Fun in the Sun at the Oakland Jazz Arts Festival!
This weekend, Macio and I had the pleasure of tabling at an Oakland event, the Malcolm X Jazz Arts Festival. This is the second year we’ve managed to attend, but the tenth of its existence. The festival is organized by the EastSide Arts Alliance, a group of artists, cultural workers, and community organizers of colour doing great community work in the San Antonio area of Oakland chance would have it!
The festival consisted of jazz musicians and bands, of course, even a gumbo band, a graffiti stage, breakdancers, and a lot of local artists. There were also a lot of great local grassroots organizations selling their wares or passing out information, including Freedom Archives, Red Bike and Green, Black Organizing Project, Critical Resistance, and many others. There was also childcare, and food court with many rumoured-to-be-delicious nonvegan items (damn you!). About 3,000 people showed up, most of them friends of Macio’s. We had a great time, made some friends, and got a little sun-stroked.
Sadly, I forgot my camera, but I did take some nice cell phone pictures for you. Fortunately, my original plan, which involved taking a picture of my cellphone picture with a regular camera has proven unnecessary, though I still think that would be funny.
 |
Macio between chai breaks (photo is crooked on purpose, btw) |
 |
View of the stage before the masses arrived! |
Also, if you are sad cause you didn’t know we’d be out and about, then you should sign up for our events emails (we have a national and a Bay Area list), and god help us all, we are on facebook, myspace, twitter, and whatever else the kids are into these days.