A Tough Call Pt 1

This is a post I have been hesitating to write. Try as I may I know that it is part of my experience I need to be honest about. It will be difficult to write it as I have drawn up many roughs but in the end I just have to wing it. Three weeks ago I was ‘asked out’ on a ‘date’ by a prisoner whom I’ve suspected to have feelings for me for over a month now. I cannot relay how difficult a situation this is to broach but how can I be true to my work otherwise?

I have found that being a woman in an all male prison is a position of vulnerability, power, distinction, and makes me a greater emphasis in the eyes of men than I ever thought I could be. As a tutor I already opened myself up on a more personal and academic level, an interaction they don’t experience every day. The winks, stares and side comments leave me feeling uneasy, like a girl who keeps getting accosted at work or on her way to get coffee. I know that for most of them it is the situation, the prison-life that leaves them aching to see the opposite sex. Before this incident I tried to distance myself, creating a firm line between them and me. But it wasn’t long before I saw that I was a class onto myself and that as long as I attended each Thursday I could not distance myself away from them completely.

(More to come)

With Liberty for Some

With Liberty for Some is a history of the prison system and imprisonment in America. Reading through the book I have learned a great deal about the continuity of human nature when dealing with society’s cast-offs. This land was a melting pot of people who came in shackles, on slave ships, and exiled to a rough new world with unforeseeable dangers. Our country was built on the backs of slavery, child labor, and human rights abuses. That was nearly 400 years ago. Today, we are not the transit stop for prisoners of Europe or slaves, unless you count cases of human trafficking. However, we still use prisoners to test vaccines, work for slave wages and leave them to rot in a cell.

One quote from a prisoner last week sums up my feelings perfectly: “we are all still barbarians, barbarians with ipods.”

When systems of government fail, and stock markets come crashing down all we have are each other. And that notion scares me to death after looking at pictures of genocide and war but it also creates a certain hope because I know that even incarcerated men can show compassion.

Race and my place in prison

Potato Salad Drama

As I sprawl out in the backseat of Nick’s new Audi, I suddenly felt my stomach do another spinning back kick on my organs.

“Drive home quickly Chris, my stomach is killing me. I think grandma is losing her touch on the potato salad.”

“Okay, but lunch was fine. I think you are just recovering from your virus last week.”

Almost every Sunday Chris takes the train into Brooklyn to have grandma’s Sunday lunch. This week our youngest brother Kevin and I wanted to tag along so Chris drove in.

The flashing lights and sirens behind us were almost too much to bear after the Long Island silence settled in. Chris stepped out the car. Then the officers told us to get out.

To the boys: “Pop your trunk and put your hands on the hood. I need to check you out.”

Kevin turns to Chris, eyes wide and face gaunt with fear. But he quickly complies. Legs are spread and bodies bent over the hood of the car waiting to be patted by a stranger.

“Open the glove compartment.”

I clumsily open the glove compartment filled with maps, coupons, and receipts for pizza.

Had anything to drink? No sir.

Carrying a firearm? No

Drugs? No

Why are ya here? To get dinner.

Where ya comin’ from? Brooklyn.

Why were yous in Brooklyn? Grandma’s potato salad.

Do you live in LI? Yes we do.

What do ‘ya do? Graduated and working, High School, Middle School.

The light flashed on my face and the officer continued.

How do you know her? It’s my sister.

‘Ya sure? Yes.

Parents names? Kermit and Wichittra Card.

‘Ya sure? Yea.

Where do you live? Deer Park, NY 11729.

Apartment right? No, house.

So you own? Yes.

After re-checking my brother’s license, our trunk, my purse, their pockets and giving us breathalyzer tests, he told us to head straight home, no more stops.

We go home in silence. Kevin’s cracking voice breaks and asks: “why?”

Black.

After reading this piece to the prisoners Alonna asked how they felt about it. The prisoners reacted with comments like “typical day in a black man’s life” or “DWB driving while black”. When she asked if they could guess the author, they all seemed surprised when she disclosed my name.

Then the questions poured in: are you black? No, I am not. Did this really happen to you? Yes. Where in Brooklyn are you from again? Oh yeah that’s a tough place, you know you’re probably a lot tougher than any of us give you credit for. How long have you been family? 14 years.

