THURSDAY JUNE 1
Fireside: Pride Edition @ SECCA (W-S) 6 p.m.
Join Emilio Rojas, the artist behind tracing a wound through my body currently on exhibit at SECCA, fine art photographer Tanner Messer and poet Ashley Lumpkin as they discuss their experiences and the contributions of the LGBTQ+ community to art and contemporary culture as part of SECCA’s Fireside conversation series. Find more information and a program schedule at secca.org
FRIDAY JUNE 2
Fireworks Friday and First Responders
Night @ Truist Point (HP) 6:35 p.m.
The High Point Rockers invite first responders to enjoy half off their ticket purchase as they take on the Charleston Dirty Birds. There will also be a fireworks display and a speciality jersey auction after the game. First responders should purchase
by MICHAELA RATLIFF
tickets at the box office. Visit highpointrockers. com for more information.
SATURDAY JUNE 3
JUNE 1 - 4
sale at activatenc.com/surfacetension
SUNDAY JUNE 4
Ciders, Pups and Empanadas @ Bull City Ciderworks (GSO) 1 p.m.
Bull City Ciderworks is teaming up with Tails of the Unwanted and Empanada Grill food truck to raise funds for dogs in boarding. Learn more about Tails of the Unwanted at lastdaydogs.com
Youth Fishing Derby @ Oak Hollow Marina (HP) 8 a.m.
High Point Parks & Recreation is hosting a free derby for youth up to age 15 to learn fishing skills. Following training, students can participate in a fishing tournament to win prizes in three age groups for catching the biggest fish, the smallest fish and the most fish. Call 336.883.3494 to register.
Surface Tension @ Milton Rhodes Center for the Arts (W-S) 1 p.m., 7 p.m. Company To X For, a Chicago-based grassroots contemporary circus company, makes its Triad debut with Surface Tension, the story of two friends told through juggling, weight-sharing, acrobatics and other exciting stunts. Tickets are on
We Won’t Go Back! @ Emmanuel Lutheran Church (HP) 4 p.m.
Triad Pride Performing Arts presents We Won’t Go Back!, a concert featuring music relating to the LGBTQIA+ community and their lives, struggles and more. The performance includes hits from iconic LGBTQIA+ members and allies like Elton John and Dolly Parton. Other performances will be held in Greensboro and Winston-Salem. Purchase tickets at triadprideperformingarts.org
Find more events and add your own to our calendar at triad-city-beat.com/local-events/.
My body is changing.
finally sit for long periods of time without feeling any pain.
BUSINESS
PUBLISHER/EXECUTIVE EDITOR
Brian Clarey brian@triad-city-beat.com
PUBLISHER EMERITUS
Allen Broach allen@triad-city-beat.com
OF COUNSEL
Jonathan Jones
EDITORIAL
MANAGING EDITOR
Sayaka Matsuoka sayaka@triad-city-beat.com
CITYBEAT REPORTER
Gale Melcher gale@triad-city-beat.com
SALES
KEY ACCOUNTS
Chris Rudd chris@triad-city-beat.com
AD MANAGER
Noah Kirby noah@triad-city-beat.com
CONTRIBUTORS
Carolyn de Berry, John Cole, Owens Daniels, James Douglas, Michelle Everette, Luis H. Garay, Destiniee Jaram, Kaitlynn
Havens, Jordan Howse, Matt Jones, Autumn Karen, Michaela Ratliff, Jen Sorensen, Todd Turner
WEBMASTER Sam LeBlanc
ART ART DIRECTOR
Aiden Siobhan aiden@triad-city-beat.com
COVER: Mike
by Sayaka MatsuokaLast year I turned 30, and ever since then, my body hasn’t really been the same.
First came the fall.
In the summer of 2022, I decided to take up roller skating again, a hobby that I had developed during the pandemic. I hadn’t been out on my wheels in a while, but thought to myself, I can do it. I have pads and a helmet. How bad could it be?
Well, turns out, pretty bad.
While skating on one of the local greenways, I took a sharp turn and fell right on my ass. It hurt for weeks. It hurt to sit, it hurt to stand, it hurt to shit.
