“I’m On The Pantry Line—And I’m Working”

In construction sites across New York, Fasina is often the only woman on the job. As a tile setter, she’s laid floors in the Holland Tunnel, installed marble countertops, and mastered the math and precision her craft demands. But even with steady work, making it in this city means hard choices.
Like so many New Yorkers, Fasina sometimes has to borrow from Peter to pay Paul. The food pantry helps her stretch her paycheck—turning what would be $100 at the grocery store into extra money for transportation, emergencies, whatever comes up. She’s good at budgeting. She shows up every week. And she makes it work.

Give to support the women build our city — who work hard, show up, and still need support to get by.

Transcript:

Fasina, Tile Setter:

I consider myself an artist. I love art in all forms. Most jobs I go on, I’m the only woman there. I’m a tile setter. I install marble and tile floors, countertops, and different things like that.

For about ten months, I was inside the Holland Tunnel, retiling it. Laying tile is basically math. If you have a square footage of space — or you know the area — you have to know how many tiles you’re going to need to fit that space. If you’re doing a design, you have to know how many tiles you’ll need to create that particular pattern.

You have to be able to lay it out properly. You have to know math to make your cuts and angles and things like that. So you have to be creative. You have to have patience. You have to be precise.

But that’s most things in life, right?

People ask, when you go to work, why do you go to the food pantry?

And I’m like — families in New York City sometimes have to borrow from Peter to pay Paul. It just happens. You know? I’m pretty good at budgeting, but food pantries help offset a lot of expenses.

This is a necessity for the fridge. If you’re diligent and you go once a week, every other week, you get enough groceries.

Right now, I probably have well over a hundred dollars’ worth of food here. That’s an extra hundred dollars in my paycheck. It goes toward transportation. Emergencies.

It definitely helps. I appreciate it.

If I had one thing to ask, it would be that y’all donate more — and donate often.