One gentleman said to me “it is not the shade of your skin; it is the love in your heart.” And I couldn’t agree more. Whether I think of my Thai family, my English/Canadian roots or my black family I know that there is love and acceptance. This conversation about home, race and family love was on the lighter side.

Weeks later when we approached the idea of race and cliques at Syracuse University they described similar scenes of allegiances and alliances. The Whites hung with whites, and Asians sided with Asians. After spending weeks tutoring and talking to these men I expected no less honesty and clarity into the human social condition. It is when we are faced with new environments, self-preservation and security (whether social or physical) that we ally and find safety in numbers.

When these men spoke to me they now knew that I had some insight to their world, to the environment they had to live through and their struggles as men of color. I began to think about the boys in my elementary school P.S 137 and how many of them are at a four year university. I am lucky to be on the other side of the cement walls blogging.

Race and racism is alive in society, whether it is in SU or Auburn Prison. People find security in gangs and groups. They have no choice because once you come into the system you are sorted and claimed by those that identify with you. Who are you to deny their protection? Who are you to deny the benefits of the group? And who are you to stray and make your own way? It’s a rough fragmented world we live in, behind walls and on the quad.

Folktales, stories, and oral history

Its interesting how we (Alonna and I) come up with the discussion topics to start of each week’s session. When I chose oral history and story telling it turned out to be a challenge. First Eliah and I put on a play demonstrating the Algonquin’s creation story. The men found it quite amusing but when I asked another man to read a story from The People Could Fly, the black vernacular and pace the story was read left the men distracted and uninterested. I felt a panic but I insisted that this would have a purpose. So I told them about how important oral histories and stories were. About the writing, and building of history by the culture of power. I wanted them to see how the writing and telling of limited history and experiences can marginalize people in the present. If histories are lost then so are cultures, identities and even a sense of self. Stories created and told by black slaves are a beautiful artistic part of American history, not just Black history. The moment it is divided the country is divided, peoples are divided, and any potential sense of ‘togetherness’ is lost.

This was when I realized that for most of these men’s lives the only pride they could find in their identity and communities came in the form of gangs, and ill-gained wealth. Since most of them dropped out and did not have stable families or role models they could not by told stories or be instilled with pride. Their identity became attached to their allegiances to friends, gangs, and material goods.

A basic knowledge in ones history can instil pride or at the very least a sense of who you are, and what you come from. An idea of the events and people have come before us. Perhaps this is naïve but I believe that through education we can be set free from the pettiness of gangs, and violence because there is something greater to achieve and learn. I hope this all makes sense. I suppose what I am trying to say is education, history, and stories can open someone’s eyes to a truth and way of thinking beyond the streets.

Reflection

I have often wondered what these men could have done to land in this desolate place.  In the classroom most of them seem like students ready to learn, discuss, and pay attention.  We have the average problems any class would deal with, talking over one another, noise level, getting everyone’s attention and coming up with material that will drive them towards conversation.  I was told that many of the people who come to prison are sentenced on drug charges, just regular Joes that get caught up in the wrong business. 

 

I have been reading prison writing from all over the country by both men and women of all ages and backgrounds.  It gives me a small insight to the inner workings of their motivation, and conditions that they might have faced outside the prison walls. 

 

In one session we discussed child soldiers and read some pieces describing a child soldier’s experience being taken from their home by force and made to kill, rape and torture.  One of the men was taken back by the numbers and pointed out how these children had no choice.  He was moved by the narrative and poem.  Another man made a very interesting point by asking the class and tutors what choice does a kid have if he is raised in the ghetto, is poor, doesn’t have parents, and is surrounded by the slums with no escape?  He is then a victim of his socio-economic class and must turn to a life of crime in order to survive. 

 

In the prison writing I have been reading I get a glimpse into these personal childhood hells, it is a world of corruption, violence, gangs, rape and complete insecurity.  I can see the lack of choice, and hope for a brighter future.  So many people can counter this by talking about the organizations, groups, and social structures that are set up to help and assist.  But how available are they?  And just how helpful are they?  I have worked in many public school settings to know that the system can and will give up on you.  That teachers, social workers and administrators don’t deal with a certain amount of ‘bad’.  This is especially true for poor minority children who don’t have stable homes, food, healthy lifestyles and support. 

