Last summer, the City of Oakland sponsored the first Oakland Book Festival. When I was invited to participate, I accepted right away. The event was free and it was in the center of downtown Oakland, a great place to spend an afternoon in late spring.

The Oakland Book Festival turned out to be a wonderful event. I had a great time speaking with the other sellers, and I really enjoyed meeting the people who attended the fair. The organizers did a great job of publicizing the event, and the result was a sizable crowd of Bay Area bibliophiles who were eager to spend money.

I was impressed not only by the size of the crowd, but by its diversity. There were a lot of Black people in attendance, both as buyers and sellers, and I was pleased that a number of the Black men in attendance let me take photos of them so that I could include them in the 1001 Black Men series, later on.

The man in this drawing was the first person I photographed. He seemed surprised that I wanted to do his portrait, but he was really quite friendly. I liked his open face and his geeky chic glasses, and I pretty much feel like any Black person at a book event is a potential best friend.

Ajuan Mance

Whole Foods, Harrison Street, Oakland, California.

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I’ve been to a lot of different Whole Foods grocery stores, but I’ve never been to one with as many Black customers as the Whole Foods in Oakland, California. There are also a lot of Black employees there. Even some of the security guards are Black.  Then, a few weeks ago, one of the security guards at the store beat a Black customer pretty badly. There were several days of protests, even after Whole Foods fired the security guard. Eventually, the store ended its relationship with the security firm for which he worked. Throughout this period, there murmurings on social media that it was one of the Black security guards who carried on the beating, at least according to the handful of reports that mentioned his race.

Today was only the second time I’ve been to Whole Foods since the beating and the subsequent protests, but it’s the first time I’ve taken a moment to think about how those incidents have impacted the store. I was there just before the lunch hour, and the line at the deli counter seemed just a long as ever; and it seemed like there were more Black employees behind the counter then I remembered from previous visits. There were other Black customers, but not as many as I recall seeing in the past. Then again, I usually go to Whole Foods around the dinner hour, just after work. I probably won’t be able to tell whether or not Black shoppers are staying away from this store until I have a change to go back during the early evening rush.

If there are less Black shoppers, it’s hard to know exactly why. It might be for the same reasons I stayed away for so long: I didn’t want to cross the protest line; and although I was personally satisfied with the actions the store took to try to make sure such a violent incident never took place again, I was willing to privilege the consensus of my Oakland Black community about when it was necessary to stay away and when it was appropriate to return. From the looks of the shoppers and the employees, I feel pretty confident that it’s appropriate to return, and that’s good for me and for all the Black folks who have been using the store to make healthier food choices. (I mean, when the chefs are Whole Food Oakland are really on their game, the yellow corn grits in the food bar are the best grits in Oakland.)

Ajuan Mance

I couldn’t tell if this brother’s expression conveyed serenity, resolution, annoyance, acceptance, or all four.

Ajuan Mance