When the pain didn’t subside for a few months, I decided to get an X-ray. Thankfully, my tailbone wasn’t broken, but it had been severely pushed inward by the fall; it was causing a serious problem. I sought out a pelvic floor physical therapist (didn’t even know those existed) and underwent manual therapy…. It was invasive to say the least. But it fixed my butt!
Now, almost six months later, I can
But then my hips began to hurt. I realized it was the way I was sitting in my chair, so I bought a new one. I also got one of those fun pillows you’re supposed to put between your knees when you sleep. Sometimes, if I accidentally sleep on my stomach for too long during the night, I wake up with bad lower-back pain.
Now, my right shoulder blade is the issue. For the last few weeks, I’ve been seeing a physical therapist (the regular kind, not for my butt), to stretch, strengthen and hopefully solve my upper back woes. But I have a feeling once that’s fixed, there will be something else.
Because I’m afraid to say it, but I’m in my “aging era.”
I used to be able to play four hours of tennis five days a week as a teenager and walk away not feeling a thing. Earlier this week, I did a strength workout and I’m still having trouble bending down to pick things up because my legs hate me.
And I’m an active person. I stretch, do yoga, play tennis, lift weights. But it’s all different now. I’m different now.
I was lamenting about my newfound problems to a lady I play tennis with the other day. Her response?
“What ’til you’re 40.”
I’m afraid to say it, but I’m in my ‘aging era.’
It is so funny, people think that if they know where you were born, they know a thing about you, but it’s complicated.
— Sangeetha Shivaji, pg. 9
The cities of Greensboro and Winston-Salem have released their yearly budgets. In the coming weeks, opportunities for the public to voice their opinions on them will be available.
Winston-Salem’s total recommended operating budget is $605.7 million, decreasing 3.5% from the previous year. Greensboro’s is $749.5 million — an 8.8% increase.
Both budgets go into effect on July 1.
Winston-Salem’s Finance Committee will hold workshops on the budget on June 1 and June 8 at 4 p.m. while Greensboro city councilmembers have already attended work sessions to discuss the budget on May 23 and May 25
Winston-Salem’s Finance Committee — comprised of councilmembers Robert Clark, Mayor Pro Tempore Denise D. Adams, Jeff MacIntosh and James Taylor, Jr. — will hold a public hearing on June 1 at 6 p.m. The full city council is scheduled to hold a public hearing and adopt the budget on June 20 at 6 p.m. All meetings are open to the public and will be held in the council chambers on the second floor of City Hall at 101 N Main St.
The public may comment on Greensboro’s budget via email and during the city council budget public hearing on June 6 at 5:30 p.m. in the council chambers of Melvin Municipal Office Building at 300 W. Washington St. There’s also a budget simulator on the city’s website where you can make suggestions on the budget. Comments on Winston-Salem’s budget can be submitted at cityofws.org/175/Budget-Performance-Management.
Police salaries have been a hot topic during Greensboro city council meetings. At-large councilmember Marikay Abuzuaiter has often advocated for higher police salaries, while other councilmembers like District 1’s Sharon Hightower have said, “If we fund all the police to the tune that some wanted to, we’re gonna have to take away something. And who’s gonna be impacted the greatest? That is the community that is saying, ‘Invest in us too.’”
According to the city of Greensboro’s website, the previous starting salary for police was $46,367, with the new recommended budget bumping it up to $52,459. The new minimum salary for police officers in Winston-Salem will be $52,500. The previous sworn officer starting salary was $41,442 according to the city of Winston-Salem’s website.
In order to fund an increase in police pay, 30 vacant GPD patrol positions would be decreased while WSPD would eliminate 50 unfilled police officer positions.
GPD will also convert 10 sworn positions to professional positions. GPD Chief John Thompson told the council during the May 23 work session, “They’re positions that sworn officers sit in that will now be professional staff positions.” Thompson said that this will transfer work away from sworn officers and bring them out of professional staff positions like court liaisons.
“We are looking at ways of putting police where police need to be, answer-
ing the calls that they need to answer, and making sure that we’re staffing those resources appropriately,” Thompson said.
Wages for city workers in both cities are also set to increase.
