The City as Museum, Part 1

When rainbow crosswalks were installed at the intersection of 18th and Castro, neighborhood groups and locals alike applauded the infrastructure as a symbol of the enduring LGBT presence and general cultural acceptance in San Francisco. In fact, much of the Castro Streetscape Improvement Project featured elements that sought to commemorate LGBT history via sidewalk plaques and inscribed neighborhood factoids. These installations came especially at a time when, among many of the rapid demographic changes happening in the city, some are lamenting the “heterosexualization” of the Castro, and perhaps the city at large. While there’s no actual demographic evidence of this change (and, just to note, SF still ranks as the the queerest city in the U.S.), its worth noting the phenomenon at play here.

The idea that urban infrastructure, namely that which is on or visible from the street, can properly retain a group’s neighborhood presence is no stranger to Bay Area locals. Talk of “preserving neighborhood character”-- San Francisco’s prefered euphemism for maintaining two- to three-story density in residential neighborhoods-- has become coded into civic discussion like the grammar that binds it. It is important to note, however, that the evidence has yet to conclude whether these structures and streetscapes will preserve neighborhood character of any kind. In the case of density controls and architectural preservation, San Francisco has walked into the same trap that Paris has; both places, obsessed with an idealized image of the dollhouse city-- be it Haussmanian or Victorian-- have prevented any ability for neighborhoods to grow, despite that population rates continue upward, even faster than expected. Put simply, we’ve capped our housing even as thousands flock to the Paris of the West. So we’ve preserved these beautiful dollhouses, but not the cultural vibrancy that once made them lively.

Back to the Castro.

I don’t think it’s fair to say that rainbow crosswalks preserve LGBT culture on Castro any more than Dia de Los Muertos-inspired tree grates preserve Mexican culture on Valencia Street; in fact, given the latter example, it would be more accurate to say that such commemorative infrastructure has a tendency to induce cultural amnesia. Photographs may not capture one’s soul for eternity, but there’s no quicker way to capture the soul of a community than to commemorate it with literal kitsch. This is the crux of Disneyfication-- reduce, sugar-coat, package, and produce-- and we as a culture make this mistake all the time. I’m not the first to point out that the authenticity of those rainbow crosswalks seems to fade within a very short period of observation.

The problem at play here is more than just the cheapening effect of cliche gay iconography, but a pattern of kitsch permeating the urban landscape. It following the footsteps of kitsch culture, seeking to capture and tame its objects, lifeforms, and imagery, preserving them in vitrine ecosystems so that they can be digested and consumed by the general public. This is what’s happened in Castro: the complex and turmoiled history of lesbian, gay, and transgendered San Franciscans is reduced to a sanitized product ready for mass consumption; almost as an attempt so austere as to ungracefully position itself as the official "gay mecca" of the world.

It remains to be seen how these crosswalks will be viewed in decades to come, but it’s possible that their relevance might not last until the next time these crumbling streets need repaving.

Coming Out

I seldom like retelling my coming out story. I suppose I recounted the events so many times at age fifteen that, nine years later, I've exhausted the story's potency; and frankly, it matters less and less to me as time goes on. As I've gotten to know the world a bit better, I've come to realize that coming out has less meaning as an adult. And there is certainly an increasingly distant relevance to society: as The Closet fades into history, many children seem to feel less compelled to declare their sexuality in the matter-of-fact nature that previous generations were confined to, and some might say, slave to. This is the byproduct of progressive social assimilation, for better or for worse; the boundaries between sexualities are less distinct than they once were. Gay spaces in big cities-- once the bastion of freedom for closeted queers-- appear to be decreasing in density. It's no coincidence that even the term "queer," and all of the ambiguity it connotes, has risen in prevalence at the same rate these gay spaces are diminishing. But maybe that's a monologue for another day.

