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New York
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2020-03-12
Living post March 12, 2020
I want to share my feelings and thoughts through text that display what I experienced as a senior in high school during the outbreak of COVID-19. -
2021-09-27
Garima Sehgal Oral History, 2021/09/27
Two Northeastern students discuss how the pandemic affected their lives, including the impacts of the pandemic on their communities -
2020-12-09
Life in the Pandemic
My life in the pandemic was tough. I couldn't work so I was not able to pay my bills, I like the rest of the world during lockdown had to sit at home bored out of my mind because nobody could leave. I was very scared for my mom when she got covid because she had oxygen issues and also heart issues. Going to school during the pandemic really bothered me because I lost a lot of focus and became very lazy when it came to handing in assignments. I would rather physically go onto campus because when I am actually listening to the professors' talk, it makes it so much easier to understand and to focus. -
2021-09-23
Advika Chaudhari and Matthew Bonfanti Oral History, 2021/09/23
This is important because it provides the experience of students who had to adapt to several changes during the pandemic who may have had different experiences. -
2020-09-18
MO and LC Oral History, 2021/09/18
Basic interviews between two college students looking back on the start of the pandemic. -
2020-04-06
The City That Slept
When you look at this picture, you notice something right off the bat. Most likely the fact that the streets of New York City are completely empty. On April 6th, 2020, New York City was as quiet as it’s ever been. The streets were empty and there was a ghostly feeling to it. If you were downtown that day, something had to feel wrong. I chose this picture to submit to the archive because these streets represent how the majority of people felt during lockdown; empty and alone. When people are cooped up and confined to the safety of their home, they start to realize the things that they took advantage of when things were normal. This picture also represents the odd nature in which the pandemic brought upon the world. We’ve never experienced anything like this before, and didn’t really have any idea how to prepare. It kind of just happened, and whether we liked it or not our way of life was going to have to change for the time being. While sitting in our homes, time was never an issue and, for me personally, I kind of just expected that one day this was just going to be all over. -
2020-03-20
School Closings
Most people thought that we were getting an extra two weeks off of school and that this covid "thing" would blow over. Everyone thought this was short term and nobody expected to not be in schools for a year and a half and have their lives rearranged. -
2020-03-20
The city does sleep
At the start of the pandemic, I was facing home insecurity and was living in a shelter for three months and special housing for 6 months. The city was the most empty I have ever seen it. Ive seen so many people, homeless people, because of the pandemic and it was devastating. It isolated people. -
2020
Brooklyn College HNSC Prompt
Brooklyn College HNSC assignment prompt, taught by Margrethe Horlyck-Romanovsky -
2020-09-08
From always on the go to no where to go.w
Before the pandemic had hit the United States my family and I had always been on the go between work, school and sports. A father who works crazy shifts a mother who works your typical eight am to five pm shift for her company then going to pick up her children for any after school activity that may have been going on at the time. We had family time but not enough, not like we had during the beginning of the pandemic. Once we were put into lockdown both my sister and I had been stuck at home, no more sports or clubs. While my mom also started working from home and still is today. It was kind of a blessing with the fact she wasn't driving an hour back and forth everyday. But my dad was still working. Even though my father had still been working on his days off, we had played many uno games, my sister and I had also learned how to play scatt a card game. But overall covid did bring us closer as a family, giving us time to really focus on each other. The photo I chose to send in is a photo of my sister on her first day of high school. High school to a ninth grader is already an unknown territory but going to classes through a computer at your desk at home is not ideal. Which I do have to say she handled it like a champ but it was something new, something so scary. From my experience it was unsettling to never know truly when you were going to go back to the classroom. The lack of interaction too just makes things worse. We got better as time went on but the Pandemic definitely had changed things, some things for the best and some for the worst. -
2020-05
Waiting to be Connected
I moved out of New York City for a month in the spring of 2020 during the period where my gallery furloughed most employees aside from the principal directors and a select number of sales people. I spent that time with my father in upstate New York in a close quarters quarantine. I was always struck by the quiet during the day and how visible and bright the stars were at night. Two things that seemed foreign to me at times as I grew up in cities and had lived in various Brooklyn neighborhoods for the past year. The passing sound of car stereos and people’s voices on fire escapes from a floor above were white noise. All vibrant - completely alive - no stars. His apartment was a studio and at the time he had not yet begun paying for internet service. Some nights we would drive four or so minutes down the road to the apartment complex where my Dad used to live a few years prior. We would camp outside the complex’s gym which housed one or two treadmills and the outside looked like a glorified garage - but it had wifi. As we were no longer residents and owners of a key pass to the facility, my Dad would pull up to the side entrance and put on his hazards. I would jump out and begin to search for a signal and attempt to connect to the complimentary internet. Whenever a stray person would emerge from their units to retrieve Amazon packages from their front stoop, I would make uncomfortable eye contact with them, as I held up my phone. Yes, yes, this is what you think it is. They hastened back up and quickly closed their door behind them. I found that the most expedient way of downloading content was to position myself by the exterior front left corner and stand with my back flush against the wall. Every night my Dad and I listened to podcasts and drank tea. Despite everything, moments like these helped us laugh and I look back at this memory fondly. -
2021-09-04
hermit HERALD, ISSUE 127
Taliban need outside help -
2021-08-22
What COVID-19 Meant for My Mother: A Latina Small-Business Owner’s Experience in the Bronx.
