UNDERSTANDING THE RIOTS / PART 3 : WITNESS TO RAGE : THE YOUNG : ‘Our intentions weren’t to kill anyone, just scare them off.’

Friday I went to my father’s store after school. There were 10 of us.

My father told me to be strong. He said, “Don’t do anything to hurt yourself because of the store. If we lose the stock, we’ll rebuild.”

I told him, “Don’t worry about anything.”

I thought, my dad’s store is our family’s lifeline. If we lose this, we lose everything. I thought it was my duty to go up there with them. Even if I don’t do anything, my presence will somehow help.

I wasn’t up there to hold a gun and fire at anybody. The intention was to protect our business from looters and firebombs. That was the most important thing--fire. We didn’t want the place to be set on fire. So we were on the roof with fire extinguishers. We had a hose to beat the fire.

And if looters came, we tried to stop them.

On Friday night, there was a gunshot near California Market on 5th Street. Some people ran with flashlights to see what was going on. The cops and National Guards thought we were holding guns. So they wanted us down off the roof. There was another shot fired. We had weapons, but our intentions weren’t to kill anyone, but to scare them off.

They wouldn’t let me carry a weapon. Nobody was actually carrying one. They had them on the floor just in case they needed it. The second shot was fired on 6th Street, so we all ducked.

People started calling us, saying, “Get down from there! Get down from there! The National Guard may shoot at us.”

I can understand what the looters were feeling. But looting is uncalled for. I feel the looters should get the death sentence. They were looting people’s lives--not their stores, but their lives.

I think all this had nothing to do with the Rodney King case or anything that has happened until now between the black community and Korean community. Before the riot I knew our fathers and black community parents were having arguments. I know they were having trouble. But before the riot, I was still making friends with black community kids and Hispanic kids and any kids in school.

Now after the riot, some kids treat me differently. I treat them differently. We look at what happened in a different way. We’re not as close as we were.

We’re growing apart. If there is any more controversy between the Korean community and black community, I feel we’ll be just like the adults saying, “You’re bad” and “No, you’re bad.”

I wouldn’t say we Koreans won. I think the riot’s not finished. There still are people out there and people in Koreatown with guns. We’re still worried that people are going to come out here and throw firebombs. I’m still worried they’re going to loot the place or start a fire here.