25 years ago I was teaching in a small primary center (K-2) public school near Koreatown.
The night before,
4 white police officers were found not guilty for beating a black suspect in custody...
despite a video recording of the beating.
There was some trouble that night, but not near me in Downtown.
I think we all figured it was over and contained to that one night of protest and outrage.
We were wrong.
The following day, I went to school like every other day.
The kids arrived by foot or on buses from the overcrowded neighboring schools.
Then it started.
We had the news on live in the staff lounge.
Florence and Normandie was about 10 miles away from us.
Surely, it wouldn't effect our school.
As the morning went on...
so did the unrest.
54th and Vermont...
48th and Vermont...
40th and Vermont...
Slowly it was moving north on Vermont towards us.
Reality hits.
Some staff members asked to go home.
Families came to pick up their children.
Not all of them could because we had kids that rode the bus.
Some staff went home.
USC and Exposition Park
We stayed in our rooms trying to keep things as normal as we could
But kids could sense our anxiety.
I remember one teacher calling us at school to tell us she had arrived safely at home.
Those of us there wondered why.
I don't remember exactly when it arrived,
But I remember hearing the sirens.
I remember hearing the panic in parents voices when they arrived to pick up their children.
I remember the principal and teachers making a barrier around our students
walking them to the buses
while teens and adults,
normal people,
were running and screaming,
carrying garbage cans full of stuff.
It was madness.
I remember someone with a handful of dry cleaned uniforms running past us.
I wondered, what they were going to do with all those uniforms.
As we escorted our precious cargo onto their buses,
A few teens ran by yelling and trying to scare us.
Jose was the only man on campus.
He was my TA.
He stayed until the kids were safe and gone.
He walked us to our cars.
It was his neighborhood they were looting.
I don't remember much after that.
I remember wearing sunglasses because I was afraid I would be mistaken for being Korean.
They had killed and were beating Koreans.
I remember shaking as I drove to my apartment Downtown.
I remember thinking this was all a bad dream of some sort.
I knew it was real when I arrived home to my high-rise apartment.
I could see tanks on the streets below my balcony.
I felt pretty safe where I was.
There were guards with machine guns "protecting" us.
I knew other areas of LA were not safe.
I was afraid for the police officers.
I was afraid for the store owners.
I was afraid for my families.
I was afraid my city would burn down.
It wasn't a good feeling.
I am not sure if that is what others felt in other parts of LA.
The unrest was contained to a specific area of the city and it
devastated the communities where it hit.
The strip malls by my school burned.
Windows shattered, stores emptied, people hurt.
I drove to San Diego for a few days.
When I came back things were eerily calm.
It wasn't the same.
But we would rebuild and move on.
Kids are resilient and teachers too.
I remember a mom brought in a receipt for a TV-
Because her child had said they got a new TV.
She didn't want us to think they had looted it.
Not sure if things are better.
It is different, but it is also the same.
We have a long way to go.
But we have to keep moving forward.
Some photos I found from LA Times of that day... 25 years ago.
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| It was a like a march up from one area of the city towards my school that morning... |
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| A Rite Aid on 3rd and Vermont. The one I had visited when I needed supplies. (2 blocks from my school). |
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| 2nd and Vermont. The strip mall a block away from my school. |
This is the strip mall behind our school on First and Vermont.
I've eaten at that KFC.
I've taken my students to Seafood City for a field trip.
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| Too close for comfort, behind our school was the major street where the unrest moved along. |
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| When we started the new school year in July, we started our with a unit on neighborhood and the people who work there. |
