CALSA Newsletter

CHOATE AFRO-LATINO STUDENT ALLIANCE PRESENTS February 2019

CALSA Newsletter

NOTE: Every year during Black History Month, CALSA releases a newsletter filled with artwork and written pieces completed by members of the club. This celebrated tradition means a lot to us and we hope that you enjoy what our members have created!

Amerikkkan

by Sandra Leon You celebrate fourth of July just like any other day just with more food. At 7pm, it is still light out and you feel the anticipation of night coming. However, you remain fairly calm because you’re used to fourth of July tragedy. You don’t know if it makes you a bad person that you don’t really care or are you just desensitized to gunshots? You do know that when the clock hits around 8pm it’s either fireworks or gunshots in the air. Your mom doesn’t let you go on the roof anymore because she’s scared someone might shoot and it’ll hit you. You wear American wear for irony at this point because imagine not knowing if you were about celebrate independence or mourn someone’s death. Is this what it feels like to be American?

Nowhere

by Kenya Mendoza Here it goes: Where are you from? your English partner asks. Hoping to calculate, you, your life, and your experiences in your reply.

You respond similarly: The United States, San Francisco, California; New Hope, Pennsylvania; Long Island, New York.

Recognition, confusion, or understanding.

It crosses their wide, curious eyes.

Placing you in a category stacked neatly in their head.

I’m from the place, the one I love dearly. It teaches me, to express myself through its history and no matter the cost. The freedom it gifts, to believe, and to love.

The place loves me not.

Where my tan complexion, my dark hair, my Spanish speaking tongue, is something they’re waiting to extinguish. I’m from the place, that still seeks to kick me out.

To steal something, my rights, my heritage, my life, that to them means so much.

From that place that makes children mature quicker, harsher, and abruptly.

As they cry, unaware of what’s happening, or what’s to come.

When you witness the separation of family firsthand, and not being able to do anything, but console.

Console and push back the tears.

For that friendly pulse, on the other side of a border, built in loathing for one’s own kind. Cursing those who enforce it with a smile on their face, and those who have no choice. Believing inside that there’s always a choice, you just have to be strong enough to make it.

I’m not from one place.

From the bumpless, off-white pavement that I walked to school everyday.

From the sirens that could be heard outside my window, as I slept.

I’m from the smiles, hugs, and companionship, awarded by those dearest to me.

I’m from the green, overgrown fields.

The ones I slammed into, waiting to get up and chase after the ball and its compadre. I’m from the heat, radiation, and humidity that I’ve experienced all my life. The music, that I can’t help listening when I’m lost.

From the strings, the beat, and the courage it infuses to forget what I’ve been through. The music that’ll make me stronger, that makes me stronger.

The culture that builds a mask of indifference, hostility, and bitterness. The actions that melt through the layers, until they reach my heart.

Ask me again, Where are you from?

I’ll respond as expected: I’m from Houston, TX.

But wait, before you categorize me.

Before you take in my non-existent accent, you were waiting to make fun of.

Before you take in my curves, my height, with a sneer.

Know that I mean this: I’m not from a place, a country, a planet, anywhere.

I’m from the choices that define me.

"Black Woman"

by Dominic Thomas

No Longer

by Rebecca Alston I’m refusing to live in boundaries of a stereotype That the way I talk has to make me white Or that I’m the angry black girl trying to start a fight No longer No longer No longer A lose-lose situation Filled with complication The only way I win To be authentic To be free To be me I’ll do what I want I’ll act how I want I’ll be who I want

I’m black and I’m proud Opinionated and loud Blessed with melanin Doused in confidence I will no longer...

Quand On ne Sait pas

by Diarra Dieng Il est un jour au printemps quand Une belle fille est arrivée dans le monde Toujours noire et toujours en pleurs Mais la mère a soupiré de soulagement parce que Au moins elle ne sait pas Elle ne sait pas que quand tu veux un travail Il dit “non, vous êtes Africaine, que savez-vous sur le travail” Elle ne sait pas que ton fils Mohamed dit qu’il veut être appelé “Moe” parce que c’est plus cool Elle ne sait pas que quand les noirs ne peuvent pas traverser la frontière Il dit “non, restez à votre place” Elle ne sait pas que: être forcé d’oublier ta langue maternelle sinon, “elle pourrait aussi bien être perdu” Elle est seulement noire et toujour pleurs

C’est désespéré parce que je sais que bientôt elle va savoir Qu'est ce que je peux faire?

