All posts by Breffni Neary

Assignment 4

Hurricane Sandy Experience

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Hurricane Sandy hit New York City when I was a sophomore in high school.  I can barely remember the darkness of the sky or the howling of the winds, but the ominous feeling that surrounded that week is something I will never forget. While a week without school is something any student would normally be overjoyed about, there was an air of unsettlement. Every day, we waited to see if the greatest city in the world was truly great enough to overcome the devastation. And every day, we learned more and more about just how much damage was done.

Eerily enough, my street was not damaged. No power lines went down, no flooding occurred, no windows were broken by debris in the high speed winds. Yet stepping off my little side street was like walking into a battlefield. The streets around us had all lost power, large tree branches had crashed into more than a few houses, and cars were either dented from flying garbage cans, or partially submerged. My parents went out during a moment of calm in the middle of the storm out of curiosity. They said the air was scarily still, and scarily quiet. After the storm, this air returned.
This air killed the vibe of Halloween and was still around by the next weekend. A friend had her quincenera scheduled for that Saturday, and half of the guests didn’t show up due to the storm. Even her best friend missed the party due to the gas shortage. While it was a fun night, it was very unsettling to be the only car on the highway for long stretches of time. While I am lucky to not have been impacted heavily by the storm, it was an eye opening experience. It was the first time I had felt the city fall to its knees since 9/11.

Assignment 3, Writing on Readings

Homelessness Experience – 3rd writing response

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I am lucky enough to have never been homeless. The same cannot be said for my father, who was homeless for six weeks in his mid-20’s. While this is nothing in comparison to the years some of the city’s most unfortunate citizens suffer through, the street is still the street. Yet it also can’t be ignored that his experience was in part due to his pride. My dad had friends and cousins who lived in the city, but he did not want them to know he had fallen on hard times. He had lost his job and been thrown out of his uncle’s house, whom he was staying with after he had moved to America.

My dad was able to secure another job, but as a construction laborer, the pay was very low. It covered food and subway tokens and some nights at a shelter, where he was able to get food, a shower, and a place to sleep. On nights when he had to keep up appearances and go out with the guys, he would choose beer over a safe place to sleep. He slept on church steps, in the 42nd street bus terminal, and on the train, and was lucky enough to not be arrested. He was also lucky that this happened over the summer.

Eventually, he swallowed his pride and talked to his cousins, who let him live with them for the first two months rent free as he saved up. My dad later got a better job, met my mother, and made amends with his uncle, but those six weeks are still a sore spot for him. He refuses to talk about it, and what little I know was siphoned from my mother.
I did learn that he had his tools stolen by another homeless person, but it could have been much, much worse. For the last Macaulay seminar, I completed a research project on homelessness, and learned that the shelters are largely the centers of violence and assault. Both my father’s experience and my research was eye opening to the fact that literally anyone can experience homelessness. The homeless are not alien concepts who just beg for money on trains or spout gibberish on street corners. They are parents, friends, people, and above all, New Yorkers.

Assignment 2

Police encounter – Week 2 response

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Police encounter

I truly cannot think of any significant encounter with the police. I’m lucky enough to have never been questioned, stopped, or harassed. The clearest image I have of police is their movement en masse along Fifth Avenue during The Saint Patrick’s Day parade. Happy, smiling, the image of justice and positivity.

And yet, whenever I pass the police on the street, it is not this ideal that I think of. Their eyes always look black, their jaws tight, their stance hostile. While this often melts into a ‘good afternoon’ or just a nod, I still feel uncomfortable and unsafe around them.

        It’s because I know that while I’m left alone, so many other innocent people are not so lucky. I am a middle class white woman, and that is likely the reason. It is in no way right, but statistics don’t lie: ‘minorities’ (which is an obsolete word in a diverse city such as New York) are stopped more than white people.

