A Waitress Abroad – My First Job

June 21, 2016June 21, 2016 / terryhschwadron / Leave a comment

by Noelia Sanchez

My first job was 9 years ago in 2007. I was a student, and a friend told me “Let’s try to participate in a cultural exchange for university students.

I said, “I don’t know! Getting a visa is too difficult!!”

I knew that trying to travel to the USA was very hard and sometimes you couldn’t do it. But my friend insisted very much until I agree to participate. While in the process I felt exhausted by all of the requirements they requested from me and all the money I spent. Soon, it was time to go to the consulate, and thank God I got the visa. The most curious thing was, that the friend who encouraged me to participate didn’t continue with the process.

Well, the time came for me to travel and it was the first time that I took a plane. Everything was exciting to me. It was an experience that I will never forget. I went to Miami and I had the opportunity to work in a restaurant as a waitress. The owner was Dominican like me. But it was a wider Latin restaurant. There were a variety of foods from different culture, like all who work there. We were from different countries, Honduran, Cubans, Mexicans, Ecuadorians, and Dominicans. They are the nationalities I can remember. I had never been in a place where people worked together from different countries. But we all tried and helped each other as brothers.

Since that time, as a customer, I am nicer with waiters. I understand the hard work they have day to day and how little they earn. There are long standing periods, many demanding customers or people with upset temperaments.

I only had 4 months of work there, but I learned a lot. I learned how to work in a restaurant, how to socialize with customers, the name of certain dishes, and how to deal with colleagues from different places. But something important that I learned was to improve my soft skills and my capacity to do my best.

My first job helped me to be more independent, work hard to achieve my goals and think about my future profession. My first job was the most interesting experience that I had. It changed my way of thinking, and it changed my life.

Noelia Sanchez was born in Dominican Republic, and has lived in the United States for nine months. She studies English at the Harlem Adult Learning Center of the New York Public Library. Her instructor is Myrna Holguin. She writes “I am Adventist, with a strong trust in God, happily married and ready to conquer the world.”

My First Job – A Difficult One

June 21, 2016 / terryhschwadron / Leave a comment

by Thierno Diallo

I moved to the United States in 2014. After one month I had a job. My first job was in an African clothing store. My job was to watch the merchandise inside the store. But I had a big problem with the customers because I didn’t understand English and Spanish.

The first day the boss explained the job to me. He said, “You have to clean the store every morning.”

I remember the first customer was a woman with three boys. She asked me about the t-shirt and shoes. I didn’t understand what she wanted.
She asked, “What kind of t-shirt do you have?” I didn’t say anything.

She asked if it was cheap.

I said yes. I didn’t know what she meant. She didn’t buy the cheap t-shirt. After she left, the boss called me inside.

He asked why the customer was sad. I didn’t know what to say.
The boss reminded me to do a good job before he closed the store. If I did bad work, I would have to pay for the merchandise.

I was very nervous with my boss. My first job was a very difficult job.

Thierno Diallo was born on 1989 in Conakry, Guinea. He has been in the United States in 2014. He is single and likes to read Internet news stories. He has a sister and brother in Conakry. He lives alone in the Bronx and is employed at a famous Italian restaurant in Manhattan. He studies English at Harlem Library. In the summer he will go to the CLIP program at the Bronx Community College

Murder, Love, Obsession: Stories of Imagination

December 15, 2015 / terryhschwadron / Leave a comment

Myrna Holguin’s English class for adults speaking other languages at the Harlem Library were shown unrelated photos – a hotel, a drowning/rescue scene, three people reading newspapers on a subway, an ambulance, a romantic dinner—and invited to weave one or more into a story. Here are some of the results:

Murder in the Hotel

By Jennifer Ranfla

Mary and Paul met in New York City a couple of months before the murder …

When Paul met Mary, he fell in love with her at first sight. After all, Mary was very kind, beautiful and so smart. Paul was a successful businessman and Mary was the new secretary in his office. Paul dated Mary for many months. One day, he decided to ask her to marry him. She accepted his proposal immediately, of course because she had many plans for her life.

One week after the wedding, they flew to Miami for their honeymoon. There they spent their days on the beaches and in the malls. All it was perfect! One night before they needed to come back to NY, he took her to a fancy restaurant for a romantic date. After dinner, they came back to hotel room. There, her real plans came true.

