Just Another Van in the Wall

It was a tough 2010 for Youssef Bahket.

Last January, we found the owner of on Monmouth Street standing in an inch of water. The season’s heavy snow had resulted in a of his Laundromat’s roof, spilling water every, damaging industrial drying machines and ruining customer clothing.

Fast forward to the end of the year. Repairs to the damaged roof were finally getting underway in December after long delays and things were looking up for Bahket, despite breaking his collarbone just a few weeks earlier.

Then he drove his van into the wall.

Patch caught up to Bahket to ask why the side of his business’s wall was boarded up. He said his van lurched while he was trying to change gears with one arm late in December sending him right into the wall. Luckily he was unharmed, he said, and the damage to the wall isn’t too severe. Still, it an inauspicious end to a year that started with its own set of problems.

Still, Bahket is looking up.

“I think it will be a good year,” he said, taking a break Tuesday. “I hope it will be a good year for every one.”