Chinatown, at night

It is a little strange to think back on when I used to post here pretty much every day.

Since closing our store, spending a year finding a new job, and now being thoroughly immersed in that job for nine months, I have felt very uprooted from having a particularly healthy routine. Did I ever have a healthy routine? Maybe not, but in any case it has felt particularly unhealthy the last few years. Living in an ongoing, barely-acknowledge pandemic and the collapse of the United States probably isn’t going to feel particularly healthy any time soon, either.

But I am trying, and part of that has been getting out and enjoying the city of Los Angeles.

Every weekend there is a Thai night market in Chinatown (called “DS Night Market” which doesn’t have a website but you can search for their Instagram). They have different entertainment each night, but Sunday is always Karaoke Night. There are some great vendors, the people watching is fantastic, and it is a great excuse for us to walk to and/or from Chinatown.

It is disappointing that Chinatown isn’t getting the investment it could use to become a thriving community again, but the sort of sustained small/mid-scale investment that would be needed just isn’t something that exists any longer. I fear this story from the Los Angeles Times about Yue Wa Market closing is just another heartbreaking example of what is going to keep happening.

(The photo was one I took on the way back from the night market one weekend. The night market itself is a few blocks away from this.)