Happy Earth Day and I hope you are healthy, happy, and well! 
Ventura is a beautiful place that I’m fortunate to call my hometown. When you picture Ventura, you will probably think of the west side where the beach, pier, and downtown are located. The west side has a small town feel that’s ideal for tourists and locals alike, but I’m from a place just around the corner called Ventura Avenue.

For the most part, the avenue is kind of avoided, but it’s such a unique place, especially because it is located right between downtown and the huge oilfield that’s sitting in Ventura’s backyard. Has anyone else noticed the large oil operation all over the valley or is it just me because I grew up in the neighborhood right next to it? Maybe it’s just me, but I can see this clear juxtaposition between two different scenes as I drive down the avenue. 

There’s about a 3 mile stretch between KC’s Market and Vons, and one thing that I’ve noticed on this drive is my community’s access to healthy food. There are 2 grocery stores, 3 if you include Vons at the end, 8 liquor or convenience stores, and 4 smoke shops. Ventura Avenue isn’t a total food dessert, which is a low income area with limited access to healthier food, and on the bright side, the avenue is also home to 11 Mexican restaurants, a solid taco truck, and it now has 3 community gardens.

Good food links to good nutrition, and good nutrition to good health. Sure, there are more food options once you turn onto Main Street or drive into town, but in the age of covid, there is this greater social distance and food is just one way to try to communicate this. 

Downtown is around the corner and the city has been pushing for tourism in our picture perfect town, promoting the downtown business club, and constructing all these luxury apartment complexes on the west side. I can’t help but feel that this social distance is also woven into our city’s blueprint because the avenue and the oilfield are still right there and it appears that this area has been masked and developed around.

Investing more into the luxe side of things is not flattening any curve, it is creating a greater social distance between downtown and the avenue, and masking the oil field with a low income neighborhood puts those who live there at risk to potential environmental health hazards. 

Structural racism and environmental health have been ongoing conversations on the internet and I reflect on that with examples I see in my own community. First, is the oil field an environmental health problem? It is causing pollution or harm to the environment and others? Next, is the avenue an example of structural racism? It’s a low income neighborhood located right next to the oil field and the avenue would be the most severely impacted area if an environmentally related health crisis emerged.

Just to be clear, those are candid thoughts and not accusations, but that’s the sort of thing that I wonder about. Things like food, nutrition, health, wellness, sustainability, environment, and race are all connected in the bigger picture. I am not going to call this structural racism, but it appears to be laid out in the blueprint and I am writing this because I hope that my city will have a good conscience to do something about it. 

Now, this is also not breaking news or an immediate call to action because things have been like this for decades. This is nothing new and no one’s going to riot over it, but after 2020, we should really consider the environmental health and wellness of the people who live in our city, especially the residents on the avenue who live right next to the oil operation. With all of the city’s recent development plans for the west side and all these luxury apartments being built, I just ask that the unique nature of the avenue will be taken into serious consideration in moving forward with the city’s overall sustainability goals. 

We can start by making an effort to increase this community’s access to healthy and affordable food options, address the potential environmental hazards that could harm the land and the people who live there, and bring the city’s sustainability programs like fire safe landscaping and drought resistant gardening to this neighborhood. The city can include Ventura Avenue in its sustainability efforts in other ways besides dumping the recyclables there. 

We don’t necessarily have to abolish oil or start a food forest or do anything too extravagant, but a little effort goes a long way and I just wanted to start the conversation because we can act locally about a broader global problem. 
​

A Different Kind of Sad
There’s a lot I could mention on the topic of Asian Hate, but to begin, I would like to extend my sincere condolences to the victims and families of the shooting spree that happened recently in Atlanta, Georgia. The sad thing is that was not the only mass shooting that happened within the month, but what stood out about Georgia was that the victims were immediately identified by being Asian. 

