Revisiting the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 135, the San Diego Chapter

Photo is today's Union Tibune's report of the impending strike in Southern California. I am reposting a blog I did at Facebook almost two years ago. Not much is new. Mickey Kasparian is still the president of of the local chapter. I have read somewhere that union membership as condition for employment is illegal in America. The UFCW seems to be just using grocery workers as milking cows. I still have good memories of working with Vons. It is not the best place to work but it is better than having no place to work. I feel sorry for the thousands of workers affected in this impending strike. Pha Khin Mickey Kasparian!

UFCW
by Glo Navarro on Thursday, 29 October 2009 at 11:35


I was a member of the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) union for two years. The Safeway Companies makes membership to the union a condition for employment for anyone wanting to work in its groceries. This meant a cut of $15 for UFCW from every paychek while I work for Safeway. As a newcomer to America then, I was just too excited to to get to work and the idea of a membership to a union made me feel counted as a American worker. I even went to an assembly at one time and hear the Algerian-American chair talked about how successful the union has become in the local chapter. Mickey Kasparian looked like a frog to me from afar. The arena of the San Diego State U was reserved for tor the occasion. Everybody cheered at Mickey as he talked about the lock out that was being threatened at the negotiating tables was prevented. Four years before, groceries in the area had a 141-day strike, locking workers out of the groceries and causing loss of jobs of 65,000 UFCW memmbers and $3 billion revenues on the employers.
Short and stocky, Mickey really sounded like a frog himself celebrating a much-awaited rain.
I left the company shortly after the celebration. While the threat of lock-out and unemployment was imminent, I was online intensely browsing for job opportunities.
The grocery is a mile away from where I live and I still shop there for old time's sake. It was in there that I learned about the basics of customer service:
Greet
Anticipate
Take to the item (not just point with my fingers or nudge my head in the direction where that damn salami is the way I learned it in the Philippines growing up in the barrio)
Provide information on the product (I assure you they are not expired)
Offer samples. (Would you like a free sample to make sure that the salsa is really spicy?)
Being polite
Parting greeting (Enjoy the gay parade!)

Today, after I dropped off KG and Karlee at their schools, I went up to the area and chatted with one of my former co-workers. Yvette K who I used to call Frau K is from Bulgaria. Blonde and naturally blonde, not bleached blonde like several Asians I know have become, Frau K smoked her Misty one after the other while she told me about everyone.

You remember Vicky?
The Iraqi who got fired for using too many coupons for her family? And the UFCW couldn't do anything to restore her.
No, that was Victoria. Vicky was the woman you sang to: " You are beautiful, no matter what they say."
Oh yes, Vicky. She once asked me to slice some provolone cheese for her and when I asked her why couldn't she do it herself, she marched to the manager's office as soon as she could and came back with Bill, the assistant manager, her fellow Caucasian. I told Bill that I didn't know what Vicky's problem was. and Bill said: "Neither do I."
According to Frau K, Vicky has been transferred again to another store, this time in Del Mar, way further off from where she lives. Nobody got fired for telling her she was a dumb fucking bitch.

I asked Frau K about Senyor Lorenzo. Senyor Lorenzo is an undocumented worker, a day laborer who could communicate with his limited English. I learned from Jodi, a supervisor that he has been coming to store for more than 10 years. Some days, he comes to the Deli buying half roasted chicken, some potato wedges, ensalada and other treats. I could tell he worked for the day. On other days, I see him just outside the store drinking Starbucks coffee. I was just among his many amigos and amigas. Frau K used to tease me because he would ask for me first thing he gets to the Deli referring to me as "my lady". He still wears a sombrero. During the fire of 2007, I didn't see him for about a month and I began wondering about him. Day laborers camp out in parks and many casualties of the fire were some of them. I learned later that he was with his nobya during the height of the fire. When I finally left the store, Frau K had to tell him that I have a nuevo trabajo.

Frau K also updated me about Tammy Sulaiman. I actually asked about her describing her because I couldn't remember her name at first: dark curly-haired Filipino in her mid 20's. Tammy, according to Frau K has been offered to train as Deli manager but she doesn't drive yet, her Mom, couldn't find time to drive her to the store where she is supposed to be trained. Tammy was adopted by a Caucasian couple then assigned to Kuwait. Tammy left her hometown in Sulo when she was 15 years old to work as domestic worker for a Kuwaiti family. She had the Caucasian couple as employer and when the couple came back to the US, they brought her along and eventually adopted her. Familiar about girl-child laborers in the Philippines, I explained to Frau K to keep encouraging Tammy to earn her GED diploma because I am sure Tammy didn't have a chance to finish her high school education in the Philippines. Tammy has actually bloomed in America and learned how to get her way into the workplace and she thought not having a high school diploma is not a problem.