What a decade?

A Four Part Blog dedicated to PrYSM; 10 Years of Peace, Love, and Justice!!

Part I

What a decade? 10 years of ”Peace, Love, & Power” has gone by right before us. Is there something we’re missing besides the fact that it’s been that long already. Do we really have time to reflect upon what has been done when our road to a brighter future just began to pave out in front of us. This unimaginable burden has now been placed on our shoulders after we said farewell to our leader, for now at least. This challenge is something we made an oath to get rid of. By striving steady and working hard since day one as a community, as people under the same hope of changing the world one day at a time. To me it feels like we’re all just getting started…

I’ve only been a part of this colossal movement for about 2 and a half years now. The impact it has had on me was dramatically outrageous in a good way. I think it’s safe to say it has had a similar impact to others who have encountered PrYSM, and the impact could be far greater than it has had on me- but that’s just me sharing my deepest thoughts.

We’ve come a long way, from tackling issues that we see as very problematic within our neighborhoods from South Side to the heart of the West End District. We have fought against deportation. Having to leave your family behind whether male or female, sometimes a child is something to discuss immediately especially if there’s a chance of saving some one’s family for their sake.

S.E.A. Brunch;After the 10th Anniversary Celebration, PrYSM invited our friends to brunch to discuss the last ten years of our work, their work, and the nation's work.

We take immigration policies and issues with a great interest. Taking a caravan hundreds of miles from Rhode Island to Arizona just to show how much these issues really do affect us; whether it doesn’t necessarily targets us as an individual. But who says we can’t imagine the emotional strain it has on people who really get singled out by these laws.

So I would like to think speaking from a member in an organization perspective, that as long as there are things conflicting with the lives of people who make up our community, your community,  we will always fend off these bad entities that destroy the core meaning of what a community stands for. 10 years of ”Peace, Love, Power” and running for another decade, century, maybe even a millennium all because of this world that we live in needs change now, and we’re just a few of numerous activists, sisters, brothers, and children who have taken the initiative into making this dream a reality. So when I reflect upon what has happened over the last decade I say “What a decade!‘”

To be continued.

-Suthpha Muth

How Are You? My Thoughts on PrYSM’s Transition

Thoughts on Change/ Thoughts on our Transition

How are you? I think this is one of the most common starts to a formal and detailed conversation that we all use more than half of the time.  But today ‘’how are you?’’ means where are we, are we actually fine, and are we ready to mold and craft our future ahead of time? Hi there I’m Suthpha or to make it easy for both of us, you can call me Soup. I’m 18 and I’ve been a proud youth-activist working, campaigning, and striving with a non-grassroots organization named PrYSM.

Sam and I at the Y4C Mayoral candidates forum

About a little over a year and a half now I’ve witnessed quite the momentum shift in the direction PrYSM has taken. Some of us thought staff changes and transitioning without them would be an issue hard to deal with. Some of the more optimistic ones were leaning towards this is our chance to prove everyone else wrong. So why do we all have to fall if our feet were already planted in enriched soil that we nurtured and took care for? Why would they give the cold shoulder to a place some of us call home, a sanctuary where PEACE&LOVE was accounted for everything it meant to us as a whole? Seems like everybody is on the same page but are reading different books.

A moment of silence is only supposed to last for a moment, right? This took a while to deal with. But once the silence was interrupted by a herd of young voices, filled with emotions and filled with pride we all took a leap of faith.  Doing so we realized something and thought, “where do we begin?” Formulating a plan upon where to go is difficult when you cannot foresee where you are now. But with risk comes chance and we used this chance until we could no more. True colors started to illuminate the possibility of continuing on and we made sure to draw our own silver linings if we ever encountered cloudy days.

Within a couple of months since our staggering days have passed, our progress has been slow to be quite frank. But at the same time other things were moving at the same pace of a speeding bullet. Leadership was one of those things spreading like wildfire, burning through a gasoline drenched forest. This was all worth it, especially after losing two of our leaders that kept us strong in the dimmest of light or lowest of times. We found a way to face all of these obstacles and come out clean, refreshed and a whole lot more than what we were before. I’m proud to say sometimes that when you lose, you have so much more to gain, so much more to earn and you realize what parts of you need tuning when you’re not running at your best. So if you ask me, us, or PrYSM we’ll tell you wait until you get a load of us now.

Here are some pictures of our office!

conference room

youth leaders room

staff office

study room

Some of these people who made this happen – who saw the cup half full and who made it happen – are Jonathan Acquino, Danny Ram, Channy Neou, Grandpa Voeul, Chanravy Proeung, the new leaders of SOUL (Vina, Allex, Tina, Daniel, Damery), I could go on and on, but ALL of the PrYSM volunteers who do not get paid for the work they do, and do over the top work.

group shot after the drag show