Hugo Alfredo: The Invisible Immigrant Who Gave

Let me begin my stating my understanding of who is an immigrant. In recent years, this term has become code, in the dominant discourse, for referring to people of color who have come to the U.S. Belgians, Scots or Swedes are not envisioned. However, in actuality, Native Americans are the only people in this country who are not immigrants, and perhaps, they too migrated here from somewhere else long ago.

But today I woke up to the beautiful and tragic story of Hugo Alfredo, an immigrant from Guatemala. I do not know how long he has been in this country or had been homeless. What I know, from watching ABC this a.m. is that he attempted to help a woman who either was or seemed to be in danger from a man pursuing her. She apparently got away from her pursuer, who then turned his rage on Hugo, stabbing him several times, before taking off. A video camera records Hugo giving chase but only for a few feet, when he collapses on the sidewalk, face down. Individuals pass by him, with no movement towards him. Finally, one guy actually stops and rolls him over, seeing his wounds. It's not clear who called the police, but for one hour Hugo lay on the sidewalk dying. He is going back to Guatemala to his family in a box.

When Ju-Ju reported this story on Good Morning America, she ended with a line and flip delivery that led me to turn off the TV: "A Good Samaritan Who Needed a Good Samaritan." Clever line but no feeling evident in it.

I'd like to think that if I had passed this man on the street that I would have done something. I'd like to believe that about myself, especially if he's face down. I don't think I would have gone over and touched him, out of fear (of germs, of his reaction, of what I'd find). I have certainly approached strangers, adults and children, who seem highly distressed, to see if they need help. But there is this veil, sometimes opaque and other times sheer, that hangs between homeless people and most of us with homes to go to (even if in foreclosure). When the homeless are sprawled on the ground and if we look at their faces, we assume sleep or passed out. But face down on the sidewalk, I believe I could not have done nothing. I believe I would have called the police to report a man face down, perhaps in medical distress. That's all I can do, believe. I wasn't there and so I do not know what I would do. The man who extended himself to at least turn Hugo over may in fact have been the one who called the police.

Hugo, a Central American immigrant, did not have a home, but he had a generous spirit, a humanity of grace. To those who want to scapegoat and traumatize immigrants of color, we can ask, where is your humanity? Does Hugo's humanity reach yours? To those of us who believe we would have done something, we can ask ourselves, how can we lift that veil a little higher?

I hope we get to hear from the woman to whom he made his offering. But even if we don't, Hugo's sacrifice stands as a reflection to us all.

Photo courtesy of AP, F. Franklin

Appreciating Little Signs of Progress

Most of us want to do big things. We’re led to believe that is what matters. Make a splash, grab a headline, make a lot of money, cure AIDS, turn 100 heads as we walk by. Make a difference. It’s why I’ve always loved the saying by Mother Teresa:

“We cannot do great things in this world, only small things with great love.”

And so it is with our growth. We look to make great leaps and that’s fine. Shoot for the stars, it’s the only way you’ll get there or even close. And at the same time, so many important moments come in tiny steps, a certain look of compassion, the one time, when you don’t respond the way you almost always do, a day when you eat more fruit and green vegetables. As a therapist, you are not always the vehicle to a certain outcome. Sometimes, that outcome is far away, and what you can contribute is to the quality of the process, a different experience along the way, or maybe one new opening in the mind and heart of another. You are contributing, and others will too, maybe down the line, another therapist will see the outcome.
I believe that all of us know a great deal, even if we do not always have access to what we know. Much of what is needed is to remember, keep remembering, and to practice, and keep practicing. And so recently, I noticed one of those small steps in my own growth -- nothing earth shattering, and yet something in which I find pleasure, a sense of goodness.

