Author: c.nazario

 

AMBI:  (Keys and door opening)

AMBI:  (Opening music)

TRACK:  In the first episode of this two-part episode, you were introduced to Victor Caltajeno, a super from New York City who has spent 21 years as a super. You heard about how he started and got to know the person rather than the super. In this episode, you’ll listen to him as a super. He’ll talk about what it takes to be one, what the job is like, the difficulties about it, as well as more. Let’s start with what it means to be a super and what does a super do.

Victor Caltajeno:  Being a super is making sure that your building is safe.  Um, how? No fire hazards, no gas leaks. Your heating system is working properly in the winter. Nothing in the hallway that’s a hazard because somebody can trip and fall, garbage maintenance, moping sweeping in the building.  Things like that you know.

TRACK:  After explaining to me the job of a super and what he does. He goes on to tell me that he didn’t always work for the company he works in now. He use to work for a company called dogger management. He was glad he didn’t have to work for them anymore. According to victor, they didn’t pay him sick days or vacation days or any bonuses and treated him like garbage.  But the company he’s with  now is better.

Victor Caltajeno:   This company took over it’s a better company, better benefits, we get vacation we get sick days we get a health plan. Plus, like I said, they give us a phone for they can reach us, and also they give us a uniform. Hats, three shirts, right now you got a coat they give us a coat. Everything is blue, you know we gotta wear boots, and we gotta have a sensor for we can check the hot water temperature. The temperature of the house is cel… the radiator makes sure everything is working proper.  We gotta have a knife a chief wright knife on us a spatula. We gotta have a tester an electric tester for we can test the outlets and the switch.  What else we gotta have a tape metric just in case we have to measure something right away.  And that’s it make it look mostly professional and make the tenant feel comfortable with us being there.

TRACK:  Victor also told me about what happened to dogger management and how the transition to where he is now happened. It wasn’t a smooth transition; instead it was more luck and chance that made the change happen as Victor explains.

Victor Caltajeno:  they lay me off cause the company went bankrupt and they give the building to somebody else then I got a porter job in dogger management. Then they gave me a super job. That’s how I switched up to here in 179^th St. Then a year ago this company took over the building after I was working for seven years for dogger so they took over, and they gave me the opportunity to work for them. I had to leave cause if they didn’t give me a chance to work with them I had to leave cause the management was different, so they was not responsible for me, but they like the way I working so they gave me an opportunity to work with them.

TRACK:  One of the interesting things Victor told me was how he was starting to focus on getting his certification or diploma, for he can earn even more money. Which I thought was smart the way he was thinking.

Victor Caltajeno:   Right now I’m focused on getting my diploma and more degree’s cause at the end of the day they gonna pay me more. The more things I know how to do they gonna pay me more so you really work to get money right, so the people is paying good. The company is paying good so yea I’ll stay here cause in order for me to do something else. I gotta go to school I’m thirty-five years old I don’t wanna go to school to do something else I don’t like you know. I do like this what I’m doing so if they gonna pay me more for doing what I like, my goal is really is to stay here and play it safe and probably be a manager who knows a general manager.

TRACK:  Other reasons why Victor doesn’t want to leave include his kids and the community also the longevity he’s had there. It’s all he’s known he’s never really worked anywhere else as a super. He’s Done favors here and there for other companies but has always remained with the one he’s in now.

Victor Caltajeno:   I been here since I started as a super I haven’t moved and I don’t want wanna move I create this like around here my kids they around here in school I like the area you know everybody knows me I don’t wanna move and start all over again. With other people other habits I know what they like some somethings got to be done, and I could do it right away they can wait and more patient, somewhere else I won’t have it like that.

TRACK:  As much as victor does like his job there are some things he does hate about it. Plumming is always a struggle for Victor. And now I understand why.

Victor Caltajeno: Plumbing cause I’m tall, so when I gotta unclog a bathtub or work under the sink you know it’s hard for me I be hitting everything; it’s kinda messy.

TRACK: There’s also, of course, the supers who don’t take their job as seriously. Victor goes on to tell me about friends he has that are like that. He does admit that there are supers that don’t care what happens and do their jobs for other reasons.

Victor Caltajeno:  I got like twenty friend supers probably more, and out of all of them probably three of them like what they are doing the other ones do like to do it. They just do it for the job and the apartment and for the money.  They don’t got the building as clean as I got, they don’t work as hard I you know. I like to help right now this is not my building and I came over here and  I made my own clock I got the snake in my house I got my tools, so I come over here do it real quick you know a favor for a favor.

TRACK: When asking Victor about the advice he would have for other supers if they ever find themselves in any type of situation with management or any legal troubles, this is what he said.

