On Preparing For A Hurricane
[Author’s note: I wrote this blog a few weeks ago during the Hurricane Irene, but have only just now edited and posted it. Hope you enjoy.]
Let’s take a look at how a true New Yorker prepares for a hurricane. For most of us city dwellers, the biggest concern this weekend is not necessarily combating the elements, but boredom. In preparation for the storm, Mayor Bloomberg has implored us not to leave the safety of our apartments for the better part of two full days as Irene is projected to barrel through the city. An unrelated but recent study* found that on average, a New Yorker spends no more than four consecutive hours in his or her apartment, including time spent sleeping. And on weekends, the number of consecutive hours is nearly cut in half. You see, we have new restaurants to try. We have bars to frequent. We have live music to hear. We have people to dance with, new clothes to show off, acquaintances to keep up, and late night falafel to eat. Stay in? For the whole weekend? I’m afraid, for this weekend at least, it’s so.
In response to the impending boredom, I have devised a little Hurricane Survival Guide for the New Yorker combating cabin fever. Here is what you will need:
1. Patience. The line to get into the Trader Joe’s grocery store to stock up on food items to outlast the hurricane is second only to the line to get into the Trader Joe’s wine store to stock up on, well, wine to outlast the hurricane.
2. Duct Tape. For reinforcing glass windows to prevent shattering. Also for writing in giant block lettering, “WE ARE OPEN” on the plywood boards used to protect the windows of the Project Parlor, the neighborhood bar.
3. A Plan B. The Duane Reade pharmacy has run low, as you might expect, on many staple items such as tortilla chips. Apparently, during hurricanes, New Yorkers do exactly the same thing they do when it is not hurricaning: drink and eat tortilla chips. Have a plan B grocery store in mind to make sure you get your chips for the weekend.
4. Creative Outlet. Use your iPhone to take pictures of all the neat pre-hurricane cloud formations. Use Instagram or some similarly clever iPhone app to enhance the contrast of the photos to make the cloud formations even more neat. Upload the photos to your various blogs and twitter sites and/or txt them to friends and family across the country to maintain some semblance of contact with the outside world.
5. Multi-tab web browsing. In addition to the normal non-hurricane barrage of gmail.com, facebook.com, nytimes.com, and npr.org, add weather.com’s Hurricane Tracker to your multitab browsing to continually refresh Irene’s path and each time comment to your roommates about how you never realized how slow hurricanes were.
6. A gchat status message, about the hurricane. The gchat status is, we must all admit, conversation bait. We’ve all been there: wanting a conversation with someone but not wanting to appear desperate and socially deprived. And so we write a moderately witty, controversial, inspirational, or slightly confusing gchat status, and watch the conversations pour in. Same principles apply during hurricanes. Try writing something like “Here it comes!” or “Battening down the hatches!” or even, “Windy.”
7. Arrested Development Seasons 1-3 on DVD.
*This study is a fiction.
Friday, September 16, 2011
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
How To Look And Feel Like A New Yorker And Not A Tourist
Part Four: On Nomenclature and the Pronunciation Thereof
New York thrives on exclusivity. New Yorkers, in fact, make it their personal unspoken business to make it nearly impossible for outsiders (i.e. Tourists, Midwesterners, Country Music fans) to assimilate. We prefer to let them flounder with their fanny packs and fanciful glances at the height of buildings rather than give them the necessary directions to begin down the long and arduous road of indigenization.
You see, for the New Yorker, the more ways to demarcate insiders from outsiders, the better. And a particularly effective (and pleasant) mode of demarcation is this: the complete deconstruction of the Tourist’s intuition and reliance on past experience when it comes to the naming of things and the pronunciation of such names. For example, the Tourist reads the street sign “Houston” and ignorantly assumes that his knowledge of the prominent Texan city has given him the necessary background information to pronounce the street’s name correctly. In fact, “Houston Street” is pronounced HOWston, and not HEWston.
“Excuse me, sir” the Tourist asks with confidence, “Which direction is HEWston Street?”