In certain neighborhoods, certain regions of the country, strangers acknowledge each other as they cross paths, as a matter of human courtesy. Most times, especially in big cities, strangers may look at each other as they pass and that’s it. Every now and then there’s the exception. In the past, when I have extended myself to be the exception, and the human being ignores me, I have felt one or more of these feelings: foolish, devalued, miffed. Courtesy and respect were BIG in my household growing up -- it’s downright rude and disrespectful to not return a greeting that is respectful. When my friendliness was not returned I wished I hadn’t extended myself.
And yet, I didn’t like the tit for tat attitude either. There is something valuable about extending a friendly greeting, period, the feeling of good will. . I aspire to get to that place, where I may be disappointed that a greeting isn’t returned, but that I don’t feel diminished by it and I don’t regret having extended myself.
A few days ago, I got a glimpse of it. No one else was on the sidewalk when I and a Black man, who looked like he may have been from the Caribbean, approached each other.

“Good morning,” I said.

He looked at me, his eyes rather piercing, and his face like stone, as we passed each other. I wondered about him. I did not feel foolish or regretful. I felt good. I spoke because that’s how I wanted to be in that moment. It’s been easier for me to know the satisfaction of taking a stand on big things, to represent my vision, my values, whether or not it will change anything. It’s been a matter of principle.
But even in small things, I am practicing to see the value of being who I am unconditionally.

Photo courtesy of Bernadine Tolbert

MLK Jr. - reflections on the anniversary of his murder

I can remember this day forty-two years ago like it was yesterday. I was in my high-rise dorm room when the voice of my friend Jimmy Mac, a cool dude with wire-rim glasses from Harlem, came through the phone. "They did it," he said. "What?" I said. "They killed him." "Who are you talking about?" "Martin Luther King." "WHAT? They KILLED HIM? They KILLED him!" That gentle giant with black eyes like that of a doe, willing to get his and others' heads bashed in in the name of love and turning the cheek. I could not take it in, but told Mac I'd be downstairs in a few minutes to join him and others who were going downtown (Boston) to be together with other Black students in the area.

I am still not over it. The issue of race took on a new philosophy and role in my life. But that's another blog.

What I didn't appreciate at the time was how radical Martin Luther King Jr. was, not just in terms of his non-violence stance (which truthfully didn't seem that radical to me at the time), but when he began to address the immorality of Vietnam and of class oppression, and suggested that the ghetto was a colony. This progression in his thinking, his voice, his actions doesn't get much play, and he had just started to support the Black sanitation workers on strike in Memphis when he was shot down. Bill Moyers recently did a show on PBS about King and the state of class and race nowadays. He and Michael Winship also did a piece in Salon.com http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/feature/2010/04/02/martin_luther_king_assassination_anniversary_ext2010/index.html King lost a lot of support when he widened his lens and protest, including flak from the N.A.A.C.P. So sad. It reminds me again of how lonely it can be to take a stand against injustice, and yet as he said "There comes a time when silence is a betrayal."

Not long ago, there was concern that the sculpture of him for the memorial being built in Washington looked too forceful (my word). Or is it that it looked 'angry'? His face, his hands needed to be toned down, smoothed over. This is what society wants to do over time with social justice heroes, render them innocuous teddy bears so they can be loved. I think about this not only with Martin Luther King but Muhammad Ali. These Black men did not go gently against injustice, and they were willing to risk status and lifestyle in taking their stands. Muhammad Ali gave up his heavyweight title, his ability to make a living in is profession for years, and Martin Luther King gave us his life. These men had the courage and integrity to speak up and lose the support of many.

The cost of integrity can be high. This post-modern notion that everything can be negotiated pleasantly with appropriate empathy and good will is itself a sanded-down notion. There is sacrifice, burning, and heartbreak in speaking truth to Power.

I give thanks to these brothers and others who bear witness to such strength. Though I cannot be them, they hold me up in the little steps I take to speak up at times when silence is preferred and well cultivated.

