On Oct. 12, the hotel workers of Marriott entered the tenth day of a country-wide strike on October 12 in eight cities. Their core demand is higher pay, based on soaring housing and living costs. They have advanced the pithy slogan “One job should be enough.”
On the afternoon of Oct. 12, 300 strikers organized by Unite HERE Local 26 led a march in downtown starting from the Boston Common to the the front of W Boston, a luxurious hotel owned by Marriott International. On the tenth day, striking workers have remained resolute with full of energy. In the march the multiracial, multigenerational, multilingual diversity of the hotel workers of Boston was on full display.
The strikers showed high discipline by not giving out individual interviews but directing a few designated strike leaders to speak so as to give out a coherent response.
Brian Lang, the president of Local 26 said, “We deserve to share the wealth we create so that we can live and work with dignity. We are staying out on strikes until they agree to our proposals to make the happen.” When asked why Marriott has not budged yet, he didn’t hold back, saying, “Because they are greedy bastards.”
Striker Godwin Bakely who works at the Ritz-Carleton, described the tactic the Marriott management is playing now. “They know they don’t pay us enough and many of use live paycheck to paycheck hence they have not budged yet. They are hoping that the workers are going get fed up and go back to work.”
Milos Aramayo, holding the picket line pointed out, “You can see people are really strong and determined. Frankly, they [the Marriott group] just want to test our determination.”
Striker Elvin Gonsalves who works at the Westin Waterfront explained: “They are the biggest hotel chain hence they have the power. But we have the power that we have come together.”
A striking worker who wanted to remain anonymous said that he has worked for 28 years at the Sheraton Boston. “Many of us long term workers, we gave our whole lives working for Marriott but now they are kicking us out for nothing. No benefit, no nothing. They want to hire new young people with less money to save money.” He described a Marriott manager who looked the strikers with pure hate. He then explained, “The managers have high salaries, they don’t want the workers to have raised salary.”
The strikers chanted a slogan directed at the glass-walled W Boston: “If we don’t get no contract, you don’t get no peace.”
Newly unionized Harvard university graduate student workers, who are working on their first contract, joined the march to show solidarity. Sara Feldman who is a non-unionized non-tenured faculty member at Harvard university said she had stayed at the Sheraton Boston for earlier conferences and knew that the hotel workers were unionized. She felt connected to the people working at the hotel. Hence it was important for her to come and support the striking hotel workers.
The strikers rebuked the scabs with the chant “Shame shame” as visibly nervous scabs were seen trying to sneak in hotel guests through the picket line into the front door entrance.