The item I am submitting is a pandemic auto-ethnography detailing the disproportionately negative impact of COVID-19 on Latinx businesses. I do so through the narrative of my own family's experience, specifically my mother, as well as supporting academic research of general demographic trends. This piece speaks to how the pandemic, while in and of itself does not discriminate, has proportions of its impact that demonstrate a systemic bias leaving certain racial and ethnic groups less protected and far more targeted than others. The piece also connects how these discrepancies are not products of the pandemic, but rather were already systemically there and exacerbated by the pandemic. -
2021-03-02
A Religious Sister’s Service with the Medical Reserve Corps
This article celebrates the dedication of a friend and mentor, Sister Jean Flannelly, SC, who, at age 80, volunteered to serve with the Dutchess County New York Medical Reserve Corps to help people affected by the pandemic. Despite age and some health problems, she felt called to use her many talents as a psychologist, teacher, counselor and religious sister to do contact tracing, case investigation and serve in various roles at COVID-19 vaccination sites. She is an inspiration to me and to many! -
2020-04
MUSE 360 Assingment Juliee Decker RIT
Assignment prompt given to MUSE 360 students of Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) by instructor Juliee Decker, Spring 2020 -
2020-03
How to lighten the mood? Homemade brunch!
Before the pandemic, one of my favorite ways to celebrate a special occasion was by going to brunch in New York City. Understandably, once the pandemic began, I knew that it would be a long, long time before I would see those city lights again. Rather than get down in the dumps, I decided to improvise and bring the brunch experience to my family home as a way to lighten the rather grim mood. A few weeks into the lockdown mandate in March 2020 I told my family to stay away from the kitchen. I organized a brunch with avocado toast, bacon, fried potatoes, and the centerpiece, a meal I had never made on my own, and a brunch staple, eggs benedict. I learned how to poach an egg for the first time with a few failed attempts. I then decorated the plates with the hollondaise sauce as if it were at a 5 star city restaurant. I made menus with drink options ranging from mimosas to bloody Mary’s and served my family, pretending I was out in the city for a celebratory brunch, despite the lack of celebrating going on in the world at the moment. Even if for an hour, this experience eating brunch lightened our moods and reminded us that despite what was going on outside our home, we at least had each other. -
07/25/2021
Lauren Pease Oral History, 2021/07/25
Ashley Tibollo interviewed stay-at-home mom, Lauren Pease about her experience with the Covid-19 pandemic. In this interview, they discuss her experience with the lockdown, her worries about the pandemic, and what life was like during lockdown with her foster child. This interview also touches on political protests, virtual learning and her husband's transition to working from home. -
2021-07-24
Joseph Dopkin, Oral History 2021/07/24
Ashley Tibollo sits down with Joseph John Dobkin to discuss how his life has been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. In this interview his discusses how his life at school as a University student has changed. He also discusses how the dynamics in his dorm room and life at home with his family were impacted. At the end of this interview Dobkin touches on political topics, his views on how the pandemic was handled by local and state governments. He also discusses his views on both anti-mask and BLM protests. -
2021-07-24
Janine Brown. Oral History, July 24, 2021
In this two-part interview, Ashley Tibollo interviews Janine Brown on how her life was impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic. In the first part of the interview, Brown discusses how her last year of college was impacted and about her transition to remote teaching. She discusses her fears of the Delta variant, what sources she uses to get her information and what her feelings are regarding government action. She also discusses family life and how she was affected by the quarantine. She ends this part with her hopes for the future. In the second part of this interview, Brown discusses her decision to move in with her boyfriend right before quarantine and what it was life navigating a new relationship amidst a pandemic. She also discusses her pets and how their moods changed as her life changed. She discusses the difficulties of house hunting and the ways that the pandemic has affected the market. -
2021-07-24
Joseph D. Joseph, Oral History, July 24, 2021
Ashley Tibollo sits down with Joseph D. Joseph in an ice cream shop in Buffalo, New York to discuss how his life has been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. In this interview, Joseph describes changes in his day-to-day routine, his life as a martial arts instructor, and changes in his economic status. He also discusses his students and how the pandemic affected them. In the last part of this interview, Joseph discusses his views on politics and what he hopes the future generations will learn about the response to this pandemic. -
2021-07-23
Canine classmates
I was grateful to be able to do my martial arts classes through Zoom. My dogs, though, didn’t know what to make of it. Daisy, my young lab mix, consistently tried to participate in the classes. She seemed to love the group dynamic, even though most of it was on screen. Zoey, my older dog, needed to be in the room with me and often made appearances on screen. During such a trying time, these small moments brought a lot of joy. -
2021-07-19
Erie County Health Equity
This Buffalo News article discusses the racial disparities impacting the residents of Erie County during the pandemic. The article claims that the pandemic shined a light on the racial disparities as more African American community members were becoming infected and dying from COVID. -
2021-07-19
HERMIT HERALD, ISSUE 121
Afghanistan- not forgotten? -
07/09/2021
Joseph Giangreco-Marotta Oral History, 2021/07/09
Wife interviews husband about COVID-19 experience. -
2021-06-13
Red ribbons at P.S. 042 Benjamin Altman