Possible responses to his question, as a New Yorker:
The false humility response: “HEWston Street? I’m sorry but I’m not familiar with that street. Perhaps my knowledge of the city isn’t what it used to be.”
The I’m gonna have a little fun with this Tourist response: “I don’t know of a HEWston Street here in Manhattan. Are you perhaps looking for HOWston Street?” The Tourist will invariably assure you that in fact he is looking for ‘Hewston’ street, in which case you slyly ask him to spell it. Waiting for the Tourist to spell it all the way out: H-O-U-S-T-O-N, you flatly respond, “Yeah. It’s pronounced HOWston.”
The more direct, ‘I’m a New Yorker so I don’t care about you’ response: “HEWston Street doesn’t exist.”
The even more direct response, in three simple steps: Step 1) Draw umbrella. Step 2) Strike Tourist on the upper arm. Step 3) Feel no remorse; the Tourist deserved it.
Another important matter: The trains must be referred to by their number or letter, and not ever by their color. You will be tempted, upon first arriving in the city, to ask someone how to get to the Red Train. Don’t do that. There is no Red Train. What you are really looking for is a One Train, a Two Train, or a Three Train, which all happen to be red on the map. The One Train, you see, is the local train, whereas the Two and Three Trains run along the same line but make only express stops. Yes, it’s confusing, but do you want to be a New Yorker or not? Such is the long road, or track rather, to indigenization.
The purist and noblest form of Subway nomenclature, however, is to refer to trains not by their number or letter, but by the avenues under which they run. The Four, Five, and Six trains, for example, run along Lexington Avenue in Manhattan. So you may, of course, refer to any of those trains by their number, but if you want to really prove your Indigenization, consider occasionally referring to the Six train as the “Lexington Local,” or the Four and Five trains as the “Lexington Express.” Be careful though: such nomenclature should be used sparingly as it potentially comes off as pretentious. And don’t get cute with any rhymey nicknames like the “Lex Express.”
Two Quick, Final Pointers:
1. A New Yorker travels “Uptown,” “Downtown,” or “Crosstown,” not “north,” “south,” “east,” or “west.”
2. You ought to call Manhattan “The City” as if it is the only city in the world. This works particularly well when speaking with folks from the township of Chicago, or the village of Los Angeles, or other such lesser municipalities.
New York thrives on exclusivity. New Yorkers, in fact, make it their personal unspoken business to make it nearly impossible for outsiders (i.e. Tourists, Midwesterners, Country Music fans) to assimilate. We prefer to let them flounder with their fanny packs and fanciful glances at the height of buildings rather than give them the necessary directions to begin down the long and arduous road of indigenization.
You see, for the New Yorker, the more ways to demarcate insiders from outsiders, the better. And a particularly effective (and pleasant) mode of demarcation is this: the complete deconstruction of the Tourist’s intuition and reliance on past experience when it comes to the naming of things and the pronunciation of such names. For example, the Tourist reads the street sign “Houston” and ignorantly assumes that his knowledge of the prominent Texan city has given him the necessary background information to pronounce the street’s name correctly. In fact, “Houston Street” is pronounced HOWston, and not HEWston.
“Excuse me, sir” the Tourist asks with confidence, “Which direction is HEWston Street?”
Possible responses to his question, as a New Yorker:
The false humility response: “HEWston Street? I’m sorry but I’m not familiar with that street. Perhaps my knowledge of the city isn’t what it used to be.”
The I’m gonna have a little fun with this Tourist response: “I don’t know of a HEWston Street here in Manhattan. Are you perhaps looking for HOWston Street?” The Tourist will invariably assure you that in fact he is looking for ‘Hewston’ street, in which case you slyly ask him to spell it. Waiting for the Tourist to spell it all the way out: H-O-U-S-T-O-N, you flatly respond, “Yeah. It’s pronounced HOWston.”
The more direct, ‘I’m a New Yorker so I don’t care about you’ response: “HEWston Street doesn’t exist.”
The even more direct response, in three simple steps: Step 1) Draw umbrella. Step 2) Strike Tourist on the upper arm. Step 3) Feel no remorse; the Tourist deserved it.
