taking a stand

Yesterday I definitely didn't forget to be awesome.  I attended and participated in the second annual Walk Against Gang Violence in Wichita, Kansas.  I hadn't heard of this gathering before this week when I was cleaning out my e-mails of 2,000 and still counting when I came across an e-mail from my youth leader asking me if I wanted to go.

I had no idea that it would be such a massive event.

I knew that there would be a good deal of people there, maybe five hundred at the most.  Nope, estimations are that there were 2,000 people there.

This year the walk was in honor of a 13 year old boy who had been shot and killed at his home.  The coordinators of the walk changed the route the of the walk to lead by the house where this 13 year old boy was killed.  The family of the boy were standing in their driveway watching as the walk continued by their house, you could see pain on their faces still, but they were happy to see so many people participating in an event that was helping to decrease violence in general in Wichita.

One of the things that I thought about as we began the almost two mile walk around this very sketchy neighborhood, was that people of all races had come out that morning in support of not only the family of the 13 year old boy, for everyone who has been affected in some way of violence in the Wichita area.  The area of the walk was mostly Latino based, or at least that's what I'm assuming by all the Mexican based restaurants and stores along the route we walked.  But it wasn't just Latinos that showed up, there were African Americans, the average white person and Asians.  It just showed that it didn't matter your race, we were all there for one reason.  To stand up for those who can't against violence.  We were all there for one purpose and we made our voices heard.

Yesterday was a day of decreasing world suck, and I'm happy that I was apart of it.

Article about the Walk Against Gang Violence ---> Click
Youtube video from the Wichita Police Department (this is from 2010, but shares the basis of the event) ---> Click


Fish caught this month: 0
Miles biked this month: 0