I took these two photos in Downtown Manhattan at Public School 42. There were red ribbons tied around the iron fence that appear to have wishes or hopes from students. Some of the ribbons are hard to read, but one says "[Illegible] make homeless people happy by giving them things I don't need" and another says "My [illegible] that COVID-19 will stop forever". All of the ribbons where the grade level is visible indicate that the ribbons were made by fourth graders. -
2021-06-14
Anti-racism advertisements at Times Square
These are two photos of anti-racist advertisements I saw in Times Square on June 14, 2021. One is an advertisement on a digital advertisement board that says "#NOHATE AGAINST JEWS" in white text on a blue background, while the other is a poster on the side of a garbage receptacle that says "FIGHT THE VIRUS NOT THE PEOPLE #STOPASIANHATE", made by artist Zipeng Zhu. -
2021-07-03
A Dog's Tale
This is Hannah aka Hannah Banana. My husband and I adopted her May 4, 2013 from a rescue in St. Catherine's, ON. We live just over the border in Buffalo, NY. Hannah is a purebred Sheltie (Shetland Sheepdog), but purebred gone wrong. She is what is called a double merle. That means an irresponsible breeder bred two merle coated dogs together, which results in 25% of the litter being born deaf, primarily white in color, and with eye problems or missing eyes altogether. Hannah was approximately 4 years old at the time. The previous owners who surrendered her had had her for 2 years. They had adopted her from a shelter that had picked her up as a stray. Hannah was our 2nd double merle (we also have an Aussie with the same problem), so we were used to the unique problems associated with deaf and vision impaired dogs, but Hannah came with many more from a history of abuse and neglect. One of her biggest issues was that she was absolutely terrified of people, particularly men, and she hated small children. We worked with a trainer, we did agility twice a week, and did barn hunt once a week. She broke out of her shell a lot, but did not lose her fear of people. In 2016 my husband and I had our first and only child, Charlotte. Hannah was very aggressive towards her. She would bark and snap at her. We had to keep her separated a lot, and we worried about what the future would bring. She got a bit better when Charlotte could walk, but not to a comfort level. Once Charlotte was about 3, Hannah accepted that she was a human in the house but wanted nothing to do with her. She didn't really want to have much to do with any of us or our other dog except for at agility class. She wouldn't play with us and only tolerated petting for a short while. Fast forward to 2020. While COVID-19 was cause fear, anxiety, and depression in people, for Hannah it was just what she needed. After a few months, she became a whole new dog. Having all three of her humans home 24/7 seemed to alleviate a lot of her fears and anxieties. She completely bonded with Charlotte. She actually plays with her and snuggles with her and sleeps in her bed. Who knew this 12-year-old dog just needed constant companionship to heal her old wounds. Luckily, my career path changed during the pandemic (I am going back to school to pursue a PhD) and so I will continue to be home a lot of the time. While COVID did bring devastation to people across the world, for one little dog it was just the medicine she needed. -
2021-06-05
Andy Gaukel Oral History, 2021/06/05
Puppeteer Andy Gaukel had carved out a comfortable niche for himself in the Early Childhood Center at Bronx Community College. Then Covid-19 hit, and he had to find new ways of connecting with the college’s smallest students. In this oral history, he explains how he learned new skills to teach online while maintaining his rapport with his pre-schoolers and engaging their parents in a way that he hadn’t before the pandemic. -
2021-06-28
My Pandemic Experience
When the pandemic was coming, I was initially relieved. I was supposed to fly to Chicago to visit my sister and go to our favorite band’s (Keane) concert, but as a person with anxiety and panic disorder who is terrified of airplanes and crowds it allowed me to back out. The concert was cancelled. It was the excuse I needed to back out without shame or blame. It seems silly now, but at the time covid seemed more like a bad cold or flu to me. It seemed like another Swine Flu or Avian Flu or other scare in recent memory which hadn’t amounted to a plague style pandemic. Lockdown was even kind of nice at first. My husband, daughter, and I got to spend a lot of family time together. I had taught ESL online for a number of years previously, so converting my in school classes to online was easy. I had no problems teaching over Zoom. I’m a homebody anyway, by habit and by anxiety, so this was great… until the body count started. I was horrified and sickened to hear about the freezer containers being used in New York City to store the overflow of bodies. The germaphobia that had plagued me in childhood, that I had gone to years of therapy to overcome, came roaring back with a vengeance. Like everyone else, I went to the grocery store to stock up so I wouldn’t have to leave me house for awhile, only to find shelf after shelf empty. As a super health conscious, organic, vegan my choices were extremely limited. My husband and daughter aren’t vegan, but they do eat only organic, which became impossible. Soap, disinfectant, cleaners, and hand sanitizers were nowhere to be found. At a time when it was so important to be as clean and healthy as possible all those modern conveniences were utterly gone. I felt helpless. I imagined that people living during pandemics like the bubonic plague and Spanish flu must have felt similarly. After a couple of weeks, quarantine started to feel more like a claustrophobic prison sentence than a family vacation. I missed my sister, my parents, my friends, my colleagues, and my students. On my birthday and Easter I just had to wave at my parents through the glass door. My favorite hobby- taekwondo, which I had started in order to relieve stress and help with my anxiety was taken from me. I had to do the classes online from my living room, which was nearly impossible. I felt trapped. A raging epidemic across the planet from which there was no escape. If I spent too much time thinking about it, I would start to feel the claw of panic. By the time summer arrived I was at breaking point. Luckily with summer we had some reprieve. Case loads declined, and I started meeting my best friend outside. We socially distanced ourselves and wore masks, but we were together and that was a start. By the end of summer she and her boyfriend were on our “quaranteam” that is we decided we could see each other since we weren’t seeing anyone else. In the fall school started. Since I teach at a Catholic school we were able to have school in person full time, though we had students in every grade who opted to go remote. But my bestie and I were back in the building with most of the kids, and I started to feel less trapped. I was going to stores masked and my daughter was also in school. But as soon as Thanksgiving hit everything changed again. So many people ignored all of the recommendations and restrictions and got together with family and friends. It made me so angry that people were so careless. A friend of mine had a large family in Pennsylvania who all got together for Thanksgiving. She didn’t go because she thought it was reckless. 