several things that do not make you look like a new yorker

Having been born and having lived in the grand old big apple and raised in what's "affectionately" known as the 8th borough (NJ), I'm pretty sick and tired of seeing yuppies and college students try to blend in with the general populace of NYC (as if the original populace was even around anymore). Kiddies, doing the following doesn't make you look like a New Yorker, just the fake scum that you are:

1. Jaywalking

People in other cities wait for the lights to change to cross the street, not having the "devil may care" attitude of the quote-unquote tough, badass, hard New York citizens. This is partly true - I've been to L.A., Miami, Boston, D.C., Cleveland - people wait. That being said, WALKING IN FRONT OF CARS DOES NOT MAKE YOU COOL/TOUGH. People who are actual New Yorkers don't pay attention to the cross walk symbols because our avenues/streets run in one direction and therefore do not merit the attention required at La Cienega, Calle Ocho, and Pennsylvania Avenue. If there is a car within 60 feet and you're crossing one lane, you go. If a taxi is 15 feet away from you, has the green light and right of way, and is going pretty fast, stepping out into traffic (as one less-than-street-savvy NYU student recently attempted) isn't cool, it's flat-out retarded. To anyone who takes issue with my political correctness - I do not care.

2. Wearing Black -

Oh god, you're wearing black, skinny jeans, and some kind of pathetic "reworked" (read: knitted, restyled, or otherwise less-ballsy) motorcycle jacket. I'm so afraid, you must be REALLY tough. Do you really think we don't see your blow out, your highlights, your makeup, your Gap jeans, your Guess top, your Forever 21 bag, your H&M accessories, your Victoria's Secret underwear, your Steve Madden shoes, your Nikes, your Adidas jacket, your London Fog umbrella, your Guido Palau haircut, your Chanel handbag, your Kova & T leggings, your Starbucks coffee, your Lucky Strikes, your Bic lighter, your Blackberry? People used to wear black in New York city because they had dark fucking souls and because it's the chicest thing since Diana Vreeland and because they listened to terrible music while smoking Galoises and drinking espresso (NOT pronounced "EXpresso," philistine). I don't care what Teen Vogue, Anna Wintour, and all the rest tell you - we can still see your conformist Abercrombie souls and we still hate you.

3. Having a Hard Attitude

People here who want to blend in or look cool ignore the crazies and the street people, even though they are visibly terrified and/or shocked by them. Dude, if you were really so used to this, you wouldn't be so obviously disturbed by, or hardened against, helping out someone who's been completely destroyed by our system. Instead of ignoring the sad old woman asking for change on the subway, middle aged black dude without any teeth singing blues on the Metropolitan Museum steps, or facial-tatted street kids on Second Avenue while rushing back to your Finnish Modern Design apartment (with Urban Outfitters artwork, PB Teen rugs, and some "clever" bullshit i dont feel like thinking of right now), why don't you forgo like, three ciggarettes, and do a little good for humanity? And seriously, theres nothing more obvious than when some homeless schiz person scares you by jumping out of an alley and then you try to put on this cool facade like "yeah whatever I'm a tough New Yorker if I can make it here I can make it anywhere I'm not shocked by anything Mommy please bring me back to Westchester/Nassau County/New Jersey" look.

4. Talking Loud on the Subway

Teenagers, and twenty/thirtysomethings, who want to look really AWESOME talk really loudly about what's going on in their lives/what cool party with a celebrity "dj" they went to/where they're going to spend money/whatever their goddamn personal business is, on the subway. NOTE: I am not impressed. I overheard some soulless yuppies on the 4 talking about "Hanging out in the L.E.S." and I almost throttled them. Don't you need to tend to your young children instead of snorting blow and pretending to understand conceptual art? Worst of all, absolute, absolute worst, is hearing you talk about "New York" as if it were some kind of far-off idea where Brittany Murphy kisses dudes under sheets of Egyptian cotton and anyone gives a shit about you. Please refrain from explaining the social rules of New York City or how it's changed to your visiting friends from, like, Akron. I'm sure they're wonderful people (probably more interesting than you, in fact), but your smug posturing and just ridiculously superficial understanding of this place infuriates me.

Babeling

However, the Tower of Babel was not built for the worship and praise of God, but was instead dedicated to the glory of man, to "make a name" for the builders: "Then they said, 'Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves; otherwise we shall be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.'" (Genesis 11:4).

(This stolen directly from Wikipedia - paraphrasing doesn't seem necessary.)

"And the Lord came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded. And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do; and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech."

Genesis 11:5-7

How many people have been murdered because of our differences and our pitiful, weak inability to let go of brutal evolutionary devices? Perhaps the Lord could have saved some more of his flock by allowing us to share a unity and common heritage instead of scattering us via language to fight and kill each other for centuries. 

I'm no atheist, but, more and more frequently, God's desire for humans to be sniveling, helpless worms disgusts me. I truly fail to see how these humans' building a tower for themselves is in any way immoral or against God. Perhaps the Great Lord was having a fat day and felt insecure...

Fashion

I hate fashion, because it promotes the idea that clothes and accessories (extensions of your personality) can become obsolete due to the judgement of others and therefore should be purchased and disposed of rapidly (a state of mind which soon imprints itself onto your personality, your way of life, your views on the world, etc.)

