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Andrew Adam Newman on Ave C points us to tonight's forecast at The Weather Channel... where something extraordinary will happen ... as he noted on Facebook, "If you're still up at 3 a.m. ... be sure to look up at the sun poking through the clouds."
Name: Elissa Jiji
Occupation: Writing Tutor, Member of 4th Street Food Co-op
Location: 4th Street between 2nd and Bowery
Time: Noon on Saturday, July 27
I’ve lived in the neighborhood for around 20 years. I grew up on the Upper East Side. I work at John Jay College as a writing tutor; I’ve always been a fan of words.
I’ve been coming downtown since I was a teenager — we’d go out dancing here all the time. I remember the elevator at Danceteria — that teeny, tiny elevator. I remember when Keith Haring was drawing his drawings in the subway. I miss those places. A couple weeks ago, I was out for a bike ride by the river. We were pulling this sound bike behind us, and stumbled on somebody’s nighttime birthday picnic on the pier. We had a spontaneous dance party with a bunch of people we'd never met — including a three-generation family, all dancing together with their abuela and all of us. This community can surprise you in that way.
I only learned how to ride a bike 10 years ago, in Tompkins Square Park, on the basketball courts. Eventually I branched out from going around in a circle in the basketball court to going around in the Park, and all the older Chinese ladies were going past me and people on the benches were giving me the thumbs up. It was one of the best things I ever did, and now I ride my bike everywhere. I commute to work at Columbus Circle.
This neighborhood feels very much like a neighborhood, and even still, with all the chains and banks and with things disappearing, it still retains its neighborhood aura. This block has a lot of small businesses on it, and a lot of that is the tenant-owned Cooper Square Mutual Housing Association, which is our landlord. Several buildings on the block are part of the Cooper Square MHA. They support small, independent businesses. They're very supportive of us, and they like having us on the block.
I’ve been working at the co-op for maybe 15 years. My sister, who lives next door, said, “You should join that food co-op on 4th Street.” It took me awhile to listen to her, but she was right. Once I did, I really liked it. I like being part of something where we make decisions together.
I’ve done a bunch of different jobs at the co-op, from reconciling the till, to training new members to running the meetings. It’s nice not to be bound by having to make a profit; we really try to make stuff affordable. We’ve had a couple of major renovations and projects where we’ve questioned, are we actually going to be able to pull this off, or are we gonna kill each other in the process? It will be two years this fall since we completely ripped out the floor to put in a concrete one, and put in the motors for the refrigeration down in the basement. It was a huge project. Did the stuff fit through the door during that renovation? Apparently not — we had to cut away the lintel and replace it.
The co-op is open to the public and entirely member run, which is not the case with every or even most co-ops. We don’t have a paid staff, and it’s important to us that everybody from the neighborhood can shop. We also give discounts to a bunch of different categories of people — seniors and students, people shopping with EBT cards, and then our members. I think we have between 75 and 90 working members at any given time. There are a fair amount of students and people who were recently students. There are teachers, artists, musicians, at least one nurse, web developers and a cabinet maker. We probably have the highest workload of any co-ops with working members: we’re there two hours a week.
It's also is the kind of place where you see your neighbors all the time, and their kids, and their dogs. Our neighbors, some of them are so sweet. This one lady comes in every time there is a Yankees game — she’s got her lucky chocolate bar that she has to get. You know when there’s a game on because she comes in for it.
He also whined to an EMT, "Don’t call my mother, she’s going to be upset," court papers said.
August 3: 25th Annual Tompkins Square Riot Reunion Films! Sponsored by The Shadow, producers of the 25th Annual Tompkins Square Riot Reunion Show.
Your House is Mine, Squat or Rot, and a Paper Tiger TV special on the demolition of the 5th Street squat.
Venue:
Museum of Reclaimed Urban Space
155 Avenue C
August 4: 25th Annual Tompkins Square Riot Reunion Films! Sponsored by The Sh@dow
Tompkins Square Park: Operation Class War on the Lower East Side and more!
Venue:
Museum of Reclaimed Urban Space
155 Avenue C
August 5: Not For Sale, directed by Yael Bitton
Venue:
La Plaza Cultural
Garden at Avenue C and 9th Street
August 6: L.E.S., directed by Coleen Fitzgibbon; B/Side, directed by Abigail Child; and Heart of Loisaida, directed by Marci Reaven and Beni Matias
Venue:
La Plaza Cultural
Garden at Avenue C and 9th Street
August 7: Featuring More Than Flowers, directed by Laura Beer; Loisaida, Avenue C, directed by Maeva Aubert; and a Paper Tiger TV special on the demolition of Esperanza Garden
Venue:
6B Garden
Avenue B and 6th Street
August 8: 7th Street, with filmmaker Josh Pais in attendance
Venue:
6B Garden
Avenue B and 6th Street
August 9:Landlord Blues, directed by Jacob Burckhardt
Venue:
Orchard Alley Garden
4th Street between Avenue C and Avenue D
August 10: No Picnic, directed by Phil Hartman
Venue:
Orchard Alley Garden
4th Street between Avenue C and Avenue D
There are a limited supply of all-access passes available for $20. The schedule and venues for 1st Annual MoRUS film fest were announced today by the Museum of Reclaimed Urban Space (MoRUS). Tickets for 8-day festival of films underscoring a theme of “reclaimed space” are available here and at The Museum of Reclaimed Urban Space, 155 Avenue C between 9th and 10th Streets. Tickets are available at the door for a suggested donation of $5 per film. Museum hours are Tuesdays and Thursdays through Sundays from 11 AM - 7 PM.
For all screenings, doors will open at 7:30 PM with films beginning at dusk. Selected screenings will feature discussions and Q&A with filmmakers and other speakers. Refreshments and popcorn will also be available
They were going to destroy a building to build condos ... that had beautiful graffiti covering the exterior walls and security garage rolldown. I contacted the developer to see if anyone had requested the rolldown, as it was assumably detachable from the building and could be preserved. I offered to pay if needed and he said he would contact me when they had taken it down. I'd have to make arrangements to transport it offsite.
They called me the day before Thanksgiving [2011] to tell me that I had to pick it up the day after Thanksgiving at 8 a.m., otherwise it would be turned into scrap. I had not made any arrangements. I needed help moving it, a truck to move it in and a place to store it — at 11 feet by 12 feet, there wasn't a wall large enough wall to display it on in my two-bedroom apartment.
After some frantic searching, I discovered that Moishe's offered free pick-up with three months of storage, solving all my problems in one swift motion.