that the money should be spent on after-school programs, community organizations, and education.

Adding to the two opposing, almost contradictory viewpoints is the third one—one that acknowledges that while some police officers used their badge and rank as a way to exert power over the community, others worked hard to establish trust. People who work in local community organizations and schools say that the city had a successful program in which plainclothes officers visited health clinics, day labor centers, free lunches for the homeless, and schools. However, cuts in funding and layoffs in the police force forced closure of the program, prompting some to question the wisdom of (and magical appearance of) the over $100,000 dollars spent (so far) on the injunction.

Speaking to the principal of school in east Oakland, I learned of the very personal struggles of families working three jobs to make enough money to put food on the table, all the while trying to keep their children in school and out of gangs. I was told of the strength many parents find in each other and in the school. These stories reinforce my perception of the “small-town feel” of the area.

But this is a small town with big city problems—violence, widespread victimization of particular communities, and vicious gang activity. These are very real threats to the cohesion of the community, and hamper efforts by community members to speak out—to each other and to the police.

I feel that my initial opinion about the Fruitvale neighborhood was correct, but it was also just the tip of the iceberg, so to speak. As they say in Thailand “patchee loy na,” — “sprinkle the surface with coriander”—which means that even a sour, spoiled soup can be made to look delicious with a simple garnish of coriander.

Appearances can be deceiving. But more importantly, there are no simple answers to complex questions.

My visit to Mercy Retirement and Care Center

Mercy Retirement and Care Center is a large, imposing building that takes up an entire city block on Foothill Boulevard between 34th and 35th avenues.

I have chosen to visit this facility for a few reasons. Firstly, it is right in the middle of my neighborhood, and second, I was (and this is a severe understatement), reluctant to ask if I could visit a children’s day care facility “just to observe,” for reasons that should be obvious. I cannot imagine that scenario working out well for anyone.

I call in advance and am directed to Sister Patty. Sister Patty suggests I visit during dinner time, when all the residents are in one place, and I might more easily find some willing to speak to me. Sister Patty says she is about to leave for the day and so she instructs me to ask for her assistant, Stephanie Manyo, upon my arrival.

I arrive in the middle of dinner. I know it’s the middle of dinner, because as I walk up the long, curved front entrance (easy on walkers and wheelchair-pushers), I see all the residents eating through the glass to my right. They are all in a large dining room, mostly paired up, but with some groups of three, and some tables with only one diner.

I find Stephanie. She is a friendly blonde woman whom I guess is in her mid-forties. She smiles and shakes my hand, saying that she thought I would have arrived earlier. I apologize for my delay, and she brushes it off, bustling me into the dining room with a muted sense of excitement.

She wants more details about my assignment, but I am almost as in the dark as she is, and I explain that to her.

“I’d like to talk to some residents who go outside and have some level of interaction with the community,” I say. “But I’m also happy to just observe them and take notes.”

She brightens, and suggests a resident named Gus, who she says takes BART to El Cerrito three times a week. She points him out to me—he is wearing a green short-sleeved button-up shirt, and is sharing a table with a female dinner companion.

I try to tell Stephanie that I don’t want to interrupt his dinner, that I can wait off to the side until he is finished. She waves off my concerns. “Gus will be more than happy to talk to you,” she says. “Come, I’ll introduce you now.”

She’s right, of course. She knows her flock better than I, and sure enough, Gus invites me to sit down, which I do at the moment his dinner plate arrives. Despite his invitation, the moment the plate is placed in front of him I feel even more like I’m intruding.

I ask him if he minds me recording the conversation, so that I may quote him accurately. He politely declines, saying that in the past he’s said things he shouldn’t have when he was being recorded. I do not ask him what he said that he shouldn’t have, but I want to.

Gus is 81-years old, and has lived in Mercy since April 2008, when he moved here with his wife. She died within a month, and he has been alone ever since. He lived in El Cerrito ever since leaving the Navy years ago, and has friends there with whom he plays bridge a few times a week.

Fruitvale is an “average American neighborhood,” he says. “It’s inundated with blacks and Latinos-who are nice people,” he adds. I get the feeling that he simply wanted to state a fact, but then realized that it came out wrong, and then felt the need to show that he was not racist.

I don’t think he is, but I don’t want to interrupt, so I let him continue. He tells me how much he enjoyed his first visit to a local Mexican bakery, and how much he loves tamales. He mentions that he once had a pineapple tamale, and his dinner companion, Mary Jane, gasps lightly, indicating that she doesn’t think such a thing sounds tasty at all.

Mary Jane is originally from Connecticut, and moved to California with her family at a young age. She lived near Mercy for many years, and one of her two twin daughters still does. She says her two daughters used to stop in and work at Mercy in the mornings, before going to school at Cal, telling her “they make great breakfasts.”

Gus tells me two stories that he feels sum up the people in the neighborhood. In the first one, he is late for BART, and doesn’t want to wait for the bus, so be begins walking. Halfway down the block a bus pulls up alongside him and the doors open.

“What are you doing walking, Gus?” The driver enquired. “Come on in, I’ll get you where you’re going.”
Gus says that passengers on the buses he took always made space for him on the seats at the front of the bus. In his second story he is on BART.

On that day he had passed his normal stop, El Cerrito Plaza, and the BART driver came up to him. “Gus, you missed your stop, why don’t you get off here and take the next train back?” The driver said.

Gus replied that he was getting off at a different stop that day, but thanked the driver for asking.

Gus sums up his thoughts. “Awful people,” he says. “Why don’t they mind their own business?” Then he laughs, and I join him.

More thoughts

I revisit Fruitvale on Friday afternoon around 3:30 p.m., right before the Labor Day holiday weekend. High schoolers are just getting out of their last class of the day and congregating in small groups around the bus stops on Foothill Boulevard, laughing and jostling each other playfully as they await their or their friends' buses.