Ghana Journal III - Elmina Castle

On our next to last day in Ghana, my daughter, Maia, Bernadine, a family friend and I set out for Cape Coast, intending to see the castle where our enslaved ancestors were kept. Yes, castle. I couldn’t wrap my brain around it at first when others referred to Elmina castle, and Cape coast castle. Somehow an eleven year old girl’s memories of royalty and castles lived on -- the enthrallment with gold, fine jewels, the pomp and circumstance and the drama -- collided with the notion of dungeon. That is the word I put on a place where Africans were held captive before shipped across the Atlantic, not castle. I had been fascinated by British history, the Queens and Kings, learning about them in school the summer my mom and I spent in London. No mention of the slave trade, least nothing that made an impression.

There in Ghana the romanticized version of royalty had to catch up with all the subsequent years of my life. We ended up at Elmina castle, instead of Cape Coast castle, because the former is closer to where we had lunch by the water, Coconut Grove Resort. We’d done the Canopy Walk at Kakum Forest, and yearned for some good food. The water helped calm the irritation that had arisen among us, particularly Maia, about the tense walk on a board plank strung with rope high above the forest. Nothing steady about it and sturdy is up for grabs too, given the netted rope that served as un-reassuring side rails. Concentration was key, and not on the forest.

As we left the Forest, Felix our driver called our attention to the dying coconut trees. Somehow we hadn’t noticed on the way there, rolling fields of tall, barren trunks a nub at the top, besieged with some disease, its remedy not yet identified.

We arrived at Elmina castle late afternoon. The conversation between us faded, as we approached on foot, amidst a swarm of young people, each insisting we give their wares and words attention. The massive off white structure with black trim, peeling, under a magnificent blue sky loomed, and I felt my body brace before we crossed the moat into it. Immediately after paying to get in, extra to take pictures, I felt incensed. Why should I have to pay? I thought, African-Americans should get in for free. It’s not like we wouldn’t donate to keep this monument to the Maafa, the Great Disaster. I let the feeling go as I stepped into the central courtyard of the castle, flooded with light.

Kwesi, our tour guide, a handsome young man, in his early 20’s with espresso colored skin and a velvety voice, had such gruesome stories to tell, such grim inhabitable spaces to show us. Ground level and below. Up on the second floor, your fate told clearly by which staircase you took there (the back steps, of wood) or the wide polished ones, the Governor’s suite, a balcony, the Portuguese kitchen, the Dutch kitchen. Three hundred women corralled in a lean corridor, lit like a closet, with little attention to their bodily needs. Above their heads, Dutch church services were held. Standing in that space I tried to imagine myself there with my ancestors, but made a fast mental retreat. I wanted to scream a mad woman’s protest, long and loud, the unraveling kind where the woman's hair is all wild and her eyes glazed, house shoes on her feet. But I stayed quiet. For a special occasion, women got herded in the courtyard, for the Governor’s pick, as he surveyed below from the balcony. The chosen one had had the privilege of being cleaned with the collected rain water. Cells a tad larger than a phone booth for trouble makers. And then the last stop for the Africans in Elmina, the cube of darkness, except for the rectangular opening in the wall, the door of no return. Here began the loading onto ships for the Middle Passage, nearly 3 months after being in Elmina's dungeon. Here is where I placed the offering I had brought, a piece of rose quartz from my ancestral altar at home. I put it next to the wreath Kwesi said had been left by other African-Americans. Here is where I said a prayer to my ancestors, honoring them for what they endured, words that could barely touch the unfathomable.

Kwesi acknowledged the role of some Africans in capturing other Africans to sell to the Europeans, and the chiefs who bartered in African lives. I found some comfort in this expression of accountability, even as Kwesi and I both know that no African could have strung a bridge in his or her mind from slavery in Africa to that in the Americas. The presence of Kwesi, in his reverent manner, throughout, was a balm in Elmina. Fifty two years since Elmina came into Ghanaian hands, five centuries since the Portuguese built it, the first prison in Africa for those who lived and died through the Maafa.

Photos by thandiwe.

