Nancy Ruhling's Astoria Characters

YEAHHHHH BABY! Finally, The King of Falafel & Shawarma is in his castle. Fares “Freddy” Zeideia — OK, you know you can’t help yourself so just call him The King — is a big guy so his YEAHHHHH BABY! is a lion’s roar. The King of Falafel & Shawarma on Broadway. These days, The King has a lot to YEAHHHHH BABY! about because after 14 years of cooking street food out of a truck, he finally has a restaurant to call his own. His eponymous King of Falafel &…

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Laughter. That’s the first thing you hear in Gregory Briggler‘s second-floor walkup. The giggles and guffaws are coming from his three boisterous boys, 12-year-old Harry, 9-year-old Simon and 6-year-old Adam. Gregory’s the principal trombonist for the Astoria Symphony Orchestra. They’re clowning around as Gregory’s wife, Katarina Vizina, prepares a mid-morning snack in the kitchen, and he presents homemade ice tea in tall glasses. “I inherited the recipe from…

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Saturday night. Love at first sight. (Well, almost.) The time: December 2007  Noel is from New Jersey. The place: a club in Manhattan The characters: Nick Fiorentinos, the clubgoer; Noel Descalzi, the club’s hostess.Nick is a Queens native. The story: Nick and his friends were out on the town. Noel seated them at the club. Nick wished that she were their waitress. Noel wished she were, too. He says/she says the flirtation was fiery and flamboyant. “We’re very social,” Noel says.…

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As Henry Kimpel climbs the stone steps of Trinity Lutheran Church, an act he has done some 12,000 times since he joined the congregation nearly seven decades ago, he apologizes. Henry has devoted his retirement to Trinity. “I’m a slowpoke,” he says, leaning heavily on his wooden cane. The bad thing about old age, he says, is that you get old. That goes for churches, too. There’s nobody who knows more about the physical aches and pains of Trinity than Henry. For nearly three…

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As soon as Gene Coffey rolls up the ink-black metal gate at his tony tattoo parlor, he starts talking about his art studio. It’s right upstairs, so when he has free time between clients, he goes there to paint. Gene opened Coffey Shop Tattoos in September 2015. Do you want to see it? Follow him up the stairs and past a warren of jail-cell-like rooms until he stops at a plain black door. Inside, illuminated by a century-old skylight, the figures in his oil paintings spring to life. In one…

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