 

It is not a funny coincidence that the majority of this classroom is African American and Latino.  I was asking some of the prisoners about Asian Americans and the response is that “Sing-Sing is like Chinatown” and prisons on the west coast are filled with Asian prisoners.  So for those who preach and push the model minority card there are obviously many Asian Americans that slip through the cracks.  I look into the faces of the men in my class and I wonder how many of them have had a comfortable bed to sleep in at night, a nice meal, healthcare, or caring/concerned individuals that reached out to them.  Yes there are the sickos in the world but I promise you that most of these men are just regular guys that made a mistake. 

Being around these men have altered the way I look at the world for the better.  I hope that

they will find new hope and intellectual freedom from what I teach them.   

Speeches and pictures we discussed

Elie Wiesel Buchenwald June 2009

Mr. President, Chancellor Merkel, Bertrand, ladies and gentlemen. As I came here today it was actually a way of coming and visit my father's grave -- but he had no grave. His grave is somewhere in the sky. This has become in those years the largest cemetery of the Jewish people.

The day he died was one of the darkest in my life. He became sick, weak, and I was there. I was there when he suffered. I was there when he asked for help, for water. I was there to receive his last words. But I was not there when he called for me, although we were in the same block; he on the upper bed and I on the lower bed. He called my name, and I was too afraid to move. All of us were. And then he died. I was there, but I was not there.

And I thought one day I will come back and speak to him, and tell him of the world that has become mine. I speak to him of times in which memory has become a sacred duty of all people of good will -- in America, where I live, or in Europe or in Germany, where you, Chancellor Merkel, are a leader with great courage and moral aspirations.

What can I tell him that the world has learned? I am not so sure. Mr. President, we have such high hopes for you because you, with your moral vision of history, will be able and compelled to change this world into a better place, where people will stop waging war -- every war is absurd and meaningless; where people will stop hating one another; where people will hate the otherness of the other rather than respect it.

But the world hasn't learned. When I was liberated in 1945, April 11, by the American army, somehow many of us were convinced that at least one lesson will have been learned -- that never again will there be war; that hatred is not an option, that racism is stupid; and the will to conquer other people's minds or territories or aspirations, that will is meaningless.

I was so hopeful. Paradoxically, I was so hopeful then. Many of us were, although we had the right to give up on humanity, to give up on culture, to give up on education, to give up on the possibility of living one's life with dignity in a world that has no place for dignity.


We rejected that possibility and we said, no, we must continue believing in a future, because the world has learned. But again, the world hasn't. Had the world learned, there would have been no Cambodia and no Rwanda and no Darfur and no Bosnia.

Will the world ever learn? I think that is why Buchenwald is so important -- as important, of course, but differently as Auschwitz. It's important because here the large -- the big camp was a kind of international community. People came there from all horizons -- political, economic, culture. The first globalization essay, experiment, were made in Buchenwald. And all that was meant to diminish the humanity of human beings.

You spoke of humanity, Mr. President. Though unto us, in those times, it was human to be inhuman. And now the world has learned, I hope. And of course this hope includes so many of what now would be your vision for the future, Mr. President. A sense of security for Israel, a sense of security for its neighbors, to bring peace in that place. The time must come. It's enough -- enough to go to cemeteries, enough to weep for oceans. It's enough. There must come a moment -- a moment of bringing people together.

And therefore we say anyone who comes here should go back with that resolution. Memory must bring people together rather than set them apart. Memories here not to sow anger in our hearts, but on the contrary, a sense of solidarity that all those who need us. What else can we do except invoke that memory so that people everywhere who say the 21st century is a century of new beginnings, filled with promise and infinite hope, and at times profound gratitude to all those who believe in our task, which is to improve the human condition.

A great man, Camus, wrote at the end of his marvelous novel, The Plague: "After all," he said, "after the tragedy, never the rest...there is more in the human being to celebrate than to denigrate." Even that can be found as truth -- painful as it is -- in Buchenwald.

Thank you, Mr. President, for allowing me to come back to my father's grave, which is still in my heart.

http://z.about.com/d/history1900s/1/0/p/7/buchenwald5.jpg

I just wanted to add that the men were moved by the last line. The power of humanity for good is a

concept they find themselves in the middle of. I also think it is important to point out most of these men

are very sensitive to issues and are extremely well-read. In addition to the Holocaust we discussed

Africa, Asia, genocide, and slavery. I find it inspirational that men who are convicted and imprisoned

find so much from education and information. When I related these issues to a individual basis I asked

them what this meant for us. And they truly seemed to believe in the idea of understanding and knowledge.