Victor Caltajeno:  Get legal advice cause some of them is legal, and some of the things they do is illegal, and you can’t shut up, and you cant stay quiet cause you know what I’m saying you saying something it helps benefit others. When you speaking you free your mind it’s a free country you got freedom of speech so some of them like me I was scared to say a couple of things we didn’t have sick days or holidays pay. Other companies do it and other companies they don’t do it.  So they know we not gonna go out there for fear of losing your job, you know.

TRACK: But as far as advice for anyone who is just becoming a super and is just getting into the actual job Victor keeps it simple, really.

Victor Caltajeno:  I’m just letting them know every day is a new thing, so you got to deal with it and if you come to the garbage room and it stinks get another job cause it’s gonna stink all your life.

Track: There’s another important and simple piece of advice Victor did add on later to the conversation.

Victor Caltajeno:  Take it easy. Don’t take your job to serious not too serious just don’t take it too hard.  Don’t be rude and be flexible with the people around you and work wit the building, the building works with you the people in the building is the one that makes you and to be a great super and to be successful for you to like your job you gotta do it like this is a hobby makes somebody happy, it makes you happy. So do the best you can to satisfy the person you know the tenants.

TRACK:  And you learn how to be a super and everything from your father you said right, so what was like the number one thing he told you that always sticks with you?

Victor Caltajeno: Don’t change be yourself and like I said being around some of the people it will give you bad vibes sometimes they will get mad at you and you just trying to make them comfortable and listen to them and what they say work around with what they want, you know if you can do it, do it if you can not then you can not do it.

TRACK: In closing out my conversation with Victor there was only one real thing he wanted people to understand about him and his job, just one thing he ask of the tenants and for anyone else he does a job for.

Victor Caltajeno:  I got things to do to its not like whenever you wake up today its listen well call the super for he can do it now. No please, I would like for people to understand me better and treat me better, that’s it I give you respect, and you give me some respect.

TRACK: Hopefully you got some insight into what it’s like being a super and the trials and tribulations Victor had to face and is still facing to a degree. And I hope you enjoyed the listen as well for Baruch College this Christian Nazario signing off.

AMBI:  (Entering Apartment)

Track:  This is a new apartment you’re fixing for somebody?

Victor Caltajeno:  Yeah Wednesday the person is gonna come on wensday.

Track: So nobody’s lived here before-

Victor Caltajeno: Yeah somebody’s lived here before

Track:  In the first part of this two-part episode, you’ll be introduced to Victor, a handyman or super who works around where I live. He’ll talk about his early life and his job as a super, also, his family, among other things.  This was a conversation with someone I never really talked with that much before. Especially when he was on the job. I knew very little to nothing about him. We always greeted each other and said a few words about how things are going in our lives but nothing in-depth like this. On this day, he had to paint and fix up an apartment for a tenant in one of the buildings he works in. We were on the move getting equipment, going up and down the building, and from room to room as he fixed up the apartment. Here’s how that day started.

Victor Caltajeno:  By the way, my name is Victor Caltajeno

Track: Caltajeno?

Victor Caltajeno:  Yeah Victor Caltajeno. That’s my name and you can call me super.

Track:  Everything started pretty quiet as you would expect from two people who didn’t know each other that well.  And before I could get the chance to ask, he goes on and starts telling me about his early life.

Victor Caltajeno:  Yeah I was born in Puerto Rico came over here when I was sixteen first. No first I came here when I was like eight.  Then went back and came back here when I was sixteen, then just… I been here since then.

Track: So you were born and raised in Puerto Rico?

Victor Caltajeno: I was born and raised in Puerto Rico. I went to school in Puerto Rico elementary school, middle school high school.  I dropped out of high school in twelfth-grade cause I’m not gonna graduate with my friends.  So I started working and it didn’t go as well as I want, Puerto Rico was hot a lot of people was getting killed.  So I moved on over here.  It’s hard to make money over there and not be killed.  There’s a lot of jealousy a lot people growing up wanting to do the same thing as you.  So my mom begged me to come over here and live with my father.  So I won’t get- between the other streets and-

Track: So your dad was already living here?

Victor Caltajeno:  My dad was already. He was a super. He was a super in the building and that’s why they saw me helping him out and it was basically that connection.  When I first came over here my father was the one who basically was around me at that time so I learned a lot from him.  Also I was working in construction in Puerto Rico.  In a company called Caribbean Construction INC.  They do pharmacies. It’s almost about the same thing you know. We work over here in Tremont, we work over here with stubs, tracks. But the super don’t really have to do much, we do it and when we know how to do more stuff they pay us extra. That’s what I like about this company other company management force you to do things that you’re not supposed to for the same pay.