On the personal side, I've found that my sexuality is more complex than the confines that the "coming out" story entails. Sure, I declared my sexuality-- not all too proudly but with a sheepish nervousness-- but is it such a definer that my life should be marked in periodized epochs, like those of today's Gregorian calendar?  Think "Before Coming Out" and "After Coming Out," and then think about what other things I've "come out" as, perhaps less definitively. Urbanist? Devil's Advocate? Long-Winded Narrator?

I prefer to think that the stories of my life, and all its queerness, paint a picture of me that matches the complexity of my character. In the messy mosaic of Stan that is under eternal construction, it is these stories that I carry with me with more weight than any Coming Out story I have or could have had...


There is the story of my 11th grade science teacher who called me after class to have a chat. She and I got along on an appropriately sarcastic common-ground, her being not older than 34 years old, and I often felt that she and I had a special comedic connection. After class, she fumbled through her disorganized book bag as she spoke in a vaguely hushed tone.
"You ever listened to Erasure?" she asked, as she pulled out an unmarked CD-R. She handed it to me before I could even answer "no," in the way an amateur drug dealer might slide over the goods: a touch of suspicion that it would be received well, but an underlying confidence that the drug was potent and worthwhile. Did I want a taste of this dangerously addictive 80's musical substance? She assured me I would love it, perhaps even with a wink, and my 15-year-old self had no idea exactly how much this club pop band would influence my energetic, if not outdated, dancing style.
Erasure was my gateway drug to a world of disco dance obsession that consumed my entire Junior year.


There are the stories of countless boys and girls who interrogated me about my sexuality throughout the school day. Every day after the last bell, I walked through the incongruously grand Classical arches of the over-crowded and under-funded Woodrow Wilson High School. There, leaning against the cheaply-imitated Corinthian columns, groups of guys and gals mocked my decidedly ill-fitting pants and flamboyant shirts, often paired with the shrill interrogation:

"Ain't you gay?" 

For the first two years of high school, I would either clumsily flee before they had time for more questioning, or later, I would egress the campus by means of alternate routes.
That question, "ain't you gay," was one not born out of genuine curiosity but out of maliciousness and mockery, and they knew they were hitting a soar spot. It took me some time to realize that what they were really saying was, "ain't you gay yet?"
After I "came out" and gained a bit more confidence, I learned how to answer that question properly. I started with "Yes!," then, "Fuck yes!," then "Yes! And...?" Once I arrived at that last formulation, I found that these guys and gals had no response. Some of them even started smiling and nodding in approval of my defiance, like I had passed their test of will. Soon enough, these kids were so bored with my confidence that they didn't even acknowledge me anymore, and a small part of me missed the attention.


And then there is the story of the first boy I ever kissed. I met him on a gay youth chat network, and he was the bad-boy older 17-year-old of my naive dreams; he was a Senior, I was a Junior, and one can only imagine the instant adoration I had. We met on a gay youth chat network online, and went on our first "date" at a pizza joint on 2nd Street, the only lively place I could think of for hip single daters in Long Beach. The conversation was predictably awkward and stilted, and all I wanted to do was kiss him smack on the lips, right in front of everyone! I of course didn't, and waited for some clear signal to move ahead with my agenda, but the signal never came. Even as he drove me home, I nervously concocted every possible phrasing I could think of to ask if I could "go for it." We stopped in front of my dad's house, the car double-parked on Bayshore Avenue, and this is where I learned the age-old key-fumbling trick. Waiting for the inevitable, I stalled for time by shuffling my collection of mostly useless keys. He got the signal and pulled me in for a lip-lock that lasted for all of ten seconds, and my heart seemed to stop for a minute. I don't think I stopped grinning for a few more hours after that.


