Posts tagged new york

‘You Feel Bad For Being Safe’: East End Rallies Around Ukrainian Community

Blog March 9, 2022

At 12 years old, Vira Palamarchuk shouldn’t have a care in the world.

At 12 years old, she should not be tired, or sad, or worried. She should not be glued to the media, closely watching from over 4,600 miles away as Russia attacks Ukraine, her home country, where her father is fighting on the front lines.

At 12 years old, she should not be left to wonder whether he is alive or dead.

“It really is, like, you don’t want to even know what’s happening,” Vira said of the war from her home in Montauk. “I’m not on my phone anymore. I don’t look at the news anymore, because I don’t want to know. I just want to know if my family is okay and if my friends are okay. You see all those pictures and you don’t even want to …”

She paused, her voice hitching. “You feel bad for being safe,” she said. “That’s the feeling I get.”

No Road Map For Coastal Communities: NOAA Study Predicts Sea Levels Will Rise A Foot By 2050

Blog Planet February 22, 2022

As the debates over beach nourishment, shoreline armoring and managed retreat create a deafening din in coastal communities, a report by researchers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration landed last week with an even louder thud.

In the next 30 years, the United States is expected to see as much sea level rise as it has over the last century, the report says. For many coastal communities, that means the water will come up 10 inches to 1 foot, on average, by 2050 — and, by 2100, up to 7 feet, though the report noted that these long-term estimates are less certain.

“This new data on sea rise is the latest reconfirmation that our climate crisis — as the president has said — is blinking ‘Code Red,’” National Climate Advisor Gina McCarthy said in a press release. “We must redouble our efforts to cut the greenhouse gases that cause climate change while, at the same time, help our coastal communities become more resilient in the face of rising seas.”

Slipping Away: Homeowners, Officials Buy Time As Escalating Effects Of Climate Change Threaten East End

Blog Planet January 25, 2022

For centuries, the world has known one type of refugee: those who leave their homes behind due to war, violence, conflict or persecution, often risking their lives in the pursuit of safety.

In recent years, the definition has unofficially expanded.

Consider Hurricane Katrina, a natural disaster that forced 1.5 million people from their homes in Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi — about 40 percent of whom never returned.

In Alaska, residents of a small, eroded seaside village are planning to move what’s left of it to safer ground inland — a project that will cost over $100 million, but sea level rise, stronger storms and melting permafrost have left them no choice.

In Siberia, a thawing permafrost there has been called a slowly detonating “methane time bomb” that can be seen from space.

Last August, Death Valley, California, set a world record for the hottest reliably measured temperature in Earth’s history — for the second consecutive year — while, paradoxically, scientists link the cold snap that hit Texas last February to a warming Arctic that has weakened the polar vortex, allowing frigid air to reach farther south.

More than 3 inches of rain pounded New York City last summer during Hurricane Ida, resulting in its first-ever flash flood emergency. And, last month, dry conditions fanned what started as a grass fire into the most destructive blaze in Colorado state history — burning over 1,000 houses to the ground and displacing 35,000 people, many left without a home to return to, now that the dust has settled.

According to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, based in Geneva, Switzerland, 30.7 million people across 145 countries and territories were displaced due to catastrophic weather disasters in 2020 alone. The people left in their wake are now known as “climate refugees.”

On the East End, local environmental experts fear that some East End homeowners could land among them, if the effects of climate change continue to escalate.

Photographer Michael Heller Documents Africa Fire Mission’s Tireless Work In Kenya

Blog Travel January 13, 2022

Mathare is one of the oldest slums in Nairobi — home to over half a million people who live in a sea of mud-and-tin shanties, tightly packed into just 2 square miles. Survival is a daily struggle, set against a backdrop of poverty, disease, anarchy and violence, social complexities, and a lack of basic amenities, like sanitation, clean water, electricity and passable roads.

It is hard to imagine what would happen if a fire were to break out here — which is precisely what 20 firefighters and EMTs from the United States considered last November while touring the slum as part of their debriefing with Africa Fire Mission, a nonprofit organization that trains, empowers, supports and encourages fire departments in developing countries.

Among the firefighters was Michael Heller — an active member of the East Hampton Fire Department and a professional photographer whose work regularly appears in the Express News Group publications. He soaked in the atmosphere and conditions, noting the sewers running next to the shacks, the air heavy with the smell of burning and human waste.

“It gave us a sense of, ‘This is what the firefighters are having to deal with,’” he said, adding, “We were educated on what the odds are — and what they’re really dealing with when they try to go to a fire in these situations.”

The East Hampton Press Person of the Year: Hugh King

Blog December 30, 2021

Hugh King is a man of many faces.

On the surface, he is a historian, an actor, a teacher and an avid baseball fan — with an entire room in his Amagansett home dedicated to the sport. He is a husband and a caregiver, a trusted colleague, and a friend to so many across the East End and beyond.

At age 80, he is firm, yet gentle and kind, vibrant and welcoming. He is steadfast in his opinions, but always eager to listen. His wit and effortless humor shine through while challenging the status quo, and even though he loves history, he never stagnates nor lives in the past — always striving to be better.

