Neighborhood

Kids’ Cafe, around the block

LuQuann, Paul, Kiev, Asia, Delilah, Crystal, Janeim, Timmy, Montas, and Jakel

Image and text by Kremena Todorova and Kurt Gohde

Gohde/Todorova

LuQuann, Paul, Kiev, Asia, Delilah, Crystal, Janeim, Timmy, Montas, and Jakel

After being turned down by neighbors a few times, we made our way to the Kids’ Café, an afterschool community center located at the corner of Elm Tree Lane and Seventh Street. We knew Crystal from working with her and the kids at the Café through a class we taught at Transylvania the previous winter. As it turned out, we also knew one of the kids at the community center that afternoon, Montas. We had photographed him for Discarded a few months earlier. Montas, more than Crystal, became our gatekeeper, his excitement encouraging the other kids to participate. We learned that the furniture belonged to a Hispanic family who had lived nearby for about 8 months. The neighbors suspected that the family left so abruptly because they were undocumented immigrants and had to go.

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