Willie Bodega Character Analysis

“The next day we went to City Hall and filed our demands. And you know what happened the next month, Chino? […] The next month, they hiked the subway fare from twenty-five cents to thirty-five cents. […] So we waited, and we waited, and we filed and we filed. Finally, when we knew our demands weren't going to be met, when we knew […] the sanitation department wouldn't even lend us brooms to clean our streets, we had no choice but to take over the streets of East Harlem.”

If Sapo killed that reporter then he deserved to go to jail. I thought that, but I knew I didn’t mean it. I felt bad for Sapo. I also knew I would never rat out Sapo or Bodega. I wasn’t going to say a word.

No wonder Bodega’s name had spread like a good smell from a Latin woman’s kitchen.

“I’ll buy her one bigger than that! One with a diamond as big as the Palladium.”

“Blanca, why does me becoming Pentecostal have any bearing on you getting your privileges back? On you playing the tambourine in front of the congregation? Why do they look at me and my faults and not you and your merits?”

All I understood was that Bodega was in trouble. Not with the fire department, which would know right away it was arson and dismiss it as another case of pyromania in a neighborhood crawling with fire-bugs. Nor with the media, who needed sensation and since no deaths had occurred would give it only passing mention, like a footnote in a thousand-page book.

“Look around, Julio. Every time someone makes a million dollars, he kills some part of the world. That part has been us for so long, and it will continue to be us unless we fight back. The day will come when, lust like the white guy, we will also steal by signing the right papers […] What do you think, it comes from nothing? America is a great nation, I have no doubts about that, but in its early days it had to take some shady steps to get there. Manifest Destiny, that was just another word for genocide.”

That night Sapo dropped me off at one of the new-old buildings Bodega had renovated on 116th and Lexington. Those buildings had been condemned for years. The City of New York takes so much time to either renovate or bulldoze a condemned building it’s like those guys on Death Row who die of old age rather than execution. Bodega had bought the entire row from the city and had slowly renovated three of them. He had improved the block. Improved the neighborhood. Given people a place to live.

I would never have guessed he was Latin. He was more American than Mickey Mouse and just as old.

Everyone was there like in some pageant for a dying monarch. And to pass the hours on fire, Bodega tales began winding around the avenue. Almost everyone had one, and those that didn’t added to the tales by retelling them.

“Willie Bodega doesn't exist […] l’m sorry. […] Pera! […] You can stay with me.”

“The next day we went to City Hall and filed our demands. And you know what happened the next month, Chino? […] The next month, they hiked the subway fare from twenty-five cents to thirty-five cents. […] So we waited, and we waited, and we filed and we filed. Finally, when we knew our demands weren't going to be met, when we knew […] the sanitation department wouldn't even lend us brooms to clean our streets, we had no choice but to take over the streets of East Harlem.”

If Sapo killed that reporter then he deserved to go to jail. I thought that, but I knew I didn’t mean it. I felt bad for Sapo. I also knew I would never rat out Sapo or Bodega. I wasn’t going to say a word.

No wonder Bodega’s name had spread like a good smell from a Latin woman’s kitchen.

“I’ll buy her one bigger than that! One with a diamond as big as the Palladium.”

“Blanca, why does me becoming Pentecostal have any bearing on you getting your privileges back? On you playing the tambourine in front of the congregation? Why do they look at me and my faults and not you and your merits?”

All I understood was that Bodega was in trouble. Not with the fire department, which would know right away it was arson and dismiss it as another case of pyromania in a neighborhood crawling with fire-bugs. Nor with the media, who needed sensation and since no deaths had occurred would give it only passing mention, like a footnote in a thousand-page book.

“Look around, Julio. Every time someone makes a million dollars, he kills some part of the world. That part has been us for so long, and it will continue to be us unless we fight back. The day will come when, lust like the white guy, we will also steal by signing the right papers […] What do you think, it comes from nothing? America is a great nation, I have no doubts about that, but in its early days it had to take some shady steps to get there. Manifest Destiny, that was just another word for genocide.”

That night Sapo dropped me off at one of the new-old buildings Bodega had renovated on 116th and Lexington. Those buildings had been condemned for years. The City of New York takes so much time to either renovate or bulldoze a condemned building it’s like those guys on Death Row who die of old age rather than execution. Bodega had bought the entire row from the city and had slowly renovated three of them. He had improved the block. Improved the neighborhood. Given people a place to live.

I would never have guessed he was Latin. He was more American than Mickey Mouse and just as old.

Everyone was there like in some pageant for a dying monarch. And to pass the hours on fire, Bodega tales began winding around the avenue. Almost everyone had one, and those that didn’t added to the tales by retelling them.

“Willie Bodega doesn't exist […] l’m sorry. […] Pera! […] You can stay with me.”