Christina Adja: If there were one word to describe my neighborhood, it would be: Loud. There’s always a party going on. You can hear them from down the block. And sometimes the ground shakes as cars drive by, blasting music.

 

[Sounds of trains passing overhead, cars blasting music, people partying outside.]

 

Christina: Kids laugh and play in fire hydrants and people lean out their windows to talk to each other. Men sit outside the bodega playing dominoes. They crowdaround a small table — and they’re always yelling at each other. I love how everyone shares their culture here. Even my dad — who’s from Togo in West Africa — greets people in Spanish, using a few words he picked up from the Dominican neighbors. All my friends here feel the same way.

 

[Sounds of children playing, dominoes being shaken over a table and Dominican men yelling in Spanish.]

 

Diane, Christina’s friend: There's a bunch of Mexican Dominicans, everybody's like dapping each other up saying hi to each other on the, on the streets. 

 

Christina: That’s my friend Diane, I met up with her – and our friends Melanie and Bernie – to interview them about our neighborhood.

 

Christina:  Uh, so like, the question we were on is like if there’s one thing you wish stayed the same forever in this neighborhood, like what would it be?

 

Melanie, Christina’s friend: Um, it would definitely be community. Um, I feel like, yeah, there is some, like, rough parts to this community, but it’s always fun. Like, especially in the summer, like everyone’s having barbecues, everyone’s outside and yeah, I just love that about our community. 

 

Diane: You see how I live in front of a park? There’s a bunch of Dominicans and they, one time they brought a whole DJ to the park. They brought a whole DJ, they brought tables, they brought like two barbecue stands…

 

Christina: We have our own culture in the South Bronx, which makes sense. We literally invented hip-hop and we survived all those burning buildings decades ago.

 

Melanie: I think that’s what really, like, separates us from the rest of the boroughs and, like, it makes us unique.

 

Christina: Yeah, I hate how people be, like, hating on the Bronx. But it’s like, you’re from Brooklyn! Don't speak, oh my gosh.

 

Friends laugh.

 

Christina: Clearly we all think our borough is the best. But lately things are starting to look less familiar.

 

Diane: I feel like the neighborhood’s just changing, as in like, the buildings. Them tearing down, like, the old buildings — the old crusty buildings and putting up new buildings. Everything is just suddenly changing. They’re modernizing everything. Like trying to make the Bronx a better place but it's like, it’s losing, its actual like, I guess, charm. It’s charm and its culture. Like whitening — like they’re making it, they’re whitewashing it.  

 

Christina: The new apartment buildings look dull and gray. And yes — they look clean and polished. But they still look out of place. And then there are the chain restaurants. They’re going up  next to all the small businesses that have been here forever. I’ve always loved the small businesses. The candy shop, the bakery with the really good bacon egg and cheese and the spot where I used to get my hair braided.

 

Melanie: I dunno if you guys been through 170 recently but all the small businesses that were there before are gone now. It’s just some like random buildings and like stores and like I just miss those, um, family businesses. Like  we don't need to change for some big corporations. And there’s a Chipotle there now, —

 

Christina: Okay. I be going to the Chipotle because — okay, let me explain myself. Let me explain myself before y’all attack me. Okay. Okay. Okay. That’s the only Chipotle near here. So I go to eat.

 

Christina: I lowkey feel guilty for giving my money to these big corporations.. It’s just that sometimes, I wanna enjoy the new things too. And even if I stop paying 14 dollars for a chicken burrito bowl, it’s not gonna stop my neighborhood from changing: The countdown to gentrification has already started. We know how this goes: New buildings go up, a Starbucks opens. And then the rent starts going up. That’s the part I’m really worried about: Displacement. When people who’ve lived somewhere their whole lives have to move out because new people with more money wanna move in. I know the word “gentrification” is overused and it means different things to different people. So I asked my friends what the word “gentrification” means to them.

 

Diane: It just mostly means that people don’t care about us and they only see like the, like, the money that they can get out of all of these renovations. Like big companies trying to take over. It’s just like ruining what's already been established for years. 

 

Melanie: Yes so I agree. I think gentrification means to me means like people making money and profiting. They see the Bronx as, like, kind of an opportunity for them in a sense. Like, um, a way to make more money. Capitalism guys, not okay [Laughs.] So yeah, I feel like, um, gentrification is, um, another like system that benefits white people. Uh, privileged white people specifically.

 

Christina: When I looked up the median rent for an apartment in my neighborhood – I was shocked. It’s $2,195 dollars a month. To pay that much – and live comfortably – you would have to make about $85,000 a year. But a lot of people here only make around $34,000 a year. I used to think my family was financially stable. We had enough to get by in our neighborhood. But now I’m worried that we’re not gonna have a stable home for much longer. I wonder what the future of my neighborhood might look like — and what that will mean for me. I know a lot of Brooklyn has already gone through this. So I called up my friends who live there. I wanted to find out what it feels like when your neighborhood is changed, forever.

 

Samari, Christina’s friend: It’s disheartening, it’s disrespectful.

 

Christina: That’s my friend Samari. She told me about some of the ways Flatbush has changed.

 

Samari: Before it was like thriving businesses and like small businesses, all POC owned and now there's just a huge building. Apartment building. And it's, like, it disrupts the environment and the culture of the community because now those people who were there have to move. It’s disrespectful to those businesses who had to move, it’s disrespectful for the people who lived there for years who have to move.

 

Christina: When Samari said it felt disrespectful, that was the exact word I had been looking for. It feels like these new buildings and “improvements” are not meant for us. They’re for the people developers hope they can attract And profit off of. My other friend, Thandi, lives in Bed-Stuy. He said that when he was a kid, all the store owners used to know him.

 

Thandi: And now there's less and less of that. It feels less like my neighborhood and more like a neighborhood.

 

Christina: He told me that these new people who’ve moved in make him feel like an outsider in his own home.

 

Thandi: Like the building across from me, I’ve seen like so many people move out and so many white people move into that building. And it feels more uncomfortable because like, I feel like even just like walking down the street, like I just feel. The way I’m judged is like different. Like I feel like I am judged a little bit.

 

Christina: That’s another fear of mine – being judged by newcomers. I think I would feel the need to conform to match the changing neighborhood. I wouldn’t wanna be considered “ghetto” by new residents. so to take the spotlight off me, I would have to act more like them. Seeing my neighborhood start to change has made me realize that our homes are also part of our identities. This neighborhood has made me who I am and it’s the one constant in my life. As teenagers, we already have so much to deal with: We’re being pressured by everything,  we’re being swayed by everything. Ad gentrification makes it even harder to feel comfortable and safe. We need to know we have a place we can come back to every day. A place where people know us and accept us. A place where we feel seen, and welcomed. A place that can remind us of who we are. For WNYC, I’m Radio Rookies reporter Christina Adja.