May 5, 2016 was a highly eventful day for East Los Angeles College that shook the community and brought more conflict rather than bringing ELAC together, and becoming more in touch with the surrounding communities. The day consisted of the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the newly constructed buildings and quad, the Taste of ELAC, which was a walk-around food samplings provided by participating clubs of ELAC, the opening day for the CCCAA State Championships for the Women's Swim and Diving team, the Bracero Mariachi Opera show, and, lastly, the event that, sadly, completely captured and seized all media, and community attention, Democratic Presidential Candidate Hillary Clinton's visit, however it felt more like a rally.

During the ribbon-cutting ceremony there were many speakers, but protesters came and stood in front of the audience with posters and banners calling for a resource center for undocumented students. The speakers with a microphone, along with the audience, shouted over the protesters, disqualified their statements, and told them to leave. I do not know how the protesters left, but their march came around to the Taste of ELAC, which was happening at the same time as the ribbon-cutting ceremony. The march continued onward, and then forced by sheriffs to move to the free speech area, but would eventually join in with the protests against Hillary Clinton. Everyone should have respect to ceremonies, especially for one that is welcoming a new environment for ELAC students. The new constructions are great additions to the campus, however, it is strange that a college that prides itself in community, and bringing immigrant families higher in society through education, would disqualify and do away with students that are undocumented. The school should have a resource center for undocumented students, as well as a resource center for LGBT students, and all the other groups on campus that can be at any moment not continuing their education.

The Taste of ELAC was a buffet provided by participating clubs of ELAC. For $10, a person could try a sampling of food, and no club could serve the same thing. There were many options such as hot dogs, pork buns, cupcakes, churro sundaes, Chinese food, and only two vegan options. I am Secretary of the Community Advocates for Health Empowerment, a new club at ELAC started by my sister, Nicole Mendoza. CAHE served homemade healthy vegan Empanadas of either pumpkin (made by President Nicole) or mole with vegetables(made by myself), and homemade Paletas of either watermelon and chili, lemon and cucumber, banana and coconut milk, and hibiscus (made by Vice President Vanessa Santana). I did not get the other club's name, but they were serving fruit, so a friend was able to get me a plate, and that was my lunch. The event went incredibly well, and CAHE had a incredible time talking with the community, and serving a vegan option in ELAC's food desert. My sister started the club for people who want to begin taking back their health, and learn how to cook healthy foods, as well as reach out to all of the community, especially vegans because they are the most neglected in terms of food, and to serve them nutritious organic food. Such an incredible event, there was even people dancing to the point where the DJ played dance songs that almost everybody knows. I have never seen the community so happy eating, dancing, and enjoying themselves; I certainly enjoyed myself. Taste of ELAC is such a perfect way to bring the community together, and should be organized every semester.

After the Taste of ELAC, my sister, a new friend Regina, and I walked over to the Men's Gym in which the rally and speech by Hillary Clinton would be held. The line to the door was insanely long (about half a mile, maybe more), and there was one person I saw being arrested. Thanks to a connection of Regina, we were able to skip the line and head near to the front of the line. Walking toward the front, I did not recognize anyone in line. In fact, they were all strangers to ELAC from different communities, especially from Cerritos. Demographically, there were many old, white supporters for Hillary that have no ties to ELAC. One cool thing is I got to hug the man from the Free Hugs Movement. We entered the gym in basic airport security protocol, which was the simple empty pockets and walk through a metal detector. We sat in the bleachers straight to the left of the podium and lectern, and under Hillary's huge wall poster. We heard about the protests that were said to take place, but I did not see any happening while I was in line. However, I got in the gym fairly early, and once I came home, and onto Facebook, I saw that the protests were happening, and protesters were marching. My group entered around 2:30 p.m., but the speeches did not begin until about 4 p.m.. During the idle time, there was many staff members handing out posters, and singing chants of Hillary for the impatient. The staff was also looking out for potential protesters, and taking steps to ensure protesters did not get any spotlight. About two rows behind us, the staff placed three old men next to a woman who was believed to be a protester. The staff and the three old men came to an agreement that if the woman try to shout anything against Hillary the three old men would begin shouting "Hillary! Hillary!" in order to drown out the voice of the woman, essentially overpowering her voice. Also, the crowd consisted of many old white strangers, but the people on sitting on-stage behind Hillary were very diverse in ethnicity. All of this we heard and saw within our vicinity. The event began with several speakers including Marvin Martinez, president of ELAC, and Mayor of Los Angeles Eric Garcetti. They all praised Hillary Clinton as president, even though the ELAC students are very pro-Bernie Sanders, but the audience was not made up of students. In fact, a huge number of students were not allowed to go inside the gym because of simple Bernie Sanders attire. And I believe students, and professors, were the least in attendance. The most in attendance were police, secret service, and strangers.