Qu'est-ce la solution?

Gloire à Dieu s'Il peut me donner la réponse Grâce à Dieu s’Il peut me donner une réponse Augmentez la musique, La Djembe, le Bougarabou, le Balafon, le Sabar Augmentez les voix Les crie de Tenkamenin Les sanglots de Mansa Musa Quand ils voient L’infériorité L'insécurité L'inachèvement Je rêve d’un jour où ma belle fille se réveille dans un monde juste Un monde où nous sommes fiers d'être Africain Un monde où il y a l'égalité Un monde où elle peut dormir contente Et elle réveiller contente Mais pour le moment, je suis reconnaissante Qu’elle est toujours noire et toujour en pleurs Parce qu’elle ne sait pas encore

Kids in Our Culture

by Maxwell Brown It is hot July 1973, kid walks down a Brooklyn street with vintage records shining so clean. The black curves and streaks Of these records that speak To the souls of the people Desire and crave the needle.

Kid sits down on the sidewalk on the block To sell what he has in stock.

He yells, “I have for you: Disco.

The next step in our culture. We will dance the night away, throw our cares away With what these tracks have to say. So please pay attention To the new direction Our culture is leading us.�

It is cold December 1929 Kid sits on the curb at night.

Street lights still shine bright as the sky still fights The gleaming sparks they give.

But clutching his sax tight, He puts his mouth on pipe And tells stories through his own language.

He yells, “I have for you: Jazz.

The next step in our culture.

A new style where the notes on page Is only a match to the flame we create out of air.

It’s unorthodox but fair. So please pay attention To the new direction Our culture is leading us.”

It is early morning April 1981 Kid runs Bronx downtown Looking ‘round To find an audience.

He finds an old park, The trees with bark That had lasted for years.

This beat up wood with scars that share The hardships they’ve faced, And had not shed one tear since.

In the middle of the park, he yells, “I have for you: Hiphop.

The next step in our culture. It’s almost like poetry With a beat full of ecstacy, As I speak the words in harmony To the rhythm I love and The picture you have to see.

So please pay attention To the new direction Our culture is leading us.”

Black children.

Evident from the backs Of their hands that clap To the rhythm we’ve created The rhythm you’ve enjoyed Through struggle that they’ve feared It is the music that appears Loud and proud In our culture now that is music to your ears.

"Galaxy"

by Kamsi Iloeje

"Where I'm From"

by David Arias I am of Colombian ancestry and with open arms, I have welcomed all that is meaning entails. It's a culture I embraced beyond other, but it does not compose all of who I am today. I have learned to call more than one place my home. My shape, who I am, is the product of my being, being molded bits of my innocence carved off with every step I take. Today, I'm in a frosty place. I am living in Connecticut at grand school. I have managed to leave behind my dear loved ones in California and Colombia, two opposite poles within the Americas. Oh, how divergent the cultures of these places are. What if I was a sophomore in my precious Bogotรก, and not in New England? I am mystified by the ever-increasing depth of this thought. Perhaps, I would rather learn Portuguese as my second second tongue. I recall my infancy in the suburbs of Los Angeles, the kindergarten times when I had not a clue of what took place at school. The meaning behind the chatter and laughter of my little companions left me perplexed.

Mr. Spivak was my first teacher, his big blue eyes made me feel so different. I see blue eyes every day now. My inexperience with the language was blatantly screaming. Afraid and confused. My mother was my motivation to persevere. My mamรก was my rock, my refuge. I am from my mother. I am not from one place.

Wherever my family is, that is home. The delicate smell of golden arepas, the thick batter whipped by my mother's soft hands. I come home to my mother's food.

