Listen, Corona!

(Statue located in front of my house, 37th Ave and 102nd St.)

All semester long I tried to look for the perfect artifact to write about and the one that I eventually found was literally right in front of my home. I live in a two family, brick house. The front of the house is gated and in the garden that consists of two small bushes stands a glass covered statue of Jesus Christ. Everyone who passes by is forced to see the chipping statue. Those who are religious stick their hands through the fence to tap the glass, others bow their heads and say a quick prayer. The street I live in is predominantly Catholic. Many of the houses have similar statues hidden in their small gardens, which are kept private.

I have lived in this home for nine years and always wondered why our home is the only one with a statue placed in the very front, instead of being kept private like the others. I also wondered why homeowners would decide to display such a prominent religious symbol. In light of this class, I finally got my answers from me asking my landlord, Marina. She explained that she and her brother, Juan, bought the house in the early 80s (Crime Report). The house had been abandoned and only bums and drug addicts would be found living in the space. Marina and Juan put their money together and remodeled the house top to bottom. While remodeling the front, she explained how they argued about what to do with the space. They both wanted something that stated the house was now free from all the terrible things it once was, but the siblings had different ideas in expressing this. Marina wanted a delicate garden with flowers that would symbolize the blossoming of a new life within the home. Meanwhile, her brother wanted the statue, which would be permanent and was indestructible.

Looking ashamed, Marina shared with me her opposition to the statue. She was against it because their house would be the only one with a statue standing out like a sore thumb. She also felt as if the statue would not prove anything. Meanwhile, her brother thought the ability to put a figure, such as Jesus, would give them an opportunity to save their neighborhood that was doing so horrible at the time.

Marina went on to explain the dangerous conditions of Corona during the 80s. I think she did a good job in reflecting the hardships of the time period in America as a whole. As many of us know, the 80s were a hard time in America with the crack epidemic and high crime rates. The apartment mirrored the problems at the time and like the house, the country needed some fixing up. Juan’s insistence on placing the statue in the front of the house reminded me of Falwell’s persistence on America trying to better itself. His urgency, like Juan’s, was to make a change for the better using religion and hoping that those around would make the change as soon as possible. I would not call Juan a Fundamentalist who thought the world was going to crap, but maybe he thought that by putting up this statue would inspire some change for a neighborhood that was falling apart.(Maybe Juan should have created a plaque underneath the statue that said: Listen, Corona!)  

The last question I asked Marina was, why wouldn’t Juan just place the statue off to the side if he wanted it so badly? She explained that he was proud of his faith and wanted to bring some comfort to everyone that would see it, unlike the other homes that kept their statues private. I’m glad that this project forced me to ask these questions about something that I’ve been living with for the past nine years. It was interesting to learn how the time period and conditions of my neighborhood affected the way my home looks today.


Falwell, Jerry. Listen, America! Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1980. Print.

Fuchs, Erin. "It's Incredible How Much Safer America Has Become Since The 1980s." Business Insider. Business Insider, Inc, 27 Jan. 2015. Web. 28 Apr. 2015.