After all the internal turmoil, the endless conflicts in my head about my identity and sexuality, clarity came to me one morning, about one week before I officially "came out." I had been battling the forces of my desire, at least on a conscious level, for some months, trying to comprehend how this new layer of wanting would fit into my idea of a cliche suburban future: wife, kids, private property, white picket fence and all. I kept attempting to assess my queerness with an eye of reformation, as if I could logically rework my homosexuality into a heterosexual equation. This was by far the deepest source of anxiety for me at that time.
One morning, in the early break of a Saturday sunrise, before I had even opened my eyes, I thought to myself, "I want to kiss a man today." The words were so clearly formed I almost said them out loud, and for some reason it registered a level of honesty with myself that I had never come to terms with before. I had no more questions for myself in that moment, because a statement like that answered all the previous ones.
This was, in the chronology of my life, the moment that I allowed myself to be queer. It was a moment of such profound honesty and momentous decisiveness that it shook me for the rest of that day, and I hold this moment very dearly to my heart.
The only disappointment is that I, in fact, never did kiss a man that day.

Darkness is the Greatest Thing

At a bar, sipping a hefeweizen, I allow my day to melt away from me, contemplating the aloneness as each gulp placates my omnipresent anxiety. Suddenly, the song comes on. It begins with a slow thumping beat, and at first its so faint that I can hardly tell it's begun. This is the song that followed me across my journey, in taverns and through tunnels beneath beds and in the expanse of airspace in a tower somewhere. Soon it crescendos to a recognizable riff, and as it reaches my ears and reverberates through my cloudy brain, some Pavlovian response warms the chill of my body, and I am awash with the memories of that summer. I am taken away almost instantly, immersed in a deep sea of nostalgia that floods my heart full of longing and loving and missing and wanting. In this spaceless dimension of memory immersion, I can taste the beer at the scrappy hipster dive bar in Neukolln, I can smell the sweat in a packed room of spent 20-somethings, I can see the fading bulbs of dim nighttime streetlights as I stumble down a mysterious medieval alley, I can feel the steps downward into the underground club and the impending excitement of what will happen next.

And its really the excitement that I miss the most; that feeling in the early part of the evening, sipping the first beer and wondering what will happen tonight, who will I talk to? who will I kiss?, where will I end up?, where am I now? It seemed at times there was a never-ending continuum of confusion and mystery, that the possibilities were truly endless. It didn’t take me long to embrace the feeling of being lost, because I had some unfounded faith that everything would end up okay, and somehow it always did. Some nights lasted forever. Some nights I couldn’t believe where I had ended up. In the indulgence of nostalgia--which is a thing almost always intensified with relative distance from the Current-- its hardly the experiences themselves that matter, but the feeling that came in anticipation of them. I felt that anything could happen at any moment, and nothing back in San Francisco mattered anymore, nothing from my past was relevant, only the Current had currency.

I went on this trip to find a part of myself that I longed to discover, but I think its more true to say that I lost a part of myself. I left something of myself among those experiences, perhaps on a speeding train or on the curb of a cobblestone road, and I’m okay with leaving it there. Losing part of oneself is a freeing experience for the soul, lightening the baggage of a heart too full of love for such a young man.

The song fades out and I am risen back onto my bar stool from the abyss of memories, floored that I forgot where I am or what I was doing or where I am going, which sort of comforts me if only for a moment. My heart still aches from the love-sick obsession with escapist fantasies, the day-dreaming and night-wishing of dropping it all and running away, much like I did. I close my eyes and think about how darkness is the greatest thing, and I wish I had more of it.

On Traveling [Alone]

My first experience of traveling alone was nothing short of eye-opening. Despite that I’m a generally sociable creature, I found at times the loneliness of walking down a foreign street both fascinating and frightening. In an English-speaking environment, I feel generally comfortable approaching strangers by way of eaves-dropping or observation; this trick doesn’t work so well when you can’t understand anyone around you at the bar, and you’re never sure if they speak English, or least speak it well. I learned that acquiring new friends requires leveraging any social currency you have. This is to say I picked up smoking again, because its an easy way to pick up men. This is also to say that I got in the habit of getting one more beer at the bar, because that kept the conversation going between me and a new group of friends. I mostly stayed with other queer hosts, because it was something we had in common, even if there was a significant language barrier. Any commonality you can use to make a connection with someone, work it. 

