The Streets That Raised Me

July Letters-04

27th July, 2026.

(P.S: This letter was written in July 2026 by a participant in our pen-pal project, addressed to their pen pal. We’re sharing it here with permission. July’s theme was A letter from my corner of the world..)

Dear Stranger,

I live in East LA, a fruit garden that’s pushed up through the pavement like dandelions. My neighbors have a pepper tree, a variety of oranges I don’t know the name of, and a passion fruit tree. The smell always confuses me when it starts to flower, like I forget it’s there. My aunts’ lemon tree has never heard of an “off season,” and the yellow of the fruit, the green of the leaves, and the blue sky feel like a painting waiting for its turn. Behind brightly painted wrought-iron fences are carefully tended avocado trees, oranges, lemons, apples, kumquats, herbs, tomatoes, garlic, and green onions. Anything that can be grown has been tried. Plumeria trees that look older than me are blooming in the most beautiful shades of white to pink and white to yellow you’ve ever seen. Taking a walk through the neighborhood is a mingle of decadent fresh scents and car exhaust.

In the morning, the fruit carts roll by to their designated corners, and in the evening, they roll home. Up the street lives Gloria, who walks the neighbourhood in 6-inch heels, thick black eyeliner, and the tightest jeans I’ve ever seen, honking an old-time horn from her modified shopping cart while offering fresh tamales. Ice cream trucks flock through the streets in droves, each playing its own jingle. I don’t know most of my neighbours’ names, but I recognize the ice cream jingles we all hum. Along the major streets, luncheras sell burritos, tamales, coffee, café de olla, and champurrado out of their cars or, when they’re really established, from tables from 5 a.m. into the late afternoon. After the luncheras pack up and leave, they are quickly replaced by the dinner crowd. Under red pop-up tents and strings of bistro lights, people swarm, no matter the season, to get some of the best food Latin America has to offer. I’m saying Latin America to save time because you can find food from pretty much every country in Central and South America. Driving past the plumes of grill smoke is like an amuse-bouche for the nose.

Over the weekends, each neighbour takes their turn blasting music late into the night, celebrating birthdays, quinceañeras, weddings, baptisms, and more. There’s always a point in the night when the music drops a bit and we can hear the kids jostling to line up for the piñata. The whacks of the bat and the yells of the crowd ebb and flow as whatever brightly coloured papier-mâché cartoon character is jostled back and forth. The resident mockingbird sings car alarms at dawn and dusk. The parking garage three doors down used to have ivy-covered walls. My mom took her wedding pictures in front of it. Now the cement bricks glare at us all. On the Fourth of July, people throw fireworks into it, trying to be as loud as possible. Lowriders and car enthusiasts cruise and rev their way up and down Whittier Boulevard on Sundays. Families bring chairs and sit on street corners to watch the parade of classic vintage cars, souped-up modern cars, and cars that are more pieces of art than vehicles, everyone waving and chatting with their friends.

I’m the fourth generation of my family to live here on this property. My tías live in the front house, where they were born and raised, and I live in the back house that was built by their Tata Pascual. When my Nana and Tata got married in the ’50s, they couldn’t find a place to live, so my Nana’s dad built them a one-bedroom, one-bath house on the back half of the rectangular property. My mom was the oldest daughter and spent the first years of her life in this little house. So many cousins, tías, and friends have lived back here at one time or another. And now it’s my turn. I feel so close to my mom here. Also, I think it might be haunted, but family’s nosy, so I shouldn’t be surprised.

With love from East LA,
Anonymous

This letter was written as part of our global pen-pal exchange —“With Love, Anonymous.”

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