8 out of 14 people at the family dinner got covid and 2 of them died. Then at Christmas, my great uncle passed. No funeral. No wake. Nothing. Schools shut down again. We were trapped. Then the vaccines came. It was nearly impossible to get one for a long time even if you were eligible. Slots filled as fast as they were posted. You needed to present a lot of proof of eligibility in order to get one. As a teacher, I was able to get mine earlier than many others. I got the Moderna. The first shot made me feel a little sick for a few hours, but with the second I had a fever of 103.5, aches, chills, nausea for 12 hours and a general malaise for 3 days. A friend of mine in taekwondo, who has some autoimmune problems, had a severe reaction after her first Moderna vaccine. She has had side effects for a few months now that are not going away. She has dizzy spells and heart palpitations regularly. She is undergoing testing and being monitored by the CDC. Despite some horror stories, the vaccine is still the absolute best thing that we could have hoped for. I would like my daughter to get it as soon as they open it to the under 12 population. A lot of people won’t get the vaccine because they are in the “Science is fake, I’m a Trump supporter” camp. In my opinion, Trump’s misinformation and mishandling of the pandemic cost tens of thousands of American lives, and his diversive legacy is going to cost us dearly for many years to come. It is now June again. School just finished. New York State is allowing people to enter buildings unmasked if they are vaccinated, but few people are actually requiring any proof. Given that the people with a cavalier attitude toward wearing masks are many of the same people who are against getting vaccinated, an honors system policy towards wearing masks is really just a no-mask policy. It is very frustrating to me that people can’t just deal with masks for a while longer to fully insure this disease’s eradication before we have another relapse and find ourselves back in quarantine again. -
2021-06-27
virALLanguages
virALLanguages is a volunteer-led project that creates COVID safety content in different endangered languages. The project runs a YouTube channel and Facebook page where they post videos with information about COVID in rare languages, and their website also has a collection of downloadable materials in those languages. Beyond translating material, the project also seeks to tailor awareness materials to members of a community to be in touch with the speakers of those languages by using culturally-aware vocabulary and figures of speech. The attached URIs contain, in order: 1: The main page of the website 2: All of the videos the project has made, including YouTube links and downloadable videos, on the project website 3: An Internet Archive page with the videos the project has made -
2021-06-18
A Linguistic Tour through Arthur Avenue
I traveled to New York this summer, and one of the places I visited was Arthur Avenue, located in the Belmont neighborhood of the Bronx and the main artery of the Bronx's Little Italy. Arthur Avenue provided a unique insight into the function of immigrant languages during the pandemic. Most of the people I heard talking as I walked down Arthur Avenue and went into the stores were speaking English, as would be expected in most of the United States. Some had an accent similar to a "standard" American accent/my Californian accent, while others spoke in New Yorker accents. I heard some people speaking Italian, mostly if not entirely elderly people, in several stores, including Cerini Coffee and Gifts. I also heard expression of language through music, in the form of a speaker in front of Mario's Restaurant playing "Tu vuò fà l'Americano" ("You Want to Be an American") and "O Sarracino" ("The Saracen"), two famous Neapolitan language songs. I didn't expect to hear music in Italian "dialect" (called so even though Neapolitan is a proper stand-alone language). However, Belmont is no longer just Little Italy. It also has a large Albanian presence. I saw a flyer on a street pole in Albanian which I presume to either be a missing sign or a flyer for a funeral. I have no idea what the flyer said because I don't know Albanian, but among the text were two pictures of an elderly man. In front of Randazzo's Seafood, I also saw a sign advertising some type of shellfish (I can't remember which) in Albanian and English, though not in Italian, which I thought was interesting since the store is owned by the grandchildren of immigrants from Sicily. There was also an Albanian television provider called TV ALB, which indicated to me that there are enough Albanian speakers in the area to sustain an Albanian-language cable or broadcast provider, even during the pandemic. I didn't hear any spoken Albanian. This could be a purely anecdotal observation, but I saw Italian primarily as a spoken language and Albanian primarily in writing. There was some writing in Italian, but most of it was either names of food items that couldn't be translated into English or sayings like "mangia bene vivi bene" ("eat well, live well", as a command; the picture of which is attached to this story) for promotional purposes. There was no actual communication occurring in written Italian. On a non-linguistic note, most of the restaurants also had outdoor seating under canopies, a consequence of COVID. -
2020-05-22
Pet Adoption Protocol During the Pandemic - A Purr-fect Fit Animal Rescue
This is a social media post from A Purr-fect Fit Animal Rescue in Buffalo, New York explaining their covid procedure to potential adopters. -
2021-01-03