Most of my experiences of cities were through everyday environments: sitting at a café, people watching at a park, sitting at the 5th-floor balcony looking down on the activity buzzing below. My favorite city person is the old woman. She inches along the sidewalk as the hurried young lives rush past her. She’s got her groceries in one hand, and perhaps a cigarette in the other, and I love watching this living history. I’d see these types in Berlin and think, what has this woman seen? She’s probably witnessed her city torn and pulled and demolished and rethought and rebuilt so many times. And all these youngsters think Berlin is still hip.

I was in a squat building in central Amsterdam, which had been turned into a punk bar-slash-music-venue, and there was a poster up high, with Margaret Thatcher’s face plastered over it. Words above it read: “Only the Good Die Young”

I don’t usually engage in watching sports. This is probably because I was never really that involved in playing sports (tennis aside, but does that even really count?). The FIFA World Cup was in full swing by the time I arrived in Copenhagen, and throughout my travels I was followed by the championship everywhere. In the beginning, there were at least two games every night, so to avoid it, I would have to be blind. After some time, I really grew to enjoy the camaraderie of watching football (excuse me, soccer). I was rooting for he Dutch, until they lost… then I was with the Germans. I was at a bar in Cologne where the conversations all surrounded the game: the players, the teams, the venues. We all got drunk, smiled at each as we joked about the players, scoffed when a move was mis-handled. These are things many people over the world take for granted, but to me it was quite special.  By the time it was over, I felt sort of sad, because I wasn’t sure what would replace that sort of camaraderie. Rio 2016?

I’ve grown to love trains even more than I did before this trip. On my way to Amsterdam from Hamburg, the landscape was generally pretty dull, and needless to say, this was on the German side. The clouds were gloomy and it rained occasionally as we smoothly whizzed past the provincial landscape. I got up to go to the bathroom, and when I returned, the light from the sun was shining through like it was the first day of spring. The trees seemed greener, the occasional cottages we passed were cuter, and somehow I knew I was in Holland. 

I met a lot of interesting, handsome men on my travels, and needless to say, I had a lot of fun with them. There was one in particular that I really connected with. He showed me around Cologne, and was the most open-minded, flexible host I had. We drank beers at midnight on a bench in Volksgarten, a beautiful park from the 19th century. He showed me to my train when I left the city, and there was a very real sort of sadness at hugging him, perhaps for the last time, as I boarded the regional Deutsche Baun to Cologne Hauptbaunhoff, the central station. I entered the train, and saw him wave as the train slowly inched forward. I waved back and saw his stunning grin fade away out of vision. I laughed for a moment, remembering all the fun we had together, how valuable that was to me, how much he taught me about myself in such a short time. And then I just wanted to cry.

Things I lost or got stolen whilst traveling:

-Kenneth Cole watch my father gave me for Christmas two years ago

-three shower luffas, each on separate occasions

-€90 at a bar in Paris

-skin moisturizer

-shampoo

-my brain

I awoke on the upper-level of the N11 night bus in London. It was raining, and from up above the city felt like the mysterious medieval metropolis I had begun to be charmed by. Through the foggy window, through the hazy darkness of the night, all I could see was a faintly-lit clock face atop a shadowy tower, whose time read 4:31 AM. Panicked, I wondered when I’d get home, if this bus was even going in the right direction. Big Ben is like a ghost of 19th-century London, a phantom watching the city as it booms once again. Even as skyscrapers colonize the old city, bombarding the  the skyline with Manhattanized verticality, Big Ben seems to top them all. 

I met a French boy in Berlin who was a very funny character. I met him at a gay bar called “Roses” which had pink fur lining the walls and a red hue of light permeating the interior. I immediately liked him because he smiled a lot, and, especially for a Parisian, he was very easy-going. Speaking of Parisians, he spoke almost no English (despite that people jokingly say that English is the national language of Berlin). We spent a few days together, and it was one of the first times I didn’t feel alone. The language barrier was so thick that every thought had to be mimed and hand-signed, like an ongoing game of trans-national charades. Every sentence took at least five minutes to explain, but somehow this was fun. We both would laugh when we couldn’t articulate what we wanted to say, which made the mood always light… but needless to say, a kiss is never lost in translation, especially a French one. 

