I was born in Mexico City. We moved to the United States when I was 12. I was very sad and scared the first few years. I didn’t want any of it. I wanted to go back to the life I had envisioned growing up. I wanted the natural sequence to continue. I was supposed to start la escuela secundaria the year we immigrated. I was robbed.

It was 1980. We lived in San Rafael where my mom’s brothers had opened a restaurant sometime in the 70s. It was the fifth of several restaurants my family opened under the guidance of my mom’s aunt Celia starting in San Francisco in 1960.

I missed Mexico so much. I guess I was lucky to have family living here already. Half of my mother’s siblings lived in Mexico and half lived in the San Francisco Bay Area. I loved going to my cousins’ houses and speaking Spanish with them. And eating the same food my family made in Mexico. That was nice. And then the people who worked at the restaurant where both my parents worked all spoke Spanish. As well as some of the customers. That was nice too.

The problem was school. My two younger brothers integrated much quicker than I did. It took me longer to learn English. They were in elementary school. I was in middle school. 7th grade. I hated not being able to learn English as quickly as my brothers did. I hated my accent. I hated not understanding people. I hated not being able to talk to people. I wanted to go back to Mexico. I was so angry. I was robbed. What was the point of all this? What were my parents thinking?

I remember the first time my parents took me to the Mission District in San Francisco.

We parked in a narrow street. There was music coming out of a window on the second floor of some house. Then the radio DJ came on speaking Spanish sounding just like the radio I was used to hearing coming out of windows in Mexico. And then another familiar song. We walked to a bigger street. Wider. Busier. Full of people selling things on the street. Lots of people walking on the sidewalks.

24th Street.

It felt familiar. It didn’t feel like Mexico. It didn’t look like Mexico. But with all the Spanish music coming from virtually every business, with all the people speaking in Spanish, some with strange accents shouting who knows what…a store full of piñatas. Fresh fruit and vegetables on display at various stores. And taquerias everywhere. Mexican restaurants offering the same food as the food you would get at restaurants in Mexico. It looked the same, it tasted the same, it smelled the same. Milanesas. Costillitas. Tortillas. Tacos de lengua. Frijolitos. Carnitas. Horchata. The same. Still, it wasn’t Mexico, but it was comforting. It was very, very nice. Though it messed with my mind.

Going to Librería México to pick up the latest Condorito. Or Mafalda. Going to Discolandia and buying a record, or a cassette. Music blasting from the speakers at the door. Little by little discovering different types of music such as salsa, oldies, chicano rock, cumbia… opening my world to the Latino culture. The culture of the Mission. La Misión.

These visits slowly helped me go from Mexicano de México, to Mexican, to Latino, to beaner, to wetback, to Raza...and everything in between. The many ways people labeled me. The many ways I labeled myself. It helped me discover, understand, and embrace my metamorphosis from Mexicano to Latino. La Misión was my capullo, my cocoon.

We would go a few times a year. The visits slowed down eventually. I graduated from high school, focused on college, life got busy. I would go to the Mission at night after clubbing somewhere in the City. 3:00am. Farolito. Dos de lengua, uno de cabeza, uno de carnitas. Drunken nights. Margaritas at La Rondalla. Drunk. And afterwards… 3:00am. Farolito. Dos de lengua, uno de cabeza, uno de carnitas. Little Baobab. Dance. Drink. Sol y Luna. Cesar’s Latin Palace… and afterwards, 3:00am. Farolito. Dos de lengua, uno de cabeza, uno de carnitas.

I love the way the Mission saw me grow up on sunny days when I was little, and how it saw me throw up in the middle of the night in my twenties.

And then I ended up with Papalote. In the Mission. On 24 th Street. It’s been 26 years since we opened in 1999. A block or two away from Farolito. What did happen? It’s so surreal.

Fast forward to a few years ago when I opened La Snackería, which I had to close after a couple of years because it didn’t go as I thought it would. I failed. 24 th and Mission, the heart of the Mission District. Street food, tortas, salads, Mexican nostalgia candy, Chaparritas, Sabritas… nope. Not its time.

La Snackería was a block or two from Papalote, so I would spend my time walking back and forth checking out Papalote, checking out La Snackería. Back and forth.

A block makes a heck of a difference in the Mission. A block is the difference between the Tijuana vibe on Mission Street and the vibe on Valencia Street, one of the most gentrified streets in the City.

