Hasta Muerte is the name of a Latinox-owned cafe on Fruitvale Ave in Oakland. They’ve been in the news because they have refused service to police officers in uniform. Complex News quotes their Instagram, “Talk to your neighbors, not the police,” They also reference OPD’s “history of corruption, mismanagement, scandal…and blatant repression.”
I have come to know about many instances of police violence during the two decades I’ve lived in Oakland. So on a beautiful Sunday afternoon, I am happy to give them my $10 for a snack and a beverage. There’s a shelf with political books, a kids’ play area and a donation basket for the Sogorea Te’ Land Trust, an urban Indigenous women-led community organization that facilitates the return of Chochenyo and Karkin Ohlone lands to Indigenous stewardship. The empanada and the latte are a little taste of justice.
“Hasta Muerte” reminds me of the Che Guevara quote cited at the end of the Uhuru Solidarity Movement (USM) principles of unity, “Solidarity is not a matter of well-wishing, but sharing the same fate, in victory or in death.”And USM raises reparations from white society to build a new economy, by and for African people. I think this is really important and so that’s why I’m a member.
One of the key current projects USM is supporting is Black Power Blueprint in St. Louis, Missouri, which was born following the resistance to police violence, poverty and oppression faced by the black community when 18 year old Mike Brown was died at the hands of Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson.
Hasta Muerte. We don’t know when we are going to die. The question that comes to mind is what do we want to live for? And there’s just so much.
Wendy Lea Writing 