Ten Lives Club Eastern Hills Mall Adoption Success
This is a Facebook post from a rescue group that operates out of the local shopping mall. Even though the mall was closed during the pandemic, the group still managed to place 600 cats with their new furever families. -
2021-06-18T17:20
Greenacre Park
When I visited New York, one of the places I went to was Greenacre Park in Manhattan. The small, house-sized park is a wonderful example of nature in the middle of a mass of high-rises, with a wall of ivy, a waterfall, and many trees. There were about 15 people there, all doing various things. A man was working on his computer, as can be seen in one of the photos. Quite a few people were on their phones. Meanwhile, a group of tourists took a selfie photo, and a pair of elderly women shared a carton of fruit nectar. Underneath a canopy, others sat and read or worked. It was nice to see people still enjoying nature as the pandemic finally winds to a close. I also thought it was interesting how many people were using technology (including me!) in a natural space apparently meant to provide a break from the rush of normal life. -
2020
Working at a Restaurant, Winter 2020
In the wintertime, I work at a restaurant inside a ski resort. This past winter, NYS had just opened up restaurants with very tight restrictions: no more than 4 to a table, close at 10 pm, must order food with alcohol.... and so on. Anyway, as the restaurant floor manager, it was my responsibility to police all these restrictions. Some people were very kind and understanding about the whole situation. They would split up their party of 5 in two groups; one of three and the other of two, and thank us for our willingness to work during this time. Others, however, were not thrilled about the restrictions and argued with us, as if it was our idea to put in place all the restrictions. We had so many people complain about the rules as if we could actually do something about it. Many left or demanded free drinks because of their inconveniences. It was very stressful to deal with this! Be kind to your servers!! -
2020-06-04
Guerrilla Gardening in the Time of COVID-19
The operation will take only a few minutes. I don my mask and slip the gloves and pruning shears into my back pocket and take to the streets. Walking briskly, I pass a row of 1900s brownstones, each with a small garden plot in front. On this block the specialty is roses, and every home seems to have a different variety growing. Towards the corner, there is a house with its iron gate ajar, and an overstuffed mailbox by the front door. I had already removed two small bags of garbage and moldering cardboard and a crushed toy fire helmet from the front yard, and also ripped out a row of mugwort that was blocking the big rosebush. I don’t know what variety they are – a peach-colored hybrid, with massive blooms that bent the rose stalks down. I deadhead the big old roses and the stalks spring up, attempting to gash my face. One does nick my arm, and I wipe the blood off on my mask, not thinking that I have left a red splotch of blood in its center, like a tiny pair of lips. Pretty soon I have collected about thirty roses – all massive and past their prime and bring them home in a plastic bag I brought with me. I don’t think anyone would mind, and I am sure the person who planted these roses doesn’t mind. A hybrid rose plant like this needs a lot of tending, but the blooms are enormous. As part of my quarantine routine, I take walks in the early morning. After a while, I got tired of seeing weeds hiding the “nice” plants and began reflexively pulling them. It was fun! Especially after a rainfall, when the weeds pulled out so effortlessly. After a few minutes work I would have a sheaf of shepherd’s purse, lambsquarter and mugwort under my arm. Fortunately, there is always an empty construction yard in our rapidly developing neighborhood, and that’s where most of my weeding crop ends up, lobbed over the green construction fence. Nobody has ever bothered me, except for the times older women will ask if I eat the weeds. Since the trees planted by the city have little tags on them that give tips on how to take care of them, including one that instructs citizens to keep the tree pits free of weeds, I consider that my carte blanche. “I work for Bette Midler!” I want to tell somebody, but nobody asks. Some houses show evidence that they were owned by gardeners that took a lot of pride in their plants but abandoned them this year. I see mugwort and lambsquarter cropping up in beds of well-tended plants –gardens that might have received some care earlier in the season but, for some reason, have been untouched these past few months. I reach over and – yank –problem solved. I know they would do it, if they were able. One home I pass by regularly had an infestation of mugwort that covered some nice lilies and other shrubs. After a few days I had cleared all the mugwort out, and stopped by every so often to rip the tiny mugwort sprouts that persisted – some of the roots are tough, baseball-sized clumps that live for years, and you often find odd things wound up in them like bottle caps and corks. This past week, our local news had the notice of the death a Haitian doctor in our neighborhood of longstanding repute, who had died of COVID-19. For the obituary, they showed not a photo of the man, but of his doctor’s office, which was the old house where I had been waging my war against mugwort. So many have died in our neighborhood – so many gentle people who once sunned themselves in front of their houses and apartment buildings and maintained the cheery tradition of saying hello to all neighbors. When they moved here, Flatbush was cheap, and a family from Trinidad or Guyana could buy decent homes for an affordable price, in what was then a highly unfashionable neighborhood. The untended gardens of my older neighbors are hard to miss, when you know what to look for. “Maybe they just went out of state, you don’t know,” say my kids, when I showed them the peach-colored rose bush I had been surreptitiously tending. They were horrified, and nervous that I was breaking a law. My daughter even closed and latched the small iron gate, while sternly looking at me, warning that I could get arrested, or worse. But I’ll be back. Those roses need me. -
2021-03-17
A Day at Macy's Inc. During a Worldwide Pandemic