One of the things I enjoyed the most about the location of La Snackería was that it was the first business you saw as you came out of BART (our subway) on this side of the 24 th and Mission station. This side of the station is a wide plaza where vendors would set up to sell belts, cobijas, hats, food, coffee, fruit. All kinds of stands. And then there were the special seasonal events where the lowrider club would park several cars there on the plaza and showcase them. There were concerts. Dance events. Afro-Cuban, Yucateco, hiphop… all kinds of dance. That BART plaza was a true community center for the longest time. Decades. Before Papalote and La Snackería I would only get to see these events once a year or so, if that… if I happened to be in the City, in the Mission, when one of these events was going on. But now that I owned La Snackería I got to see something cool every other weekend.

One of my favorite things to see at the plaza was when the Aztec dancers would set up at the corner and they would dance to the beat of the quintessential drummer, with the dancers shaking the shells tied to their ankles with every barefoot step. Incense (copal) burning.

At this point in my life the Mission had become the main reason for my stress, my worries, my fears, my drinking, my depression, my anger. I had two businesses in the Mission and they were not doing so good. Papalote to Snackería, back and forth. Snackería to Papalote. Anguish. Angst. The fear and the pain of imminent failure.

One evening I was at La Snackería and I heard the Aztec Dancers there at the corner and I went to see them, and I just stood there, watching the drummer. I began studying his face. His eyes. There he was, drumming away, leading his students with his drum, working them into a trance. His face barely moved. But his eyes saw everything. He was aware of his dancers. He was aware of the families walking by. He was aware of the drunk walking in front of him stopping momentarily and then walking away. He saw everything. He judged everything. He forgave everyone. He sanctified that corner. He blessed those who were present. He drew us all in with his beat. He catalogued. His eyes moved wisely. Forgivingly. Lovingly. This was his stage. This was his church. This was his temple. And we were all there to worship the moment and take it in. Mindfulness. And he had been doing this for decades.

After seeing him a few times I got to know his face well. And I found comfort in his expression. And it took me back to when I was little and saw the dancers in Mexico in Chapultepec, or at el Zócalo, or some festival somewhere. Before I got robbed. Before Mexico became a distant memory that I’ve tried to hang on to with all my love and power. And anger. Watching him hit his drum as I stood there with La Snackería in the background I began to let go. I began to accept that I control nothing, and that all I can do is try really hard. Work hard. And not give up. Forgive myself. Learn. Live. Breathe.

Eventually I found out he was the owner of the store I always saw on my way back home from the restaurants. It’s a store in the corner of 24th Street and South Van Ness. Driving away from Papalote at 24th and Valencia, past La Snackería at 24th and Mission, and driving in front of his store at 24th and South Van Ness.

Fuckin’ 24 th Street, man. I tell you.

Anyway, the store is Mixcoatl. Lucha libre masks, ponchos, zarapes, arts and crafts. He would often be standing by the door. Talking to people, watching people walk by. When he saw me he would wave and smile. When he didn’t notice me I would roll down the window and shout something to get his attention… “Qué pasotes con los chayotes y esos zapatotes?!” Big laugh. Big wave. “Ahí nos vemos, carnalito!” He spoke my Spanish. He spoke the Spanish I knew when I was not aware of the existence of the San Francisco Bay Area. When I didn’t know the hallways of Davidson Middle School in San Rafael. When I didn’t speak English. When I wasn’t late to turn in a final paper at Dwinelle Hall at U.C. Berkeley. He knew the Mexico I knew when my reality wasn’t torn and distorted.

Sometimes when I drove by his store he had a certain expression on his face that made me pull over and see what was going on with him. We were from the same place, but now somehow, we both had a business or two in San Francisco’s Mission District… on 24 th Street. I cried with him a couple of times. Sometimes I would walk out of Papalote, past La Snackería, past the McDonald’s, and make it to the corner just in time to let the tears roll. And he would comfort me.

Sometimes I would be watching him hitting his drum at the corner with his dancers going all out, with all the people around them. And then he would catch my eye. Eye contact. A five second conversation. A five second lament. A five second connection that filled my spirit and my heart.

All of this until very recently.

Ricardo “El Tigre” Peña passed away in his sleep on Monday, December 8th. Ask me where his spirit is.