I approach a group of two young Hispanic girls with an older woman at the corner of Foothill and 35th Avenue. I assume that the older woman is their mother. I had been working earlier and my camera, a large, professional-looking DLSR, is slung over my shoulder, dangling at waist level.

I ask the girls about transportation in the neighborhood, looking for a story idea for my reporting class.

"Are you a photographer?" one of the young girls asks.

I tell her that I am but not in the context of this story. "Why?" I ask her.

"Because I like havin my pitcher taken", she replies, laughing.

I apologize, and bring the conversation back to transportation just as their bus, a modern Van Hool driving route number 40, pulls up. They pile on and they're gone. I ask their names just as they're boarding, asking them to spell their names into my phone, held at arm's length, recording all.

I speak to some more high school students and find my story, then speed off on my scooter to the AC Transit depot at Seminary and San Leandro Boulevard before they close for the day. By now it's 4:30, and I imagine administrative personnel are itching to call it a week and go relax.

An hour later I head home. All my potential interview subjects are home now, and AC transit is closed until Monday.

On Monday I call the office of Vision Hispana, the only paper serving the Fruitvale neighborhood with any specificity. The phone rings in a long, unmodulated tone, as if I've called a foreign number. I wonder if this local number forwards to a central line somewhere, where spanish language papers are printed from a template, throwing in a few local articles to appeal to the region they're being given away in. After all, the paper is free, and supported by ads. A woman answers on the third ring, and identifies herself as Elena. A quick glance at the 'contact us' section of the paper shows that she is the editor. I identify myself and ask her whether there are any neighborhood groups in the neighborhood. She seems confused, and tells me that I've called a newspaper. After a quick clarification she tells me to email her, which I immediately do. As of this posting, I have not received a reply.

First Impressions

I know these feelings. These faint stirrings of wonder and awe and unfamiliarity. Although I disembarked from the Fruitvale BART station only minutes ago, I find my thoughts jumping back much further in time, to when I was 13, and crossing the border at Mexicali for the first time.

Now, to say that Fruitvale feels the same as Mexicali does both places a disservice, but it’s hard not to have a similar sense of out-of-placeness in both of them. Fruitvale is only 4 stops from my neighborhood BART station (19th St. Oakland), but it is a different world in so many  ways.

A sweet sugary odor (both brown and white I think) wafts from the El Sol Bakery to my left, across E 12th Avenue from the Fruitvale Village mini-mall. According to the banner hanging above it’s door El Sol is “Just Opened”. I can also smell fresh cinnamon and hot dough from a churro vendor’s cart that’s tucked into a corner of El Sol’s patio.

Many signs are in Spanish—proclaiming everything from low rates on calling cards to Central and South America, to the best selection of dresses and accessories for your quinceañera  or wedding. One doesn’t need to stand in one place too long on a sunny day before an ice cream cart vendor passes by, his imminent arrival teased by his ever jingling bell.

I reach E 14th Avenue, the famous (infamous?) International Boulevard, and take a left, walking towards downtown Oakland. A young girl, probably in her early 20’s, is manning a cart selling plastic quart containers filled with sliced fruits and melons. She liberally sprinkles unprocessed cane sugar, cinnamon, and cayenne pepper on each container as they’re purchased, stabbing a long wooden skewer in as a finishing touch. She shyly declines to be interviewed, but I linger long enough to watch her make a few sales before continuing.
 

When asked what people liked most about Fruitvale many people responded that they liked how close everything they needed was. “Everything’s close, like the liquor store” says Wilburt Stanley, a 17 year-old high school student. He laughs at his joke, and it’s obvious he doesn’t mean it and is just trying to be funny. Wilburt’s friend Javier, who’s 16, laughs too. Both Wilburt and Javier have just left their classes at Arise High School for the day, and have been called over by Donald, a security guard for the Fruitvale Village, just to speak with me. Donald used to live in Fruitvale, but moved a year and a half ago. He suggests that the pair of high schoolers can be more helpful than he can.

Asked about safety concerns both boys laugh off the question at first. “There’s a security guard right here!” says Wilburt.

“This here’s my buddy!” says Javier.

After the laughter both boys do acknowledge that crime is an issue in the neighborhood, but say that it’s not a problem during the day. Some days they get out of classes early, at 1pm, and Javier says that when they do “you don’t see [the thieves],” and that they only come out in the evening, after about 5pm.

Maria M., 34, who sells bacon-wrapped hot dogs and sausages from a cart near the corner of E 14th and Fruitvale Avenue, says that she doesn’t leave the house at night. She loves the neighborhood for the large Latino population, and all four of her daughters go to school nearby, but she says that she doesn’t let them walk home or take public transportation. Instead, her husband, who works in Berkeley, returns from work to pick them up and take them home. She says that while E 14th is bustling with people at 9-10am, it is practically deserted at 7pm when all but the bars shut down.

Almost everyone I spoke with cited concerns about safety, and the need for more police patrols. Many also volunteered the fact that they would be willing to pay more taxes if it meant more and more frequent police patrols.

Julius Kabera, a 42 year-old Kenyan who moved to Fruitvale 5 years ago said that if the police department can’t afford to hire more officers it should just buy more cars instead. He says that he used to see only one police officer in a car, but now every car has two officers. He feels that they could cover the neighborhood much more comprehensively if they weren’t doubled up all the time.

Three people I spoke with either recently had friends assaulted (for money), or were the victims of a crime themselves. Julius thinks that most robbers around the Fruitvale Village area target Hispanics returning from work, who carry cash and who are more often than not reluctant to involve the police. He thinks this is either because of fear based on their immigration status or the ever-present language barrier that exists between many in the Hispanic community and the police.

More posts coming soon!