Tuesday, October 12, 2010

Surprises.

Let's get this straight.

So, I'm living in New York. This isn't like living in Nagoya; that was Japan. This is every country on earth. Here, you walk a block and you're on another continent; you cross the street and it's a new ecosystem. Everyone has an opinion, and be it through tirades on the subway about sexual orientation; furious pontifications accompanying passing out of tracts at the station; snickering socialites huddled with signs protesting construction; or verifiable Jerks muttering under their breath at the Nerve of Some People turning My City into a Third World Country by Speaking Spanish; whatever the opinion, you're gonna hear it.

This is New York City, where I live two blocks from a hookah bar. Where I went for a walk yesterday, took the subway to China Town, and immediately found a grocer with a display of fresh fish, including live crabs in a bucket and whole sharks on ice. Where I then walked for all of ten minutes and found myself in a Whole Foods with conveyor belt sushi. Where every store has the world's best bagel, gelato, baklava, or whatever's on sale.

I can't seem to go out for a walk on the weekend without wandering into a street fair, and seriously, at first I was planning it that way but now I wonder why I even bothered. There are museums everywhere, bookstores everywhere, parks everywhere, bikers who defy fate and physics by weaving in and out of cars and other bikers who wear helmets and tight pants and zip down tidy dedicated bike lanes and where I live I have no choice but to do a little from column A and a little from column B. There are bento vendors - two of them - stopping by my office every morning, and trolleys and trucks selling fruit, pretzels, knishes, frozen yogurt, cupcakes, and I'm sure that if I speculate here that there's one out there with caramel apples and old fashioned lollipops, I'll come across it first thing tomorrow. Everyone's reading on the train, from magazines, free newspapers, library books and e-readers, and if they aren't reading, they're gabbing with each other in any of a dozen different languages.

And what still catches me off guard every time? Booze in the supermarket.

Trader Joe's sells wine! Seriously, New York, what is WITH that!

Pfft, I bet they make people pump their own $3 a gallon gas, too.

Sincerely,
A girl from South Jersey and the Philadelphia area.

4 comments:

Judy Lubetkin said...

I grew up in New York and your blog makes me feel like I had my eyes closed the entire time. You have turned a few paragraghs into a New York experience in my mind's eye. I love how you are getting so much out of everything that you are experiencing in NYC.

Sheryl said...

That's because you live in the center of the world!!

http://bigthink.com/ideas/21121

Lucky girl.

oviya said...

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Sonia Perez said...

Que bien oye. La verdad que me alegro que abran un bar de cachimbas. Es una alegria que pudan ir los jovenes y no tan jovenes a fumar un poco de cachimba, que es mejor que fumar tabaco u otras cosas. Tengo un viaje programado así que tendré que buscar esos bares. Gracias por compartir.