Address At The United States Vietnam War Memorial
Veterans' Day 1996
by Kim Phuc
Vietnam War survivor

November 11, 1996 - Washington D.C.

Dear Friends:

I am very happy to be with you today. I thank you for giving me the opportunity to talk and meet with you on this Veterans' Day.

As you know I am the little girl who was running to escape from the napalm fire. I do not want to talk about the war because I cannot change history.

I only want you to remember the tragedy of war in order to do things to stop fighting and killing around the world.

I have suffered a lot from both physical and emotional pain. Sometimes I thought I could not live, but God saved me and gave me faith and hope.

Even if I could talk face to face with the pilot who dropped the bombs, I would tell him we cannot change history but we should try to do good things for the present and for the future to promote peace.

I did not think that I could marry nor have any children because of my burns, but now I have a wonderful husband and lovely son and a happy family.

Dear friends, I just dream one day people all over the world can live in real peace--no fighting, and no hostility. We should work together to build peace and happiness for all people in all nations.

Thank you so much for letting me be a part of this important day.

http://blindflaneur.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/napalm_kim_phuc.jpg

Fourth Session: Loosened up

This week’s session was powerful and drove the classroom into new understandings of tutors and students. After last week’s reaction to the pieces, as good as they were, I felt we needed to take this discussion up a notch. So I found two speeches and two pictures that fit them. One speech by Kim Phuc and her picture as the little girl running away from napalm fire during the Vietnam War and the other speech by Elie Wiesel and a picture of the holocaust victims and the ovens. I did not know how the men would react to the content but I figured I should give it a shot. If it didn’t work then we would proceed to tutoring proper. Well one factor I did not account for was the lack of tutors this week. In total there was only Joe, Alonna and myself. We knew there would be a good number of inmates not only because the semester is rolling along but it was cold out and yard time might not be appealing.

We needed a game plan and fast. Three tutors 15 men who needed help in their studies. We thought that because we were unprepared for this mini crisis we would have a longer discussion and split up into larger groups of 3-5 depending on subject need. Our longer conversation we hoped and prayed would follow through worked like a charm. We began by looking at the Holocaust pictures and Elie Wiesel’s speech at Buchenwald on June 2009. The gentleman who raised his hand to read prefaced with “I am not a good reader, but I’ll read. Here to learn aren’t I?” We (yes as a class) encouraged him to read it and he did a fantastic job. Yes he stumbled on many words but his rhythm was perfect. It truly captured the emotion, and power of the piece. Elie Wiesel would have to take his hat off to that reading. Looking around the room to see the reaction men began to loosen their shoulders as the speech went on, there was a sigh of understanding, you could see the sadness of the piece mirrored in their eyes. No doubt it touched them and on many levels they found it profound. There was a brief silence after the piece was read. One man raised his hand and it sparked conversation that never took place in any of the sessions before.

We talked about reparations, war, corruption, power, humanity, world leaders, Obama (whom they love), responsibility, symbolism and so much more. It was profound and I was moved. They became more real to me at that point. They were less like shapes and more like men with ideas, opinions, thoughts and the will to voice to them. The idea of national and global responsibility was a huge topic. So many of them believed in Obama and yet others feel like there will ever be a change. One comment made about finding a deeper understanding through education and history really spoke to me because that is what I believe in. Another gentleman asked how we could unite as a country when we are all so different, race, religion, and class. My answer led to the piece about Vietnam War. I told him that the picture and others like it unites us all because it is a burden we carry as a nation and there is no escaping history. And although it is not a pretty picture or ideal it is a point to begin changing for the better. When we talked about Vietnam, the speech and the picture the men surprised me with their compassion towards the young girl. In fact the men said in whispers that I was very passionate and knowledgeable which touched me. I was happy to hear that not because it was a very nice compliment but I know realize I want to be there and I put effort into my work for them.

In this session almost everyone spoke up but I think it is because it is a passionate subject and everyone wants to put in a thought. Even when we were talking over each other the men politely asked to complete his thought or to interject a thought.

And as a last thought to this note the young man I mention last post did not attend session this week. My idealism was both uplifted and broken at the same time. I hope he attends next week but I cannot force it. No to break a good image and good day but in the world nothing is perfect but some things can be good.

Please stay tuned for the posting the speeches and pictures.