The Oakland boy doesn’t remember hearing the shots fired from two cars engaged in a high-speed gunbattle as his family drove to dinner on a summer evening, cars filling the roadway, the sun high in the sky. He doesn’t remember feeling the bullet hit his face, before taking out his bottom front teeth, breaking his jaw, severing his spinal column and shattering his world.
That night, doctors told the family his injuries were not “compatible with life,” his father, Caesar Luo, said.
But Asa Luo lived. While the boy still has no memory of what happened on I-580 two years ago, he knows that one moment he loved to ride rollercoasters and play soccer, and the next he was paralyzed from the waist down.
He’s 10 now, in many ways a typical fifth grader who plays video games and hangs out with friends. But there are many things Asa can’t do that his peers can: ride a bike, swing on the monkey bars, kick a ball, pick up something that has fallen.
And as for his school’s Halloween parade, his costume options are limited given his mouth-operated wheelchair and other physical constraints. Masks, long flowing fabric, dangling chains or other accessories and anything that could get caught in wheels or block his use of the mechanisms is out.
None of that mattered Friday, not when expert builders made sure Asa had the costume of his dreams: an 11-foot, Hot Wheels MarioKart Red Yoshi Standard Kart, with a red azure roller to chase.
The creation was a life-size replica of a Kart used in the “Mario Kart.” video game, a candy-apple red race car, with blue and white trim, with sleek exhaust pipes out the back. Asa’s version had flames out the pipes.
The jaw-dropping Kart took about eight months to create, with volunteers from the nonprofit Magic Wheelchair designing, crafting and fitting the costume around Asa’s chair before gifting it to the boy.
Asa Luo checks out his Halloween costume, a “Mario Kart” inspired hot rod that connects to his wheelhair, with his dad Caesar Luo watching on the playground of Chabot Elementary School in Oakland. (Jill Tucker)
Asa’s eyes grew big as he saw the costume for the first time, lights flashing and “Mario Bros.” sounds blaring, as the builders unveiled it on his school playground, his classmates cheering.
“It’s cool!” he said, circling the costume several times, acknowledging it was “much bigger” than he ever imagined.
The design allowed him to drive the Kart using his wheelchair. Within a few minutes he was navigating narrow walkways and doing spins on the blacktop, his father urging him to watch out for people and maybe slow down the spins.
“It’s my convertible Smart Car,” he said as his classmates surrounded him.
This was the fifth costume Magic Wheelchair volunteer and Oakland police officer Cory Hunt has built. It was the first one for an Oakland child, which was always his wish.
“I like building for kids. I like building for kids in wheelchairs,” Hunt said, describing the moment he saw a child riding on a dinosaur, the boy’s wheelchair transformed, the pitying looks from others gone. It was a magic wheelchair and Hunt knew then he wanted to build more, to give other kids the same gift of inclusion.
“This is the moment, this is where he’s included,” he said of the costume. “This is his transformation because you’re not looking at a kid in a wheelchair. You’re looking at a kid on a dinosaur.”
Hunt’s focus was on Asa’s face as they unveiled the Kart.
“It’s an absolutely wonderful moment because you get to see the expression on their face and you no longer remember all the cursing you were doing in the garage when you were trying to get everything to fit together,” he said. “There are no words to describe it.”
Asa is still missing his two bottom front teeth, but there is otherwise little visible evidence he was shot two years ago. And there have been no consequences. The investigation is ongoing, with no arrests in the case, according to the California Highway Patrol.
He spent six months after the incident in the hospital recovering and learning to breathe without a ventilator and eat without a tube. He had to use his chin to drive his wheelchair, his mouth to play video games, his voice and head movements to read or listen to music and his eyes to type or move a mouse on a laptop.
He loves video games these days, including “Madden NFL 26” and “The Legend of Zelda.” But he’s particularly good at “Mario Kart,” frequently trouncing his friends and his father, even if he gives them a 10-second start in the game that pits popular video game characters against themselves in racing go-karts.
He often picks the standard kart to drive in the games, which he described as “classic.”
“I don’t want anything fancy,” he said.
Asa wasn’t quite sure what to do with all the attention Friday, giving media interviews and being the center of attention. He described the scene as “overwhelming” and “too much.”
Asked his thoughts about being considered the most popular student at the school – and now the coolest one with the best costume – Asa smiled and then answered: “I don’t like it.”
Not entirely surprising, his parents said.
“He just wants to be around kids his age, trick-or-treat, play video games,” said his mom, Melissa Neuwelt. But: “He was really looking forward to Halloween this year.”
This article originally published at This Oakland kid was paralyzed by stray bullets. Now he has the coolest Halloween costume in town.