You're not in LA anymore

This is a picture I took when we went fishing 

By Maggie Sanchez (Follow me)

I have been in Kennewick, WA for about 3 months. I was living in South Central LA before I moved there, and well, this town doesn’t compare. The majority of the people here are white, but you also have a handful of Asians, Hispanics, Bosnians, Ethiopians, and African Americans.

When I left LA, I left with an open mind, so that it wouldn’t be too difficult to adapt to my new home. It took about 18 hours to get here (driving), and because of certain circumstances, I only had one day to make up my mind about if I was going to leave LA or not, and only one hour to pack my stuff. I left my mother, my sisters, my uncles, my aunts, and my cousins and grandparents behind, who, by the way, I miss a lot.


When I first arrived here, the neighbors all offered to help me with my job hunt. But, I quickly realized, everywhere else you go, you get stared at. People won’t take their eyes off of you. If you go to a local store, the owner will follow you around (believe me, it has happened to me). If you go to a Best Buy and you ask to see something, or if you want to buy something, the employees will tell you they’re out of stock, because they think you can’t afford it.

This town is very small. Downtown Kennewick is made up of a handful of buildings, which by the way are only two stories tall, and the entire downtown is only about two blocks long. I wouldn’t have even known I was in “downtown” if I hadn’t been told so. To give you an idea of how small it truly is, when I was given a tour of the town, it only took about an hour.

However, the nice thing about this town is that you never really hear any helicopters or any police sirens. I’ve seen more patrol cars in one day in Los Angeles than I have here the entire time I've been here. My favorite spot is the Columbia River, which is like my backyard. We have the blue bridge and the cable bridge, and the sunsets are to-die-for, you can even see the sky full of stars at night. But, most of these beautiful nights are ruined, because the weather here sucks BIG TIME. It can be sunny one moment, and then out of nowhere it starts pouring , and next comes lighting, before it all ends with a wind storm (eating dirt has been my least favorite part).

When I was in Los Angeles, taking a walk at 11 pm was unheard of (for safety reasons), and here, people are still walking and riding bikes down the street at that time of night. Here, we have one mall that is shared by three towns; the area I live in is known as “Tri-Cities”, made up of Pasco, Kennewick and Richland. Pasco is known as “ghetto” around here, and Richland is where the wealthy, old, retired people live, or at least that’s what I was told.

Luckily, for me and my sanity, my stay here won’t be for long though, because I’m headed back home soon! :)