Another important matter: The trains must be referred to by their number or letter, and not ever by their color. You will be tempted, upon first arriving in the city, to ask someone how to get to the Red Train. Don’t do that. There is no Red Train. What you are really looking for is a One Train, a Two Train, or a Three Train, which all happen to be red on the map. The One Train, you see, is the local train, whereas the Two and Three Trains run along the same line but make only express stops. Yes, it’s confusing, but do you want to be a New Yorker or not? Such is the long road, or track rather, to indigenization.
The purist and noblest form of Subway nomenclature, however, is to refer to trains not by their number or letter, but by the avenues under which they run. The Four, Five, and Six trains, for example, run along Lexington Avenue in Manhattan. So you may, of course, refer to any of those trains by their number, but if you want to really prove your Indigenization, consider occasionally referring to the Six train as the “Lexington Local,” or the Four and Five trains as the “Lexington Express.” Be careful though: such nomenclature should be used sparingly as it potentially comes off as pretentious. And don’t get cute with any rhymey nicknames like the “Lex Express.”
Two Quick, Final Pointers:
1. A New Yorker travels “Uptown,” “Downtown,” or “Crosstown,” not “north,” “south,” “east,” or “west.”
2. You ought to call Manhattan “The City” as if it is the only city in the world. This works particularly well when speaking with folks from the township of Chicago, or the village of Los Angeles, or other such lesser municipalities.
Saturday, May 8, 2010
How To Look And Feel Like A New Yorker And Not A Tourist
Part Three: On Escalators
Some of us prefer to stand, and we do so on the right. Some of us prefer to walk, and we do so on the left. Walk on the left, stand on the right. Always. No exceptions. If you’re interested in eliciting a nasty, nasty response from a fellow New Yorker, try standing on the left side of the escalator. I was once obediently standing on the right side of an upwardly bound escalator, and glanced (without looking, mind you) backward at the folks standing behind me, all of us making our slow, effortless journey to the train platform above. All of us heading. Heading to the office. Heading to the park for lunch. Heading to the bar. Heading home. I enjoy seeing the many different people all around me and musing about their lives:
“What is that dude listening to? Because he seems to love it, and perhaps so would I.”
“This person a few stairs back, the one with all of the hoola hoops: is she a professional hoola hooper? Cause I’ve never seen that before.”
“Hey that girl’s wearing a Radiohead t-shirt. Maybe I’ll strike up a conversation with her on the platform: ‘So, In Rainbows, eh? Yeah, great album. So, uh, got plans for Friday?’ Smooth is a word I use regularly to describe myself.“
“Ah, Look at this: fanny pack, Macy’s bags, I Love NY t-shirt… classic Tourist.”
“And then there’s this guy reading the New York Post. Something deep within me wants to hand him the New Yorker, or the Times, or even the Metro. Oh, but what’s that about Tiger Woods? If this guy could hold that page a little higher, that would be great.”
I love these moments of escalator surveillance. Taking time to imagine another person’s life helps me more deeply recognize the connectedness of humanity. This can similarly be done on the train. But I like the experience better as I look down the escalator, because I like to think of myself as above people, and to experience it physically only enhances this notion in my mind.
Anyhow, that’s neither here nor there. One day*, during one such imaginative reverie, I noticed a Tourist blatantly, but unwittingly, standing on the left side of the escalator, about 7 steps below me. Behind the Tourist I could see a herd of New Yorkers, all recently de-trained, all heading places, all stampeding relentlessly up the left side of the escalator. The leader of the pack, making the most of his escalation by taking the steps two at a time, neared the unsuspecting Tourist, and without so much as pausing his iPod and removing his earbuds to say excuse me, drew his umbrella from his shoulder bag, and whacked the Tourist square on the left shoulder. “Walk on the left” the New Yorker admonished emotionlessly. The Tourist, muddled and disgusted, moved as far right as he could, and after the New Yorker had passed, looked appealingly at the rest of us, as if to say, “Can you believe this guy?” We all returned the look: “Well, yeah, what do you expect?” This is New York, folks. City of tough love.
