History book after history book extols the many splendid virtues, benefits, and wonderment of New York's geography. These books tell us that when Henry Hudson came upon his most famous discovery, the fields were green, the forests lush, and fawns played lutes softly beside bubbling brooks. Most agree that the deep harbor enable the location to be a shipping magnet, before the sturdy, accessible bedrock beneath Manhattan allowed the rise of great towers to support the cities primary interest: business. I have yet to see a book which didn't credit New York's fame and good fortune to it's unique geography.
Or for a more personal view, you could talk to any of the millions people who commute into the city each day. Like candles to a flame, tourists to a gift store or Dan to a brownie sundae, cities and towns have sprung up around New York, each pulling the tentacles of New York Metropolitan transportation further and further out. Aside from commutes terminating in New York, another shared aspect of many of these cities is proximity to the sea. Perhaps you're a fan of casino's or want to still claim to be a New Englander (despite rooting for the Yankees). Well, we've got oceanfront property in Port Chester to Stamford to Norwalk. Or if the TV shows have you wearing your hair big and rockin' out to Bon Jovi, New Jersey has ample shoreline for you too. Then again, you might be a New York purist, and prefer to live and work in the same state, so Long Island, with miles of soft sand beaches could be your choice. With so much oceanfront property in the region, New York benefits again.
But I'm really here to bring up the geographic benefit I've been seeing lately; it's smack-dab in the middle of the Eastern Seaboard. Being poor, as young travelers should be, I find myself gravitating to travel by bus. It's cheap and easy, plus they have wireless Internet now so I can write dibble like this for you while moving at 65... ugh, traffic, make that 20 miles per hour. Whatever the speed, it's relatively simple to get wherever I want to go, quickly and cheaply. Last weekend I returned to Boston. This weekend I swung through Washington, DC. Pretty much any major city on the Eastern Seaboard is accessible within a few hours on the bus. How had I never realized how much better it would be to live in the middle, instead of at the end? Aside from being the destination for other travelers, it seems to be a great departure point for it's own people!
I tell you I'd be positively giddy with excitement about this discovery, except that all this time on the bus has zapped most of my energy. Plus we have a long way to go before we reach Manhattan, all those cities up and down the East coast have brought traffic to a crawl. I think I'll relax and read my book about how great the New York Harbor is. Or maybe I'll gaze out the window at the passing sea. Just kidding... the Jersey turnpike goes nowhere near it's beautiful ocean.
Sunday, May 16, 2010
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Bouncing Back
I'm not predisposed to like New York. Let's face it; down in my heart, cultivated since birth, there is a deeply embedded bias against the city because it is home to a certain baseball team. As a result, fair or not, accurate or not, I've used that starting excuse to draft a mental tableau of ills that plague the city. Sure, maturity, personal experience and Big Papi have helped dissuade these irrational perceptions, but I'll confess that just a mere year ago I was saying, "there's no way I'd live in New York. It's too... big/dirty/dingy/self-centered/full of Yankee fans. Yet, here I am.
Off the bat, I'm pleased to report that most of my remaining prejudices have proven false as George Washington's teeth. In fact, my first weeks there have left me deeply impressed with numerous things, including it's resilience.
New York has seen terrorism, and I haven't. To be honest, I've always felt pretty secure because: (a) nobody is going to attack suburban Lexington because it's not an economic center, (b) nobody would dare attack Shanghai, let alone know how, and (c) nobody would attack Boston when New York is a more appealing target.
Then, one week into my New York Experiment, someone puts a car bomb in Times Square. Thankfully, we were spared disaster, but that doesn't alter the fact that 7 blocks from my office sat a terrifying weapon of destruction.
48 hours later, I walked through the area on my way home from work. I expected thin crowds, an aura of hesitancy, the unease of vigilance, people looking over their shoulders. There was none of that. The place was packed with tourists and suits. Nobody looked concerned, nobody looked upset. It was business as usual for all the bag sellers, professional sign holders and street cart hawkers. Taxis, buses and subways ran on time. The city seemed to have moved on from the attempt. What struck me even more was that week at work, it wasn't the hot button topic of conversation. People had other things to talk about - the Dow and Cinco de Mayo festivities.
Compare that to Boston, where a few years back the evening commute was disrupted when light-bright signs, in a guerrilla marketing campaign for the TV show Aqua Teen Hunger Force, were mistaken for possible explosives. Not only did the city come to a near screeching halt, but everyone was talking about it for days to come. I know the news is making a much bigger deal of the Times Square attempted bomb, and rightfully so, but I personally saw more public interest in Boston about a night-light attack, than in New York after a bomb scare.
