美国国家公共电台 NPR With Amazon's Arrival, A New York Community Pushes To Be Included

 

RACHEL MARTIN, HOST:

One of Amazon's shiny new headquarters will be located in a part of New York City that has long struggled. It'll be just a few blocks away from Queensbridge Houses, which is the name of the largest public housing complex in North America. So what will that mean for locals? NPR's Jasmine Garsd reports from Queensbridge.

JASMINE GARSD, BYLINE¹: The Queensbridge public houses are just two subway stops away from bustling² Manhattan. But Queensbridge feels like a completely different world. Chris Hanway is the executive director of the Jacob A. Riis Neighborhood Settlement, a nonprofit which provides services to the community.

CHRIS HANWAY: Queensbridge has always been literally³ and psychologically isolated⁴. It's got the river on one side, the bridge on another and then sort of light manufacturing buildings around it.

GARSD: In his seminal⁵ 1994 album "Illmatic," New York rapper Nas, who is from Queensbridge, penned an ode to the neighborhood...

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "MEMORY LANE (SITTIN' IN DA PARK)")

NAS: (Rapping) It's real - grew up a trife life, the times of white lines...

GARSD: ...And the strength of its people.

(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "MEMORY LANE (SITTIN' IN DA PARK)")

NAS: (Rapping) Coming out of Queensbridge - now let me...

GARSD: It didn't take long for big companies to notice how close the neighborhood is to Manhattan. In the last decade or so, Ralph Lauren opened an office nearby, and so did JetBlue. But activists⁶ say, for many Queensbridge residents, it's like it never happened. Hanway says unemployment here is high. And that's why when Amazon announced it's setting up shop just a few blocks away...

HANWAY: People literally shrugged⁷ their shoulders and said, well, we've been down this road before. It's not really going to affect us in any way - because they've lived this experience.

GARSD: Amazon, which is an NPR sponsor, declined to comment. But the company has promised to fund infrastructure⁸, a school and a tech incubator. It also says it will host job fairs for locals. Chris Hanway has met with Amazon officials and made it clear he wants more concrete promises than that.

HANWAY: What are our goals? How many local residents are we going to hire - into what kind of jobs? How will we get those residents ready for these jobs? And there have to be benchmarks, and Amazon has to be held accountable for that.

GARSD: On a chilly⁹ weeknight, I head over to an area near the Queensbridge Houses. It's a lot of warehouses¹⁰ and storage units. But inside one building, I find a software developer training class.

UNIDENTIFIED LECTURER: In other words, you're able to take your data from your app and...

GARSD: The students listening intently to the lecture are mostly Latino, African-American, and there's plenty of women - faces that are scarce in Silicon¹¹ Valley. The class is part of a nonprofit called Pursuit, which trains low-income adults for tech jobs. Pursuit is also the designated community partner, co-developer and part owner of the new Amazon headquarters. Here's CEO and founder¹² Jukay Hsu.

JUKAY HSU: I think we have a unique opportunity here and for New York to be a place where the technology community can thrive but also be inclusive.

GARSD: Hsu, who was once a classmate of Facebook creator Mark Zuckerberg at Harvard University, says he saw how his school friends revolutionized technology. But then he'd come home to his native Queens and wonder about those left behind. He wants to make sure Amazon's new headquarters relies heavily on local talent.

HSU: Amazon, when it's here, can be embedded¹³ in Queens. Amazon's coming to Queens, but we want to bring Queens to Amazon.

GARSD: In a lounge area outside the Pursuit lecture room, I meet a 26-year-old new coding student, Ivy¹⁴ Strickland. She's from Harlem. She tells me she's excited about Amazon coming to Queens.

IVY STRICKLAND: I'm the youngest of three children of a single mom. My mom had us when she was a teenager. So imagine me, someone who now makes, like, under $20,000 a year, able to get a job that could pay me enough that I would be able to do certain things, like pay my mom's mortgage or help her out.

GARSD: Although she only recently started coding, she loves it. She says she sees it as a metaphor¹⁵ of how, piece by piece, you can build something amazing.

STRICKLAND: To see the way that you can take something so small and grow, I guess for me personally, to know where I've come from, it's like the same thing. I can see myself growing.

