Victoria Lo is a designer and senior creative with years of experience in New York City’s running community. Most recently, she started Chinatown Runners as a way of bringing support, awareness and love to protect and preserve the Chinatowns and AAPI-centric neighborhoods in cities across the world. She underscores that this is not a performance team, crew or club but a movement.

As noted on their website: “We run to fill in the gaps that global tourism can’t fill during a worldwide pandemic. We run to keep the streets safer by watching out for the most vulnerable. We run to celebrate the diverse cultural narratives that make our country wonderful.” In this episode, you’ll hear more about what drove her to take action and start this group as anti-Asian hate crimes and violence is on the rise.

Follow Victoria on Instagram:@omgvics

More on Chinatown Runners: https://www.chinatownrunners.com/ | Instagram

Resources: The AAPI Community Fund; Stop AAPI Hate; Save Our Chinatowns;  More here

Mark your calendars for Sunday, March 21 at 10 a.m. at Union Square Park. Follow @runningtoprotest for more information.

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This is Runners of NYC. A biweekly podcast from CITIUS MAG. Hosts Leigh Anne Sharek and Chris Chavez look to bring you many of the untold stories behind luminaries and legends that make up New York City’s running culture. You can catch the latest episode of the podcast on iTunes so subscribe and leave a five-star review. We are also on Spotify!

SHOW NOTES

Taking Action Into Her Own Hands

“I think we underestimate our own individual impact and reach. Small gestures create ripples that turn into waves. That’s kind of the way I like to think about it. That energy that you put forth into the universe and when you direct it appropriately, can come back like a thousandfold. I think this last weekend was a perfect example of everything sort of coming together…It felt like taking everything that happened and figuring out how I could make an impact in my own individual way that made sense to me – as opposed to trying to go into a lane that I don’t necessarily feel like I belong in. I admit I’m not big and intimidating so trying to join those late-night chaperon services for people. I was like, ‘I’m not scary enough or versed in self-defense to be able to be a chaperon. I am not politically savvy enough to really be a political activist. But, I am a runner and I know all these people who also run and want to get behind causes that are larger than themselves.”

What Is Chinatown Runners?

“Chinatown Runners is not a crew and it’s not based in any specific locality. It’s not a crew. It’s a movement. I wanted it to feel bigger than just this one group that really sort of permeated throughout the entire running community worldwide. When you think about it, there are Asian-American Pacific Islander-centric communities all over the world outside of just America and Canada…Every neighborhood and borough has a dozen or so specialized running crews and groups, which is amazing and I don’t want to try to eat anybody’s lunch, but the idea is for it to feel really inclusive. And that’s kind of the reason why I fight hard to say that it’s not a running crew, but it’s a movement. It’s something that everybody, whether on a crew level or an individual level, can partake in the way that they feel the most comfortable with, given the safety concerns with COVID and be in their own individual neighborhoods if they don’t live in New York specifically or they live in a small town that probably does have an Asian-American Pacific Islander community, but it’s not well known or it’s not covered in the news. Those are all important places that also need amplification and support. They don’t get as much visibility in the media. Making it a point to highlight that it’s not a crew and that really all you have to do to tag in is start or end a run in a Chinatown or an Asian-American Pacific Islander neighborhood or business even. Throw up the hashtag and show some love to a community that can really use it right now.”

The tipping point

“Obviously this past year, the vitriol and the sociopolitical climate has been pretty tough to endure as an Asian-American. The tipping point I can pinpoint precisely was literally February 26 on a Friday evening. I was just looking on Instagram to turn my brain off after work and I just remember seeing someone repost that a 36-year-old Asian-American man got stabbed in the back at like 6:00 in the afternoon on like Baxter Street or a major intersection in Manhattan’s Chinatown. 6:00 in the evening is more or less like broad daylight. I just remember the final crack in my heart. Everything literally fell apart. I just was weeping in bed and feeling completely helpless, frustrated, angry and not really knowing how to redirect all of that negativity and energy into something more productive. I was talking to my partner about just how angry and helpless I felt. All he really did was listen and it was just funny because it was like I went from Hour 1 being super traumatized, frustrated, angry and then just continuously looking on Instagram and thinking, ‘God. There’s got to be something I can do.’ I thought more about who do I know and what I can do that makes sense. Well, at least if we could get bodies in these neighborhoods that have been sort of abandoned because of the lack of tourism due to COVID and also the xenophobia that’s been encouraged through the political divide, if we just get people out on the street and just making the Chinatowns more populated again, maybe like crazy shit like this wouldn’t happen. Honestly, if COVID wasn’t around right now, like 6 p.m. and that intersection of Manhattan and Chinatown would have had foot traffic and I highly doubt some random dude could have just come and taken a freakin’ eight-inch kitchen knife and stabbed someone in the back and then just run off. Those sort of outrageous things that just continuously were happening just broke me. I realized, ‘Hey, look, even if we could just make people want to hang out in Chinatown more, that’s more eyes and ears for the communities that live there. We can just be there in numbers to support them. If we can’t physically protect them, we can at least just be around and be a presence. Bring some of that energy back so it doesn’t feel like such a ghost town and these bad actors can’t feel like they can do crazy shit like that and get away with it.”

The Rising Number of Hate Crimes Against Asian Americans

“I think the underreporting is a major issue. I can speak to Chinese American culture. I can’t speak to other Asian-Americans and Pacific Islanders. My parents and my grandparents, and that generation tends to have that belief that you shoulder all of your difficulties and your traumas and challenges on your own. Strong, silent and tight-lipped is a very common theme in older Asian generations, where they may not want to be a burden to their family members. So they’re less likely to reach out and feel ‘I need help’ or ‘Something happened to me.’ I think that plays a huge factor in the ridiculously low crime reporting. 28 seems ridiculous to me. I mean, I have been looked at shady or people have moved away from me in public spaces since COVID happened. Obviously, those smaller microaggressions aren’t on the same level as these violent attacks, but they are the sparks that then make people feel brazen enough to take it a step further. Most Chinese Americans are probably not going to report like being called something offensive or somebody spitting at them or moving away. It’s not until you get these sort of really traumatic incidents where someone is stabbed or pushed down. An elderly Asian woman was set on fire. Those incidents are so traumatic that they have to get reported because other bystanders are capturing it. I would actually be suspect to believe whether or not they would be reported if there weren’t more eyes and ears around. That’s again why I’m just hoping if we can get more people out on the street, they can be the eyes and ears for the community that is pretty much scared even to speak out when things like this happen to them.”

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