August 12, 2019
Patricia Rose
The Mission
42 years in SF
0:00 / 28:04
The traditional Latino community is
becoming smaller, but we try hard to
preserve our beautiful traditions
The Mission is becoming a very small neighborhood. The boundaries of the Mission District, the geographic boundaries, make it a very large neighborhood, so large it has two postal
zip codes. But the part where we are now is the very traditional Latino community that is becoming a smaller and smaller
part of the Mission District, I think at this point it is only about
20 square blocks. So it’s getting very small, but we love it very much and we try hard to preserve our beautiful traditions.
Neighborhood organizations are good resources for navigating in a new city better and understanding the community.
We have some very important community organizations in
the Mission. They are nonprofits, but they’re here to serve the community. And I think maybe they would be very good
resources also for young tech workers who are relocating here
and want to connect with the community to check in with
those community organizations, like CALLE 24 and ACCION Latina. They’re wonderful nonprofits that look out for the needs of our neighborhood and neighbors.
Neighborhood organizations might be good resources for newcomers to check in and help them navigate in a new city better and understand the community. I know many of the new tech workers are interested in doing community work and really getting to know the community to be helpful instead of taking what’s here and then moving on. So I respect that very much. And
I think the other organizations in the neighborhood do too.
I welcome anyone who
has the open heart
I meet tech workers sometimes on our mural tours. They can see some murals actually say, “Tech workers go home.” And they wonder what they can do and how they can be part of this community, which is so good. Be open to it, let us know and go through the nonprofit because they can let people know very specifically what needs are. So they can do volunteer or assistance. I welcome them, I welcome anyone who has the open heart.
I very much love the
Latin foods on 24th St
When I was a child, I didn’t live in San Francisco. But I did live in California in a Mexican neighborhood so I grew up with traditional foods. I’m living here now. It makes me very happy to be able to
eat the foods I grew up with. So I recommend every place on 24th St.
San Francisco is such
an amazing cultural hub
The culture of San Francisco is everywhere, music, dance, theater, mural painting, spontaneous festivals that happen on our streets, street festivals of all kinds. It's such an amazing cultural hub. It is
just a location where so many things happen all the time. This is
what I thought was so wonderful for my own children. They can see
all of these things, hear music, learn dance, witness dance, go to performances, go to street festivals. There’s so much happening here. And it’s very exciting and inspiring, especially for young people to
see so many possibilities. They see what other people are doing and they thought they could do something even different from that or better. I think it really inspires people to bring even more to the city.
San Francisco is a seaport so many
different traditions come in and
become part of local traditions
Every individual brings something new and different cultures,
they bring those cultural traditions which assimilate into our bigger traditions. In a way, we are very fortunate because of our location. Right in the center of the West Coast, the Pacific Rim. It’s a seaport.
So people come here from all over the world and they bring so many different traditions that become part of our local traditions. This
is a very exciting thing. I love that about San Francisco.
Walking along 24th St is like
entering a foreign country, but a
country I’m very familiar with
Every morning I walk to work. I live very close by so I walk into the neighborhood every day. I love it. I love it when I start hearing Spanish being spoken. I love it when I start greeting the neighbors because people are outside in this neighborhood more than other neighborhoods I think. We love to be outdoors in the Mission. I greet the neighbors and I love that many times we greet each other in Spanish. I often feel like 24th Street is a little bit like entering a foreign country. It’s a country I’m very familiar with, but it seems a little bit different from the rest of San Francisco. I love this and I cherish it.
It makes me very, very grateful. I have this opportunity every day to come into this beautiful neighborhood and to be welcomed as part
of this community. It's very special.
Sometimes I do worry that the city is not as diverse now as it was 10 years ago. 10 years ago, I think San Francisco was the most diverse city in the United States. Not so much now. We’re losing some of that. And I think it’s too precious to lose. And so I would just say, work as hard as we can to preserve all of these traditions and to keep them vibrant in our city so that we don't lose that diversity.