When browsing the headlines for this recent tragedy, the first glances I saw were along the lines of “6 Asian Women Dead,” “Shooting at Asian Massage Parlors,” and “Asian Hate Crimes Rising.” My first impression from media headlines would be maybe this has to do with race, but my initial feeling to this was sorrow because those victims had names and families and unique immigration stories and the rest of their lives ahead of them. 

My second natural feeling was shock. Why did this happen? There’s more to this and race is not the only issue, but race is the first thing we usually see. The headlines of this tragedy in large part identified the victims by their race, but when looking further, the excuses and explanations given were on the basis of sex and addiction. The suspect, Robert Aaron Long, had a deeply troubling and disturbing sex addiction, but that is not a rational excuse for going on a shooting rampage that claimed the lives of eight victims. What was also infuriating was that this was downplayed by having “a really bad day.”

It appears that excuse is invalid. It also appears messed up to me that the suspect’s reasoning for carrying out his shooting spree was to eliminate his temptation because he has a sex addiction and can assure that this was not racially motivated. So he’s definitely not racist and he just has a sex addiction? When he downplayed race to highlight sex, he also forgot to mention the third issue here which is violence. Long specifically targeted Asian massage parlors because of his sex addiction and murdered eight victims who were mostly Asian women, and this is a tragic example of racial and gendered violence that did not have to happen. If Long was having a bad day then, well now he has to live with the consequences and guilt of what he did.

This shooting amplified the demand to Stop Asian Hate. Elderly people should not have to fear being mugged in broad daylight and women should not be the victims of sexual frustration and murder. Stop Asian Hate is not just a hashtag or an awareness day on social media. This really is a plea to stop racially motivated violence and misconceptions that could lead to further harm. 

Although sexual predators like Long would argue that they love Asian women and definitely aren't racist, that messed up fetish feeds into Asian Hate because that sexual misconception is dangerous to any Asian woman who can step into a room where she is not aware that’s what the men are really thinking of her. So because the suspect is definitely not racist, this also brought up sex and violence against women. Social media highlights more of the activism side of this issue while the news media describes more detail of how troubled the suspect really was. He was too stuck in this mindset of having a sex addiction and feeling bad all the time that he failed to see himself as a sexual predator who was weak to his own urges.

Another underlying problem here is that there are predators like him who perpetuate that harmful assumption of sexualizing Asian women because of their stereotyped misconceptions about race and unreal ideas about sex or women. I’d like to say that we don’t know for sure if they were sex workers and cannot assume that just because the victims were Asian women who worked at massage parlors—but Long was a regular and this entire situation is so messed up! 

Do not even try to shame the victims. Those women were just murdered and you must have serious issues if you’re still thinking about sex. He had a sex addiction? That was definitely not racially motivated or racist at all? Seriously? This makes me feel a different kind of sad. The online mediasphere is broadcasting Stop Asian Hate because it’s usually about your race when you’re a minority, but becoming the targets of violence is not the kind of representation any community wants. Please let the victims rest in peace and let this aftermath teach us all something new to be aware of. 

Featured on the special issue of Asian Hate on Overachiever Magazine
https://www.overachievermagazine.com/identity/stop-asian-hate

I will explain this image in a bit, but I’m going on a circle of thought here.
I probably didn’t have solid expectations or plans this year, but I certainly did not expect this turn out. There are some opportunities in life that I am open to, like continuing my education at the graduate level or traveling, but I haven’t made real plans to make any of that actually happen, and with coronavirus as a huge economic factor this year, those opportunities slowly moved down the priority list for me.  I got caught up with job searching, then keeping up with work once I found something to do, then completing the extra coursework I started, and then I guess that seemed like a good time to start another art project. So, that was probably the train of thought which led me to where I am today.

On the other hand, I didn’t know that coronavirus would have the impact around the world that is has made by the end of an entire year. I could have never known or imagined that the virus would put the world in lockdown or take the lives of millions of people worldwide because I have never lived through anything like this. In America, covid was speculated as a conspiracy and it was further politicized by the media as well as the White House (How can anyone ignore how the president continually brushed it off by saying the “China virus” would just “disappear” and “go away” by “April with the heat” and then got covid as a result of ignoring social distancing precautions while rallying for reelection). Regardless of your political stance, that was not responsible leadership or taken very seriously, and this really could have been the time for a leader to unify us and encourage each other to get through this hardship, and it disappoints me that this was used in the advantage to confuse and divide us.