Ghana Journal II -- Food and Fabric

Four out of the five. That's how many nights we ate Ghanaian food. Three of those nights in Accra we hit an outdoor restaurant where we religously ordered kelewele, spiced fried plantain cut like apple slices, and jollof rice. I don't know what seasonings go into that food or whether it's the palm oil, but the flavor is got-to-have it. I liked Red-red, a bean dish, too but I didn't keep ordering it like I did kelewele, jollof rice, and fried fish. I compared kelewele from our hotel, Coconut Grove, her sister hotel Coconut Grove Resort, dining next to the water, and our regular Accra spot, the winner in my view. But Maia, my daughter, said the cook at the guest house where she stayed topped the restaurant's version. She got instruction in making them under the cook's supervision, and has made them since back in the States. I can't wait to sample! The only night we didn't eat Ghanaian we went to an Indian restaurant, invited by Maia's cohorts, who touted it to be the "best Indian food in town." I can't speak on that but my shrimp briyani took a delicious notch up on the spice over the one back home. The other Ghanaian delight not to be missed is their cocoa. Even with mostly water and a little milk, the chocolate flavor was sublime!

All over Ghana, in the bustle of Accra or along dirt roads in the countryside, women wear some of the most well-fitting skirts and blouses made of strikingly colorful fabric on the planet. I'm talking women of all sizes, those with big hips, bountiful breasts as well as those more modestly endowed, or downright lean. Not once did I see a woman with her skirt "cupping her behind" as my mother used to say when she took me shopping as a girl and a dress or skirt I was trying on was too tight and wasn't coming home with us. The Ghana ankle length skirt follows the waist and hips with precision, and the kaleidoscopic colors of the fabric, along with the creativity of the blouse, and precise tailoring, all add up to beautiful, elegant women. Fabric is everywhere for sale, the colors and designs a vibrant feast for the eyes. I bought one of the loveliest batiks from a roadside stand manned by an adolescent boy whose mother had instructed him not to bargain, and though I doubted him at first, he made a believer out of me.

Kente and adinkra are the most prized traditional cloth from Ghana. Kente is an intricately woven cloth of silk threads that come from the okomantan spider. There are many designs, and at one time, a particular design was associated with a particular clan or social status. It is woven in narrow strips which are then sewn together. On my second trip to the Cultural Arts Center I bargained well for a piece of kente and adinkra. The adinkra cloth is stamped with adinkra symbols, each one representing a particular belief or principal of Asante (also spelled Ashanti) culture. Sesa Wo Suban, Transform my life is one of my favorites. That's why it's in my blog heading. One day I'll figure out how to get the symbol there too.

Next and final Ghana Journal - The Castle (where the enslaved were held before making the Middle Passage).

Ghana Journal I - Akwabaa and Bodacious

It's nearly a month since I returned from my trip to Ghana, a short but meaningful one. My daughter was going because of her interest in international health, particularly, in Africa. She'd been to Swaziland twice, and I'd gone once before, back in the 70's, to parts of East and West Africa. How nice it would be, I thought, to be on the Continent together. Beyond that I wanted to go to one of the dungeons where the enslaved Africans were held before loaded on ships for the infamous Middle Passage. I had not done that before, but now I had a need to do so. I learned they are called castles, but that journey is not for today's Ghana Journal.

A family friend, Bernadine, and I flew non-stop to Accra. Nine hours. The flight, with center rows of 3 seats, flanked by rows 2 seats deep, was full. I speak from the vantage point of coach class, and have no idea if all the business class seats had bodies. Judging from our section and the airport terminal, Ghanaians ruled the passenger list, and I couldn't help notice that quite a few were mothers with young children, and some grandmothers. I imagined happy occasions on their returning home, to visit or stay.

Akwabaa! This is the greeting you hear and see on signs everywhere. It means you are welcome. And you are. You feel it with customs folks who look over your passport and make small talk, smiling young men who swamp you once you're outside the airport itself, vying for the role of helping you to your transportation, with hotel staff, and the young men and women vendors who approach the car selling home made and store bought food, pouches of water, gum, dish towels, nearly anything that can be used. The Ghanaians we encountered had a warmth and dignity about them, from those in the middle class sector to those who live in a small village we visited in Kligor, a few hours drive from Accra, in the Volta region.