As my primary source I chose a picture that I took on March 17, 2021 at 8:39pm, it was the end of my shift in my retail job. This picture was taken one year later since they first closed down the city. I work in Macy’s Inc. at Bay Plaza, and the store was closed during the pandemic until the end of June. When the store first reopened, big crowds of people came to the store every single day without caring about the pandemic. It is understandable that all they wanted was to shop, and also get out of their houses to distract themselves. This picture is just a small representation of what retail workers have to deal with during times like this. It got to a point, where it was very frustrating seen so many people at the store walking around trying to shop. Many people did not care about the 6ft social distancing, and others did not want to wear a mask because it was too hot, or they couldn’t breathe. There was a limit of 600 people in the whole store, but in days like this I know for sure that it was more than that. The women shoes department was always full of people, there was always a long line, people were right next to each other, and others were screaming or talking too loudly. People were getting into arguments with each other, many were getting frustrated because they wanted to get a shoe size right away. Others were just sitting on the couch sleeping, you could hear babies crying, and kids running or playing around dropping shoes on the floor. I remember I was in the register during my whole shift taking customer after customer, some were really nice but others very rude. As my job, I have to ask every customer if they want to open a Macy’s credit card with us, but their answer was always, “I can’t afford it, this virus has made me broke” yet, they were still out shopping. On this day, I had a disagreement with a customer because I told her to put her mask on about 3 times, and she just ignored me. She then, approaches me to pay for a shirt, and I told her very kindly once again, “can you please put your mask on? Thank you!”. Her reaction was priceless because she was furious and asked me if it wasn’t enough with the plexiglass that was between us, I felt very frustrated because she didn’t seem to understand how serious this virus is. I told her no, and refuse to ring her out she then, proceeded to another register very furious and still with no mask on. We are not essential workers but working in a retail store during this pandemic has been very overwhelming. The company benefits from all of this because they reach their sales goals every day. When I think about it, we as employees should be happy that there are sales because it means the store won’t close down, and we can keep our jobs. The customers do not seem to have any type of consideration for any of us as retail workers. It upsets me because now more than ever, everyone should be thankful for still being alive after what we just went through this whole year. We need to appreciate each other, and respect one another because we don’t know what everyone is going through. Always be kind to everyone! -
2021-05-18
BLM movement during COVID
The horrific and inhumane death of George Floyd was the absolute last straw for many people. His death caused such an uprising that no one was prepared for. Floyd’s death caused thousands of people across the country to protest and literally fight for their lives. Citizens began a peaceful protest which turned into violent protests which resulted in the burning and looting of the city of Minneapolis. This protest turned violent because even after the negative image the police had in the country’s eyes, they still proceeded to injure Americans, using rubber bullets and tear gas during these protests. I chose this picture because it is very impactful to me as a Black man in America it is terrifying and sad. The way police treat Black men such as myself is beyond scary and traumatizing. There are no words to describe how it feels to walk around as a man with brown skin. In the photo I selected, there are two police officers beating on a Black man while he is down on the ground. It baffles my mind how even after an individual is down, disarmed, and disables, police officers will continue to apply unnecessary force to the individual. The death of George Floyd and the events that took place after is a monumental event in history. People need to know how America, came together despite race and differences and protested to enforce the Black Lives Matter Movement. So many different groups of people put their differences aside and came together to protest the safety of Black people. It is important that police violence is captured not only for the justice of the individual who was hurt, but as a part of history. The police brutality and Black Lives Matter movement is very important part of history. This is a movement that brought together many individuals of different race, class, and beliefs to support the end the abuse of Black citizens of America. I chose this picture which occurred in Buffalo NY, officer decided to beat down a 75 year old man who was peacefully protesting. The idea of police who are supposed to serve and protect are beating an elderly man, imagine what they would do to a young man as myself. I’m glad these cruel acts of violence are now being captured and people are receiving the justice they deserve. It is also important for people to see these events as a part of history. -
2020-05-20
LaGuardia’s Ghost Town
For my primary source, I selected a photograph I took of the gate house area in LaGuardia Airport in mid March of 2020. In the picture it shows several employees, sitting around doing nothing at all, the whole airport was a “ghost town”, meaning there were no passengers to assist with there tickets and gate claims, or any questions in general. During this time we were all nervous, not just nervous about COVID-19 and from the horrific scenes in the news, but also as an 11 year veteran in the airline industry, our jobs were on the line because of the decrease in flying, fear of flying, and the travel restrictions of no flying. With the airline burning 35 million dollars a day how can they pay 80,000 employees system wide I told myself. The airline soon told us system wide that it’s recommended we take a leave of absence at least a year with no pay to save the company or else there would be cuts, not including the 25% cut in our salary we took already. All week I was on the phone with my work partner talking everyday trying to figure what’s the plan. All these thoughts came