The food I indulge in. The place where I am reminded of the pleasure of eating. Affectionately, she says "Mi negrito, eres mi vida entera. No te imaginas como me fascina verte comer." I flavor the round and symmetrical, grilled arepas; with the mere sight of them, an indescribable pleasure. The smell takes me to another place. I travel through the smell. I see the short, tan man yelling. His tired brown eyes look heavy. They remind me of hard work, of the sacrifice for family. I'm all ears to what he says, his lilt is soothing. "Arepas de choclo con queso cuajada," he repeats. Now, I admit I am from Cali, too. Not only the West Coast Golden State but also Cali, Valle del Cauca, the world's capital of salsa. Here I feel at home.

Here I am awakened and soothed by the scent of pan de bonos and almohabanas, the best mixture that bread, cheese, and love can create. Here we all bleed yellow for the Seleccion Colombia, the Colombian National soccer team. Here my grandparents are.

Selfless kids are eager to sell snacks at the traffic lights.

The blazing sun is no deterrent from working to support la jefa. Here I have witnessed poverty and crime, but there is true love. The kind of love that is unconditional, that never dies out. I have experienced loss in Bogotรก, the city of my father and his siblings. This is another place I am truly at home. I have grown familiar to the beautiful geography, astounding monuments, poor and upscale neighborhoods to the university my attended. I am used to the elevation, beyond eight-thousand feet, to the strong breeze and constant precipitation. I've grown immune to the annoyance of traffic, and I've learned to listen, noticing different things about the thousands of people in the city. Through every step of the path, I learn to open my eyes more. I have certainly felt lost, but in California, I learned to take refuge with Jesus Christ. I am at home wherever true love is, because God is true love. The good and the bad are all around, but now I know I have been found.

"Belvita Box"

by Mila Hill

"Tokens"

by Adrienne Chacon I hold on to them. The words and stories, hymns and outfits and the basic things that make me feel real. I grasp them like they’re droplets of water in a desert of sand. I cling to them like they’re tokens when money is tight. I carry these tokens around with me. Keep them in my ID, next to my face. They are my color, they match to my face. I take pride in these tokens, they’re as much me as the person that I see in the mirror. Their coloring is not a coincidence, what they represent is nothing fake. I wouldn’t ever trade them in, wouldn’t ever disregard them, wouldn’t ever hide them. The tokens of my history, the tokens of my people, the tokens - currency of my race.There are moments when I realize that I am the only one with a token of my kind; it may be in a group, in a room, in an interest. A token with gap teeth from her mother, with a high afro from her father. And all tokens are beautiful, no matter what color they may be. But in any given room someone else’s tokens are not mine, they are not like mine. At those times when I am alone, I am one of a kind in my own skin. One black token in a sea of white ones, and their colors bleed onto me. And those black aspects become more poignant in their individuality: songs specific to my community, truths passed down from my mother to me, the shape of my body - the curl of my eyelashes. I feel sometimes like they are slipping from my fingers, my tokens. Tokens that are the same color as me. I don’t know how to get validation through them; if I don’t talk the same way as someone else with a token my color, does that mean that mine are invalid?

If I listen to the same music as someone with a different colored token does that make mine wrong? If I can’t connect to people that look like me, have I missed something in my life? I walk through life with these tokens weighing heavy in my pocket, the issues of my race weighing heavy on my brain. I think: ‘if you heard my voice without seeing my face, what kind of token would you think I carry?’ And: ‘how can I form relationships with others with the same color of token, if we are often not the same in any way beside color? That is why I cling to the little things, a food we all share, an interest we all have, a saying that we all know. I don’t want to change, to reconfigure myself to fit into a group, but I also don’t want to be a stranger to my own family. I am hyperaware of the color of me and the color of you when we’re together.

And I know the slight discomfort when everyone is different from me, I have known it all my years. And I hate it a little when I’m the only nonalike token in a room. Cause then I’m token black, and that’s too close to alone.Even in a room with tokens of my kind I feel too alone.

