The Brief

On a recent Friday morning, a group of Black women with pregnant bellies step onto a party bus in Leimert Park.

They’re headed on a tour of birthing centers and hospitals around Los Angeles, in style: leather seats, good music, mood lighting that shifts colors.

“This program is essentially an opportunity for you all to get resources, connect, build a village… because it takes a village,” says guide Gabrielle Brown as the group takes off. Brown is the maternal and infant health program manager with Black Women For Wellness, which created the expedition.

The tour started this year during Black Maternal Health Week, and shows Black birthing parents resources in their communities and the different birthing options available around Los Angeles. The goal is to help equip them on how to self-advocate. In California, Black pregnant people are three to four times more likely to die due to pregnancy-related issues.

While the tour is just getting started, that topic is top of mind for the women on the bus.

“Equity in healthcare is a very big thing for our community, like, we're so underserved and it's just ridiculous,” says Candace Cosey in a discussion with the other expecting parents. “Like, people are dying.”

Last year, for instance, April Valentine, a 31-year-old mother, died at Centinela Hospital in Inglewood while giving birth to her daughter. Soon after a state investigation, the hospital closed its maternity ward. In 2016, another mom, Kira Johnson, died after giving birth at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.

“It's important for us at Black Women for Wellness to host these programs and provide the education around how to self-advocate,” says Gabrielle Brown. “Unfortunately, racism is built into the system, into the healthcare system.”

Showcasing doulas and midwives

The bus arrives at the tour’s first stop: a cozy house in South L.A. associated with the Charles Drew University’s Black Maternal Health Center of Excellence.

At the house, the expecting moms are greeted with staff that treat them to smoothies, snacks and gift bags filled with a onesie.

The center provides prenatal, postpartum and wraparound care services to Black birthing persons throughout L.A. County.

Clinical manager Keomi Barksdale explains how the center helps with providing lactation support, physical therapy, and getting access to a doula — which is what expecting mom Victoria Levi came on the tour to learn more about.

“I'm still in my first trimester, so I don't know a lot of information,” she says. “No one's ever — in my family — had doulas or had a midwife. So these are things that I want to explore.”

Searching for equity in healthcare 

Candace Cosey is expecting her third child in July, but came on the tour because she wanted to make this birth better than her previous ones.

“It wasn’t horrible with my daughter, but nine years ago, with my son, it was just very traumatizing and so I don’t want to go through that, but that’s kind of led me to start being active now,” she says.

When she started going into labor with her son, an ambulance took her to the nearest hospital, Centinela. “I didn’t have anybody in the room with me,” she recalls.

She says a doctor tried to deliver the baby while she wasn’t fully dilated, and she had problems with her epidural being placed correctly. A second try was also unsuccessful, and Cosey decided to labor without the pain medication.

“At that point, I’m like, ‘It’s OK. I don’t want anything.’ So it was like I was forced into a non-medicated birth,” Cosey says.

In a statement to LAist, a Centinela spokesperson says federal and state privacy laws don’t allow them to discuss specific cases without a patient’s permission. They note that patients who have concerns about their care can talk to their physician, nurse, patient experience staff members, or contact a relevant regulatory agency, like the California Department of Public Health: “Information for these agencies is included in our Patient Handbook and posted in various locations throughout the hospital.”

This time around, Cosey says she wants a doula, which Medi-Cal now covers. She hasn’t decided yet on where she wants to give birth, but is exploring the options of birthing at home or a birthing center. “That’s why I’m here and that’s why I want to get more information.”

She’s enamored with the next stop, Kindred Space LA, a birthing center.

Nicole LaCour-Wordlaw, director of operations, guides the guests around the space, and shows them tranquil birthing rooms, equipped with bathtubs and birthing balls for labor.

One mom quips she’s about to go into labor.

A birthing suite in Kindred Spaces LA.

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Chava Sanchez

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LAist

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Considering pregnancy plans and hospital births

The next and final stops of the tour are two hospitals: Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and L.A. County General Medical Center, formerly known as LAC-USC.

On the way there, several of the women discuss Cedars’ history with Black maternal health, most notably the death of Kira Johnson in 2016.

Gabrielle Brown, with Black Women For Wellness, explains choosing the hospital was intentional, and that it’s been working to address Black maternal and infant health.

“We wanted to be sure to introduce our mamas to the care that Cedars-Sinai provides. But also, when we show up, our goal is to hold Cedars accountable,” she says. “Let them know that, you know, ‘These Black mamas are interested in seeking care here. What do you all have to offer?’”

