USSF day1

the ants go marching one by one, hurrah hurrah...

After a quick 4 hours on a plane from SFO to ATL, we've arrived on the eve of the US Social Forum! We were greeted by giant ants at baggage claim who were marching to the tune of the USSF too-- equally excited.

En route to the hotel, lovingly called the "Bay" Hotel because so many Bay area delegates are housed here, we chatted with our Eritrean taxi driver who gave us the scoop on Atlanta. We had to ask him if he'd heard of the New York City taxi drivers successfully organizing and he said they had tried here but it was more difficult with the large African immigrant population speaking various languages from Eritrea, Ghana, Ethiopia, etc, as well as the diversity of South Asians in the mix. Of course we also tried to get the scoop on the best restaurants around, like Vietnamese food & he said Vietnamese food was like Chinese food. Uh oh. We told him that saying that was like saying Eritrean food was the same as Ethiopian. Point made. We tipped him at drop off & the welcoming hotel crowd was like home: NNIRR, MUA, CPA, PODER, SOUL, Design Action, FACES, PILA, Liberation Ink. Our social justice colony has found the sweet spot. Hurrah hurrah.

At 1:30am now, in 12 hours the ants won't be the only ones marching as we'll protest Coca Cola at their headquarters. Now in CocaColatown, as Atlanta is like Richmond being Chevrontown, we were briefed about the struggles around the world against this giant corporation. And we ordered water with our meal. Hurrah hurrah.

BLURBS OF THE DAY:

TINA: "B is for bravo," prompted the helpful airport train voice. And "A" is for ants.

MIMI: "Where's my pickle?" after receiving an incomplete airport lunch on the go at SFO.

HAI BINH: 3 glasses of sweet tea upon arrival. Aaahh. Hotlanta quenched.

MARI ROSE: Cuban rueben sandwich with Texas fries without meat, please. "Say what?" said confused waitress.