Greensboro would raise the minimum wage for city workers from $15.91 per hour to $17, while Winston-Salem’s minimum wage would increase to $15.45. In Greensboro, tensions came to a head in April when dozens of city workers gathered in the council chambers to request higher wages during the public comment period. During City Manager Taiwo Jaiyeoba’s report to the council on May 16, Hightower told Jaiyeoba that she supported no less than $18 and is seeking $20.
Greensboro
Public Hearing
When: June 6 at 5:30 p.m.
Where: Melvin Municipal Office Building at 300 W. Washington St.
Winston-Salem
Finance Committee Workshops
When: June 1 and June 8 at 4 p.m.
Where: City Hall at 101 N Main St.
Public Hearings
When: June 1 and June 20 at 6 p.m.
Where: City Hall at 101 N Main St.
Amural will soon be installed in Winston-Salem’s Downtown Arts District at the intersection of Trade and Sixth streets, sweeping a rainbow across one of the crosswalks. The mural, which is planned for mid-June, will mark the city’s celebration of Pride month. According to Assistant City Manager Patrice Toney, the installation period will take place June 16-17.
The city’s sanitation department will powerwash the street before the mural is installed, according to Toney. The city’s Human Relations/Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Department and volunteers will be responsible for the installation of the mural and upkeep so the artwork does not fade away in the years to come.
During a city council meeting on May 15, the city’s Human Relations/DEI Department was authorized to install the mural in the city’s right-of-way. The design of the traditional rainbow flag has been slightly altered with arrow-shaped lines to include LGBTQIA+ communities of color and the transgender community.
The mural was recommended by an ad hoc subcommittee of the city’s Human Relations Commission. Human Relations/DEI analyst Sherita Cain presented the item to the city council and explained that the subcommittee previously conducted a nondiscrimination study to look at issues and opportunities with the LGBTQIA+ community. Out of that study, Cain said, there were several recommendations, one of which was for the city to paint a “Progress Pride Flag” crosswalk at the intersection of Trade and Sixth to symbolize the city’s support of the LGBTQIA+ community.
Southwest Ward representative and first openly gay Winston-Salem city councilmember Kevin Mundy told TCB he’s glad that the mural is going “right
there in the middle of the arts community.”
“I knew that I could fight for getting a voice in city hall, but as far as being a voice for what they wanted and needed in the community, I wanted people who were more current,” Mundy said. “We decided that the best way to do that was to have this subcommittee.”
In 2021, North Carolina counted 33 hate crimes committed based on sexual orientation, according to reports submitted to the FBI. Another three hate crimes were based on gender identity. That’s an uptick from 2020, which saw 24 hate crimes committed based on sexual orientation.
In recent years, a spate of anti-LGBTQ+, specifically anti-transgender, bills have been sweeping across the country and in North Carolina.
According to the Human Rights Campaign, there have been more than 500 anti-LGBTQ+ bills introduced in statehouses across the country this year. More than 210 of those bills specifically restrict the rights of transgender people, the highest number of bills targeting transgender people in a single year to date, HRC reported.
In North Carolina, there have been bills introduced that would ban trans girls from competing in school sports, restrict gender-affirming health care, ban drag shows and ban books that center LGBTQIA+ experiences from schools.
Cain said that the goal of this recommendation was to “celebrate the diversity of this community and to have a more inclusive society.”
To kick off a celebration of love, unity and equal rights, the Pride Winston-Salem Festival will start at 10 a.m. on June 24 in the Downtown Arts District. The celebration includes a parade as well as an array of live music, entertainment, street vendors and activities.
Gov. Roy Cooper sounded the alarm last week: a state of emergency in our public schools, brought on by new, ostensibly veto-proof legislation that would further decimate our schools.
Cooper said the expanded voucher program espoused by Senate leadership will “siphon a little over $3 billion from the General Fund” by allowing parents in any income bracket to claim a state subsidy on private education for their children.
The meat of the bill is in the math — allocations from the General Fund that start with $176.5 million in 2023-24, jumping to $415.5 million in 2025-26 and hitting more that $500 million by 2031. The total is $3.6 billion over nine years.
For comparison, this year just $98.5 million from the General Fund went towards the public school budget. So it’s new money, but the beef is that it’s being used to fund private schools instead of public-school teachers and facilities.
