Community
Bike bells chimed as voices shouted “Bike for justice!” on the streets of Oakland’s Fruitvale and San Antonio neighborhoods late Tuesday evening. A group of 30 community activists toured the streets—lined with taco stands, vedura y fruta mercados, liquor stores and auto body shops—calling people inside stores and at bus stops to join them in opposing what could be the city’s second gang injunction.
Oakland North is adding a new feature to our site–every Wednesday, we will publish a photo submitted by one of our readers. This week’s photo is by Miranda Everitt.
This Wednesday, Oakland residents who follow the Jewish faith will join millions of people around the world in celebrating Hanukkah. The eight-day “festival of light” begins in the third month of the Hebrew calendar on the eve of Kislev 25, which falls either at the end of November or at the beginning of December on the Gregorian calendar. The religious holiday commemorates the triumph of light over darkness.
A week before Thanksgiving, Spice Monkey Café and Restaurant co-owner Kanitha Matoury had been worried that food donations would fall short of her 1,000 pound goal. The restaurant, located at 1628 Webster Street, hosts one of several food drives in downtown Oakland aimed at stocking the food pantries, soup kitchens, and senior centers served by the Alameda County Community Food Bank.
Oakland North is continuing with our new feature. Every Tuesday, Oakland Animal Services will spotlight an “Animal of the Week” that’s up for adoption at their facility. This week it’s Margie the rabbit.
With its daytime temperatures peaking in the 60s, San Francisco seemed like an unlikely place for outdoor ice skating last Wednesday. Yet there they were, almost a hundred visitors from all over California—skating in a circle around a frozen swath of Union Square.
What would you expect to find in a farmers market? Fruits, vegetables or fresh local produce? How about a goat that poops and pees at will? Well, you got one on Saturday morning, at the North Oakland Farmers Market. Oakland resident Crow, brought along his Oberhasli goat named Prema — which is often mistaken for a giant dog — to show the neighborhood how to milk a goat.
By 5 am Friday, David Martinez and Derrick Love, both Oakland residents, had spent nearly 48 hours stationed outside the Best Buy on the city’s Mandela Parkway. The first night, they slept in a borrowed tent. On Thursday they ate Thanksgiving dinner—turkey on paper plates—under the streetlights as the line circling the building formed behind them. “It’s totally worth it,” said Love, who had locked his target on one of the store’s ten $349 laptops that usually sell for $600….
It’s the little things Joseph Riley remembers, like his mother’s homemade rocky road candy, when another holiday season takes the stage. The candy remains a distant taste of childhood, Riley’s more recent holiday memories are composed of long lines out a shelter door, paper plates filled with turkey and trimmings, and finally Riley returning home, wherever home is that year, alone.