Sunday, July 20, 2008

Kentucky Rocks with the Front Lines Tour!

A few days and an enormous of amount of knowledge

    I find myself on the bus alone... typing away. Its 2:48pm in Knoxville, Tennessee and the sun is expressing itself exponentially. The rest of the Front Lines Tour crew is inside "Shoney's" finishing up their lunch. I decided to collect my thoughts and begin documenting our experiences over the past few days. They've been days full of conversations with locals, performances and learning experiences. We've found ourselves looking deep within in order to understand the plight of others in our attempt to make their plights be heard. By doing so we hope that some change may be possible. Many have called our goals as a group idealistic. When I looked up the word idealistic in the dictionary to make sure I had the definition correct, my definition was confirmed. The Oxford American Dictionary defines the word as "the practice of forming or pursuing ideals, especially unrealistically". After looking up the word up in the dictionary I smiled and slowly nodded. Since the inception of humanity plight has been present. Our days are no different from the past. They just seem to be due to our current experience of this day and time. Idealism has often been scoffed at due to the apparent unrealistic views of the idealists. The funny thing is that the reality of the non-idealists is often what is unrealistic.
    It was unrealistic of me to believe that I could not go to college and graduate Magna Cum Laude. It was unrealistic to believe that we could not buy a bus and retro-fit it with our needs for a US Tour. It has been clearly demonstrated that it is unrealistic to believe that words do not have the power to move. And it is unrealistic to believe that change is not possible. The examples of why this is true are infinite and would not allow space in between these lines for anything else. All it takes...is a dream....some faith...work and some words.
    Now our reality is the reality of others. The other day we arrived in Whitesburg, Kentucky. We got there late due to our being behind schedule (the broken belt incident and other bus maintenance) so we missed our radio interview. However, we got there with plenty of time left to rock out on stage (at the Summit City Lounge) and were told by the locals that it was a radical move for us to have been there. Nick told us that the change would continue for years and that we just wouldn't know about it. He works for Thousand Kites. Thousand Kites is an organization that works towards giving inmates a voice. Its acts a "national dialogue to address the issues of the criminal justice system". Nick is a documentarist that works with the APPAL shop. The APPAL shop acts as place that serves as a multimedia resource for many in the community (especially the youth). There they are able to produce radio shows, documentaries, record, and learn learn learn which is most important. The APPAL shop acts as a place for the youth to walk into a safe environment and leave with works of multimedia art.
    After the performance we headed to the apartment that Amelia and her husband Joel so very kindly allowed us to borrow for the night. The next morning we ate breakfast at a restaurant that had opened for the first time two days before. We were better off waiting a few more days till they got their things settled because they weren't doing too well with anything. But our bellies were full and we were "read to go". We met up with Nick and he showed us around the APPAL shop. It's a beautiful space and one can tell they have definitely put in work to keep the place going for about half a century. They're funded by grants and are very big on making connections with others. These are the connections that have kept them going throughout the years. It's a testament to what can be done if we all work together. We talked with some of the people that volunteer there at their radio station, record label and the filming department then checked a documentary. Nick played a documentary that he and Amelia had worked on called "Up The Ridge".
    This documentary is all about the U.S. Prison System, it's corruptness and the many lives that it has destroyed. The way these "Super Max" prisons are set up is reminiscent of the slave trade. The state will build a Super Max prison to house all of their prisoners. However, they make them so big that they end up having empty cells. These empty cells mean lost money so the state has to find other ways to fill them up. One way is by "encouraging" judges to increase the sentence of prisoners. Another way is by opening their cells to other states. That way both states make money. States find that it is more beneficial to build large Super Maximum Security Prisons and fill them with prisons than to build and fund the improvement of schools. This is because Super Max prisons make more money than schools. In fact, it's a multi-million dollar business. Some one has to sell boots, weapons, uniforms, food, cells, concrete, security systems, razor wire, vehicles, toilets, clothing, toiletries, televisions, overpriced, phone service, etc. to these prisons. In addition, much of the labor the prisoners do is either free or extremely low paying (going to a commissary account for toilet paper and other toiletries) and then goes to benefit large corporations. For instance, if prisoners make doors they might get paid a few cents and hour. That door however is sold at regular market price.
     Each prisoner equals thousands of dollars for the prisons. By sending these prisoners away (transferring them from state to state to fill up prisons) their families are longer able to see them. This along with no educational options further diminishes the prisoners chances of recuperation. Prisoners are sent back and forth on a regular basis with no notice. This further destroys families and creates a increased profit for the "prison trade". In addition, the staff members at these prisons are predominantly white with little training in regards to "peoples of color". All they see day in and day out (due to their small communities) is Black and Brown peoples that are criminals. With no training on how to deal with distinct ethnicities racism kicks in and "peoples of color" find themselves brutalized in place where they are no longer human in the eyes of the staff. The atrocities committed by the prison staff is horrendous. Dehumanization is something that is profoundly practiced in this world of evil for the sake of profit. Many of the staff members find themselves quitting their jobs because they find that the "work" they do is against their morals. Fortunately, organizations such as Thousand Kites work towards giving these enslaved peoples a voice against the evils that they find themselves dealing with. After the documentary all of us reflected on what we had seen and discussed our desire to create a documentary based on the unfortunate truths we see on our journey.
    Later on Amelia was kind enough to take time (Owner of Summit City Lounge, Volunteer at APPAL shop and Thousand Kites) from her busy day to show us around. She gave us an in depth tour of the region and answered questions along the way. Some of us had known of the corporate colonization of the Appalachia region by Coal Mining companies but Amelia gave us an in depth up close perspective of the matter. Coal mining companies have maintained a strong grip on the regions for decades and they don't seem to plan on letting go any time soon. They've effectively destroyed much of the environment, until recently refused to admit responsibility for black lung (a disease caused by inhaling coal dust) and have even pushed oxycontin a highly addicting painkilling drug on the people of the drug. In fact, Amelia told us that one of the biggest problems affecting the region is drug addiction to "Oxy" and other pills. Learning about all of this further clarified the truth that we as a people are all suffering similar struggles. They're just a liiiiiiittle different everywhere you go. Amelia even showed us an area on the side of the mountain that had coal that locals seemed to have dug out for their own personal use. There she explained black lung to us and we picked up a few small pieces of coal for ourselves. The views and sights we saw going up and down those mountains were beautiful and left us all pondering how greed could dare inflict such destruction on a region that had naturally developed over centuries. Our final stop on the tour was the coal miners memorial. There we saw a monument remembering those that had given their lives in order to provide for their families. The extraction of black gold had cost not only their lives. It had also left their families with a void that no amount of coal or anything for that matter could fill.
    After our tour of the area we dropped off Amelia at her house, picked up some things and headed back to her home for some good ole food and a jam session. DJ H20 set up his equipment, as Graham prepared his recording equipment others tuned their guitars, fiddles and banjo's. We ate and jammed until we couldn't jam anymore. First we had the Kentucky crew do their thing and we did ours (incorporated the two guitars we brought on tour with us). Then we all joined in and had a massive jam goin' on. I even freestyled for a while and made sound effects while Cuttz went from the dome, Free spit her pieces and DJ H20 and Decora kept the vibe DJ'ing. Graham recorded as much of the session he could as he could and pasted instruments to create additional music in his own way.  The night ended with all of us being exhausted and the Kentucky crew asking us not to leave. We told them we'd love to but that we had to get on the rode and head to the next stop of the journey. There in Kentucky we were embraced as part of the family thanks to people like Nick, Amelia and Joel. We will forever be thankful for their hospitality and let them know that NY has a few homes for them as well.
-Latin

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