Categories
Interview

From the archives: Janeth and Julia

Julia Bravo (l) and Janeth Toral (r)
Julia Bravo (l) and Janeth Toral (r)

From the archives– the interview with Janeth and Julia on 14th street

I met friends Janeth Toral and Julia Bravo sitting outside a house on 14th Street just south of 30th Avenue, on a Saturday morning.  Janeth works as a consultant for Mary Kay: they were selling beauty products made by Mary Kay and Avon from the porch to passersby.

Janeth and Julia are both from Ecuador.  Julia has lived in Astoria for 49 years and is now considered the “abuelita” – the “grandmother” – of her community.  She works as a crossing guard by public school 171, which is bordered by 29th and 30th Aves, and 14th Street.  Her work is clearly needed there, as there are no traffic lights.  One day four years ago, after getting a group of children across the street, a taxi hit her and hurt her leg.

Julia works 12 months a year – in the summertime there are still classes going on.  She says that the children who she helps cross the road are from all ethnic backgrounds – Hispanic, black, South Asian, Chinese, Irish, Italian – but that differences are overridden by the fact “they are all children.”

She enjoys the affection she gets from the children and the fact their parents are grateful for her help.  Julia’s own children are now grown up and married, and are currently serving in the army – she says that email helps her to keep in regular contact with them.

Janeth came to New York from Ecuador 19 years ago.  For the first year before moving to Astoria she lived in Corona.  “I didn’t like it because it was so noisy.  There was so much loud music!  Here it’s a bit calmer.  There are problems here and there, but we manage.”  She began selling beauty products to help support her family.  Her husband and two of her sons are in Ecuador, and her other four children (two boys and two girls) live with her in Astoria.

Both Janeth and Julia agree that the good things about the neighborhood are the nearby parks – in particular Astoria Park with its swimming pool – and access to different things that they need: stores, schools, post-offices.  The problems, they say, come mainly from people who come through from other parts of New York City.  And as Julia adds, the prices are going up, making it an expensive neighborhood to live in now.

The two women first got to know each other when Janeth’s son, now 13, was in pre-kinder.  “He kept asking me about Julia, saying ‘when are we going to see my grandmother?’” says Janeth.  “I would say no, she’s not actually your grandmother’ and he would say, ‘yes, she is!’”.

Categories
Interview

Speaking with Brian King of Vapor Generation

Brian King of Vape Generation
Brian King of Vape Generation

A new arrival on 30th Avenue is “Vapor Generation” at 36-20B. I quit smoking about five years ago when I became pregnant with my first child: while I’ve noticed vape stores popping up around the neighborhood and people standing outside bars with their vape pens, vaping has been a bit of a mystery to me. I spoke with Vapor Generation’s Brian King to find out more.

Brian moved to Astoria from California two and a half months ago. He started working with Vapor Generation when it opened in late February.

‘We’re trying to get people to quit in a nice healthier way, giving people many options,” he says. “We’re talking ingest or otherwise, with varying rates of nicotine from zero all the way up to eighteen milligrams for the heavy smokers. That way they don’t go through withdrawals if they are trying to kick.”

The store has a long counter where customers can test the products, and glass cabinets where they are on display: the battery-powered vaping devices, and the liquids in various flavors which go inside them. Along one wall is a black and white image of a lamp-lit street in Paris.

“There’s a heating element inside that atomizes the liquid,” says Brian. “Instead of turning it into a smoke it’s actually a vapor. You are exhaling, and it looks like smoke, but it’s not.”

He adds: “It tastes good, and it smells good too. People’s boyfriends and girlfriends are happy when they are not smoking because they don’t have to kiss an ashtray anymore.”

Brian, who formerly worked in construction, started using vapors in California.  “I had to do something with my mouth,” he says. “I was chewing on pens and pencils, toothpicks, and eating lollipops…and then I found vaping.”

Until he got into the business, however, he did not realize how many options were available.  Vapor Generation sources its liquids from the US and Europe – avoiding other overseas sources given the risks of them containing harmful ingredients such as pesticides.  The liquids they sell contain pharmaceutical-grade or food-grade propylene glycol and glycerin.

Vaping is picking up quicker in New York than in California, Brian says, “because of Prop 215, which has made other things legal to smoke in California.” (Prop 215 is the legislation on medical marijuana).

While many of Vapor Generation’s customers are young, older long-time smokers are also venturing in. Brian sees it as his role to educate them. “A lot of the older folks that come in are trying to quit smoking – they have a lot of questions.  It’s good to be able to answer their questions for them and let them know what’s going on.”

On Astoria, Brian says that it “has friendly people.  It’s a little bit busier than I am used to.  But when you get somebody to stop and talk to you they are actually willing to give you a bit more time than they would in San Francisco.  If you’re lost looking for somewhere, people will actually get on their phone and ask other people.  They will try and help you get what you need.”

Vape Generation
Vape Generation