Monday, January 3, 2011

“Airport food vendors were blizzard's unsung heroes - NJ.com”

“Airport food vendors were blizzard's unsung heroes - NJ.com”

Airport food vendors were blizzard's unsung heroes - NJ.com

Posted: 02 Jan 2011 09:32 AM PST

Jan. 2, 2011, 12:39 p.m. EST

NEWARK, N.J. (AP) — When Sandra Vasquez awoke to a winter wonderland at 6 a.m. Monday, she resolved to get to work as quickly as she could.

Vasquez is an assistant manager at the Famous Famiglia Pizzeria in Terminal B at Newark Liberty International Airport. And she knew not only that travelers stranded by the blizzard would be hungry, but that co-workers would be snowed-in as well, unable to drive or catch a bus.

So the diminutive 32-year-old dug out her four-wheel drive Toyota RAV4, and then — once she had dug herself out a second time after being plowed in while she was taking a shower — navigated snow-clogged streets, picking up half a dozen Famiglia employees at home on the way in.

Finally, the Ecuadoran immigrant said she and her co-workers arrived at the food court about noon. To the wild cheers of famished fliers.

"As soon as the people see we are here, you can imagine the lines, buying everything we had," she said on Wednesday. "We came to the rescue, fed these people."

They are the unsung heroes of last week's crippling blizzard: the food vendors of Newark Liberty. More accustomed to bored or restless fliers killing time before their flight with a slice and a Coke, the men and women of the airport's food courts, many of them immigrants, students or both, rose to the occasion when called upon to feed the storm's tired and hungry refugees.

The winter's first storm shut down Newark Liberty, John F. Kennedy and LaGuardia airports for 24 hours starting Sunday evening, and canceled thousands of flights during the week, stranding countless travelers.

While the airlines were cursed by passengers for not taking phone calls or failing to warn of cancellations, the food vendors won praise for remaining open, some well beyond normal hours, and providing solace to so many passengers whose holidays were capped by an otherwise miserable travel experience.

"We appreciate the efforts made by the food operators at Newark Liberty to remain open during and after the blizzard, ensuring that meals were available for inconvenienced travelers," said Ron Marsico, a spokesman for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which operates the airport. "It made a difficult experience a little more tolerable for our fliers."

Villa Pizza, Jamba Juice, Tony Roma's, Hudson News (where toiletries, books and magazines were available), Chilli's Too, Subway, the Grain Station, McDonald's, the Blue Point RA Bar and Dunkin' Donuts were among the vendors who kept fed-up passengers fed.

Famiglia stayed open overnight Monday into Tuesday, when 20-year-old Uddin Kutub of Newark worked a 20-hour shift in the kitchen and behind the counter.

"We were open all night," said Kutub, a student at Essex County College, who originally was from of Bangladesh. "I felt like, people getting stuck, we can help them. ... They were very happy."

For Dan and Dana Marion, who had been visiting family in Hackettstown, free salads from Famiglia, compliments of Alitalia Airlines, were a consolation of sorts for the minor hassle they had checking in for their flight home to Albania.

"There was a little problem with the ticketing today," said Dana, 28, a graduate student. "So to appease the angry mob, I think they decided to give out vouchers."

Vasquez said one challenge of the storm was keeping the kitchen stocked. During one stretch on Tuesday and Wednesday, Famiglia ran out of dough balls for pizza crust while deliveries were hindered by the storm's aftermath.

"It's bad. Pizza place with no pizza, right?" Vasquez said with a grin.

The Krishnan family didn't seem to mind.

The Krishnans, who live in Edison, had already been at the airport for three hours on Wednesday afternoon trying to re-book a flight to India to visit family when 5-year-old Neva became hungry. So her mother, Sudha, ordered Neva a dish of pasta with red sauce, and wraps for herself and her husband, Venkat.

"The food is good," she said. "It came to our rescue, actually."

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