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VIRTUAL CLASS: HONDURAS
In 2015, I dedicated an hour and a half of my time every Sunday evening to teaching an online arts management class to a group of young bilingual Hondurans in the city of San Pedro Sula. They are straight-A students, highly intelligent, socially conscious young men and women with a desire to make the world around them a better place. Our studies included written and verbal communications, Internet research and productivity, promotion, grantwriting, acting and other skills needed to produce and promote arts programming. In countries like Honduras, arts are an untapped resource capable of bringing new thinking to the critical challenges of today.
FIREMEN’S GARDEN (MEMORIAL)
In the mid to late 80s, I lived in the East Village, on one of the greenest blocks in the city, 8th St. between C and D. One summer my girlfriend at the time, Gina House and I, decided to clean up the empty lot few doors down the block. Housemates Scott Molampy and William Mills joined us and soon we had landscaped and planted the whole lot, where years earlier a fireman died battling the flames of a burning building that once stood there. This became our breakfast spot. Years later, Ainsley, who lived next door, registered the lot in the Greenthumb program, where it remains today. After 9/11, this being the only such garden in the city, it’s safe to say that no one will mess with the little oasis of green we bequeathed to downtown Manhattan.
Firemen’s Memorial Garden
Firemen’s Memorial Garden (East)
Firemen’s Memorial Garden (East)
Firemen’s Memorial Garden (Entrance)
Firemen’s Memorial Garden (Entrance)
Firemen’s Memorial Garden (East)
Firemen’s Memorial Garden Sign
Firemen’s Memorial Garden Plaque
HAPPY LAND MEMORIAL
In the mid 90s, I worked as Executive Director of the Federation Of Honduran Organizations in New York. This non-profit was founded in the wake of the Happy Land Social Club fire of 1990 in which 87 mostly Honduran immigrants died after spurned Cuban immigrant Julio López used a gallon of gasoline to torch the place, which had only one exit, to avenge being spurned by his former girlfriend. One of my first tasks consisted of researching the complex genealogical/friend bonds so that the names on the memorial obelisk reflect those relationships. At the time, the Federation had no files or databases after 5 years of existence, so I had to start from scratch. This memorial is another permanent feature of the New York city landscape in which I have had a hand. Above, the location as it stands today.
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