I can't help but marvel at the contrast, and at New York's ability to bounce back. It's like the city, known for it's cynicism, is wrapped in a blanket of optimism about these things, focusing on the positives (the heroes of the day, nobody getting hurt) and glossing-over the obvious negatives (there was a bomb in Times Square). The city has seen much worse. I don't know what the city felt, what it went through, how it recovered, how it bonded in the fall of 2001, and I don't see how I could. I never properly realized exactly how important, how galvanizing those months were for the city. The result is a city far stronger, far more prepared, far more resilient than I expected. The type of city that can come back from after loosing the first 3 games of the playoffs to win the last 4... or something like that,
Off the bat, I'm pleased to report that most of my remaining prejudices have proven false as George Washington's teeth. In fact, my first weeks there have left me deeply impressed with numerous things, including it's resilience.
New York has seen terrorism, and I haven't. To be honest, I've always felt pretty secure because: (a) nobody is going to attack suburban Lexington because it's not an economic center, (b) nobody would dare attack Shanghai, let alone know how, and (c) nobody would attack Boston when New York is a more appealing target.
Then, one week into my New York Experiment, someone puts a car bomb in Times Square. Thankfully, we were spared disaster, but that doesn't alter the fact that 7 blocks from my office sat a terrifying weapon of destruction.
48 hours later, I walked through the area on my way home from work. I expected thin crowds, an aura of hesitancy, the unease of vigilance, people looking over their shoulders. There was none of that. The place was packed with tourists and suits. Nobody looked concerned, nobody looked upset. It was business as usual for all the bag sellers, professional sign holders and street cart hawkers. Taxis, buses and subways ran on time. The city seemed to have moved on from the attempt. What struck me even more was that week at work, it wasn't the hot button topic of conversation. People had other things to talk about - the Dow and Cinco de Mayo festivities.
Compare that to Boston, where a few years back the evening commute was disrupted when light-bright signs, in a guerrilla marketing campaign for the TV show Aqua Teen Hunger Force, were mistaken for possible explosives. Not only did the city come to a near screeching halt, but everyone was talking about it for days to come. I know the news is making a much bigger deal of the Times Square attempted bomb, and rightfully so, but I personally saw more public interest in Boston about a night-light attack, than in New York after a bomb scare.
I can't help but marvel at the contrast, and at New York's ability to bounce back. It's like the city, known for it's cynicism, is wrapped in a blanket of optimism about these things, focusing on the positives (the heroes of the day, nobody getting hurt) and glossing-over the obvious negatives (there was a bomb in Times Square). The city has seen much worse. I don't know what the city felt, what it went through, how it recovered, how it bonded in the fall of 2001, and I don't see how I could. I never properly realized exactly how important, how galvanizing those months were for the city. The result is a city far stronger, far more prepared, far more resilient than I expected. The type of city that can come back from after loosing the first 3 games of the playoffs to win the last 4... or something like that,
Monday, May 3, 2010
A New Begining
I'm starting up my blog again. Writing helps me process my world, allows me to see it, gives me cause to examine it. When I'm writing my blog the mundane becomes exciting; sights my mind would gloss over become fascinating vignettes. Life is more interesting when you contemplate it.
I no longer live in Shanghai, and I'm no longer traveling. I have started a job in New York City, while living a bit further outside the city in New Jersey. This can never be as foreign as Shanghai, and because of that perhaps my revival will be a bit of a boar, and certainly a blog about New York life is far, far from a new idea, but I hope this blog will be amusing, if nothing else.
When I speak of my impressions of Shanghai, I always talk about "Dan's Shanghai", which was different from everyone else's Shanghai. I went to my restaurants, my parts of the city. I did things I thought were interesting, and had a fascinating job to boot! But make no mistake, "Dan's Shanghai" and the Shanghai of my students would have likely seemed very, very different.
In that light, I hope to write about "Dan's New York". I'll confess I expect it to be riddled with information about commuting from central Jersey, eating from street carts around my office and the changing of the seasons. It may be mundane, it may be boring, but it'll be my life, and as I slow down to study it, it might become my New York.
I no longer live in Shanghai, and I'm no longer traveling. I have started a job in New York City, while living a bit further outside the city in New Jersey. This can never be as foreign as Shanghai, and because of that perhaps my revival will be a bit of a boar, and certainly a blog about New York life is far, far from a new idea, but I hope this blog will be amusing, if nothing else.
When I speak of my impressions of Shanghai, I always talk about "Dan's Shanghai", which was different from everyone else's Shanghai. I went to my restaurants, my parts of the city. I did things I thought were interesting, and had a fascinating job to boot! But make no mistake, "Dan's Shanghai" and the Shanghai of my students would have likely seemed very, very different.
In that light, I hope to write about "Dan's New York". I'll confess I expect it to be riddled with information about commuting from central Jersey, eating from street carts around my office and the changing of the seasons. It may be mundane, it may be boring, but it'll be my life, and as I slow down to study it, it might become my New York.
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