Make no mistake: Private schools in NC are already benefiting from the voucher program, dubbed “Opportunity Scholarships.” This year, private schools got more than $133 million that could have gone to our
public school system. As an aside, eight of the Top 10 have a religious affiliation as Christian or Baptist, which combined took in $11.5 million for the 2022-2023 school year.
The state of our public schools can be ascertained from the Leandro case, a 1994 decision insisting on the need for more funding from the state, one that has survived decades of challenges and appeals without being fulfilled. The previous NC Supreme Court issued an order in November 2022 demanding an additional $1.75 billion for public schools, which the new Supreme Court quashed in March of this year.
Barring something unforeseen, we will get this instead of that.
Because the governor’s antics notwithstanding, leadership in the NC Legislature seems bound and determined to undercut our public schools.
Many Republicans are openly hostile towards public education, including NC Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, who literally sits on the State Board of Education. In 2022, he established a puny task force with a snitch form people to “expose indoctrination.” As he runs for governor, the voucher program is a main plank in his platform
Leadership in the NC Legislature seems bound and determined to undercut our public schools.
Sangeetha Shivaji is well traveled, but doesn’t remember most of it.
Her mother and father are from Sri Lanka, and are part of the Tamil ethnic minority there. That’s where Shivaji was born. But she had been conceived in Jordan, where her father was completing a post-doctoral program at university.
“My mom was pregnant but wasn’t comfortable with the medical care in Jordan so she went back to Sri Lanka to have me,” Shivaji shares.
Then her family immigrated to Texas, and by the time she was three years old, they had moved to Mississippi. That’s where Shivaji’s earliest memories are rooted.
“It is so funny, people think that if they know where you were born, they know a thing about you, but it’s complicated,” she says.
As a communication manager in the Office of Research at UNCG, Shivaji is used to crafting other people’s stories, but when it comes to her own life, she’s been pretty reserved. And that’s partly because of her complex background.
Part of the reason why Shivaji’s parents left Sri Lanka was a civil war that was raging in the country at the time, involving a separatist move-
Do you have a favorite Asian meal?
In celebration of AAPI month, TCB will be sharing stories by PAVE NC, a local volunteer-run organization that highlights the stories of Asian-Americans in the South. Find this and other stories at pavenc.org. This week, PAVE NC sat down with Sangeetha Shivaji, a communications professional at UNCG. In our conversation, Shivaji shared her experience fleeing Sri Lanka as a child and her complicated relationship with her Asian identity.
ment for Tamil people.
The summer before she went to third grade, Shivaji visited northern Sri Lanka with her mother. The political situation had been calm before their trip, but while they were there, war broke out again.
“We were stuck there for months — no gas, electricity,” Shivaji recalls. “There were shells falling from the sky. I was a kid, so I thought it was the best thing ever. When we could hear the helicopters, which sprayed bullets, we would go to the middle of the house for protection from the interior walls. I just thought it was so fun because we were all sleeping together.”
At the end of that summer, she, her mother, and her cousin found a way out of Jaffna, the city they were in, via a van, a boat, and a stretch on foot, as they crossed from separatist-controlled to government-controlled land.
“One leg of the trip was at night in a boat where we were told to stay really low,” Shivaji recalls. “The next thing I remember there was a van; there was no door on the back; there wasn’t room for everyone – my cousin had just his feet inside and he held onto the roof.
A lot of people from the Tamil community left the country, Shivaji says.
“We were not refugees, but it was not great to be in Sri Lanka,” she continues. “A lot of people landed in London or Toronto.”
Well, my real favorite food is chicken and dumplings. But I do love sakkarai pongal which is something you eat during the harvest festival at the beginning of the year. In the morning you worship the sun and the whole house has to be clean. You lay out a kolam and you do a prayer. To make it, you boil milk and then add rice and add other ingredients. First you boil the milk until it boils over and, depending on which direction it boils over, it tells you what kind of year it’s going to be.
What about a favorite Asian show or movie?
My favorite South Asian movie is a movie from the early 2000s called Kannathil Muthamittal. It’s in Tamil, and has the big Tamil star of the era. The story is about how he adopts a little girl from Sri Lanka who eventually tries to find her mother. It’s extremely well done and beautiful, and seeing this Sri Lankan girl who isn’t quite Sri Lankan anymore trying to understand her home country resonates with me.
