Who Keeps Us Safe?

We followed up with "The Eggrolls," who you might remember from our conversation with them last summer. They are a mutual aid group based out of ChuMinh Tofu in Little Saigon, located in the eastern side of the CID.  The Eggrolls and ChuMinh Tofu restaurant have continued to serve 150-200 free meals outside of the restaurant every Sunday to homeless and elder members of the Little Saigon community. While providing basic resources to the community around them, they also get a glimpse as to how policing in that community impacts safety in different ways. Our conversation with them reflects some of the process they have had to go through while trying to create safety in their neighborhood.

If you're interested in volunteering with The Eggrolls, reach out via their website at https://www.chuminhtofu.com/get-involved. You can also connect with them on Instagram @chuminhtofu.

Read more about The Eggrolls:

https://southseattleemerald.com/2021/11/05/love-mutual-aid-and-humanity-at-chuminh-tofu/

https://iexaminer.org/thanh-nga-tanya-nguyen-of-chuminh-tofu-and-the-eggrolls-serve-a-free-hot-meal-to-anyone-who-wants-one-every-sunday-in-little-saigon/

This summer, we revisited the CID Coalition as they address a new challenge that threatens the CID. The regional transit service (Sound Transit) is working on an expansion of the light rail system in the Seattle region. Although this might seem like a great opportunity for the city, Sound Transit has selected the CID as the transit hub location for all of this new expansion. This project would have huge environmental impacts, including displacing long-time residents and between 5 - 10 businesses in the historic core of the neighborhood.

We wanted to hear from the neighborhood about this light rail proposal, so Andy met up with CID Coalition organizers at flower flower (an artist studio in the CID on Jackson St) where the Coalition was making banners to prepare for a Sound Transit hearing.

Join us for a brief conversation with "The Eggrolls," a mutual aid group based out of ChuMinh Tofu in Little Saigon, located in the eastern side of the CID.  For the past 3 years, the Eggrolls and ChuMinh have been serving 150-200 free meals outside of the restaurant every Sunday to homeless and elder members of the Little Saigon community. We hope that this episode can give you a glimpse into what mutual aid in the Little Saigon area currently looks like, and how these community efforts contribute to safety.

A couple weeks ago, MPOP (Massage Parlor Outreach Project) held a vigil in Seattle's CID to mark the anniversary of the tragedy in Atlanta, GA. We chatted briefly with some MPOP members to hear more about the event and what community safety means for us now, one year later.

Content Warning: We briefly mention the physical violence and murder that occurred on March 16, 2021.

If you haven't already, go and listen to our 4th episode titled "MPOP" to learn more in depth about the organization and the issues they seek to address.

In this episode, we wanted to connect our learnings about incarceration & immigration with the local work being done around supporting and organizing Asian migrant massage workers. The massage parlor industry has been highly targeted by systems of policing and punishment, so it's another vital piece to the discussion around community safety. We are so grateful to be sharing with you this conversation with MPOP (Massage Parlor Outreach Project), who are an innovative local organization that supports massage workers in the Seattle area.

Content Warning: This episode will be discussing violence against Asian Americans, and specifically commenting on the violence that occurred in March 2021 against massage parlor workers in Atlanta.

You can find MPOP on facebook at Massage Parlor Outreach Project 女工互助小组 and on instagram @mpop_sea.

As we continued exploring the topics of safety and policing, we knew that this conversation was incomplete without addressing incarceration. This month, we had the opportunity to have candid conversations with our friends Tien and Eric, who are formerly and currently incarcerated folks (respectively). They are connected with groups like FreeThemAll, FIGHT (Formerly Incarcerated Group Healing Together), and APICAG (Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Awareness Group). Listen with us, as we consider their stories and perspectives in order to work towards a Safety that includes us all.

You can find APICAG on facebook at APICAG//Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Awareness Group.

FIGHT is at https://fightwa.org as well as on facebook @fightWA.

FreeThemALL is on facebook @FreeThemAllWa.

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Tien Ho's story is important but wasn't necessarily described in our conversations, so we wanted to make sure you got an overview here. Tien was detained at the NW Detention Center (NWDC) after being convicted of a second degree assault of a child in 2016. This conviction was blind to personal and cultural factors. A petition was made to ask for her release, which stated, "As a very young mother, Ms. Ho had disciplined her husband's child by spanking. Since then, she has worked extremely hard to rehabilitate and learn skills to be an effective parent without resorting to corporal punishment. We believe that redemption, not retribution, creates a more just and safer society [...] Her family has suffered greatly with her being detained. She was taken into custody when her child was only an infant. Since then, her three-year-old child has been growing up only seeing his mom through video chat. She is an instrumental person in taking care of her husband, who has health issues; and her mother, who does not speak English. [Additionally], the conditions at NWDC where social distancing measures are near impossible, [are deeply concerning]. In this time of COVID-19, [this is] a death sentence for Ms. Ho -- a mother, wife, daughter, and valuable community member. [...] We believe that Ms. Ho is invaluable to our Vietnamese communities while we continue to heal from the remnants of war and as we live, work, and make contributions to the U.S. as residents and citizens."

Read more about Tien's story at https://www.change.org/p/governor-jay-inslee-release-ms-tien-ho-from-nw-detention-center

In late June 2021, we caught word of a demonstration sponsored by the CID Coalition where they were protesting the opening of a building which houses high-value, luxury condominiums in the Chinatown-International District.  We then got the chance to sit down with some members of the CID Coalition to talk more about gentrification and how this connects with the ideas of safety. Join us as we continue to learn more about the various components to consider when reimagining what safety could look like in our communities.

You can find the CID Coalition on facebook at HumbowsNotHotels. Episode artwork by Jiéyì Ludden 杰意 .