*This story is a fiction.
Some of us prefer to stand, and we do so on the right. Some of us prefer to walk, and we do so on the left. Walk on the left, stand on the right. Always. No exceptions. If you’re interested in eliciting a nasty, nasty response from a fellow New Yorker, try standing on the left side of the escalator. I was once obediently standing on the right side of an upwardly bound escalator, and glanced (without looking, mind you) backward at the folks standing behind me, all of us making our slow, effortless journey to the train platform above. All of us heading. Heading to the office. Heading to the park for lunch. Heading to the bar. Heading home. I enjoy seeing the many different people all around me and musing about their lives:
“What is that dude listening to? Because he seems to love it, and perhaps so would I.”
“This person a few stairs back, the one with all of the hoola hoops: is she a professional hoola hooper? Cause I’ve never seen that before.”
“Hey that girl’s wearing a Radiohead t-shirt. Maybe I’ll strike up a conversation with her on the platform: ‘So, In Rainbows, eh? Yeah, great album. So, uh, got plans for Friday?’ Smooth is a word I use regularly to describe myself.“
“Ah, Look at this: fanny pack, Macy’s bags, I Love NY t-shirt… classic Tourist.”
“And then there’s this guy reading the New York Post. Something deep within me wants to hand him the New Yorker, or the Times, or even the Metro. Oh, but what’s that about Tiger Woods? If this guy could hold that page a little higher, that would be great.”
I love these moments of escalator surveillance. Taking time to imagine another person’s life helps me more deeply recognize the connectedness of humanity. This can similarly be done on the train. But I like the experience better as I look down the escalator, because I like to think of myself as above people, and to experience it physically only enhances this notion in my mind.
Anyhow, that’s neither here nor there. One day*, during one such imaginative reverie, I noticed a Tourist blatantly, but unwittingly, standing on the left side of the escalator, about 7 steps below me. Behind the Tourist I could see a herd of New Yorkers, all recently de-trained, all heading places, all stampeding relentlessly up the left side of the escalator. The leader of the pack, making the most of his escalation by taking the steps two at a time, neared the unsuspecting Tourist, and without so much as pausing his iPod and removing his earbuds to say excuse me, drew his umbrella from his shoulder bag, and whacked the Tourist square on the left shoulder. “Walk on the left” the New Yorker admonished emotionlessly. The Tourist, muddled and disgusted, moved as far right as he could, and after the New Yorker had passed, looked appealingly at the rest of us, as if to say, “Can you believe this guy?” We all returned the look: “Well, yeah, what do you expect?” This is New York, folks. City of tough love.
*This story is a fiction.
Saturday, April 24, 2010
How To Look And Feel Like A New Yorker And Not A Tourist
Part Two: On Walking
Approaching an intersection, do not stop walking until you’re a good 3-4 feet into the street. Walk signals, green or red, mean nothing in this town. Your walk signal is looking up the avenue and deciphering whether or not you can make it to the other side before the oncoming traffic enters the intersection. If you decide you can, do so. And you must walk across the street as if the automobile was never invented. If you decide you cannot safely cross, then refrain, but not without a look of exacerbation. Throwing your hands up in the air is a nice touch, but be careful not to inadvertently hail a cab.
If, on your walk, you see something interesting, you may glance, but under no circumstances are you to look at it. Whatever it is that has caught your attention, I assure you it’s not at all interesting, and only the Tourist would think so. This applies to noticing “how tall the buildings are,” “how many taxis there are,” “just how big Central Park is,” and, of course, “just how crazy Times Square is.”
Approaching an intersection, do not stop walking until you’re a good 3-4 feet into the street. Walk signals, green or red, mean nothing in this town. Your walk signal is looking up the avenue and deciphering whether or not you can make it to the other side before the oncoming traffic enters the intersection. If you decide you can, do so. And you must walk across the street as if the automobile was never invented. If you decide you cannot safely cross, then refrain, but not without a look of exacerbation. Throwing your hands up in the air is a nice touch, but be careful not to inadvertently hail a cab.
