“I’ve been in the West End all of my life. I moved out for about two years and moved back; I missed it. For most people, the West End is all negative, but for me it’s the culture great. This where everything started. We get a negative image but there’s a lot of positive things going on. 

My music makes me the happiest. My dad did music and I’m picking up right where he left off. Actually, me and friends do it together. We all live in the West End, as a matter of fact. We just did a show at Shawnee Park and we were getting all positive feedback. The group’s called Ganja Boys. We rap and we’re a collective. We have people doing a lot of different things. We have somebody that takes photos and somebody that does music. We even have someone doing fashion. We’re just trying to come up in the best way possible. 

I feel most creative when I have good vibes, good energy and nothing but positivity around me. It just puts me in a good mood to do positive things. It’s a blessing to me and I just want to take that blessing and bless other people with it. 

I feel like the West needs more support. Instead of building all of these hotels and building up downtown, they need to fix the West. There needs to be more programs for the kids, so they can be in tune with their talents and not focus on the bad things. We can do more beautiful things if we just pay more attention to it. 

Whenever you feel down and when someone tells you that you can’t do something, focus all of that negative energy and prove them wrong and do positive things.” - Ben, Shawnee