When CIty Limits visited the Seaside section of the Rockaways on Thursday afternoon, people we met in a line for food and diapers were coping with a lack of heat and power with remarkable calm. But in the days since, as temperatures dropped, the feeling on the peninsula seems to have changed.
Near the 100th Precinct, people huddled on Saturday night around a few OEM spotlights which illuminate piles of donated clothes outside. Residents in the devastated area picked through the clothes with flashlights.
"I'm looking for clothes for a lot of people in my family," said Essence Trainham, 19, who is looking through piles with her sister Mecca. "I really need socks because we can't do laundry here."
"We're on the tip of the earth out here. There's nothing here," said Ruben Smith, 21, who was huddled in a blanket near the OEM spotlight. "I don't even want to go home. I don't have a flashlight yet."
At left Mecca Trainham, 19, of Far Rockaway, gets emotional while looking through donated clothes outside the 100th Precinct.
Photo by Pearl Gabel