She prepared two drinks, one was very special for her husband and other for her. But Paul didn’t know was that in his drink was his death. She poisoned her husband’s drink, and after a minutes, Paul fell down completely dead.

She started very fast o clean the crime scene because she planned to escape to Europe with all the money of her husband.

She transferred all his money to her accounts in a couple of minutes. Then she took her luggage and ran away. But when she was running, somebody saw her, and thought: Why she was acting so nervously? While she was going to her car, the hotel employee went to their room and saw Paul on the floor.

He tried to save Paul, giving him CPR, but it was so late … Paul was dead.

The employee called 911 and reported all that he had seen

Immediately. The ambulance came to the hotel and the police went to find her.

Mary at this moment was in the freeway and the cops caught her very soon.

When she saw her situation that she hadn’t other exit, she only did a dump to the river and she couldn’t control her car. So her car crashed!

When the cops arrived at the scene, she was fine inside the car. The police took her out. Of course, she went to jail to pay for her crimes. The crime was news for many weeks. This was in all the papers of the country.

She couldn’t do that because the perfect crime does not exist.

Jennifer Ranfla was born in the United States, but was raised in Peru. She began studying English at the Harlem Library in 2014. She will attend LaGuardia Community College.

The Suite Hotel

By Alex Retroso

In the ’80s in Florida, one of the most famous hotels in the area was called “The Palacio del Mar.”

This hotel had the best lobby I had even seen, and six floors with amazing balconies with views of the beach. It had excellent food and the most interesting Latin disco of all time.

The weekends were wild and crazy because the disco nights got larger and larger, but when you finally got inside, you never forgot that moment.

Alex Reynoso was born in the Dominican Republic. He enjoys politics and history. He is taking English classes at the Harlem Library.

A scary week-end

by Francesco D’Ambrosio

As every morning, George was reading the New York Times in the train going to work. While he was reading he noticed a very nice black haired girl sitting in front of him. He suddenly felt in love with her. He didn’t know how but he decided he wanted to know that girl. He folded the newspaper, put it in his bag, stood up and went to that girl. “Hi, I wouldn’t like to bother you but I’m really impressed by your shining eyes. May I ask you your name?”

She was a little surprised at first but when she crossed her eyes with George’s, she felt butterflies in her stomach. “My Continue reading →

Applying to College from a Homeless Shelter

December 15, 2015 / terryhschwadron / Leave a comment

By Van Edgewater

I am living in a man’s homeless shelter to get this education, so that I can better myself for the future. This situation has exemplified to me what kind of life I would have if I do not get a better education, and it starts with finishing my high school accreditation.

I truly believe now that an education, the right education, is the answer to all things possible; a better and possible brighter future; a means to an end in all things to live a conducive and consequential life. I need this education to be that person, the person that I was meant to be: a humanitarian who helps point people in the right direction without judgment, so that they themselves can be better contributors to their own lives and society as well.

As for me, I have been living on borrowed time, borrowed money, job to job to job. I have grown weary of it, and unlike the people I spend my evenings and weekends with, I have not given up, nor am I just living to die.

A conviction as to where I am coming from is to walk in my shoes for the day. I doubt that any of you would have the stomach to do it for six hours. I see people putting on their job resumes or college applications that they volunteer at the homeless shelters. Well, I guess that it all fine and dandy if you are trying to appease someone and look good at the same time,

If you could imaging for a moment that you are re-wallpapering your newly acquired home and that you started with the baby’s room, and all of a sudden you puncture the wall with your scraper, and out comes what seems to be hundreds of roaches. That is what I live with day in and day out, the underlying truth.

And I want to be a Social Worker.

After living with these forks since March, 2015, I have come to question my own matriculation. I have come to the conclusion that I abhor these people, and that they deserve what is coming to them. I have been pondering this thought for quite some time; I have talked to a trusted sister and a confidante friend of mine — the mendacity to myself would be to walk away from this. To stand at this crossroads at this age at this time, I have learned that life has not been easy, so why should the future be any easier. This is what I was meant to be.

Van Edgewater is a Native American currently residing in a Salt Lake City shelter. He is part of an adult story writing project with teacher Tara Allred Niekamp, and he is writing poetry. The students are working to receive their high school diplomas.