racing three my head. What are we going to do? Do you think we will be fired or let go since we have seniority? Why I didn’t finish college 13 years ago and became lawyer or something. My job made us an offer, hey said take the year off with no pay, and your still have flying benefits for you and your family as always, and you will still have full medical benefits and we will pay your medical as well. After talking with my family, my fiancé, my partner from work, I decided on March 26th 2020, I was going to take the leave of absence. A whole year later April 26th of 2021 I finally came back to work full time, and the airport passenger count is starting to increase. The reason why I seated this primary source is because I would like historians to know the insides that us airline employees faced during these challenging times. I know many airline companies asked Congress for help in payroll support for the employees which majority of them did get including us, but we never saw that payroll support, nor did they call us back Early to work since they got some kind of support from the government, instead that money went in the stock market, and for bonuses to the CEO, and managers in the company. While I am happy and very fortunate to be back at work, it was very challenging as I’m sure it was for everyone, but one good thing that came out of it, 13 years later, a year ago from today. I was able to join the family of bronx community college, and focus on my education while I was off. -
2020-02-09
Covid
My first mask was given to me by my dad. -
2020-03-11
CUNY's Response
Where to even start? 2020, the year where everything and everyone changed forever. 2020 did not just consist of the Covid Virus it consisted of many other threads that harmed everyone’s mental health including students. It was hard for all students during this time but in my perspective College students. This documents faithfully explain 2020 and I will be here to give you future historians a more in depth look at how it really was during these times. The document I chose not only explains how we went from going in person to virtual but also how it made me feel as a visual learner and as a college student of course. CUNY mentioned we were going to have a “Instructional recess from March 12-18th”, this day I will never forget because I did not know that March 11th was going to be the last day of my two-years of college. When I received this email on Twitter that CUNY had stated this I was overwhelmed and shocked. The thought of everything being virtual just didn’t seem right to me, although I did have all the access from computers to internet access, it just did not sit right. As a visual learner this was tough for me, this was a moment of you get classwork and you basically have to teach it to yourself, not seeing my professors in person and through a screen was very hard to get used to, the internet sometimes would not work and it would cut off and I would miss most of the important things said during the lesson, it was honestly very difficult, this was not just tough on students, as well as professors having the same issues. This era was honestly tough, but technology really saved a whole year worth of schoolwork. To the historians reading this in a couple of years from now, I, as a person who lived through these times want you to understand the rough time we went through, from masks to face shields to many deaths and virtually going to school. These were moments in time that no one anticipated. It shaped the future into what it had become, masks may become the new norm, working from home may be allowed for certain jobs and companies, schools just might let people continue to be fully virtual and things may be extremely dependent on technology from now on. To conclude this 2020 document, though it was a rough year where millions of people died worldwide, I can only be thankful that me and the ones I love are safe and okay. We now know how to take proper precautions in case anything like this happens again, though I don’t wish for a repeat of 2020. The year of 2020 is one for the books and one that will go down in history. -
2020-05-30
Civil Discourse During A Pandemic
I assume like many New Yorkers, March 13th through 18th was when things really changed. It did for me on the 15th of March 2020 or the ides of March as I like to remember it. My store shut down for what seemed like 2 weeks. Of course, soon I would be given the news we would be shut down completely. I already knew where things were going, at the time I worked at an Asian restaurant, so I was hearing many of the conversations about China then. But I could not have predicted what would happen next. As slow and dreadful as 2020 was, things were moving at lightning speed for the situation we experienced. It felt like every few days something new would arise and test our nation. I selected these pictures because it shows how tired everyone is, the blank faces of people who are following orders, while the other side expresses their hardships all the while wearing masks, the bane of 2020. I want the historian of the future to know that no matter the situation at hand, many of us will still protest for what was wrong even if they got sick. It didn’t matter because we needed to send a message. The two images that you see in the beginning were taken by my friend, Emilio Lopez, who documented the protests, riots, and clashes between police in the summer of 2020. I did not go to the early protests because of covid and the violence/looting wasn’t the things I wanted to be a part of. I remember face-timing my friend to make sure if he was alright as I did not go with him. What he described to me that was happening in the parts of Fordham, and Union Square areas. Emilio had said many of the protesters were young men who were bored of the lockdowns and needed to do something exciting. There were fires, baton exchanges with the cops, and then the looting started. It all got a little too ugly for the whole week of George Floyd protests in New York. One of my close friend’s stores in Fordham was destroyed as a result. The images were taken right before things took a violent turn at Union Square. Where many of my friends were tear-gassed and beaten by cops to disperse when the first lockdown was getting implemented. Those two images, I feel like the body language of the subjects conveys how I felt about the lockdowns, the social injustice, in general about 2020. These were the first few weeks of protests that took place in the wake of George Fyold murder. I was shocked and scared when the masses went on to the streets because of the sheer amount while the pandemic was still going on. I hope the historians of the future can understand us even if they have to go through a cluster of memes from this era, real pictures with real human emotions will always speak louder I believe, and that civil rights in this country still have ways to go. -