I encountered a great deal of pretentiousness in most of the big cities I travelled through. The cosmic joke I found was that everyone seems to think that their city is the best in the world, despite that they’ve seldom seen the other big metropolises around the globe. London, Paris, Amsterdam, Berlin… they all claimed to hold the secret to city living, and no other city would do. I love San Francisco, no doubt, but I would never make the dubious claim that its the best city in the world. Neither is New York. No one city can possibly provide the best combination of urban living, because no one has really figured out what that combination is. To humble these pretentious city-dwellers, I will provide one short roast for each city I feel qualified to judge (despite that I pretty much loved all of them):

-San Francisco is being gutted of its character at warp speed, and the class warfare is splitting it into a bifurcated metropolis that doesn’t know what it is anymore (and I don’t know that I would call it the “liberal capital of the US” anymore)

-New York’s infrastructure looks like a third-world country compared to London and Paris

-Copenhagen is too racially homogenous, and too expensive for budgeted travelers

-Berlin, physically, is just plain ugly, because it was rebuilt during one of the most unfortunate eras in global architecture

-Amsterdam seems to be getting a bit too rich for its own good

-Utrecht is a little too small for its own good

-Cologne is not at all the “gay capital of Germany”. That goes to Berlin now. 

-Parisians need to realize that they don’t live in a global city… one could more accurately describe it as a large French city, but certainly not a global one

-London’s Underground needs to stay open later. Seriously. 

Having dropped all this hate on these cities, I’d like to balance it with some compliments:

-San Francisco is still fabulously weird

-New York is still just plain fabulous

-Copenhagen is truly a model of civilized culture and politeness

-Berlin is still an artist’s and poor-twenty-something’s dream

-Amsterdam is still so damn picturesque

-Utrecht has a true Dutch authenticity that other cities could take a note from

-Cologne is a beautifully green city, with lots of sidewalk gardens and beautiful street trees

-Paris is still stunningly romantic

-London is the city of cities, the first in so many ways, and all other modern cities really came after it. 

I can’t wait for my next adventure. 

BERLIN

Notes from my moleskin:
-No one drinks water
-Everyone drinks beer
-People of actual color live here
-Over 35: No English
-Under 35: English 
-Germans follow every rule unquestioningly, everyone else jaywalks
-So much bad modernism
-Wide boulevards
-Not as many Nikes
-Hipster girls have this signature early-80's bowl cut, very cute


Cities have existed throughout history not just as places or destinations, but as characters, contributing to the public dialogue in and of themselves. They speak their own language to the people who inhabit  them, sometimes shouting, sometimes whispering; sometimes a laugh can be heard, and often their painful history can be felt. Berlin, more so than most other cities in the past century, has endured an immense amount of pain in its short lifetime. The scar which runs through the city is demarcated by a red brick path, winding in and out of roads, through buildings, forever dividing the east and west side of the city, despite that the neighborhoods that once stood on either side continue to meld together in typical gentrified fashion. Surely the legacy of the Wall will never be forgotten in the divided city, but each year that passes puts it deeper into the cultural consciousness, healing the scar little by little. 

The city’s memorials douse the pain of the War in an eternally apologetic tone, leaving the many new young urbanites with a tone of placid remembrance. The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe is one such place adorned with a profound reverence that I haven’t seen in any other site. Walking through each of the rectilinear cement formations placed evenly apart, one is met with a quieted solitude which silences the hurried thoughts of city life. The wordless space was designed to allow the visitor to experience her own emotions amongst the crevasses between blocks. The memorial acts as a blank, lifeless city for the dead, an empty canvas for which each visitor paints his feelings and thoughts upon them, perhaps to be at ease for just a moment. To me, the space served an even larger purpose, carrying with it the burden of representing a memorial for memorials. Children played hide and seek in the narrow alleyways, couples kissed in the shadows; these demonstrate not that the memorial isn’t being respected for what it is, but that it is so elegantly designed that it has woven itself into the natural urban fabric of the city. I found my silence there. 

