We dedicate this edition to our interns, who, as Kate (CERI’s Clinical Director) sees it, are five forces who have enlarged our community:

Allison (“with her calm, grounded, insightful and thoughtful essence”); Jeannia (“with their infectious energy to jump right in”); Irazema (“who is able to hold intense feelings of joy and pain with serenity”); Tiff (“with her natural leadership and deep listening skills”); and Roberta (“with her quiet determination, kindness and reflective character”).

Mona (CERI’s Founder & Executive Director) sees/hears their contributions through music:

“J, you have touched our lives with your saxophone; Allison, with your flute; Irazema, with your oboe; Roberta, with your cello, and Tiffany, with your violin. Your music will forever stay with us.”

JEANNIA (New Haven, CT)

Having heard your peers’ internship stories, how has your experience at CERI compare? As a graduate student, you’re enrolled into a system of power, folded into the violence of systems of medicine and metal health care. At CERI, it’s been incredible. We are not tools. Political or cultural compromises that other students may be pressured to make at other places, I don’t have to make here. 

Got a good CERI story? There are so many! I’m helping to facilitate Holding Sotha and am consistently struck by the kindness of everyone there. One day we were on an outing and I brought out my queer identity. Everyone was like, “That’s really great.” One person later came over, gave me a hug and said, “We love you and you’re amazing just the way you are.”

The world has so much to learn from them about how to think about care and giving space to difference and diversity, how to respect and honor each other’s experience. They endure so much marginalization and oppression yet the kindness and compassion they show utterly defies how they’ve been treated by the world at large. Where do we go to learn that kindness? I’m learning it from this community. 

What’s next? I want to continue learning with our communities, learning how to build sincere forms of care and power in the world. 

ROBERTA (Fremont, CA)

What didn’t you expect to find at CERI? Before my internship, I’d been at CERI for two years as a Wellness in Action (WiA) grantee and then as an outreach worker. That experience was part of why I went back to grad school. Patricia (WiA’s former director) even wrote my grad school recommendation. CERI has shown me how this work can be done grounded in community. 

Interns are folded in so closely. I didn’t expect to be so warmly accepted and welcomed, especially in the women’s group, so integrated into a community other than my own. My parents came to the US from the Philippines around the same time as many of CERI’s community elders did. The act of eating together on the floor after the women’s group takes me back to my time in the Philippines, where people live really live close to the land. My own ancestral and political journey has been sparked and awakened by being at CERI. 

What will you take from CERI? A refusal to compromise who am and assimilate. CERI’s spirit of vision and creativity to integrate all parts of ourselves, never having to compromise your humanity…so many institutions aren’t built with us in mind or the things we want to build and heal. 

What’s next ? I graduate in August and plan to return to the Bay Area/East Bay to continue serving the Filipino community and working-class immigrant and refugee communities.

IRAZEMA (South Los Angeles)

How’d you get to CERI? It was all by chance. In the middle of the summer, the person who was going to be my supervisor at another placement resigned. The Powers that Be placed me exactly where I need to be. For my field seminar sessions with my school peers, who are placed in internships all over the country, I join with joy and gratitude for the CERI community and staff. Sadly, in a lot of placements, people had difficult relationships. CERI understands that, no matter who are, your educational background, you bring a lot of insight to the community. My peers don’t.  

Name a memorable CERI event. One of the first gatherings that will forever live in my mind was when we participated in the Cambodia ancestral gathering that began with monk prayer and dance. I remember feeling like I was in a dream to be able to engage with community with so much joy and love. Am I getting credit for this? To dance, eat and celebrate in community? No one else has the opportunity to celebrate with community like CERI does. To center joy and community, even when life presents horrible situations, is so powerful. It energizes me to hold space and community with love and tenderness. 

What can one expect at CERI? The beauty of CERI is, because it’s such a welcoming and loving space, you enter disarmed in a way you can’t do in so many other places, especially as people of color when you always have to have your guard up. With CERI, there’s an opportunity to enter with tenderness and vulnerability. You don’t have to hide who are to be received and accepted. That’s the most precious gift that CERI gives to everyone. 

What’s next? I have another year so I’m coming back! I want to do more to heal the trauma of conquest and trauma and capitalism. 

TIFFANY (New Jersey)

How’d you get to CERI? I started in the youth program, trying to find ways to get connected, since I’d just moved here by myself. I’d seen on Facebook that CERI was offering green jobs training. I’d shared with Roger and Zeena that I was going to be placed somewhere I didn’t want to go for my social work internship, and they connected me with Kate, who I hit it off with immediately. She’s also from New York and we both talk fast! It was serendipitous from the very beginning. I’d also lived in Cambodia for a few years…there were just so many things aligning. 

Anything particular happening at CERI that you share with your graduate program ? This is a common conversation I have with the other interns. Being at CERI feels like it’s too good to be true. When is someone going to pinch me? 

CERI feels warm like a home, chaotic like a family. From the very beginning, interacting with the elders and the community…there was so much love. People asking my name, how I am, where I’m from. Us sitting down, cutting mangoes together. When you enter a room and someone comes up and gives you a hug because you’ve built a relationship…I wish more people could experience a situation like this. I feel safe to learn. 

When am I gonna get pinched? 

What’s next ? I’m a three-year program with another year left. Hopefully, I’ll be able to go to medical school and pursue some sort of healing work around intergenerational trauma in immigrant and diasporic communities. I want to reimagine what mental health care policy can look like. 

ALLISON (Sacramento)

What continues to thrill or excite you about CERI? CERI is really responsive to the needs the community expresses. In my prior experiences with other nonprofits, I didn’t see the same flexibility or responsiveness hold community members so lovingly. 

Is there a gap between what you’ve learned in school and what you’ve experienced at CERI? There’s a difference between academics and direct service. School provides good scaffolding but you have to learn by doing it. School has given me a bird’s eye view of systems and CERI allows me to exercise different approaches that maybe I wasn’t introduced to in school.

What advice would you give someone about to spend time at CERI? It’s ok to make mistakes and ask for help. Perfectionism, individualism and “pull yourself up by your boot straps” thinking is embodied in our culture. At CERI, you have other people to count on. Let yourself be ok with that, be flexible and open to other opportunities, be introspective and know your own boundaries. People will meet you where you are but you have to be open to making the ask. Be gentle with yourself as you make that transition.

What’s next? I hope to continue addressing the gap between public health and social welfare, ensuring that these communities have more access to care and opportunities to thrive.