2020-08-03
The Pandemic that Changed It All
I think we all should take this as an experience to be prepare for the next major event. -
2020-06-04
The Doctors and the Community
I'm submitting a picture of doctors, including my uncle and members of the community gathered outside of the SUNY Downstate Medical Center University Hospital, to celebrate the discharge of a patient who beat Covid-19. -
2020-07-15
PSC-CUNY Protest at BCC
For my primary source, I selected a photograph I took at a protest held in front of the Bronx Community College campus on July 15, 2021. The Professional Staff Union of CUNY (PSC-CUNY), the union for the faculty and much of the staff throughout CUNY, organized the event to protest the BCC administration June 26 decision to lay off 36 experienced adjunct professors at the end of their 3-year contracts, even though that their departments recommended that they be rehired. People in the picture include BCC Faculty, staff, and students, as well as those from as well as people from Hostos Community College, who came to support the BCC community and were facing similar cuts. The day was very hot, but I was nervous to the subway because of COVID, so I rode my bike from my home (about 24 miles roundtrip). I was pretty sweaty and probably stinky when I arrived. It was the first time I had been to campus since March 10, when, on my way home from school on the subway, I learned CUNY was moving online. (The campus itself was locked, but we stood in front of the gate on University.) It was also the first time I people from school in person since March; I was so happy to talk to them. It was weird to be with a group people, after months of isolation, but we all wore masks and stood six feet apart. Cars honked their support as they drove by. I selected this source because I want historians of the future to understand how the pandemic hit higher education and the connections among the COVID crisis, social justice movements, and education. Although I went to larger marches after the murder of George Floyd, I believe funding for CUNY is a form of social justice. I was angry that politicians and school administrators were giving lip-service to the phrase Black Live Manners, while cutting funding and jobs from CUNY. BCC’s students are overwhelmingly Black and Latinx, and many studies show that a CUNY education is one of the best schools for supporting social mobility, helping people support themselves and their families. Firing the adjuncts not only meant the teachers lost their income, and, sometimes, their health insurance, but that BCC students would be in larger classes; larger classes mean faculty have less time to devote to each student, which can make it harder to for students to succeed. While I understood enrollment was down and the budget from the city and state would likely be smaller because of the economic toll of the pandemic, I thought there were other places the administration could cut costs. (Such as their own salaries). I want historians to see that the faculty and staff of CUNY fought for what their students deserved and the connections among CUNY, social justice, and New York’s economic recovery. I also want them to see how people approached protests, which require gathering together with other people and often chanting or shouting, while in the middle of a pandemic that required people to stay apart and cover their mouths. -
2021-03-26
Choosing between Work and Health
This short piece shares the struggles and experiences of choosing between working as an essential worker and worrying about my family's health during the peak of the pandemic. -
2021-05-05
Broadway Looks to Reopen at 100% Capacity on September 14
This article discusses Governor Andrew Cuomo's announcement that Broadway can reopen at 100% capacity starting September 14. Broadway has been shut down since March 2020. It seems like the ability to go to see a Broadway show may be dependent on whether or not a person has had a vaccine. -
2021-04-14
Reconsidering Taking the Vaccine
I live in Bronx, New York. When the pandemic struck, it affected everyone tremendously whether you contracted the virus or not. New York is a densely populated place and it immediately required a shut down of all day to day activities due to the soaring virus. It was so impactful that my school had to be closed and I could not go out with my friends on the weekends anymore due to the fact that all business places were closed. Many people in New York contracted the virus which at one point had the highest Coronavirus cases. It made my family and I very depressed to be stuck at home all day and worrying if anyone of us would be the next person to be personally affected by the virus. During the pandemic, which is still current, the introduction of the vaccine made me feel very relieved. Even though it is not a cure for the virus but it would help to fight the virus if you do contract it, and it also lessens the likeliness that it is contracted. This was such good news to my ears. When I found out that there were different types of the vaccines I was very skeptical about it because I wondered to myself about the different component that each might have. Following this, there was word that the Johnson and Johnson vaccine was causing bloodclots. This made me extremely scared to take any of the vaccines overall even though I want to be secured from the virus but I worry that the vaccine would not agree well with my body. This was a mental battle within my family if we want to take the vaccine or not. -
2020-05-09
Through the Eyes of Assimilation: Immigrant Families, Mental Illness, and COVID-19
This story is about my partner's family, utilizing both of our perspectives to talk about how his mother, and subsequently my partner, was treated due to mental illness, ethnicity, and gender identity. -
2020-03-29
Paranoia to Peace
I struggled with anxiety around the time the news said there was a pandemic going on, and I healed as time went on and the world around me played a part in that.