Friday, March 27th, 2009
When Victor Ricardi opened the Sports Page bar in Gravesend eight years ago, he did not anticipate the collapse of the U.S. economy.
The 2003 smoking ban whittled away at his customer base. More recently, people’s tendency to shop at local liquor stores because of the recession all but eliminated his clientele.
Instead of closing permanently, Ricardi dismantled the bar’s interior and turned the storefront into a coffee and sandwich shop last fall.
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Friday, February 20th, 2009
Until last year, John Hyun used to get up at the crack of dawn and rush to Hunts Point Cooperative Market. Hyun would get fruit and vegetables, load his van and drive to his grocery store just north of Hunts Point.
What came next was the hard day of an immigrant who tries to build his way up in New York: a 12-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week marathon, day after day, spent moving sacks of potatoes and fulfilling the often unpredictable requests of old ladies.
“They’re never happy with the size of their apples,” said Hyun.
Now John Hyun, who has tiny, weathered hands, salt and pepper hair and a face that looks as it had been carved out of stone, still works 12-hour days, but he is no longer so frantically busy.
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