Member-only story
Where There’s A Will There’s A Way
A Chinese way!
It was the very first time in a span of five years of Saturdays that I went to volunteer at the University Soup Kitchen. Angie, a Korean-American girl who was running the show, assigned me pantry line duty with the admonition, “Watch out for the little Chinese ladies. They’ll steal while you’re not looking. And then they sell our food in the park.”
The truth was that as a group, the Chinatown women had no regard for the people in the back of the line who might not get anything because they’d shoplifted so much while I was restocking. And forget about lining up in an orderly fashion. Push to the front was the order of the day — as our Black and Hispanic clients grumbled — sometimes out loud and vociferously. Welcome to the Chinatown world. The real Chinatown — not where white people go to eat — but where Chinese immigrants live. The soup kitchen’s Chinese clients live there. And situated just a mile north, the USK is one of their stops.
Later, I became a driver for the Coalition For The Homeless. Each truck had 7 designated distribution points where we gave out free soup, milk, and a piece of fruit to whoever wanted it. My route took me through Chinatown.
“Make sure you feed the little Chinese ladies first. Then feed the men — and get out…