Track: Ok you got here at sixteen and you became super at what age around?

Victor Caltajeno:  Um exactly at the age twenty or twenty-one like at twenty or twenty-one.  Yea because I was already a porter and then I became a super like three years after I became a super. I know I had my first son when I was twenty and my wife was eighteen. He came over here when he was two years old so twenty going to twenty-two years old and I’m about to be thirty-five next month.

Track:  After mentioning his family I asked him about them, and how they met he met his wife and well it was interesting.

Victor Caltajeno: The love of my life you wanna know that. That’s what changed me from being a little kid to a responsible man. This created me, my wife, my wife’s name is Amari Gomez. I met her we went out a couple of times. I really kissed her the first time it was in January 12^th. El anniversario de nosotro. So I met her. I had a friend his name was Jason he had a girlfriend. So I use to tell him listen winter is about to come, and I want a girlfriend to cause I got no girlfriend, so tell your girlfriend to bring to a friend, so it was around Christmas time.  So my stepmother birthday is in the 25^th on Christmas so they throw a party and she brings a friend her friend is Amari. So we dance some reggaeton. She didn’t want to dance at first. She was dancing salsa. I’m Puertorican I don’t know how to dance salsa, so they was dancing salsa she wanted me to dance I can’t dance that so I walk around the kitchen.

Track: You didn’t try?

Victor Caltajeno:  I didn’t try, so it was a reggaeton song than I said I can dance this, so we danced I wanted to walk her home, but I ain’t had no job. This guy named champeon, they call him champion. He had a job. He had a chain, he had everything going on so he wanted to walk her home, so I said you know what I can go. So she said well you walk me.  And since there you know we go the building she said she wanted to see me again and went to my father, my father was the super. So we start playing dominos one day, and she told me to kiss her that was January 12^th. I kissed her and from their 15 years together.

Track: After that interesting story, it took a bit before we got back to talking about his job. He enjoyed just having conversations about something else for a change. So just for a moment, we talked about other things in his life, like his hobbies one of which we had in common. We started talking about boxing and his interest in boxing. He began to tell me about a scene he did for a movie where he got to play a boxer.

Victor Caltajeno:  I like boxing, and when I was going to do more I had to leave when I was living there, and I move here to New York so I couldn’t follow my dream. But I still got the gym down downstairs, boxing equipment I train people, kids come to my house they come and box they call me super-agent. I train them with the mitts and stuff like that you know. That was my dream, but even though I didn’t follow my dream I still feel like I’m the people’s champ.

Track: Right, so you never even got to be an amateur boxer or?

Victor Caltajeno: Na but I fought people famous amateurs and stuff like that. I been in the ring I did a movie also called struggle. And it’s about a boxing guy you know. I wish you know I could have did more but it is what it is.

Track: Tell me about that because you mentioned it last time, but I forgot about that how did that come about?

Victor Caltajeno: I was helping this guy’s attic and he’s everywhere so he had an opportunity to make a movie with somebody else, and he said I’m not doing it I got somebody that knows how to box and fight so when he heard about the movie he got me. The person came to my house spoke to me would you like to be in a movie we’ll pay you. I said you don’t have to pay me that’s boxing I love it so we had the whole gym the whole day for us to be in there so I bring my kids in there. I had a good time it was the best day of my life, it was one of the best days of my life. Being in the whole gym for yourself alone. That’s what you’d like to do you know.

TRACK:  As we finished that conversation we moved on to talking more in detail about his job as a super and future as a super. But that’ll have to wait till next time in part two. Until then, this is Christian  Nazario signing off.

For my final Narrative podcast, assignment i wanted to focus on Baruch’s Basketball team and hopefully interview their coach and maybe some players or former players of the team about their experience on the team and expectations for this years team.  And with their first home game in late November I wanted to talk to them again for a second part. about their progression so far and how the first home game went. and maybe interview someone who was at the home game to.  So for the first part I wanna focus on the teams past and expectation for the future. while in the second part focus on how they done so far in the first few games of the season.

A second idea for the final assignment I had was to interview people in charge of The knowledge House a organization that offers free technology courses. their focus is on technologists, entrepreneurs, and digital leaders, who will uplift their communities out of poverty. For the first part I wanted to interview someone in charge of the organization for they can tell us more information about it. and for the second part hopefully focus onone of the people taking the course and their thoughts on it etc..

Script:

HOST INTRO: The Bronx night market, where vendors from different boroughs and cultures come to display and sell their food, has become a popular event. The event is held every Saturday, from May until the last Saturday of October. With over 50 vendors and over 80,000 people expected by the time the event is over on October 26. It has become something the community and vendors look forward to. Christian spoke with one of the vendors from the market.