This is why Hugh King is The East Hampton Press’s Person of the Year for 2021.

Former Sag Harbor Family Raises Funds For Daughter Fighting Neurological Disorder

Blog December 8, 2021

Bella Adlah is nothing short of a sweet, upbeat, 16-year-old girl — kind, giving and caring, with a wide, bright smile full of braces.

She loves drama, dance and singing, spending time with her friends and family, and exploring the outdoors. She even started a not-for-profit during the COVID-19 pandemic that delivered care packages to children in hospitals.

But that ground to a halt when she suddenly found herself in one, too — diagnosed with a neurological disorder that made it impossible for her to move, eat, speak, or see.

‘Keep A Good Thought’: Tony Galgano, 78, Of Boardy Barn Fame Remembered For Boundless Generosity

Blog November 23, 2021

For the past five days, the flag marking the entrance of the Boardy Barn has flown at half-staff — paying tribute to one of the men who started it all.

“Keep a good thought,” he would say. “May the good days outnumber the bad days.”

In the early morning hours of November 20, Anthony “Tony” Galgano Jr. — the co-owner of the iconic summertime bar in Hampton Bays who was widely known for his gentle spirit, humble nature and boundless generosity — died after a long battle with cancer at the East End Hospice Kanas Center for Hospice Care on Quiogue, with his daughter, Jennifer Minihane, by his side.

He was 78.

“It’s just a sad day. It’s a sad day,” longtime friend Debbie Martel said during a telephone interview last Sunday evening. “He made a difference in so many people’s lives, from the littlest things to the biggest things. Not many people can say that. He made a difference in the entire Hampton Bays community. We all should strive to be half as good as Tony.”

Passionist Priests Say Goodbye After Feud With Bishop

Blog Religion October 20, 2021

The Reverend Edward Beck sat inside the rectory of St. Therese of Lisieux Catholic Church last Friday morning riding tidal waves of emotions — sadness, disappointment, anger and confusion.

In four days, the Passionist priest would be forced to leave Montauk, the place he had called home for over a year, and without a clear explanation as to why.

Last summer, Bishop John Barres of the Diocese of Rockville Centre, which oversees Long Island’s Catholic community, had placed him at the parish along with a fellow Passionist priest, the Reverend Robert Joerger, who served as pastor. But in July, the diocese abruptly ended Beck’s assignment, revoking his “residence and faculties” effective August 31.

Refusing to leave Joerger without Beck, the Passionists, who traditionally live in community, decided to withdraw from the Montauk parish altogether and both priests moved off the East End last Tuesday — further splintering an already fractured religious community that the two men helped stabilize, renew, and reinvigorate.

“It pains me because some of them have said they’re gonna stop going, they’re not gonna come to church, they’re gonna stop contributing. It’s affected their faith life,” Beck said. “And that is really sad to me, that something like this, that was so easily resolvable by just talking about it and trying to come to some compromise and understanding, that all of this hurt and pain could have been avoided — but that the bishop refused to take any step toward understanding, reconciling, or compromise.”

A Night Inside ‘Bubby’s Kitchen’ With Shira Ginsburg

Blog October 6, 2021

As the tradition goes, the center of many Jewish households is the kitchen. And for Judith Ginsburg, hers was no exception.

She took pride in her vibrant, tight-knit family piling around the table, sharing laughs and smiles and food — by far and away her love language — and it was there that her granddaughter, Shira, first heard her Bubby’s stories about World War II.

In fact, she can’t imagine a time that she hasn’t known them — or when she started to realize they were unique.

“Like any other child, you don’t know that you’re different, that anything is different, until you get a little bit older and you start to see yourself in the context of the rest of the world,” Shira Ginsburg said during a telephone interview. “So for me, it was just what I knew — until I started telling people my grandparents were in the woods in the war, and they were like, ‘What do you mean, like, camping?’”

Not quite. As teenagers, Judith Ginsburg and her husband, Motke, lived for years in the forests of Belarus, serving as resistance fighters against the Nazi regime.

A Man Of Many Talents: Isaac Mizrahi Overcomes on Bay Street Stage

Blog Celebrity Stage September 27, 2021

At 59 years old, Isaac Mizrahi has lived many lives — each of them, at their core, a combination of humor, personality and, of course, fashion.

Now a household name, the once-burgeoning designer established himself as a force in the fashion world with his 1988 runway debut, an explosion of color that cemented him as a man to watch — named “hottest new designer” by the New York Times.

He has dressed supermodels in couture, Broadway actors in elaborate costumes, and everyday women in his affordable clothing lines with Target and QVC. He’s sat as a judge on seven seasons of “Project Runway: All Stars,” written comic books, a memoir, and hosted a talk show.

He sings, acts and directs, and dabbles in comedy — all in the pursuit of his purpose, he said, which is to create, perform and inspire.

But nearly six decades later, it can still come with a heavy dose of imposter syndrome.