Shivaji’s family settled in Mississippi where the closest Indian restaurant was in Atlanta, five hours away.
“We would drive just to go there and then drive back,” Shivaji recalls.
Expanding her identity
As an ethnic minority, Shivaji has had trouble explaining her identity in neat boxes for people. She’s from Sri Lanka, but doesn’t quite consider herself Sri Lankan. She’s from Mississippi but also feels like the state “is its own country.”
“I don’t feel like I have a strong label identity that I identify with,” she says.
For years, she said she had a hard time identifying as part of the Asian community at all and would self-select herself out of the broader Asian dias pora. But, as a person from south Asia, Shivaji says that she’s excited about the rising consciousness of the area’s culture in the United States.
“Typically when people say Asian, they’re thinking about support for an east Asian community,” she says.
Right now, the term “South Asian” is her strongest identifier, she says. But really, the way she describes herself depends on the day and who’s asking. And that’s why she prefers being on the storytelling end of the interaction.
“I think that’s why I enjoy what I do,” she says. “It’s translating depending on the needs of the audience; if you’re a child of immigrants, you’re familiar with that need.”
In school, Shivaji was an English and Biology major, but she found that conducting research was not her thing.
“What I realized was that I really love to learn about other people’s research and convey it,” she says.
It’s something that she feels uniquely qualified to do.
“I love doing that sort of conversion and bridging,” she says.
When it comes to forming bridges with other Asian communities and expanding her own understanding of her identity, Shivaji says it’s a work in progress.
“I feel like it’s been a maturing process for me,” she says. “Being willing to form community, to say that I am Asian enough to have shared experiences, to have this shared connection…. It’s more about reading the intention of the person giving you the label. If they are trying to create community with you, take the label. If they are trying to put you in a box, I don’t take the label.”
Saturday night performances featuring:
William Wolfram, piano (July 1)
Gil Shaham, violin (July 8)
Mighty 5’s, Beethoven/Mahler (July 15)
Hélène Grimaud, piano (July 22)
Awadagin Pratt, piano (July 29)
Mike Roach couldn’t be happier.
On May 20, he and his loved ones officially celebrated the grand opening of Mike’s Vegan Grill in Greensboro. Roach and his wife India Dillard have been running their popular Mike’s Vegan Cookout food trucks out of the Triad, Triangle and Charlotte for the last few years. And as of just a few weeks ago, they now have a brick-and-mortar shop to call home.
Located at 2501 W. Gate City Blvd., the business fills the vacant spot that used to be occupied by Ghassan’s Fresh Mediterranean Eats, which closed in 2020. The local chain still has three other locations in the city.
Like Roach’s effervescent energy, the restaurant interior is painted a bright lime green with graffiti accents.
In a previous article, Roach told TCB that he wanted to open Mike’s Vegan Cookout because as a vegan, he wanted to have the opportunity to eat the kind of stuff he ate when he got drunk. And the menu at both businesses is perfect for drunchies.
While the name is slightly different, Mike’s Vegan Grill serves up the same plant-based goodness that Mike’s Vegan Cookout is known for. In addition to their burgers, which use Beyond Meat, the restaurant serves vegan hot dogs and “chicken” sandwiches too. For their brick and mortar, they’ve added vegan soft-serve ice cream and specials like Philly cheesesteaks and “shrimp” po’boys.
Roach says having a brick and mortar after running the food trucks for so long is a “dream come true.”
“Through all those hard times God kept pushing me to reach the level that I’ve always prayed for,” Roach says. “I feel extremely loved and proud of my family and I, from being in a food truck to hitting every city in North Carolina to finally have a brick and mortar is a dream come true!”
Currently, the truck only operates for special events. Roach hopes to buy a new truck in the future to do an “East Coast tour,” he says.
“Our plan is to do Miami to New York,” he says. “I don’t know when, but that’s the plan.”
Mike’s Vegan Cookout began in 2019 and has been expanding ever since. Their expansion into a brick-and-mortar location signifies a growth in vegan interest in the Triad despite the area’s historic lag behind national food trends.
“This was a big execution in my life,” Roach says. “The food truck was the start to get here.”