In a high school Creative Writing course, I once wrote a short story called “The Difference Between East and West Raccoons.” It was an extended metaphor about the Donner Party, shown as a gaze of raccoons who leave their burning forest in the east to travel to a promise land in the west. Most of the pack didn't make it to their destination because the pain they endured en route drove them to madness as they ate each other in rapacious desperation. My ultimate message was to show the fatal demise of believing in a non-existent promise land, how this changes people into entirely different characters with an evolving motive, how there is a remarkable difference between these raccoons from their humble beginnings in the east to their vicious selves in the west. They are no longer the same raccoons once the few remaining survivors reach the forests of the golden state. 

Today this piece means something else to me. The history of “east and west” has graced world history time and time again: the New Frontier of the American West, the dominance of the globalized western culture, "conflicts in the Middle East". Historians (namely from the West) have twisted the meaning of these dichotomous cardinal directions into whatever the Present deems formidable. The West can be the beacon of culture and innovation, while the East can be exotic and mystical, despite that neither holds true. 

When riding my bike through Berlin, my adventure partners kept telling me with repetition: “Now we’re in the East”, “Now we’re in the West.” These two sides, once divided by an ocean of turbulent politics, are now joined together, but insist on differentiating themselves. I ask: what is the difference between East and West Berliners?

Berlin is surely a city that is between identities. The fantastic cultural influence of the city and the increasing affluence of the country at large are increasingly positioning Berlin as the leading city for the creative class of Europe. 20-somethings from Spain and Turkey flock to Berlin in search of jobs, stimulus, and affordability; this is the hyperbolic “west” they seek. Those outside of the city consider it a wellfare state, sucking the resources out of the affluent surroundings. Some Germans I spoke to were wholly resentful of Berlin’s media-celebrated cultural richness, despite that the city can’t seem to pay its own bills. Regardless, I leave the city feeling perplexed by what it wants to be, but amazed at what it is: a young, rebellious, vibrant metropolis that deserves to be spelled here as boldly as it lives: BERLIN, I  give you a resounding smile, a pat on the back, a slap on the ass, for all you’ve been through you’re still amazing the world. You may not be so poor anymore, but sexy you are still. 

København

Notes from my moleskin:

-everyone is blonde

-everyone wears Nikes

-I can’t tell if anyone is gay

-everyone is white

-lots of shawarma food

-7-Elevens are everywhere

-slot machines in bars?

-Carhartt everywhere

-the honor system prevails

-freakin expensive

-beards are not in (or have they not arrived yet?)

-people are nice in ways I didn’t know existed

-doesn’t get dark until 10:45 PM

-sun rises at 3:30 AM

-Irish girls bring out the fun

-playing the Macarena in bars is acceptable 

My first impressions of Copenhagen were nothing short of a mild disappointment. My expectations of the city were calibrated for the lively, cosmopolitan energy I experienced prior to coming, and my arrival was a bit anti-climactic. The city can feel bland at times: the prevailing 19th-century constructions that line most of the streets create a curtain of red-brick Haussmann-like repetitive dullness. Racially, the city is homogenous: white, blonde, handsome. The local culture is so pleasant, it would seem everyone is sedated; zombies medicated into a state of complacent friendliness. It took this skeptical American several days to understand that there are entirely different social paradigms here. Just lock your bike’s back wheel to the frame; no need to chain it in maximum-security fashion to a pole. People will trust your word without much questioning. The honor system prevails. Nothing made my pessimism more evident than when it was contrasted with the convivial demeanor of Copenhageners. I am aware, however that several factors shaped this impression: a) most locals thought I was Danish (see: everyone is blonde; everyone is white), and b) having come out of another harsh Scandinavian winter, the general mood of the city during the season of 19-hour daylight is a palpable mixture of relief and bliss. 

Taking these first impressions, I was quick to say the city is too homogenous, both in built form and social climate. A small city in a very small country. Once these premises are accepted, however, I was able to relax in this surprisingly open and fluid city. 