At the hospital, nurse Paola Wong guides the group to a labor and delivery room, showing the different options a birthing parent has when it’s time to give birth, like using a squat bar on the hospital bed, playing music or dimming the lights.

She explains that after birth, nurses and doctors will leave the baby on mom’s chest for an hour to help them transition to their new world.

“It’s a form of stress being squeezed out, and so being able to be right on mom’s chest, we call it froggy position — ear on mom’s heart.”

L.A. General nurse Stephanie Fletes shows a labor and delivery room, and walks expectant moms through the birthing options that are available.

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Elly Yu

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LAist

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At L.A. County General Hospital across town, nurses guide them through the towering hospital into the labor and delivery ward.

Midwife Tatjana Muwwakkil explains for people who don’t have a doula, the hospital provides an option to have medical students serve as doulas.

“Last week for a patient, we called one of our medical students, and then they came and supported her through her labor and her postpartum, and it was a great service for her,” she says.

“Just because you're having a surgery or giving birth in the hospital doesn't mean it's all out of your control,” says med student and Black Women for Wellness intern Kayla Blair, mentioning doulas and incorporating birth plans.

She said one of the big benefits of the tour is giving people options.

“In my experience, a lot of times people in the community might just go to maybe the first provider, the first clinic or something that's available to them,” Blair says. “A benefit of this experience is you can go and ask all the questions and you’re not stuck there.”

Big surf from distant hurricanes in the Pacific could bring coastal flooding to Southern California starting this weekend.

Hurricanes Polo and Odalys are expected to cause coastal erosion, flooding and high surf along Southern California's already battered coastline. Swells from Polo are expect to arrive as early as late Sunday and peak Monday and Tuesday.

Bryan Lewis, National Weather Service meteorologist, told LAist that high tides could reach 7 feet. He said Long Beach and Avalon are among the more vulnerable areas for potential flooding and erosion.

Long Beach and Los Angeles warned residents to prepare for potential flooding and other effects through at least Wednesday.

In early September, Hurricane Marie brought coastal erosion and flooding that led homes being red- and yellow-tagged in L.A. and Orange counties.

This story first appeared on The LA Local.

Friends & Family Flea, a new market from the team behind Maum Market, will make its debut Saturday in Koreatown. 

For organizer Arnold Byun, the launch is something of a homecoming. 

Nearly five years ago, Byun and his co-founder, Kioh Park, were living in Koreatown and spending months at Document Coffee Bar dreaming up what would eventually become Maum Market, the Asian makers market they launched in January 2022. The market now has a regular presence at ROW DTLA, where it hosts pop-up markets on Dock Street several times a year.

“The genesis of Maum Market is actually really embedded in Koreatown,” Byun, 31, told The LA Local. “And we have a lot of affection and personal history with Koreatown, so it’s a very personal thing for us just to return to our roots.” 

Most of the 24 vendors participating in the first Friends & Family Flea have some connection to Koreatown, Byun said. Some grew up in the neighborhood, some still live there and others have moved away but retain ties to the area. The vendor list includes apparel brands, artists, jewelry makers, beauty and wellness businesses and food vendors. 

“We’ve been trying to be pretty intentional about curating from the community as much as possible,” Byun said.

There will be plenty of food and shopping, including “sogeum-bbang,” or salt bread, tea, handmade candles, soaps and vintage clothing, as well as flash tattoos and burgers and fries from Love Hour. The LA Hwatu-Hanafuda Club will teach visitors about hwatu, the Korean deck of playing cards with roots in Japan. The club will also offer $5 tarot card readings.

Friends & Family Flea, a new market from the team behind Maum Market, will make its debut Saturday in Koreatown.

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Courtesy Eena Cho

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Eena Cho, founder of the LA Hwatu-Hanafuda Club, was born and raised in Koreatown. She remembers living with her mother in an apartment on Wilshire Boulevard and Vermont Avenue and volunteering at the senior center near Seoul International Park, where she spent time with older Korean residents.

She also grew up playing go-stop with her grandparents during Korean holidays, like Chuseok and Seollal. 

“That was a big part of my childhood,” said Cho, 24. “Another part is that living in LA where there’s so many different groups of people together, I remember my best friend Maria growing up, she was Mexican, and we would be playmates because both of our parents were working overtime.”

