AMADO’S SUNLESS WORLD

For The New York Times; October 2019

Underground Lives: The Sunless World of Immigrants in Queens

The six men who live in the basement apartment are rarely—if ever—in the space together at the same time. Differing work schedules and no real desire for household friendship means these men are circumstantial roommates no different than guests at the same transient hotel. When their schedules do intersect in the hallways, they shuffle past each other without a hint of formality or friendship. It’s not harsh, it’s just all part of the transaction of living in an illegal underground apartment.

Amado is in his 50s and has been in the country for almost thirty years, and he’s been working the same job at a Jackson Heights Mexican restaurant for eleven years. He works 6pm-2am six times a week, and when he’s not working, he’s in his small room watching tv or texting with his wife Justina back in Coatzingo, a small Mexican town in the southern state of Puebla. Sometimes he just swipes through videos and photos of past visits home, the phone’s blue glow providing some of the only light in the dark apartment. His life in New York is quiet and practical, if not lonely, but he knows his purpose in the United States is to work and to provide a better life for his family back in Coatzingo.

But once or twice a year, Amado is able to make new memories in Coatzingo. In New York he blends into crowds with a variety of baseball caps, but in Coatzingo he dons a cowboy hat for the entirety of his visit, a sort of symbol that he’s a new man in a place to be himself. He sees family and slips an American $20 dollar bill to his aunt who runs a small bodega from her home. He visits the graves of his deceased parents, and checks on the construction of a new memorial for his father that he is paying for. He shows his step-daughters the remains of his family’s 150 year old ranch on the banks of the Atoyac River and walks along the water, the three of them hand in hand. He goes to parties, dances with his wife, and sometimes sleeps outside just to feel the cool night air–a regeneration from the stuffy pale underground in Queens. In Coatzingo, his life has everything but an income, so after two weeks away he returns to New York to continue the sacrifice. This story is about the people who live in underground apartments in Queens and the often great sacrifice it takes to live in the U.S.

This story was photographed and reported between January 2019 and September 2019, and here is a NYTimes Insider on how it all came together. Written by Nikita Stewart and edited and produced by Jeffrey Furticella

Awarded by the NPPA Best of Photojournalism for Digital Feature and POYi for Newspaper Editing
Amado descends into his basement apartment from the backyard at his home in Queens.
Amado watches TV while his roommate is on his phone at their apartment in Jackson Heights. The two rarely speak to each other other than daily pleasantries.
A television with Spanish news about President Trump plays in Amado's room in Jackson Heights, Queens. He lives in a basement-level apartment that he shares with other men who are originally from Mexico and currently live in New York.
Amado shuffles through his sunless basement apartment in Jackson Heights.
Flyers for open apartments and local restaurants on a telephone pole in Jackson Heights, Queens.
Amado waits for a train on a Times Square subway platform. He is on the way to a leadership meeting in lower Manhattan put on by Make the Road, and immigrants rights organization based in Queens.
Amado works at Tulcingo Mexican restaurant in Jackson Heights, where many of his co-workers are from the same small town in Mexico: Coazingo, in Puebla.
Amado's shifts usually run into the early morning, and here he walks to his apartment after leaving work around 1am.
A travel agency in Corona advertises money sending services.
Amado calls his wife, Justina, after sending her $300 at a store that offers money transfer services in Jackson Heights.
The intersection of Junction Blvd and Roosevelt Avenue in Jackson Heights, Queens, as seen from the F train.
Justina, Amado, and Wendy, pose for a portrait in Coatzingo, Mexico. Once or sometimes twice a year, Amado returns to Mexico to spend time with his family. During these visits he packs his time with friends and family, knowing that he will spend the other 11 months out of the year in isolation in New York.
Amado swims at a public pool in Coatzingo, Mexico.
Elizabeth and Wendy watch TV at their home in Coatzingo, Mexico. Using Amado's remittances from New York, his family in Mexico is able to purchase some luxuries for their home.
Amado and Justina, center, at a birthday party for a three-year old in San Pedro Cuayuca in Pubela,
Near the Atoyac River, Amado looks at a roadside altar dedicated to the La Virgen de Guadalupe
Amado Sanchez walks through a corn crop owned by his late mother in Coatzingo
Amado checks on his father's grave as it is being rebuilt in Coatzingo, Mexico. Amado paid for the renovations.
Amado visits his wife's grandfather, Tino Chavez, in Zaragoza, Mexico.
In a fleeting moment of quiet contact, Justina and Amado rest together in the back of a car while driving to visit more family.
"If you promise to return, I will wait for you all my life."
Jackson Heights is a Latinx enclave in Queens with a huge Mexican population, and here, a flag waves along Roosevelt Ave. that is one side Mexican and the other side American.
Back in New York, Amado looks at videos and photos from his time in Mexico. Like many people living away from family, the phone is his primary lifeline to his wife and step-daughters in Mexico.
At 1:30am and after a long shift at work, Amado rests in his kitchen before spending the next 12-15 hours in his small, shared room.
The view of an exit door from Amado's basement apartment.