From the moment Hillary Clinton stepped into the gym and stepped out after doing her speech, and taking selfies, it could not have been more than 40 minutes. And, Hillary's selfies took longer than her speech. From the beginning of her speech to the end, and even said by earlier speakers, there was criticisms made solely against Donald Trump. Hillary Clinton, nor any of the other speakers, even said Bernie Sander's name. The whole rally was being treated as if Hillary was the only democratic candidate. There were in total four protesters that were escorted out by sheriffs, two of which became rough. One happened on the railing to Hillary's left side, and the women was pulled out of the crowd, and pushed out of the gym by sheriffs. The other happened directly to my left, a woman began shouting in protest of what Hillary said, took out a cloth piece with words written and began to wave it. Not even a second passed when a Clinton supporter grabbed the cloth piece and the two women began pushing each other that also shook a couple of the people near. We were not harmed in any way. A sheriff had came by and took the woman protesting out of the gym, but not the Clinton supporter. Hillary at one point said, "We need to stop yelling at each other and begin doing some actual work." But in the same moment, a protester was yelling, and so Hillary became louder herself, along with the audience, and yelling was going both ways with the protester being escorted out. Protesters were overpowered by the audience, and you could hear three old men shouting nothing but "Hillary! Hillary!" at the same moments, and all while Hillary was doing her speech. Hillary's speech was short, boring, and criticized only Trump. She did not want to recognize the students of ELAC, and I saw a candidate for president smiling as the protesters were being escorted out.

We stayed until Hillary exited, and by that time most of the gym had left. On the path back to campus, huge amounts of protesters were shouting a lot of horrible things about Hillary, and her supporters. I am a huge Bernie supporter and I did not like being shouted at, bombarded with posters, and made to do a "walk of shame," and neither did any of Hillary's supporters. A woman in front of me was shouting back at the protesters because of the amount of anger she must have gotten for walking that path. One cool thing is I got another hug from the Free Hugs Movement man.

Arriving back onto campus felt bizarre as I almost forgot I was even at ELAC. I had never seen so many protesters and police walking around each other and through the campus. On an eventful day that could have been toward building the community, instead conflicts ensued. Many of the events had been scheduled and advertised for weeks, but the Hillary rally was only brought to ELAC's attention, including faculty, this past weekend via Facebook. Did President Marvin Martinez also found out via Facebook? I do not know.

There is a lot we can learn from such a day. ELAC has the drive to let our voices be heard against those that overpower us. We need to learn how to organize better so as in order to have student representation inside of the gym, and not on the outside. If it is as simple as changing attire, then change your attire because directing anger and frustrations directly to Hillary on the inside would have made more effect, than shouting at her supporters on the outside. And, with a population of almost over 40,000 students, why could we not have done both protest on the outside, and student representation on the inside? Because of timing? maybe, but then we must learn that we can not rely on ELAC's social media platforms, nor can we rely on those who higher up to give us an announcement weeks, even months, ahead of time. We have to come together to figure out our true power as students which I believe has the potential to shut the entire event down, and Hillary would never have been able to walk on that podium.