For Cho, joining Friends & Family Flea felt like a natural fit.

“Koreatown is a beautiful diaspora of many different cultures,” Cho said. “And I think that makes Koreatown, Koreatown.”

Friends & Family Flea, a new market from the team behind Maum Market, will make its debut Saturday in Koreatown.

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Courtesy Eena Cho

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The local focus is a big part of what Byun hopes will distinguish Friends & Family from other flea markets and fairs. He said organizers wanted to create something that “intentionally celebrates a specific neighborhood,” in this case, Koreatown. 

For the Koreatown market, that also means highlighting small businesses beyond the restaurants that often get the most attention.

“It’s more about, you know, where do we get our dry cleaning, where do we get our shoes done, or these kinds of services that I think don’t get highlighted as often as maybe restaurants do, but are really core and essential parts of a community business,” Byun said.

Byun’s own history with Koreatown also makes the neighborhood an especially fitting place to start.

His family immigrated to the South Bay from Korea in 2002, when he was 6. He remembers coming to Koreatown with his parents on the weekends for Korean meals and grocery trips.

Byun still thinks of the neighborhood as a second home for Korean immigrants, while appreciating how its community has grown more diverse.

“I’m just really happy to see it become a really beloved neighborhood,” he said.

The market is also giving back locally. Hats sold at the event will benefit the Koreatown Youth and Community Center, Byun said.

And this may not be a one-time run. If Saturday goes well, organizers hope to bring Friends & Family Flea back to Koreatown on a monthly basis. They also plan to offer discounted vendor fees to Koreatown residents.

“I feel like there was so much opportunity for us to really hone in and create something more hyperlocal and also really embed ourselves in the community as well,” Byun said.

When I lived in the UK, I worked on a BBC television show about birding. It was a strange experience as I couldn’t exactly book guests — “Hello Mr. Sparrow, could you be on location for an interview at 2 p.m.?”

So instead I spent a lot of time with the crew climbing up mountains with a large tripod on my shoulder. Did you know there’s a bird in the Scottish Highlands whose plumage turns white in winter to blend in with the snow? (It’s called a ptarmigan. Don’t pronounce the p.)

But it did mean I was attuned to British bird calls. I could hear something and pronounce solemnly: “Ah yes, that’s a lark. And that one's a chaffinch."

Moving to LA meant learning a new set of bird calls

When I moved to the U.S., however, it was a whole other story. I really didn’t recognize any of the bird calls. They were all so different. I just shrugged and figured they were part of the backdrop. But one day recently, a woman told me about a free app and said it was life-changing. "Hmm, I’ll see about that," I thought.

Merlin bird app

It’s called Merlin, from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, and it’s kind of like Shazam for bird calls. As in, you click it, and it tells you what bird song you can hear around you. When I opened it in my backyard for the first time, a whole orchestra of bird sounds opened up around me. I admit: it was kind of life-changing.

Of course it first picked up a crow, which I know only too well, given its loud, raucous sound. But then it identified a house finch. Huh. Who knew they were in my backyard? And as I listened closely, I realized … I knew that sound! It’s the first thing I hear when I wake up at dawn, lovely and melodic.

The house finch, awakening the day.

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Cornell Lab of Ornithology | Macaulay Library

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So now when I open my eyes in the morning, I say, "Good morning, house finch, communing with fellow beings alive on a vibrant California morning!" It kicks off my day, although I guess I’ve been reading too much Mary Oliver.

The backyard birds you're probably hearing right now

But then other birds I didn’t know would pop up on my phone during the day, with names as intriguing as their calls: the spotted towhee, the orange-crowned warbler, or Cassin’s kingbird.

I mean, they do realize they’re in a backyard in Los Angeles, not some estate in Georgian England? My favorite for a while was the dark-eyed junco. Now we’re talking romantic heroes. Imagine him slyly popping across the apple tree limbs to call to you. Dark-Eyed Junco, at your service.

Dark-eyed junco, at your service.

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Cornell Lab of Ornithology | Macaulay Library

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Meet Swinhoe's white-eye, a non-native bird spreading across SoCal

And then there’s Swinhoe’s white-eye. Which sounds a little like an eye ailment, but there you go. It’s a tiny bright yellow bird with a white ring around each eye. So cute! I first noticed them when there were a bazillion of them in a tree outside my house. It was such an unusual sight that I mentioned it to a woman walking her dog, and we stood there, oohing and aahing, until we both realized we’d oohed a little too much, and it was time to go.