Despite some personal setbacks, I have been fortunate to have my basic needs met and to have a normal suburban life that was not completely turned upside down, and this year has made me really appreciate the big little things in life. In my down time, I have been able to explore art again and to reflect on life to really explore my faith. It also surprised me that I took the leap of faith to come to Christ because I didn’t start the year seeking anything in particular, but that faithful decision changed the outcome of my year and my life. When I think about what’s happening or what’s going to happen, I am no longer  overly anxious because I trust in God to lead me and I do not lean on Trump. 

The coronavirus is real and it has the potential to cause great harm, so please take care of yourselves and your loved ones. This Christmas Eve, there was a family member who passed away from covid. My thoughts and prayers really do go out to the immediate family, but what can I do from a safe social distance besides contribute to the Gofundme page? Well I also shared the link. Now, I am sharing a thought tangent in this written reflection which I hope is not too far out there. Just to be clear, I don’t always think about death. Like I‘m not hopelessly depressed or think obsessively about dying. Sometimes I wonder, but what comes across my mind is what really happens at that moment because there’s a time for everyone.

One thought that has come to my mind lately is that if I was born into a Buddhist family, am I still bound to a Buddhist fate or am I saved by Christ? Okay, that thought is really far out there, but it’s important to me. In Buddhism, there is an illustration of the circle of life, or the realms of the world, or Samsara. The image shows a circle of the realms that is held by a powerful being, and outside of this circle is an enlightened one. Are you free from this cycle if you are enlightened? I’m not enlightened, but sometimes I really wonder about these things. Like I might not be awoken, but am I aware enough? Because this is not a normal thought. Most Buddhists do not constantly think about enlightenment and are not overly spiritual or religious, but they do respect monks and their ancestors and strive to live good lives in the present moment. Many have probably seen this image at some point, but don’t necessarily navigate life by it because it’s not in the forefront of anyone’s mind when we return to everyday life.

When I change my worldview from east to west, and when I read biblical scripture, there is a grand revelation about Jesus that can help guide Christians with their own questions about life. In the book of Ecclesiastes, the Bible says, “Do not be excessively righteous and do not be overly wise. Why should you ruin yourself? Do not be excessively wicked and do not be a fool. Why should you die before your time? It is good that you grasp one thing and also not let go of the other; for the one who fears God comes forth with both of them” (Ecclesiastes 8:16-18). I am not writing about this to try to appear wise or cool, and if anything, I’m actually shy about writing or expressing myself at all. The reason why I included scripture was to guide this thought, not to appear righteous because my understanding is limited and I come to God with my questions about how to navigate life in both worlds. 

It’s not just an eastern mindset vs. western, believing in Buddhism vs. Christianity, thinking about living life vs. after life, whether you hold Democratic values vs. Republican, or any other means of social division. Maybe we could all get along or at least be able to cooperate with one another if we think about what really matters in life, or at the end of life, but our problem as people is that we don’t really acknowledge our shared values or goals. We haven’t just socially distanced this year, but we’ve also allowed ourselves to become socially divided. We tend to highlight our differences, but we don’t have to look at things as opposites. Sometimes we lack context or understanding or compassion for each other, and regardless of your political or religious stance, we all exist in the same reality where we go on with our daily lives and some day we will exit. What happens beyond that moment is of faith.

There are a lot of factors and perspectives and scenarios that I did not include, but I hope that this thought was not too far out there or culturally unaware or insensitive, and I apologize again if I am. ​I shared this image to help explain what I am trying to understand, but I am by no means trying to change or challenge anyone’s beliefs or worldview. I’m also not sure if my thoughts and prayers mean anything to you, but I hope you will have a better year ahead of you.