Finding Community in Washington Heights

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10d ago

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WNYC's Community Partnerships Desk is highlighting voices from neighborhoods across New York City, in collaboration with the nonprofit Street Lab. We recently set up in Washington Heights. Here are a few of the stories we heard.

The following transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

Perla Esquivel: " I'm 34 years old and I'm a nurse working in Washington Heights, and I was born and raised in Passaic County, New Jersey. I live in a community where there's not a lot of people of my ethnicity, and to come to a place where there are is kind of nice.

Washington Heights is predominantly Dominican, but I'm Mexican and I do see like Mexican restaurants, cafes, and Mexican people around too. And to work in a place where there's people of my ethnicity, it makes me feel like I'm helping out family members.

Any patient that I have, regardless of their background, I see them as my family, but when they're someone who speaks Spanish, I've seen the struggle of them communicating with like healthcare providers. There's a language barrier and it makes me feel good that I can kind of be a bridge and you know, help them out when they're like in a vulnerable state."

Ana-Ofelia Rodriguez:

I'm the cultural director for Alianza Dominicana, an agency that was established 44 years ago in northern Manhattan and is still alive.

So that's a beautiful spring day and I'm a little tired, but we have been locked up for so long that this is great. The parents are happy and the kids are free. But protected after the pandemic, there has been like a dramatic shift where kids are not engaged that much. I think it's all the stuff that they're hearing right now.

These young children already know who ICE is because children have come back from school and the parents are not there. So we trying to teach our little ones that they belong here. Um, keep them sane. This is healthy for the kids. They're doing artwork. They're running around in a beautiful block in their neighborhood, and these are the memories we want them to go with.

Dr. Sharon E. Smith: " I'm from Brooklyn, New York, and I'm in Washington Heights today to participate in a mental health month event on trauma and the way the body and mind react to it. We talked about intergenerational trauma. Trauma that is perceived and how we carry it in our bodies, but also how to do self care, how to get therapy, what is therapy, what is trauma, and you know, the definitions of it.

So I'm really excited today and my heart is full at the amount of people who came to the program. It's important for us to do this, especially now, and it's important to me personally because I know the effects of trauma, intergenerational trauma, and I think that there aren't enough spaces for us as people of color to experience this and hear from people who look like us and sound like us.

So this was a labor of love and something that's really important for our community.

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