Trần Hoàng Oanh in Info

Writing on the Wall

I live and work in a small, relatively pleasant town. If I had to describe it, I would say that everyone’s grass here is the same beautiful shade of green. Until recently, I could only dream of being part of this community again. For over two decades I was incarcerated for a crime I did not commit. And although I’ve only been out for a while, I have come to embrace this place as my home, because I choose to see the beauty in things rather than their imperfections. Focusing on the negative would only turn the whole thing ugly.

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Now that I’m out, I’ve noticed that everywhere I go, people stare. I’m a forty-year-old Hispanic man, and I’m covered in tattoos: “ALL EYES ON ME” across my jawline; “DAMNED IF I DO—DAMNED IF I DON’T” on both sides of my head; “I PLEAD THE FIFTH” above my forehead. My tattooed face makes it easy for others to guess or assume things about me, although I admit that some of their assumptions are probably right. It isn’t until they get to know my story and how I got here that the tattoos become almost invisible and irrelevant.

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Last year, while walking downtown with my daughter, I noticed something spray-painted too close to a mural. I knew from the roman numerals, along with the style and the color, that this was someone’s gang-related way of claiming their turf. On our way back home, I spotted more of the same—graffiti near the school, on the side of a church, a dumpster, and a few wooden fences. In less than a minute I had identified these marks. I had also passed judgment and felt a level of disdain, hypocritically perhaps. This is a nice town, I kept thinking. Why would anybody want to do that here?

In the early 2000s, the movie Gone in 60 Seconds came out, and it was a huge hit, at least in the Southern California subculture I was part of: Mexicans in oversized pants, with shaved heads, tattoos, and something to prove. In the movie, a retired car thief, once the most successful in all of California, is forced through extortion to steal fifty luxury vehicles in one night in order to save his younger brother’s life. To fulfill the almost impossible mission, he must first reassemble his old gang. The movie was so influential that stealing cars in under a minute, like the “professionals” in the movie, actually became a trend among people I knew. Everyone wanted to be the best.

I was one of the countless young and impressionable minds of that time, but I was never a big movie watcher. Unlike most kids my age, I was actually out “in the field,” living and experiencing firsthand the kinds of things Hollywood glamorizes on the big screen. So, despite its popularity, I never thought much about this movie until 2002, when I was eighteen. I had just been booked into the Marion County Jail on several assault and attempted murder charges, when Lalo, my very first cellmate, brought it up. He was in for stealing a car (a fact that further corroborates my belief that television and now social media are like knives—they can either cause harm or they can be useful). Because it is almost protocol for any gang member in jail to identify themselves—by their nickname, affiliation, and by presenting their legal paperwork—my affiliation, a simple number and a simple letter, was pretty much the only thing Lalo and I talked about during our first interaction that day. And according to him, that number and letter, the same ones I have tattooed on several parts of my body, the same ones that were mentioned countless times in my legal paperwork, were also visible in one of the film’s early scenes, spray-painted on a utility pole.

Lalo and I quickly became acquainted with each other and learned to coexist. We would tell war stories to pass the time. “Bro!” Lalo would sometimes say. “I wish they would play that movie here on TV so you can see it for yourself. ”

The possibility of my tags appearing in movies had been all the motivation I ever needed, and the chances of that happening seemed greater the more of them I put out there. To some, tagging or spray-painting meant representing. But for me and most of my affiliates, there was another secret goal: to get a little bit of fame by tagging up walls in downtown LA.

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One weekend morning, while channel surfing in the dayroom, Lalo finally got his wish: the movie was playing on TV. I was excited and curious to watch, but more than anything in the film, I wanted to see this tag he had been telling me and everyone else about for months.

Right away, I recognized certain areas, which brought back fond memories and a sense of longing. There was El Trebol restaurant, where my friends and I went to eat and hang out. The stores and old hotels on Main and Broadway. I may never see those streets again, I thought.

And then there it was—the tag that Lalo had been bragging about on my behalf to everyone in that county jail. As soon as it appeared on the screen and I recognized it, butterflies began to flutter in my stomach. The sense of longing and distress I had felt earlier was immediately replaced by a sense of pride and something else that I couldn’t describe. My anxiety seemed to vanish. Questions came flying into my ears as the movie continued: What street is that on? Do you personally know who blasted that tag there? I had achieved my goal. Even more powerful was the fact that everyone was talking about it. At that moment, I actually believed my tag would be there forever, and everyone would always see it—and that felt good.

Tagging, or any form of graffiti, has always been part of human history, and that includes gang members. As silly as it might sound, learning to use a can of spray paint to visibly leave one’s mark is almost a requirement to be part of a gang, in spite of the consequences. I began to leave my mark on buildings, trains, utility poles, and overpasses when I was fourteen years old. That’s when my indoctrination began and I became an official member of a gang. Following in the footsteps of those who came before me and emulating their every move was like second nature to me.