Accra is a sprawling city teeming with buildings, traffic circles, serious traffic at rush hour, and people on the move. Unlike my time there before, where we only walked, we only rode. Felix, our driver, is an Ewe, an ethnic group that originates from the Volta region. Every morning he appeared at our hotel in a crisp neat look, shirt and pants, ready for the day's agenda. A dark skinned man in his early 60's with a head-on smile, he let us know early that he is a Christian man who observes his faith seriously. That didn't get in the way of his humor though, and we had some good laughs. The only time Bernadine, my daughter and I did any substantial physical activity was at Kakum National Forest, where we had some serious climbing to do to get to Canopy Walk. It's not for the weak-hearted. High above the forest, a plank of wood swung as we walked, holding on to the rope banister that topped the braided rope that ran from it to the wood. That was the railing to keep us in. It reached our waist, sometimes. My daughter found nothing enjoyable about it, and I admit the forest got dwarfed, as I concentrated intently on balance as I stepped.

Wherever we went, from Accra to the village in Kligor to Cape Coast, where two of the castles that imprisoned our ancestors were located, Ghanaians brought up Obama. In their faces I saw a deep pride and joy in the son of an African now President, a man who chose to visit their country with his family. I too felt a deep pride, learning more about their first President, Kwame Nkrumah, when we visited his memorial, accompanied by our well-informed tour guide. The audacity of this African man in leading Ghana out of colonization by Britain, only 52 years ago. The strategic foresight he had in marrying an Egyptian woman and envisioning a unified and free Africa. The legacy of audacity in our ancestors is a mind-blowing, immeasurable gift. Growing up, I remember the word bo-dacious . "She's so bodacious," we'd say, like too bold, over the top. But where would we be without those bodacious folks in our history, and in our lives today?

Photos by thandiwe.

Confusing Lists with Life - Rumi, to my rescue

Lists are like brushing my teeth and washing my face -- fundamental to meeting the day with a semblance of togetherness. Even now that I'm working two part-time jobs and not one full-time job and three part-time jobs, they are essential. I make lists by the week, with usually two columns, headed Calls and To Do. They help rein in the panicky feeling that sometimes surfaces, the one of not knowing where to start, the one accompanied by images of me running around from one thing to the next, flitting like a manic butterfly. Lists bring me back to the moment of what I can do, a specific task. It is on paper and I can direct myself to getting it crossed off.

Lists are my evidence of a manageable life, one in which I have control, or some. They are reassuring, like clean teeth and fresh breath, a face refreshed with warm water and a creamy cleanser, topped with rose hips oil and then a moisturizer. Ahhhh! I am in the world, not under it.

As the details and stimuli of life come at me like confetti from a paper-shredding machine in the sky, lists are up there with screening, ignoring, and scanning for a time frame. If its not relevant today or this week, the fine details are left for when I will need to take action. My attention will have more motivation to stick around then.

In addition to a sense of control, lists give me pleasure. Each time I can pick up a highlighter and bathe an item in its pastel, there is a sense of accomplishment. I have done something with my life, my time. I have met a purpose. But every now and then I get some distance on this, and sadly, it seems like much of life is tied up in this notion. The state, the agency wants to know how many clients did you see this week. The university wants to know how many articles have you published. The city wants to know how many tickets did you give out today? Friends ask what have you been up to, and somehow you feel like you have to have something to show, something you've gotten done, an outcome of some sort. And things like enjoying one's children, reading poetry, or spending years to write a poem, just don't cut it as worthwhile living. They don't fit the solid, reductionist measure.

It is easy to get entranced by the pervasive chanting that says accomplishments are the essence of life, racking up numbers, crossing off items on lists. It is so much harder to see and feel the jewel in the process, the quality of trying, the beauty of investing our time in loving and creating, and in reflecting.

"Wherever you stand, be the soul of that place." Rumi

I had a card with that saying on it. That is the life I aspire to, the living I want to do. I need to be reminded, again and again. Rumi offers his own spell and I go to him and others who remember.

Photo courtesy of Bernadine Tolbert