For years, the city has had Boba House, which has been open since 2003, as one of the only options for plant-based meals. Another was the Well Café, which was housed in Sonder Mind and Body in downtown and closed during the pandemic. Brian Ricciardi’s vegan ventures — Dom’s and Radici — came under fire last year for what workers said was a toxic work environment. Radici, which was located on Elm Street in downtown Greensboro, closed last year and Ricciardi told TCB in January that he was operating Dom’s alone. In summer 2022, friends Monty “Tigo B” Faulkner and Lamont Heath opened Romeo’s Vegan Burgers on Tate Street, which has been popular with college kids and locals alike.
When Roach started his vegan food truck in 2019, he says some people close to him told him the idea would never work.
“They said that this was a barbecue state,” he says. “And now, they say they’re proud of me. So it’s beautiful to go against the grain, take that risk, and you know, keep pushing forward.”
BY CAROLYN DE BERRY
Doak Street, Greensboro
Memorial Day Weekend situation.
by Matt Jones
Across
1. Long Island resort town
6. Stereotypical librarian admonition
9. Disperse
14. Actress Kelly of “One Tree Hill”
15. Split tidbit
16. Garlicky spread
17. Like some religious schools
19. “Jurassic Park” actor Sam
20. Like trash that’s tampered with?
22. Sit around
23. Negative vote
24. Got confused about the meaning of “horsepower” when fixing a car?
30. Wear down
31. “None of it is true!”
32. National Coming ___ Day
35. Actor Elwes
36. Watch brand featured in the movie
“UHF”
38. “Render ___ Caesar ...”
39. ___-Therese, Quebec
40. DVR brand
41. Absurd
42. European capital in a bewildered state?
46. “The missing clue!”
47. Aunt Bee’s grandnephew
48. What happened at the coronation of Charles III?
55. Put on a second time
56. Home to the Komodo dragon
58. ^ mark
59. “Lemonade” singer, to fans
60. Playful water dweller
61. Prepares for a boxing match
62. “Dynamite” K-pop group
63. Sports franchises
Down
1. Rapscallion
2. Reach the sky
3. 100 centesimi, once
4. Thatcher nickname
5. Box that gets shipped
6. Cactus features
7. Keep it under your hat
8. 30 minutes, in a handball match
9. Footwear for the beach
10. Retro fashion trend
11. Churn up
12. Glamour alternative
13. Feral
18. Atmospheric obscurer
21. Alphabetical listing
24. “Doritos & Fritos” duo 100 ___
25. “I smell ___!”
26. “Our Town” composer Ned
27. Give permission for
28. Conk out
29. Actor Logue who played himself on “What We Do in the Shadows”
33. ___ Reader (quarterly digest)
34. Open-___ shoes
36. Costa ___
37. Ab ___ (from inception)
38. Restore, in a way
40. Redbubble purchases
41. Emphatic denial
43. More woody-tasting, like wine
44. One of the Big Three credit rating agencies
45. Beehive, for instance
48. “Lord of the Rings” monsters
49. Jump like a frog
50. Olympic swimmer Torres
51. Bee Gees surname
52. Tech news website
53. “Como ___ usted?”
54. “Carpe ___!”
57. ___ gratia artis (MGM motto)
LAST WEEK’S ANSWERS:
‘Now in 3-D’ — I think it’s solid reasoning.© 2023 Matt Jones © 2022 Jonesin’ Crosswords (editor@jonesincrosswords.com)
Reconsidered Goods is the Piedmont’s only nonprofit creative reuse center, accepting donated materials from individuals, businesses, and manufacturers and giving them a renewed purpose. We supply teachers, artists, makers, crafters, artisans, and reuse advocates with affordable used goods that are diverted from landfills. Our Greensboro location features a 15,000-square-foot retail store, workshop space, and makers’ lab. Our creative programming includes classes, project workshops, field trips, and pop-up community outreach activities that promote the benefits of waste reduction through art education.
Come see why everyone loves Reconsidered Goods. Store hours and more information at reconsideredgoods.org.
4118 Spring Garden St. GSO
336.763.5041 | reconsideredgoods.org
Fully operational gristmill since 1767.
Grinding corn (corn meal, grist, polenta) and a variety of wheat (flour).
Making mixes (pancake, scone, cookies, muffin, biscuit, etc.)
Mill and Country Store are open 7 days a week, from 9 to 5.