If, on your walk, you see something interesting, you may glance, but under no circumstances are you to look at it. Whatever it is that has caught your attention, I assure you it’s not at all interesting, and only the Tourist would think so. This applies to noticing “how tall the buildings are,” “how many taxis there are,” “just how big Central Park is,” and, of course, “just how crazy Times Square is.”
Friday, April 23, 2010
How To Look And Feel Like A New Yorker And Not A Tourist
Part One: On Riding The Train
Once you’ve arrived on the train platform, it is important to go right up to the edge and look down the tunnel to see if your train is approaching. Two key things here: 1) Be sure to stand rather liberally upon the “Do Not Stand” yellow strip, and 2) Be sure to look the correct direction—do not be caught looking uptown for a train that is coming from downtown (this can easily be avoided by noticing which direction the New Yorkers are facing). Give it a good lean and a good long look. If you see your train approaching, simply stand back up and nod your head once or twice. Be careful not to give away more emotion than necessary. Your train’s timely arrival is not exciting, it is expected, and you simply want to convey your satisfaction with the result of your good planning and general skill at riding public transportation. If you do not see your train approaching, lean a little farther and let your look last a little longer. Then, upon returning to the upright position, shake your head side to side and roll your eyes slightly. Perhaps check your watch/cell phone for good measure. Repeat leaning/looking procedure every 30-45 seconds.
Monday, March 15, 2010
Out Of Sorts
Somewhere along my Sunday morning commute on the Number Six train I made the realization—or perhaps finally admitted to myself—I had fallen hopelessly out of sorts. Out of Sorts: that state of being irritable, unsatisfied, off-kilter, vexed, often the related to the occurrence of certain unexpected events and/or the non-occurrence of certain expected events.
I should have seen it coming the night before, as I pulled together all the final details for the Sunday worship service. I felt the first pangs of being out of sorts when I broke a guitar string while rehearsing the music. Being without an extra set of strings, I would have to find a different guitar for church. Not ideal. Nothing throws a guitarist more out of sorts than playing an unfamiliar guitar. It’s like borrowing someone else’s car: the mirrors are set too high, the seat too far back, you have no idea where the windshield wiper controls are, the radio pre-sets play all country music stations… Shortly after the guitar string broke, my printer ran out of black ink. I was now short one guitar string and about six copies of music.
And then, in the morning, this: the terribly unfortunate (although not altogether uncommon) loss of hot water in my apartment. I turned on the water, ready to put aside the grievances of my ill-fated preparations for worship from the night before and be renewed, rejuvenated, soothed, comforted, and consoled by perhaps the greatest and (I now realize) least appreciated technological advancement of all time—hot water on tap. I ran my hand through the unfeeling and unapologetically freezing water streaming from the tap, coaxing it, naively and ultimately ineffectually, to turn hot.
Yes, there you have it, I thought to myself as the Number Six train lumbered along. A complete accounting of my falling out of sorts for the morning. Well, no permanent damage. Certainly I can put this all behind me and pull it together before I get to church. And then the announcement came, crackling and nearly incomprehensible, through the train speakers: “Excuse me, ladies and gentlemen, due to construction, all Number Six trains will be running express from 14th Street to Brooklyn Bridge/City Hall. For local service, take this train to Brooklyn Bridge/City Hall, and transfer to an Uptown Number Six train making all local stops. Once again, due to construction…” I tuned out the rest of the announcement as I spent a moment silently shaking my head at the MTA, before plotting a new transportation strategy. I was already running late; I had foolishly been counting on this local train to make all local stops. Apparently too much to ask. Only one thing to be done: I had to take a cab.
