On Jan. 21, 11 people were killed and nine wounded in a massacre during Lunar New Year celebrations in Monterey Park, California. The mass shooting is now the worst in Los Angeles County’s history. Two days later, four people were killed and one other was seriously wounded in a shooting at the Mountain Mushroom Farm in Half Moon Bay. The gunman in that shooting then drove to a different farm that was nearby and killed another three people.

Multiple Asian American groups in Boston hosted a candlelight vigil at the Lion Gateway on Saturday, January 28. Groups included The Chinese American Citizens Alliance Boston Lodge, the Chinese American Heritage Foundation, Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association of New England, with sixty (60) Massachusetts organizations and religious leaders joined legend Tuskegee Airman and Congressional Gold Medal recipient General Enoch O’Dell “Woody” Woodhouse II. The vigil was held to stand in solidarity with Monterey Park, Half Moon Bay, Duxbury, Massachusetts, and Memphis Tennessee. Organizers sent heartfelt condolences to the families and the communities of the eighteen (18) victims who lost their lives in Monterey Park and Half Moon Bay, California. The vigil included prayers for Tyre Nichols (Memphis) and Cora, Dawson & Callan Clancy (Duxbury); all victims of violence. 

“We come here today in prayer, but we also come together to resolve that an attack on anyone really is an attack on everybody,” said Boston City Council President Ed Flynn. The Mistress of Ceremony, Linda Champion of the Korean American Citizens League, quoted poet John Keene who wrote after The Pulse massacre, “We are the silence that always remembers. We are the song that never ends.”