AMBI: People talking and music playing.

TRACK 1: The delightful look as people try their food and the smiles as people talk and enjoy the music.  Along with the sizzling sound of food being grilled fills Fordham plaza where the Bronx night market is taking place. I go to talk to Rafael Quinones, who co-owns Revelations Catering alongside his wife. And has worked under other chefs before starting his own catering company. This is also the first time ever displaying his food in the Bronx Night Market. Here’s what it’s done to help his business.

Chef Quinones: It’s brought us a lot of exposure to our food for the customer. And the customer standpoint it got us a lot of. we received more requests than anything else.

TRACK 2: People attending The Bronx Night Market for the first time like Maria. Were treated to food they have never tasted before. One of those foods was the chimichurri burger, which is a popular food in Dominican Republic she has never tasted it before and once she did. It became one of her favorite foods she has tried there. She also described her experience attending the Bronx night market for the first time.

Maria: I seen food from different parts of the world and how it’s made. The Bronx night market inspires you to learn and try different cultural food, and it brings people together.

TRACK 3:  The process of being able to participate in the Bronx night Market isn’t difficult. All you need is an application, an email and to be persistent in showing how serious you are about getting that chance to be able to participate. Why he choose the Bronx night market is most likely why some other vendors did as well.

Chef Quinones: we’re a Bronx based business, and we wanna showcase what the Bronx has to offer you know. The Bronx has a lot of untapped business that people don’t know about. And the only way they can do it is through the Bronx night market. And through social media, but the Bronx night market is a very good outlet to showcase what you have and where you come from.

TRACK 4:  Some of the food Revelations catering sells includes rice bowls. Chipotle chicken Carne asada Korean Short Rib and Seasonal roasted vegetable also a Thai burger and their most popular item on the menu their loaded fries, which is made of French fries mixed with carne asada and any vegetable topping of your choosing. All mixed in one dish. Nothing is off-limits for chef Quinones. On top of that he told me something he is currently trying in the Bronx night market.

Chef Quinones:  No I. I gotten exposed throughout the years, a lot of different foods Asian, Indian, American, Mexican, Thai, Vietnamese you name it.  Primarily right now what I’m doing is I’m mixing both my Latin roots with the Asian cuisine.

TRACK 5:  Since spring 2017, the Bronx night market has been a key event for different chefs around New York City to display their food and culture to people.  It also helps that they’re so close to Fordham University.  But probably the biggest reason why some chefs like chef quinones participate in the Bronx night market is to lay the groundwork for bigger things.

Chef Quinones: So our hope is to open our own little… our own restaurant we don’t wanna start off big we wanna grow little by little. We don’t wanna.. We wanna crawl before we run you know what I mean. We wanna make sure everything is on point you know. That our hope is to open our own restaurant.

TRACK 6: For more information about the Bronx night market or revelations catering you can follow their social media. For Baruch College, this is Christian Nazario in the Bronx.

For my Radio news story, I was thinking of interviewing the organizer or some of the vendors of the Bronx night market.  The Bronx night market is a festival of different foods and cultures from all around the world. I’d like to interview the organizer or some of the vendors to see what makes the festival unique and what made them choose this festival to display their foods.  The Bronx night market will occur every Saturday until late October then start again on may. for an additional two months.

I was thinking of interviewing a youth specialist that deals with immigrant children. I wanted to ask him about his job what role he plays in immigration. Is he an immigration agent? does he help the actual agents? also how he got the job and experiences he’s had on the job since getting it. Alternatively, if that can’t work out, I was planning on interviewing vendors and salesmen in the Bronx Night Market. The markets open every Saturday from September to October, and I interview vendors from the market as an alternate.

Today explained is a podcast from vox. And vox is an American news and opinion website distributed by vox media. The purpose of this podcast is to introduce to people the biggest news for the day, from Mondays through Friday.  The podcast is intended for anyone interested in news, especially in news away from politics at times. Today explained focuses most of the time on stories that are not focused much on mainstream media. It uses an interview-style format from experts from subjects they are focusing on. From week to week they offer different advertising from products to promotions from other podcast outlets like stitcher radio who also produces the podcast along with vox.  Though there is no ranking to match it along with another podcast in terms of popularity. Vox today explained does hold a 4.6 out of 5-star rating with over three thousand reviews on apple podcast.  It’s difficult to say if it has made waves but being from a big media outlet.  And also having a great rating it’s safe to assume so, also it is promoted heavily through vox and other sites like vulture.com have covered its release in February 2018.  When it comes to this particular podcast any episode is good to start with because it focuses primarily on individual issues that can sometimes have nothing to do with the last episode.