For those who aren't familiar with Los Angeles, the Wilshire corridor is a main thoroughfare in the city, running from downtown all the way to the ocean. It is probably one of the most traveled east-west streets in the metropolitan area. Closing it off basically cuts off a major traffic artery.
Viva's school has elected to close at 12:30 today due to all the street closures. Lena, the woman who cleans our apartment building, was here yesterday, on a Sunday, sweeping floors and taking out trash, because while she has permanent resident status, she is an immigrant and lives in a building with other immigrants who are threatening their neighbors to comply with Immigration Day boycotts. She says if she goes anywhere today, these neighbors have threatened to smash the windows of her car. Kind of goes against the whole spirit of the thing, as far as I'm concerned, but maybe that's just me. I'm interested to hear what she has to say when I see her tomorrow.
I'll stop here because I have to work now since I must leave to pick up Viva in a couple of hours. So much more to say and no time to say it!
Edited after lunch to add: Viva claims she is going to take a nap right now. After spending some time reading a variety of hateful messages on various discussion boards about the immigration rallies, I am completely drained. Went looking for something -- anything -- a bit more positive, and I just had to include this quote from LA Voice:
...in case you worried that President Bush had somehow managed to ignore the multiple significance of the date, he actually proclaimed today "National Loyalty Day."Whew. That helps. I didn't realize it was all so simple!
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