Galina Parfenov(picture above) Climbing Coach, New Haven, Connecticut
Do you shuttle daily from New Haven? No, I go around to a bunch of different gyms all over Connecticut and the city, depending on the day. When did you first climb? I was 12, in seventh grade. I was taking art classes outside of school and my art teacher asked me if I wanted to go rock climbing with her. I was like, “Sure, why not?” I was wearing skinny jeans and I remember thinking, It’s probably not the best outfit.
How did you become a coach? I was a biochemistry major, but I think that was my senior year when I was like, Wow, I really don’t care about any of this. I finished school, moved back to Connecticut, found a tiny little gym very close to my parents’ house, and literally wrote the owner an email asking if I could sit and watch and learn a bit more about coaching. He emailed me back and he was like, “Yeah, you really don’t qualify, but I found your YouTube” — I had some viral climbing videos that everyone knew me — “and you seem a little badass, so come on.
Justin Signo
Unemployed, Williamsburg
Climbing should be hard on the body.
Yes. The first time, my hands shredded. I was trying to get TSA PreCheck a day after climbing, and they were kind of surprised because I had no fingerprints – because when you climb you lose your skin and stuff.
Jai Chablat-Yates
Model, Bedford-Stuyvesant
Robert Kydd
Control Engineer, East Village
Terry Fay Hamilton
Screenprinter, Jersey City
Tatiana Fenner
Filmmaker, Bedford-Stuyvesant
Allyson Bagalay
Nurse, East Village
Caleigh Gardon
Emergency Medical Technician, Williamsburg
Alexia Adana
Creative Director, Bushwick
Kate Rhodes
Fundraising for Health Care, Park Slope
Do you come a lot?
Oh, I do my job here, I climb here, I do yoga here, I just hang out. It is open 24/7. I changed into clothes to go to a friend’s wedding at this gym. I was so embarrassed because these people never saw me in normal clothes. Coming out the door in my dress felt like the longest 100 feet of my life.
Taylor Axdorff
Designer, Bedford-Stuyvesant
Jake Deakin
Product Design Manager, Williamsburg
Julianna Wilson
Audiobook Producer, Upper West Side
Do you look around as you climb?
Yeah, that’s so funny. People look like monkeys, and they fall off walls all the time – I think of them as squirrels in Central Park. I run all the time in the park and you always see squirrels falling from the trees. That’s right, but it’s a bunch of adults.
Matthew Lev
Designer, Prospect Heights
What else do you do?
I am also a ceramist. I just sanded ten bowls yesterday. The way I think about it, with climbing you are on rocks, and with ceramics you are using a soft material that heats up in a rock. So all around, I work with pebbles.
Tammy Tan
Software Engineer, Lower East Side
Moses Chavez-Gray
Law Student and Vital Employee, Flatbush
Conchobhar Kegan
Vital Employee, Greenpoint
Adnan Aga
Graduate Student, Bedford-Stuyvesant
Rae Haas
Artist and Musician, Greenpoint
Did you try anything new tonight?
So each color on the wall represents different qualities from V1 to V8 – extremely difficult. I got 75% of that V8, which was a really big step for me. And I’m quite short – my wingspan is negative -2, which isn’t ideal for a climber.