Swinhoe's white-eyes are not native to SoCal, but are thriving.

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Cornell Lab of Ornithology | Macaulay Library

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When I researched them, I was surprised to find they’re not native to SoCal. They’re actually pretty new to the area. There were just a handful in Orange County 20 years ago, probably having been brought over from Asia as pets and escaped. And now, they’re thriving and have spread everywhere from Baja to San Luis Obispo. Who knows where they’ll end up next? If anyone sees a chartreuse cutie in New York, let me know. It'll probably be very tired.

Yes, you can see I’ve become slightly annoying with my newfound bird interest. I’ll be asking my family what they want for dinner, and I’ll say, “Wait, is that the spotted towhee?” and turn to my phone, and my teenager will wrest it out of my hand and say, “Mom, be in the present!” Which is right. But my morning serenade as the birds come online one by one and greet the new day — well, that’s as present as you can be.

Walk through the automatic doors at the Carson Library and you’ll see on your left a 1973 painting called "Dominoes" by John Riddle.

Riddle, a prominent Black artist, has worked in the L.A. County Museum of Art and the Brooklyn Museum, and has been collected by Jesse Jackson and Roberta Flack.

Riddle's work was previously owned by the Golden State Mutual Life Insurance Company in West Adams. Over two decades, the company’s art director, William Pajaud, an L.A. artist himself, carefully collected hundreds of pieces of Black art. Each piece in the collection, Pajaud said, would be a chapter telling the story of African Americans in the U.S. The collection included oil paintings, watercolors, and sculptures in clay, wood and metal.

When Golden State Mutual Life Insurance shut down, the company sold most of the best pieces at a private auction in 2007, with some selling for hundreds of thousands of dollars. L.A. County was able to acquire about 120 works, including Riddle's piece.

To keep the works accessible to the public and free of charge, county officials chose four public libraries and three community centers to show the work. Earlier this year, the county arts department created a new website with a map to make them easier to find. The locations include the Golden State Mutual historic building in West Adams, plus:
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Libraries

• Carson Library (Carson)
• A.C. Bilbrew Library (Willowbrook)
• Masao W. Satow Library (Gardena)
• View Park Bebe Moore Campbell Library (View Park/Windsor Hills)
  

Community centers:

• Curtis Tucker Behavioral Health Center Health Services (Inglewood)
• Willowbrook Senior Center Aging and Disabilities (Willowbrook)
• Mark Ridley-Thomas Behavioral Health Center Health Services (on the Martin Luther King, Jr. Medical Campus).

“All of these are county-owned spaces that are available, accessible to the public and to patrons to be able to live with the works, learn about the works, see the works, learn about the works,” said Kristin Sakoda, director of the Los Angeles County Department of Arts and Culture.

Dominoes by John Riddle. The painting was part of the Golden State Mutual Life Insurance collection but is now part of the Los Angeles County Civic Art Collection.

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Adolfo Guzman-Lopez/LAist

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As you walk past the checkout desk at the Carson Library, toward the teen section, you’ll see another remarkable piece from the county’s holdings. It’s a two-foot-tall sculpture made from one piece of mahogany. It’s called "The Embrace" by artist Elizabeth Catlett, whose work is in the collection of New York’s Museum of Modern Art, among many other institutions. Catlett depicted two people hugging, their faces and bodies fused together, their eyes looking at the viewer.

Detail of El Abrazo (The Embrace) by Elizabeth Catlett.

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Adolfo Guzman-Lopez/LAist

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In the auction catalogue for the Golden State Collection, Catlett wrote: “I still work figuratively, trying to express emotion through abstract form, color, line, and space. I attempt to reach out to ordinary people who have little or no experience or understanding of art principles, and extend to them what I may feel about a subject."

Ancestral Fragments by Stanley Wilson.

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Adolfo Guzman-Lopez/LAist

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Meanwhile at A.C. Bilbrew Library, north of Compton, there’s a piece by Charles White, who lived in L.A. County for decades and mentored many artists in the region. His paintings and drawings in the 1960s took on the issues of the Black Civil Rights Movement, and that led well-known Black Americans like Nat King Cole and Eartha Kitt to buy his art.

County officials are hopeful that the communities around these neighborhoods enjoy the art’s benefits, including “mental health, in our education, our youth development, our sense of inclusion and belonging,” Sakoda said.