NYC NOW - August 30, 2023: Evening Roundup

Episode Date: August 30, 2023

Uber and taxi drivers have a new protocol that can save riders time waiting for a car and could save everyone some money once congestion pricing goes into effect. Plus, home health care workers protest outside the state Department of Labor's headquarters on Wednesday. Also, a new NYPD rule will allow Mosques to broadcast the Adhan every Friday afternoon and every evening during Ramadan. And finally, WNYC’s Arun Venugopal highlights a weekly event in New York City’s Tibetan community that’s not just about fun but is also part of a worldwide campaign of cultural resistance.

Good evening and welcome to NYC Now. I'm Jenae Pierre for WNYC. Yellow taxis and Ubers in New York City will finally get the chance to share a lane. Users will notice that the ride share giant is now automatically sending traditional taxis to customers if the cab is closer than an Uber. The company says this new protocol will save riders' time waiting for a car and could save everyone some money once congestion pricing goes into effect. Both taxis and Ubers are looking for exemptions to the plan, which will toll drivers entering Manhattan below 60th Street.

If the taxi and limousine commission grants one for taxis but not ride shares, yellow cabs could become the cheaper option. On Manhattan's lower east side, home health care workers protested outside the State Department of Labor's headquarters earlier this week. WNYC's Caroline Lewis explains why. A group of home health a health a lawsuit against Labor Department. Commissioner Roberta Reardon last week for declining to continue investigating their complaints of wage theft. New York law allows home care workers to be paid for just 13 hours of a 24-hour shift in a client's home. But many workers have filed complaints with the Labor Department, saying they don't get paid extra if they miss out on the sleep and meal breaks they're entitled to.

State officials say they are no longer investigating these complaints because of special clauses included in the workers' contracts with their employers that say wage theft disputes should be handled through private arbitration. That's Adon, or the Muslim call to prayer, and you may hear more of it under new NYPD rules. In many Muslim-majority countries and communities, mosque broadcasted five times a day.

Up until now, New York City has required a permit to play the call to prayer on loudspeakers. Now the city is allowing mosques to adorn every Friday from 1230 to 1.30 in the afternoon and every evening during Ramadan. Friday or Juma is a sacred day in the Muslim week. Mayor Eric Adams says the change will mean a lot to Muslim New Yorkers. Many of us may know the call to prayer as the adon, as a chant that is played for one to two minutes. on Fridays. But for our Muslim brothers and sisters, it is so much more than that. An estimated 450,000 Muslims live in New York City. Stay close. There's more after the break.

Each week, members of New York City's Tibetan community dress up in traditional clothing, converge on a playground in Elmer's Queens, and dance until dark. But the event is more than just an evening of fun. It's also part of a worldwide campaign of cultural resistance. WNYC's Arun Vannegapal has more. By about 8 o'clock on a recent Wednesday night, a corner of Moore Homestead Playground in Elmhurst was crammed with members of the city's Tibetan community. Little kids, teenagers, adults, even seniors. There are about 80 of them drawn from the estimated 9,000 Tibetans who live in the city, and who have especially been settling in this part of Queens. Right now, they're lined up in concentric circles, and they're all dancing.

This dancing specifically is called Gorshid. One of the dancers is Saitan Namdol, a student at American University who is born and raised in Queens. For me, Gorshah means everything. We don't have a country, so Gorshut really brings us all together. The same dance takes place on the same day of the week in Paris, Toronto, New Delhi, and other centers of the Tibetan diaspora worldwide. Dancers pick up moves from Tibetans in other cities from clips on YouTube and TikTok. And more than just fun, community members say what they're doing is actively engaging in resistance against the Chinese occupation of Tibet, which took place in the 1950s.

For years, these protests were dominated by Hollywood celebrities like Richard Geer. In 1993, he spoke out against the occupation at the Academy Awards. If something miraculous and really kind of movie-like could happen here, where we could all kind of send love and truth and kind of sanity to Deng Xiaoping right now in Beijing, that he will take his troops and take the Chinese away from Tibet and allow these people to live as free, independent people again. But that sort of celebrity activism has largely faded. In its wake, another movement has bubbled up within the Tibetan diaspora.

Topchor sultram of students for a free Tibet says the movement is called Lakhar, or White Wednesday. Wednesday is an auspicious day for the Dalai Lama, the spiritual leader for many Tibetan people and an enemy of the Chinese state. What it is is it's a form of resistance here in exile. Specifically cultural resistance, a reassertion of Tibetan identity, whether that's in the form of eating Tibetan food, speaking the Tibetan language, or dancing Gorset. Like many of the other dancers, Chemi Lamo came dressed in a chupa, the traditional Tibetan dress worn by men and women. One of her favorite Gorshay songs is called Yudong Sanga Shikshik.

She says it speaks of the beautiful, sentient beings that live on the Tibetan plateau and prompts dancers to mimic the movements of birds and fishes. So many of the songs remind us of our home. Lamo has never actually been to Tibet. But as an activist who's spoken out in support of the Tibetan cause, she's been harassed and threatened online by pro-Chinese voices, to the extent that she's cut off all communication with her loved ones in Tibet,

to keep them safe. Topjor Sultrim of Students for Free Tibet says the state of exile forces many people in the diaspora to be politicized. You can't talk to Tibetan people for very long without hearing the common adage that all Tibetans are born activists. Which is why he says Gorshé is more than just dance. Those simple acts of joy, those simple acts of engaging with your community back in Tibet have been very intentionally criminalized by the Chinese government

in their efforts to kill Tibetan culture and the Tibetan people at its very root. Today, Tibet is among the world's most politically repressed places. And outside of Tibet, human rights groups say China conduct surveillance wherever there are Tibetans speaking out against the occupation. Chimilamo says it's almost certain Elmhurst Gorset has come. under surveillance. But she says the dance goes on because the community doesn't run on fear. So for us in exile, I think it's our utmost right to be able to practice the freedom that we have and continue fighting for our homeland so that one day we can all return.

That's WNYC's Arun Vanekapal. Thanks for listening to NYC now from WNYC. Catch us every weekday, three times a day. We'll be back tomorrow.