| SAYED HAQUE LOOKS UP and grimaces at the gray clouds that have begun saturating Central Park with a brief shower on an otherwise warm and sunny Wednesday morning. Quickly, he moves the inventory of soda, bottled water and Gatorade that he has yet to stock in his cooler under the large green canopy that covers his cart. “This business,” he said, “is completely dependent on Mother Nature.”
The business is the hundreds of commercial vendors who operate daily in Central Park, selling convenience-store items such as water, hot dogs and ice cream, and tourist keepsakes like T-shirts and hats. Haque, a Bronx resident who came to New York from Bangladesh in 1995, is the man park visitors turn to when they need a snack.
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Although selling water in the park might seem like a simple business, Haque said most visitors do not understand its complexities. There are large overhead costs, including ice, transportation for the carts and vending permits from the city. There are myriad codes from the Parks Department and the Department of Public Health that Haque complains are designed to catch vendors doing something wrong. “Too many dos and too many don’ts,” he said, referring to the park’s bureaucracy.
Customers often complain about his prices, too. “But I can buy 24 of these at Costco for $7,” one woman said to Haque after he told her the price for a bottle of water was $2. Haque said the complexities of the vending business elude most people who view the park as a place for leisure. “You’re not paying to enjoy the park, but the park gets you one way or the other,” he said.
Although Central Park is, in effect, Haque’s office, he never gets tired of spending his days there. An avowed nature buff, Haque gets as much joy from the park as the tourists, joggers and sunbathers he serves every day. “I’m having fun, too,” he said, “making money and watching what’s going on around here. If you come here only once a week, you don’t see Mother Nature’s continuous changing. I see nature’s full life-cycle.”
Haque, a former butcher and deli owner who has been a park vendor for three years, said he has turned down higher-paying jobs because the work conditions would not make him as happy as he is in the park. Still, he is mindful of his responsibilities while working. “My first concern is business,” he said. “My love of nature has to come second.”
On a recent April Sunday with conditions – sunny skies, warmth (75 degrees) and no wind – that Haque called ideal, his stand grossed $3,500. He took home $225 ($50 plus five percent of the gross), while the rest went to the New York Picnic Company, which owns Haque’s cart and vendor permit.
Bright, warm days and special events that bring many visitors to the park are the times to which Haque most looks forward. He especially appreciated Christo and Jean-Claude’s “The Gates” project, which brought 4 million visitors to the park in February 2005, according to city estimates. “Thank you Mr. Christo,” he said. “That was like winning the jackpot.”
After a visitor approached Haque and asked him for directions to the Central Park Zoo, the vendor smiled and rolled his eyes. “I do the job of a park employee, too, although they don’t pay me,” he said. But the Bangladesh native is mindful of his own roots as a visitor to New York, so he said he doesn’t mind helping others. “They’re visitors, so they don’t know. When I came to the park as a newcomer, I didn’t know where things were either.”
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