Maeva Ghennam films herself “peeing in nature” and finds herself (again) in the sauce

AFP

‘This country is going crazy’: California’s Chinatown in shock after new massacre

They were celebrating the “year of the rabbit,” but their Chinese New Year took a sudden turn for the worse: After the Monterey Park massacre left 10 people dead, residents of this Asian suburb of Los Angeles were stunned by the violence on Sunday. In this city of 60,000, red lanterns and banners emblazoned with ideograms hung on New Year’s Eve still line the roadside. But around the dance hall where the tragedy took place, yellow cordons and heavily armed police are now spoiling the party. This room is popular with local elders to try to figure out what is going on. At 57, the retired Chinese vet, who has spent 40 of his 40s in the city, still finds it hard to believe the carnage happened: ‘There, behind the white-and-green awning, he used to pass by every day to do his shopping. It’s a very safe area where I can walk around at night and I won’t have to worry about gun violence at all,” he told AFP as police helicopters circled overhead. Five women and at least ten others were injured, officials said. He was found dead after being picked up. On Sunday, the local sheriff said that he committed suicide in a white van after a police chase. This massacre was the deadliest in the United States since the Uvalde massacre. In May 2022, Texas took the city by complete surprise. Monterey Park, located about ten kilometers from the center of Los Angeles, is considered by residents to be the “new Chinatown” of this California metropolis. Amid pavilions with pristine lawns, a man reads a newspaper in Mandarin, an anti-Covid 19 mask carefully screwed to his nose, shop signs are in Chinese, and the vast majority of residents AFP passes do not speak English. “It’s a place that doesn’t exist. Normally there’s a lot going on,” says Ken Nim, who walks his dog. An IT worker was once robbed of his car’s catalytic converter. It seemed like the most brutal experience ever promised.” It’s unfortunate that this country is going crazy,” he continues. Nim, incredulous. “We’ve seen mass killings in many different cities and states, and now it’s happening to us.” Amid the cordoned-off streets, residents try to make sense of the escalation of violence. Phones on the floor photos of the sprawling corpses spread, and in a room lit by colorful spotlights, many of them feared a racist crime. But the sheriff’s revelation earlier in the day that the suspect was of Asian descent caused confusion, and now everyone is speculating. “I have a feeling it’s a personal story,” Jerry said. Liu, a 26-year-old truck driver, lined the market next to hundreds of white tents to celebrate the Lunar New Year. Throughout the day on Saturday, thousands of people squeezed between the main artery, the meat skewer stands and the fun fair. “There is a reason. Why did he target the dance hall? Otherwise, he could have gone to the market early in the morning and killed more people,” insists the young man. part of the man who wasn’t invited to his wife’s party. “The problem is that we have so many firearms in this country,” sighs the president of the Los Angeles Chinese Chamber of Commerce, who claims to know the owner of the dance hall. “It’s very easy to pick up a gun and do something stupid.”rfo/arb/pz