Because I don’t feel like my token is like theirs. We are not from the same home, we only look alike, but we are not. We are sisters by blood not by bond. What makes someone’s token black? My token is perfect for me, but it is not totally one thing, not totally one influence.

Wavering between those who are like me and those who are not.

Wandering between those who look like me and those who do not.

That is why I clutch these tokens so closely. My hair is like her hair and that is a bond we share, a token that we both have. His mother cooks like my mother, another token. A tenuous link to a part of myself that often feels unrecognized. Some of these tokens are lucky, just by the way that they’re made. Lucky that the iron ore that they’re made from was not cast out by the coin-makers.

I’m lucky that I was born in a place that I can prosper, to people who wanted to see me rise. Lucky that I could look up and see people with black tokens, rising to heights that we couldn’t have dreamed of fifty years ago. Lucky that I have the privilege to meet people with differently colored tokens without stigma or prejudice. Lucky that I have the resources to forge my own tokens. I am lucky to be able decide to be an individual, and not a copy of token that was designed to never succeed - designed by someone who didn’t want to see that token succeed. With that luckiness comes distance. I am distant from them - those who are my same color. I don’t listen to the music that they listen to. I don’t wear the clothes that they do. I don’t know the words they use. I am separated from them by an artificial barrier. I don’t fit in the box that some outsider prescribed, and I feel like I should. Someone with a token not like mine told me that my token had to be some way; had to meet a standard. I don’t meet that standard, my tokens are unique regardless of what others are. I still grasp them, still hold fast to them because I don’t want to lose what I am. I don’t want to forget what shouldn’t be forgotten, and I don’t want to fall into the trap that I won’t be judged based on my color. I don’t want to be a stranger before my own eyes. I don’t want to be ignorant of who I am in this world. I hold on to them, the tokens, because they’re integral to who I am. I won’t ever fault myself for the color and specificities of my tokens. I won’t ever look in the mirror and lose sight of myself.

"Untitled"

by Anonymous

"Untitled"

by Esi Dunyoh When I began working with my scholarship program, we researched and read about an Exeter student named Edmund Perry. Eddie was a bright kid who worked with the A Better Chance (ABC) program to secure a spot at this elite school.

He was one of many children raised by a neighborhood of mostly women, but he and his brother found their ways of helping. Edmund earned his way to Exeter while his older brother makes haste at Westminster. Eddie was sociable and got to know a large amount of people at the school. He had made a great time out of his four years before he was shot and bled to death by a plainclothes officer. The above information has often been tainted by descriptions of how Perry’s life went astray whenever I researched articles around the time of the crime, 1985. The fact that Perry dealt drugs for some of his white classmates gained much recognition. Within the last hours of his life, he was said to be robbing Officer Lee Van Houten with the help of his brother. People were understandably quick to ask questions of his death, but the focus put on his life was astonishing. One paper even claimed that Eddie was doomed from the star because of the color of his skin. After reading The Education and Killing of Edmund Perry, I questioned whether my race would be a problem for me.

I had thought about how I look while cooped up in one area of my suburban, South Asian majority town, but I hadn’t put it into the context of a white majority location that I had no option but to interact with. This prompted me to keep some questions at the back of my mind. Could my time at Choate include me seeing someone meet their end the same way as Eddie’s? Did 30 years actually make a difference in the way students of color were expected to behave and the treatment they received while attending private institutions? With the state of the country right now, I would like to hope that I don’t witness an event any similar to the Killing of Edmund Perry. I do, however, feel like the lack of killings amongst unarmed black students attending independent schools is not a means to overlook other issues. My peers and I have (physically) survived Choate so far, but I know it’s far from perfect. There is such an emphasis on the diversity of the campus yet it seems like we never truly acknowledge it. Our most fruitful prompts for conversation are pushed onto one day where only so many are actively involved. Ignorance is participatory. I encourage each and every one of us to make a step towards understanding the situations of others when possible and discussing them with others. If we work step by step, maybe the lessons we have gained will impact the greater things we deal with.

"Krause Stevens Speech"

by Allyson Alavez I lived in Mexico for three years. Three years before it became dangerous. Three years before I could not live there anymore.

