the conversations with the lady where we bring guests and i so to talk about issues and topics that matter today i have this handsome man from you new jersey and his name is eric s b know that i get that right  case of the but they so i thought it was very interesting because one i used to live in brooklyn i used to live in queens i have family in the bronx and i know all of that that's going on and i see it you know from brooklyn where i used to live even here in new jersey in some areas that's happening too and so you know as you know minorities we we don't want things to be taken away that has been part of our lives forever so you know just tell us the as i got older you know i'm thirty two now and i've done commercials i've done the n f l i've done a couple of super bowls but those were not so fulfilling right ok i needed to show what was happening to our culture to our people and even even though this is one side of what's happening there's a bigger picture when i'm trying to write one and more projects per se to showcase what's happening and bring awareness to what's happen in those photos are yes i think so right and it's called you know the so the loss of a neighborhood right you know the neighborhood people go there they confide in that grocery store they talk to me people they're right where you have a conversation you know you know they know your business you know their business just about they know what's going on in your life so i can imagine how hard that was for them to close it was hard and they're still fighting to keep it open personally so hopefully there's still hope but i was like the last day of my all these people came together i was like let's celebrate this another aspect of it my parents are in those photos to be biased they're part of the whole gentrification movement and you know there's shore because like like i said it's happening everywhere it's it's not just there and it's sad to me when i look at brooklyn you know we lived in queens but our church was in brooklyn you know had some place flattened sheria and it's totally changed i mean it was a lot of blacks and spanish in that area back in the day and age and myself but this was about thirty something years ago and it's just wholly different now totally different now  some of the stores are not there anymore and it happened because they pushed the price of them so high you can't afford to stay there you don't own the building you know in this terrible thing you know and i hate to see and we all are talking about it you know in those i have yeah i was i have always on the side was my bike right i know i know i'm laughing but not out of you know it's and i have to laugh i don't cry you know you know so it is sad to see that i mean i believe in growth and i believe in everyone being accepted but i don't think that everything should change just because of a different culture that's coming in you know the demographic right exactly so i think it you know it has to be if you want to think about people and think about where they live it should be the same everywhere you  go just when you know certain people come into the neighborhood and then i don't think it's right for people to also try to change it because right in bed with my girlfriend has her salon i know she said you know when people started coming and they used to have the block parties then they started shutting it down but i hope you can have no block party it's total out i'm like that's just block party what it's not every day is right it's a community thing so i don't know why people would do that and so i really understand that pain yeah because i was part of that in terms of living in those areas and now seeing that it's so different when i look back it's like you know it's like history repeating itself in a way and yeah it's just crazy that we're living in right now  so that's part of what my goal in life is bring awareness and just to stop all this night war people there shouldn't be any different classes right now that he will in that sense right it's like well my neighbor does this so you get this right exactly yeah it's not cool yes so what do you plan to do with the project like what else are you doing because i mean i've seen done online and i know you're trying to get it you know i mean come going so right now i mean the all talk about it in the back in the you know high closed doors but i think it's time for the doors to open and people can hear yeah you know everybody's story because when you hear that things have been taken away from people in a good family not a good thing like actually part of your history you know so it's really important to people people to be aware but not just be aware but to not be afraid to talk about things yeah i mean do some you know take action to make changes and it changes for everyone it's not change and just to keep things for ourselves yeah because i think inclusion is good but we don't want to push away and deny people you know part of their culture just to make an improvement generally didn't feel right but don't change my culture right don't try to change my neighborhood i won't go to your neighborhood and change it right was tough i didn't know what path to go i was chasing money first because i was tired of not having any right and i wanted to take care of my parents so you know i went to school for college took a graphic design major at first and then i found a love with visuals and graphic design married children so then i decided to pursue photography right dropped out and met my mentor which is dennis moser and robert houston ok and they have a studio in union city new jersey which is where i now live now and still frequently visit the studio right so that's pretty much all my career started and it's going to stay that way they're always family always go to them and you know the n f l contacted me about two years ago ok you saw my work and they were like well we want you on board  you can do film we see you can do photography and i was like all right let's marry the two and shoot something as well as film it yeah you know you have assets now they can be utilized so it's been good yeah that must've been a good feeling for the n f l to  yeah it sucks sucks for them it's a different time now i'm thirty two so i'm seven years older than my brother and how older than thirteen older and thirty years older and my sister so my neighborhood that i grew up in they probably don't remember how ok and if they do they're probably wondering where is who are all these young people around me know i'm going to have to adapt to never really spoken to them about that but i places when i lived in brooklyn my brother now used to work in the summer program at the school yeah right hook bed stuy all these places and they were not the best neighborhoods at all by far and now all the homes they are over a million dollars easy  think so it was a different demographic then we moved in and why did the value change of the neighborhood yeah why did everything stop i don't know and then now it's happening again and everything's gone back to being pristine what's going on systematically and i saw that when i moved to jersey new brunswick i used to live in north brunswick but i saw that in new brunswick that it was dark dirty you know i didn't feel so safe to walk around and now it's like totally different so different and it's it's a little bit alarming that those things happened you know yeah i'm thinking is that that we need to educate our culture more you know about valuing where we are so so where else are you trying to go now to to document have you started going to other places to document no not yet i've just been overworking myself which is that i have a gift and a curse yeah but i can't and i can't stop forget about that yeah so i'm amazing thank you yeah and i want to utilize my talents and you know make money but i also want to give it back to not just our communities but somewhere else in the world right so i got contacted by a man in god his name is christopher which is my brother's name and he reached out he sent me a video and it was of kids doing homework on the floor of his village that his message was don't even know me bro these kids don't have desk to write on how can we help and it hurt to see that because it was so personal yeah they did and even  and the surrounding villages that have desks right on this thing that we take for granted right oh my gosh so how many deaths was donated or with that money that they gave and they were able to buy it so he figured out the cost  junk food cookies so i'm i don't need that cookie that's a dollar that can go to someone you know or not having a coffee today you know simple thing that people think sometimes once a year it's good you know me and maybe i'm just being not literally i mean it's when you can see the smile on anybody's face it's amazing yeah it's that to me that's the biggest satisfaction you know you know that's why i was telling you why i do what i do with my tea is that a cup of tea put smiles on people's face when they come around together to sit and have conversations that's priceless you know if you can warm somebody's heart just having a great conversation or just telling them hi how are you because people don't say hello even on facebook of somebody's birthday people just say i actually talking to the mike and say hey happy birthday and i get along great responses like oh my god that was so someone even though you can do that with it it's so different i mean just liking or saying happy birthday by typing people are like astonished to hear your voice unless that's something that's lost like people are not doing that anymore and i think it's so important you know for us to all just be human together you know just come to give and help each other just one one dollar fifty cents you know if i don't have the money today i would fail to say to the person you know i'm going to give it to you tomorrow exactly and that's what it is people sometimes just ignore you and don't even try to help and i think you know it's not that they can't and even when you feel like you're have a phone number on number two you can even take a bus to go somewhere that people who want you know what's happening for kids walking six miles and is known to go to school and they just like go totally blank  thank you yeah humble yourself yes yeah we definitely need that yes so i'm just very excited that you came you know coming to so to talk about this project and i can't wait to see you know what you're going to do school there's going to be a lot to document over there is well you know i can imagine so be interesting yeah but i'm definitely going to post that yeah there's a lot but they've got project there's going to be more happening and