The fact that almost all of the clothes, bags, shoes, socks, bras, hats, bracelets, capelets, tank tops, vests, slouchy scarves, sunglasses, sneakers, and every wearable item is produced in a foreign country, where wages are lower, in order to suppress prices, is really sad.

That means companies deprive U.S. workers of good jobs and exploit workers in other countries so that YOU can buy cheap clothes at Forever 21, the Gap, Nike, Converse, PacSun, Hollister, Hot Topic, Urban Outfitters, Abercrombie, Delia*s, etc. One of the reasons I was so excited about the Docs i got today was that they were made in England, before the company started outsourcing.

Everyone talks about eco fashion, sustainability, whatever.

Have you ever noticed how many companies will tell you that the best way to solve our ecological problems is to STOP BUYING PRODUCTS AS MUCH AS YOU CAN?

You will NEVER hear this. Of course not - because then their system would collapse, and we'd all live more frugally, more conscientiously, more intelligently, and probably more happily, with LESS.

Instead of rushing out to replace your old linens with organic cotton towels; instead of getting some random useless thing made in Africa somewhere; instead of getting a teeshirt that says "Reuse, reduce, recycle," consider keeping your old towels, donating money to UNICEF or some other cause, or making a teeshirt that broadcasts your beliefs from materials you already own.


Have you ever gone shopping and gotten high off the rush of buying - for some intangible reason? I used to have thoughts lifted from magazine copy - "I'm going to live my life in these clothes!"; " "This scarf will help me capture the essence of a moroccan souk crossed with a parisian prostitute!"; "Maybe this will cheer me up?!"

In reality, you will live your life in any clothes you happen to be wearing, regardless of their appearance. True adventure is not motivated by skinny jeans, or fake glasses, or whatever happens to be cool at the moment.

Fashion is a language spoken by the privileged, the rich, the young; the majority of the world, including your future boss, will probably not care that the stripes on your shoes are "nautical". They will be much more interested in what you have to say and do. Don't count on apparel to speak for you or communicate your message.

And, to be honest, material things are never going to make you happy. They are amusing, but then you get sick of them because you know how quickly you will discard them - maybe in three months - once you get sick of them?

Think when you go on a shopping spree. Unfortunately, I don't really enjoy it any more, because i see U.S. economic imperialism, poor families working hard, and a pretty messed up system that could be greatly alleviated if the buying populace could cut its irresponsible spending.

We expect it from our government - we should practice it ourselves.

mah hood

My neighborhood is pretty funky, which confuses me sometimes but is, for the most part, perfectly fine. Mostly I enjoy it because there are huge houses all over the place, and they're all really old. I don't know most of my neighbors, and usually identify them with monikers having to do with their houses; there is "the pink and blue house with ron paul fanatics;" "the house where the school bus driver lives who parks her bus in front of our house EVERY DAY; "the creepy blue house where I have never seen anyone;" etc. I used to sit on my balcony sometimes, when it was warm, and just write down everything that happened. For example, seeing a woman come out of the creepy house would result in something like " sighting! pink capri pants!!"
The trees are huge, and there are all kinds of weird things like a broken down carriage and the remains of a stone building in my neighbor's backyard; the path through the woods to Saint Aloyisious church; the woods behind Lincoln School; the empty lot where a house burned down; etc. I also live walking distance from the jail and old asylum, resulting in cRaZy tYmEs such as when a prisoner escaped. lol.
The police station is a block away from my house, with its requisite shooting range; so from the time I moved here, two of the most frequent sounds I hear every day are A) gunfire and B) sirens. This, combined with the multitude of bus stops to Newark near my house, the jail, my house's proximity to Bloomfield avenue, and its location on the border of Verona and Caldwell, sometimes lulls me into feeling like I live in some kind of urban ghetto, until I look out the window and see all these trees. Also, Saint Al's and the Presbyterian church are within two blocks of my house, and therefore I always hear church bells - Saint Al's' play songs, whereas the Presbyterian church rings on the hour - which is actually pretty incredible. With the addition of Calandra's (as well as Dunkin Donuts) I now smell bread baking all the time, so with the bells and the bread I also sometimes feel like I live in some quasi -medieval shire.
I also have many crazy neighbors; they're more notable for their behavior than their houses. My neighbor behind our house has a rotating cast of people who live there. It's kind of impossible to describe their antix without living here, but a short list;
- once we came home from vacation to find a deerskin being stretched in the trees that seperate our property. Their son had returned from "wilderness camp."
- once we noticed huge plumes of smoke coming from their back porch, only to later find that they were cooking a "beer can chicken". This is when you put an empty can of beer inside the chicken while you cook it... for flavor? I don't even know.
- they lift weights in the driveway, which I personally could care less about; my dad thinks it makes it look like a prison yard.
also on my street is a boarding house for men and the occasional woman. I rarely see anyone leaving or entering. One summer night, I was walking home with some friends and a resident was feeding three or four skunks on the front steps. Which was not necessarily bad; it was just bizarre.
anyway. thas ware i live.