#baltimore riots
During the recent unrest that spread across the city of Baltimore in the wake of the death of 25-year-old Freddie Gray, several hundred small businesses in the city were damaged, looted or burned down. Many of these stores—more than 50, by the estimate of the Korean American Grocers & Licensed Beverage Association of Maryland—were Korean-owned. These small business owners, mostly immigrants, are now left to grapple with the task of assessing their losses, in some cases irrevocable, while dealing with the physical and emotional toll of seeing years of hard labor destroyed.
Minna Kim, a Maryland resident, former elementary school teacher and soon-to-be masters student in clinical and medical social work, recounts the harrowing April 27 evening in which her parents, owners of a liquor store in West Baltimore, guarded their business, at any cost, as riots spread across the city.
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by MINNA KIM
On April 22, I landed at Baltimore-Washington International Airport, blissed out and disoriented. I had spent the last two months in Bali for a yoga leadership training and in Thailand for a meditation retreat. As I disembarked from the plane, the fluorescent lights and stained carpets at the airport posed a stark contrast to the balmy lushness of Southeast Asia.
On the streets of my hometown, unrest was brewing. Only three days prior to my arrival, Freddie Gray died while in the custody of Baltimore police. Protests were forming. And five days later, shit hit the fan.
On Monday, April 27, the day of Gray’s funeral, my parents locked up their liquor store in West Baltimore around five in the afternoon. Closing before 10 p.m. was unusual for them. But their Korean friends who own a grocery store not too far from theirs called and urged them to leave the city because a riot had erupted at Mondawmin Mall, a little over a mile from the store.
Back home in our suburban neighborhood 20 minutes outside of the city, my parents beelined it to the television set. We sat transfixed, watching news coverage of Baltimore city engulfed in mayhem. Eventually, we tore ourselves away from the TV and went about our evening, shooing away any thoughts of misfortune that buzzed around our dinner conversation.
At 9:43 p.m., the alarm company phoned our home.
Without hesitation, my immigrant parents drove back to the store they have owned for nearly a decade. The backdoor had been pried open. Looters were flooding in and out of the store. Stalled outside, my father honked his car horn, upon which the looters shouted warnings to each other to “Hurry up!” and flee. At 10:06 p.m., my mother dialed 911 from the car. A voice recording said all lines were busy. Three minutes later, my mother tried 911 again: another unsuccessful attempt.
Undeterred and hyperalert, my badass mother got out of the car and ran the two blocks towards the nearest police station. Police officers were in riot gear; some were guarding the station. A female officer who appeared to be in charge told my mother they were not supposed to leave their assigned areas. My mother pleaded that her store was very close. Another officer recognized the address. As he began to get into his car with his partner, he told my mother they would stop by. She asked if she, too, should get in the car; they left her to walk back to the store.
Read full article here.
These riots didn’t destroy Baltimore. You did. You did with your fancy degrees and need to make Baltimore another cookie cutter city. Your need to promote Baltimore as city on the brink of some pseudo evolution that benefits your idea of what life should be. You ruined Baltimore by taking away manufacturing jobs. You ruined Baltimore by polluting our Chesapeake Bay, and slowly crippling our fishing industries. You ruined Baltimore by saying, “Cheaper rent, bigger places, and still can work in DC!” And how did you get those cheap places? By forcing people out of work, boarding up neighbourhoods, and then inviting outsiders from ivies in and offering people’s homes and memories for dirt cheap. You ruined Baltimore by mocking our working class history and making fun of Hon culture, distorting it into just a costume party and a reason to take pictures and share on Facebook. These folks out here in these streets have been marginalised beyond belief; forced to see the only city they’ve ever known slowly push them to the fringe of existence. These people in the streets, fighting for our fellow Baltimorean, are the real Baltimore. So excuse me if I’m just fine with some flipped over cars and a ruined CVS. Baltimore has been dying a slow death all of my life, but y'all were too busy chit chatting about the Wire to even notice. Y'all were too busy building community gardens everywhere except communities that needed them and creating jobs for transplants.
We’re tired man. We’re fucking tired. We ain’t the ones who destroyed Baltimore.
We Baltimore!
We Baltimore!
Open your eyes, motherfucker!