I arrived at church ten minutes late, five fewer dollars in my wallet from the cab ride I shouldn’t have had to take, unshowered and with a guitar I was unused to playing. This is an outrage, I thought. An outrage. The broken guitar string, well, that amounted to an unfortunate inconvenience. But the hot water… I don’t pay my hot water bill to be provided with cold water. And the train… I didn’t pay $2.25 to arrive almost at my destination. This is an outrage! An outrage I say! Who will rally with me against these atrocities? I do not deserve to be put out of sorts by such negligence. No one does! Who will boldly stand with me and say that enough is enough? Hot water should come from the hot water tap. The train should take me where I’m going, on time, every time. Ink should not run out. Guitar strings should not break.
Oh the things on which I’ve come to rely.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
World Day
Each day brings a unique energy and excitement here at the New City. Every Friday, for instance, dawns a new “World Day,” a day that can include everything from geography lessons— usually in the form of the seven continents and five* oceans rap**—to interviews with New City alumni to current events reports from students.
A few weeks ago, we had a special musical guest, Patrick, who grew up in Madagascar and now plays bass guitar professionally in New York City. The kids played some of our favorite After School songs—“Shout Hallelujah!” and “Blind Man”—with Patrick on bass and then he played a few songs on his own. Every one sat in rapt attention—I’ve never seen it so quiet—as Patrick made his six-string bass sing out in melody and rhythm. This guy was good. Really good. Afterwards, Patrick shared about his life—what it was like growing up in Madagascar, how he first became interested in music, how he became a Christian and how his faith impacts every aspect of his life. For the kids in After School that day, Patrick’s message was one of encouragement and inspiration about the significance of a life devoted to God, and the opportunities that may come through practice and dedication.
I must add that during question and answer time, one of our second-graders raised his hand and asked, “Did you know that you’re almost as good as Kyle?” I like this kid. He’s always got my back. His question, I suppose, could be attributed to a sort of “home-town bias,” but hey, I’ll take it.
*As I diligently researched information on the (to my knowledge) four oceans, I came to the discovery that a fifth, The Southern Ocean, had been added by the International Hydrographic Organization (I am not making this up) in 2000. It is perhaps also important to note here that my childhood suffered a bit of a shock a couple years ago with the sudden exclusion of Pluto as a planet from the Solar System; with the addition of an ocean I feel a kind of consolation.
** The Continents and Oceans Rap
North America! South America! Antarctica and Africa!
Then comes Europe and Asia and finally Australia!
These are the seven continents, its true,
But what about the oceans, the five oceans blue?
There’s the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian
And up in the North, the Arctic, too.
The last of the oceans in this little rhyme,
That one’s called the Southern, and that makes five!
A few weeks ago, we had a special musical guest, Patrick, who grew up in Madagascar and now plays bass guitar professionally in New York City. The kids played some of our favorite After School songs—“Shout Hallelujah!” and “Blind Man”—with Patrick on bass and then he played a few songs on his own. Every one sat in rapt attention—I’ve never seen it so quiet—as Patrick made his six-string bass sing out in melody and rhythm. This guy was good. Really good. Afterwards, Patrick shared about his life—what it was like growing up in Madagascar, how he first became interested in music, how he became a Christian and how his faith impacts every aspect of his life. For the kids in After School that day, Patrick’s message was one of encouragement and inspiration about the significance of a life devoted to God, and the opportunities that may come through practice and dedication.
I must add that during question and answer time, one of our second-graders raised his hand and asked, “Did you know that you’re almost as good as Kyle?” I like this kid. He’s always got my back. His question, I suppose, could be attributed to a sort of “home-town bias,” but hey, I’ll take it.
*As I diligently researched information on the (to my knowledge) four oceans, I came to the discovery that a fifth, The Southern Ocean, had been added by the International Hydrographic Organization (I am not making this up) in 2000. It is perhaps also important to note here that my childhood suffered a bit of a shock a couple years ago with the sudden exclusion of Pluto as a planet from the Solar System; with the addition of an ocean I feel a kind of consolation.
** The Continents and Oceans Rap
North America! South America! Antarctica and Africa!
Then comes Europe and Asia and finally Australia!
These are the seven continents, its true,
But what about the oceans, the five oceans blue?
There’s the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian
And up in the North, the Arctic, too.
The last of the oceans in this little rhyme,
That one’s called the Southern, and that makes five!
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