I experienced this firsthand back in high school. After a day at Coney Island, a friend and I were heading to the train when we noticed the emergency exit was open, and the booth worker was not paying attention. We had Metrocards, but we jumped at the chance at a free ride. We were just three feet past the exit when we heard, “Hey! What do you think you’re doing?” We turned to see two cops coming out from behind the pillar, and simultaneously blurted, “Oh sh*t.”

     The cops came up to us, but almost immediately turn their attention to my friend, who happens to be Hispanic with a dark tan. They told him he was in a lot of trouble, that they could take him in et cetera, and continuously ignored me as I tried to make excuses. They eventually wrote him a ticket, but not me. Four years later, and I’m still shocked.

About Us

About Me + Transit Experience – Breffni Neary

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  1. About Me

My name is Breffni, a born and raised New Yorker from Astoria, Queens, who’s on a quest to both become a lawyer and to find the best bagel in the city. My father is American born, my mother not, and both were raised in Ireland and met in NYC. They met at The Breffni Bar actually, which explains my first name. The name is also derived from my mother’s favorite poem, “The Little Waves of Breffny,” which is fitting because I love to write poetry and other pieces.

While my parents have retained their brogues, they didn’t raise me or my siblings in a distinctly Irish way. I learned a handful of Gaelic words growing up and we always went to the St. Patrick’s Day parade, but beyond that, it was a typical American upbringing. I attended public school in my youth, and while my parents shocked relatives by not raising us Catholic, I still went to a Catholic high school. We took regular family vacations, including trips to Ireland, but my dad, a carpenter, was often busy working. My mom, a nanny, has been raising babies since I was a child, so I have grown up taking care of pseudo-siblings, an experience which has likely shaped my desire to become a teacher.

I would love to stay in New York City to teach and practice law, because I really do think that NYC is the greatest city in the world. I love the city’s dietary staples, like pizza and bagels, because carbs are always a great idea. I love that it is a city that never sleeps; there is always something to do, one just has to look. And I love the diversity. Walking down the street is like travelling the globe, and it is so interesting to learn about so many different cultures.

Of course, I don’t love everything about this city. I dislike how expensive it can get. Why are there so many luxury apartments when the average New Yorker can’t afford them? Why do shoebox apartments have to cost an arm and a leg? Even the corner store’s prices are skyrocketing. Secondly, I dislike the New York stereotype that suggests it’s an unsafe city and that all New Yorkers are rude. Some of us are, but still. I also dislike the inequality across neighborhoods, and the stigmas that accompany them. There is no reason that people that live on the Upper East Side or Tribeca should be thought of as better than those who live in Washington Heights. Further, there is the idea that NYC is all about Manhattan. It’s not.

  1. Transit experience

Everyone has a love-hate relationship with the MTA. While I have had tons of completely ordinary, uneventful trips on our city’s subways and buses, the first story that comes to mind is one that was less than ideal. Even now, I’m not exactly sure what it was, but I do know that it made me uncomfortable. In this post-“grab her by the pussy” world, acknowledging violations of personal space is a must, even on crowded trains where this space is limited.

Two years ago. January. R Train. Rush hour. I was wedged in an overflowing car that had the familiar smell of homeless person’s piss. I had the normal level of distrust that comes with a packed train, and I held my bag a little closer to my side as I read ads for breast augmentation and technical school. And then I started to feel weird. As the train made the long under-the-river trip from Lex to Queens Plaza, I couldn’t put my finger on it. And then the doors squeaked open, people shuffled off, and the weird feeling became clear. A man I hadn’t been able to see was seated in front of me, with one hand on his crotch and the other massaging my knee.

The weirdest part? The man looked offended and honestly surprised when I said, “can you f***ing not?” I quickly pushed my way to the end of the car and into the next one. It showed me that you never really know who you’re commuting with. The action of touching a knee is not inherently sexual, and there are cases where the contact has been much worse to the point of sexual assault, but sex is not the issue. The issue is that people take the advantage of crowded trains to invade the space of others.