When I was arrested for the first time, I was fourteen, but claimed to be eighteen. After my second or third arrest, I ended up in the LA County Jail. Even there, I continued to do what I did best: leave my mark everywhere I went. One day, while I was using the phone, I also carved my gang affiliation and name into the metal enclosure around the phone. As soon as I put the receiver down, some old-timer approached me, wanting to talk. We sat at a table and he asked me what I had carved. I thought, What’s it to you? But I had some common sense; that old man was well respected. He had spent practically his entire life in prison, and he was more than likely going to spend the rest of it there too.

“I was blasting my hood on that phone,” I told him. He then explained to me a belief he had: that if you leave your mark in jail or prison, you will for sure come back, and that he was living proof of that. Of course, I didn’t believe him until many years later.

Watching the movie only encouraged me to continue leaving my mark, in spite of the consequences or that old-timer’s voice, which was still in my ear, telling me not to. During the six months I was in the county jail, I carved the same number and letter everywhere—doors, windows, light fixtures, telephones, concrete walls, you name it. After it became evident that someone was actively vandalizing the facility, an internal investigation was conducted, and it didn’t take long to determine that it was me. I was indicted on several counts of criminal mischief, destruction of state property, and vandalism.

A couple of months later I went to trial for my original case, and I lost. During the sentencing, the vandalism and criminal mischief charges were brought up in an attempt to enhance my overall sentence. I received the maximum of 280 months, plus an additional year. I was also ordered to pay thousands of dollars in restitution for the damaged property and legal fees. Shortly after, I was shipped off to prison to serve out my sentence. I was now nineteen years old, an adult on paper, but in terms of experience, I was still a baby.

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It took a long time for me to see the real picture; to understand what that old-timer had been trying to tell me; to actually watch the movie for the story itself, and not for my misplaced sense of pride, ownership, or delirious ideas of “fame.” In prison I began to let go of my secret dream of recognition. And eventually, my desire to leave an impression on things by vandalizing and ruining them was dead and gone. In its place, I learned to tattoo, and skin became my canvas, both for telling my own story and for helping others tell theirs.

Looking back, I realize that when I was the one causing harm, more than anything, I was searching for a place in life—in a gang, or anywhere. I thought I wanted to be known and recognized. Now I know I just wanted to be remembered—not forgotten. I see this same desire all around me in my town today, where vandalism and gang activity are common. These problems have always been there, but I couldn’t see them before. Now that I’m no longer part of them, they are more prominent, more noticeable.

Before I was released from prison, I helped create a program called TAG, which is short for Taking Accountability Group. Choosing this acronym was our way of taking some of the warped principles and ideals of the gang lifestyle and turning them into something positive. Now that we’re working in the community, TAG’s ultimate objective is to create a paradigm shift and break negative cycles by helping our youth discover better decision-making tools. It’s powerful to work with young people in this way. Most of us have walked in their shoes, and we understand that there is always more to learn than to teach.

A few months ago my family and I took a trip to Los Angeles. I wanted to show my wife and daughter where it all started for me, and how I went from being an ordinary kid to living life in the streets and then going to prison. As soon as we entered the city, I felt a mix of emotions—nostalgia and confusion. I had promised many times not to go back to my old ways. Returning to my old neighborhood was something I had always fantasized about, but for very different reasons. Early on in my incarceration, I envisioned myself going back and getting the recognition and respect of all my old associates. Everyone embracing me, as if I had gone to war and made it back in one piece. But I had different and better things on my mind this time. I wanted to go and see that “famous tag” on the utility pole from the movie. I was sure that after so many years it wouldn’t be there anymore—but if it was, I intended to make amends by painting over the entire pole if I had to.

Then I was back there on that same street. When I looked around, I saw that not a lot had changed. My tag was gone, but in its absence there were countless others, on every wall around me. In fact, just down the street, next to the Crypto.com Arena, thirty stories of an abandoned luxury apartment building had been tagged up from top to bottom, and it had been a topic of national news. The drugs, violence, addiction, and homelessness were still there too. I realized that the areas where one is certain to see such things are often the areas no one wants to be in. I would love to think that the graffiti on the walls is someone’s way of saying “Hey! I need help. Someone, do something about it.” But maybe something else drives them too. Every form of graffiti has a different reason, a different meaning, behind it.

I know where I have been and where I have left my mark—in prison for a lifetime, on others’ property through graffiti, and on people’s skin with a needle and ink. But even those marks fade away with time. Here in my town, we came up with a proposal to provide free graffiti removal services to residents affected by vandalism. Although putting a bandage on the problem will never make it go away, prevention is key. Talking to the right people and understanding the reasons behind the graffiti are some of the ways we help.

People tag up streets and draw territorial marks for all kinds of reasons, but some seek to create, to inspire, and to convey a message that extends beyond themselves, just like our ancestors have done throughout history. Art expresses what words sometimes can’t. If someone is struggling to speak or express their feelings, an image may be their only way to say “I’m really confused” or “I need help developing my skills.” But there is much more to it than helping people find their voice. It is about taking something that’s seemingly broken and not destroying it, but fixing it. First, though, we have to understand it. We have to see the individual—the person behind the tag.

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