My Other Me, is a collective acknowledgement of a seamless kinship across the we. Composed of Zoe Blaq an artist, poet and urban gardner who teaches gardening as a form activism and healing, Set Hernandez Rongkilyo an undocumented immigrant filmmaker and community organizer who organizes around various migrant justice issues, King Jaybo a hip hop artist, fashion designer and community organizer working to dismantle the prison industrial complex and Gloria Galvez an artist, organizer, and amateur mycologist that maintains a practice of disrupting, subverting, and dismantling bland and oppressive status-quo norms.  

Scroll to bottom of page for a complete script of this speech.

BELOW IS A VIRTUAL INSTALLATION BY MY OTHER ME

my other me digital installation intro

by gloria galvez

during the days of rebellion, i was feeling anxious and confused and often found myself walking and thinking in circles, but when my other me reached out for my hand and placed it on the moist soil of the tomatoes that their students had just planted i felt clarity.... a clarity that i had not felt in a long time. a clarity that allowed me to see the tree that their students had painted on the wall in front of me.

what a beautiful tree - i really felt comforted by looking at it. 

as i continued looking at the tree i felt a warm stream of tears rolling out of my eyes, down my cheeks and into the soil. the tears were my bodily response to the song that my other me was now singing behind me. a song that talked about poverty in our communities, brutalization by the police, and the missing fathers… a song that talked about the experiences that my other me had gone through. 

my sobs were loud but the singing voice of my other me was louder, magnificent and brave...and it invoked a courage residing within my body. 

when my other me was finished signing their song. i approached them gently and with care and asked “how can we work together?” . and my other my said “is your liberation tied to me mine?” and i said “yes, you are the other me!” and as i spoke i could feel my other me looking into my eyes contemplating the honesty and commitment that could be seen in my eyes and felt my actions.

and then my other me heard my heart - beating loudly, magnificently and bravely.

and my other me asked me “have you heard about the movement to get undocumented elders healthcare coverage?”

and i said “no” and they said “well then you must watch the film i made about it and see where you can plug into this movement”. i shook my head in agreement and began to walk and think in an upward spiral with my eyes on the film, a smile on my face, and my other me on speed dial.

King Jaybo's Song 

Set Hernandez Rongkilyo's Film Trailer

zoe blaq's image

Exquisite Corpse Speech Script:

my other me****  i want to speak to you

give your

attention to the people. 

we have been robbed of our freedom

 for 400 years. 

but change is inevitable.                                                        

trauma is not

we lack rest. 

this system prevents us from resting.*

but we are still breathing because

freedom is like fresh air; it is essential for our well being. 

but we can’t be in a capitalocene. 

but we are 

because we have imposed 

but not proposed***.

now we propose change 

not as an afterthought 

like a seed cracking open in the sunlight. 

like amaranth growing between concrete. 

we are resilient like our ancestors 

and hope 

is a discipline

 like mariame kaba says. 

we have done it before

and we will do it again

because we are cyclical non linear beings who die and are reborn every day. 

life will continue to be what we create. 

we are in constant motion. 

courage is in our dna. 

we will continue 

to stand up 

and fight back. 

this fight is not over until all my people are free. 

love is a renewable energy. 

love is quantum physics 

and in quantum physics, particles like ourselves remain connected with every particle they encounter

the actions performed to one affects the other

 even when separated by great distances

every day that we are born we become entangled with our other me

and when we die we become the other me 

to one day be born as we 

and then we will lead by obeying*** the us. 

the us who is the we

we overcome by remembering.

 “the remembering of a people relates not so much to the remembering of an idealized golden past, but rather a painful past, 

and importantly, people’s responses to that pain.”** 

acknowledging with good comes bad

 at others expense. 

it is time to heal our me. healing is not linear. 

we are training to remember

they are trained in divide and conquer

but we will win this fight by uniting our power.

a me with many me.s that works from below and does not seek to rise above the we.

we rest

rest – resting in safety, in certainty. 

sleep. 

eat. 

thrive. 

nourished. 

no need to leave or move if we don’t want to.

home is a place where we can just be.

where we can rest in power

and

there is no power without youth power . there is no voice without youth voices. 

there is no future without reparations 

for mistakes made in the past. 

this is a regenerative collective acknowledging 

that  individualism in western culture is not sustainable. 

we are art as praxis

 shape shifting with an ever evolving cosmos. 

we must not cut off the natural flow of humanity.

 we can no longer stunt our growth with outdated belief systems. 

the universe is mind and mental. 

cause and effect.

a world  with many worlds*** to serve and not self-serve***. 

our love for our people 

and our love for the movement 

is what is going to determine our freedom.

he who desires change must change within themselves first. we are the alchemists

spreading seeds of peace, compassion and charity. 

breathe in. 

what does the future smell like?

can you taste the air when you breathe it in? 

does it fill your lungs with the rush of hope? 

can you smell the rain 

envision going from drought to greening the desert. 

will you represent and not replace*** 

and construct on their destruction***. 

will your vision of freedom be the end goal 

or will unity and love be our greatest solution

dismantle fear, dismantle hate. 

here and in outer space. 

we can not hold on to old patterns that keep us from growing. 

the past and the future dance with each other 

in the space we call the present. 

the power is in our hands we demand to control the narrative.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

*the nap bishop, tricia hersey

**indigenous maori scholar, linda tuhiwai-smith

***inspired by zapatista principles 

**** my other me is inspired by mayan notion of in lak’ech which translates to you are the other me