GARSD: Whether or not this city and this neighborhood will be able to grow and build something good with Amazon remains¹⁶ to be seen. For the time being, there's hope, a good measure of distrust and plenty of that legendary¹⁷ Queens strength.

Jasmine Garsd, NPR News, Queens.

1 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

2 bustling   

adj.喧闹的

参考例句：

• The market was bustling with life. 市场上生机勃勃。
• This district is getting more and more prosperous and bustling. 这一带越来越繁华了。

3 literally   

adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实

参考例句：

• He translated the passage literally.他逐字逐句地翻译这段文字。
• Sometimes she would not sit down till she was literally faint.有时候，她不走到真正要昏厥了，决不肯坐下来。

4 isolated   

adj.与世隔绝的

参考例句：

• His bad behaviour was just an isolated incident. 他的不良行为只是个别事件。
• Patients with the disease should be isolated. 这种病的患者应予以隔离。

5 seminal   

adj.影响深远的；种子的

参考例句：

• The reforms have been a seminal event in the history of the NHS.这些改革已成为英国国民保健制度史上影响深远的一件大事。
• The emperor's importance as a seminal figure of history won't be diminished.做为一个开创性历史人物的重要性是不会减弱的。

6 activists   

n.（政治活动的）积极分子，活动家( activist的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• His research work was attacked by animal rights activists . 他的研究受到了动物权益维护者的抨击。
• Party activists with lower middle class pedigrees are numerous. 党的激进分子中有很多出身于中产阶级下层。 来自《简明英汉词典》

7 shrugged   

vt.耸肩（shrug的过去式与过去分词形式）

参考例句：

• Sam shrugged and said nothing. 萨姆耸耸肩膀，什么也没说。
• She shrugged, feigning nonchalance. 她耸耸肩，装出一副无所谓的样子。 来自《简明英汉词典》

8 infrastructure   

n.下部构造，下部组织，基础结构，基础设施

参考例句：

• We should step up the development of infrastructure for research.加强科学基础设施建设。
• We should strengthen cultural infrastructure and boost various types of popular culture.加强文化基础设施建设，发展各类群众文化。

9 chilly   

adj.凉快的，寒冷的

参考例句：

• I feel chilly without a coat.我由于没有穿大衣而感到凉飕飕的。
• I grew chilly when the fire went out.炉火熄灭后，寒气逼人。

10 warehouses   

仓库，货栈( warehouse的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The whisky was taken to bonded warehouses at Port Dundee. 威士忌酒已送到邓迪港的保稅仓库。
• Row upon row of newly built warehouses line the waterfront. 江岸新建的仓库鳞次栉比。

11 silicon   

n.硅(旧名矽)

参考例句：

• This company pioneered the use of silicon chip.这家公司开创了使用硅片的方法。
• A chip is a piece of silicon about the size of a postage stamp.芯片就是一枚邮票大小的硅片。

12 Founder   

n.创始者，缔造者

参考例句：

• He was extolled as the founder of their Florentine school.他被称颂为佛罗伦萨画派的鼻祖。
• According to the old tradition,Romulus was the founder of Rome.按照古老的传说，罗穆卢斯是古罗马的建国者。

13 embedded   

a.扎牢的

参考例句：

• an operation to remove glass that was embedded in his leg 取出扎入他腿部玻璃的手术
• He has embedded his name in the minds of millions of people. 他的名字铭刻在数百万人民心中。

14 ivy   

n.常青藤，常春藤

参考例句：

• Her wedding bouquet consisted of roses and ivy.她的婚礼花篮包括玫瑰和长春藤。
• The wall is covered all over with ivy.墙上爬满了常春藤。

15 metaphor   

n.隐喻，暗喻

参考例句：

• Using metaphor,we say that computers have senses and a memory.打个比方，我们可以说计算机有感觉和记忆力。
• In poetry the rose is often a metaphor for love.玫瑰在诗中通常作为爱的象征。

16 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。

17 legendary   

adj.传奇（中）的，闻名遐迩的；n.传奇（文学）

参考例句：

• Legendary stories are passed down from parents to children.传奇故事是由父母传给孩子们的。
• Odysseus was a legendary Greek hero.奥狄修斯是传说中的希腊英雄。