Three years before I left. Returning to “The Other Side,” or “El Otro Lado,” as my family would say, was one of the most terrifying moments of my life. Six years old, going from a home where everyone understood me to a country that calls me an alien, and treats my native tongue like a curse. Even the other Mexican kids in my classes would shame me for not knowing English, acting like Spanish was not in their blood. Nine years later, nothing has changed. Nine years of fully integrating myself in American culture; drowning myself in all that is America. It doesn’t seem to matter, I’ve been brought down deeper by “Get out of my country,” accompanied by wetback, beaner, and criminal. Nine years of living in that, you pick up a couple of tricks, or survival hacks. First of all, DON’T speak spanish anywhere that’s not your home. You’re going to get uneasy looks, and the last thing you want is to make people uncomfortable; so speak English. It doesn’t matter that the only way you can communicate with your parents is Spanish.

It doesn’t matter how much you love to roll your r’s, and feel how Spanish flows out of your mouth. It doesn’t matter that Spanish is your culture. Swallow it, this country doesn’t accept it, and you need to be accepted.

Don’t be loud, no matter what, don’t be loud. It doesn’t matter that that’s how you show your emotion. It doesn’t matter that you thrive in loudness. It doesn’t matter that your home is in the loud. You must be quiet, calm, and collected. Swallow it, this country doesn’t accept it, and you need to be accepted.

On top of loud, don’t you dare get angry. It doesn’t matter if they call you lazy. It doesn’t matter if they make fun of your parents’ broken english. It doesn’t matter if they belittle you. It doesn’tmatter if they anger you so much that the boiling blood flowing through your veins pulsates. The anger is so strong, you feel your heartbeat beating through your enclosed fists, and the lump in your throat forming, ready to yell and cry all at once. But you must not be the crazy Latina. Swallow it, this country doesn’t accept it, and you must be accepted. That’s what I felt I had to do, swallow everything and not fall victim to the stereotypes. I felt as if I had to be better than what the world perceived to be Mexican. I had accepted that as my life, felt as if being ashamed of your culture was the norm, but that’s so far from true. Here is my reality. The United States doesn’t want me to be proud to be Mexican, and it shows me that every single day. I can’t even be proud to speak Spanish, unless I know English. As if English were some heavenly language, it suddenly gives you the power for everything, and not knowing it makes you less than. This becomes so engrained, that even our parents start to believe it.

They back away any time they have to speak English, and embarrassment rushes through them if they have to. Anytime my parents pull into the drive-thru you can see they’re scared.

They hope that the worker speaks Spanish this time, they typically don’t. Every time I can see the look in my mom’s eyes as she turns to look at me struggling to say “frappuccino.” I can see her face turning red, the self-consciousness of her English shows, the tears almost welling up in her eyes because she doesn’t know this foreign language. She sticks her tongue out, trying her best to smile, but I can see the pain in her eyes, and hear her laugh of discomfort. My heart breaks every single time, seeing the woman who has raised me feel pain because of what society has decided should be norm for anyone living in America. My family and I don’t meet those expectations, can’t even walk into a store and belong.We go into any store, a basic store and get followed as if we’re some kind of criminals. Stared down as if the color of our skin represents our status. Followed as if our language is a threat to the world. I can’t walk into a store and speak Spanish, or I might not get lucky this time. This time might be the time the videos become a reality, the “Go back to your countries” become directed at me, and the fear I thought I would never have to feel, rushes in. I’m told to be proud to be American, represent it, but how am I expected to stand for a country that doesn’t even stand for me? Red, white, and blue are supposed to remind me of valor, hope, and justice.

But now, the only colors that seem to remind me of that are red, green, and white. The colors of my flag remind me of my people, the land, everything it means to be Mexican. I can feel the history of my ancestors, I feel the weight of my ancestors on my back, I carry it proudly. I represent Mexico. Being Mexican is beautiful, and I’m so glad I finally acknowledge it, our holidays, our food, our music all represents me. I will never be ashamed of that again.