The gay scene in Copenhagen is quite small, but I was informed this was because there was little need for the separation of sexualities. Many locals prided themselves for contribution to a city that embraces a mixture of so-called “minorities”— code for gay men and anyone who’s skin tone is darker than than the “2” on my toaster. This made things especially difficult for me because I had to recalibrate my gaydar to the “Euro” setting, which is undergoing maintenance at the moment. Back in San Francisco, someone may not look gay, but I can smell it on them. 

From the outside, Copenhagen is viewed by some as the “hippie city”, not because of its terribly liberal or open vibe, nor because of any lax treatment of marijuana sales (outside Christiania), but because the people are slow, participating in a  pace of life that is lazy and relaxed, and high fashion is not a common sight. The general garb appears functional and comfortable, without seeming too Freshman-in-college (think solid sportswear, not sweatpants). 

All in all, what struck me most is that this is a city where nothing has happened to them. There isn’t really any cultural trauma to live with, as you might see in Berlin or New York, and their worst period appears to be the “motor invasion”, a period from the 40’s-70’s in which the country’s affluence brought an influx of cars to the city center. The city is clean and orderly and functioning. Its people are content with their lifestyle, but they seem to have no idea that getting a Master’s degree isn’t free most other places. 

Copenhagen, you were good to me. Thanks for teaching me to relax. 

New York City

New York is a colossally massive city, and summing it with a generalized, sweeping judgement would be an error that millions have already made before me. What can be said about the city is that it is America’s city, for better or worse. It is the emblem that represents American values at their most extreme, a magnifying prism that separates the fibers of our society into neat primary colors on a subway map. Which line are you? New Yorkers will insist that they are the least American, they will dogmatically differentiate themselves from “them” and cite their cosmopolitan urbanity, their superior transit, their intense approach to vertical dwelling a defining separator from the perceived slow, homogenous suburban landscape that most Americans live in. What I see, however, is precisely what Americans want, although it may not be evident at first sight. 

New York is money-obsessed, it is driven by an increasingly accelerated momentum toward power and influence, and it certainly succeeds at this. American values, whether we like it or not, are not driven by dreams or hope or community, but by money, and this is something to come to terms with. 

We can think of nothing better to show our pride and resilience after the destruction of two towers than to build a single taller one, brighter and with more office space than ever before, and we like to call it “triumphant.” This is the ethos that Americans link to freedom, that New Yorkers equate to power. What they don’t see, however, is the prison they’ve built for themselves, codified in ever-growing castles of rich elite, looking down upon the minions as they trap themselves amongst the clouds of Midtown. What they don’t seem to realize is the commodification of a horrendous tragedy, the obliteration of solemn reverence in favor of loud bigness, and its so ugly it can only be American. Early plans from the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation included constructing a subterranean shopping mall beneath the 9/11 Memorial. 

Times Square was once a space for city dwellers to gather and celebrate baseball games and holidays, a civic space for the rich and poor. Today’s Times Square is a freakish imitation of itself, with jumbotrons so bright you can’t see the charade before you. It is surely a caricature of its own history, a capitalist’s wonderland in the theme park that is the island. 

 If the cities of the world were children on a playground, New York would be the loud, screaming bully, pushing the others around and insisting she’s the best there ever was. I’ve always felt that if you have to say it, its probably not true. 

Manhattan, and increasingly parts of Brooklyn, is the quintessential American ecosystem, teeming with imperatives toward constant spending in the 24-hour lifestyle. Neighborhoods are fetishized like fashion trends, and the excess populous of this real estate rush are pushed one stop further along the L-train every year. New York is in no way unique in its self-destructive gentrification, but it is certainly the best at it that I’ve seen. 

New Yorkers have an unabashed pride in their city, and rightfully so. New York is so many colors, so many wonderful chaotic happenings at once that its hard to believe they all exist in one place. From the monstrous verticality of Manhattan to more moderate-scaled Brooklyn, and everything in-between, there is so much to see in New York, and it certainly cannot be described as one thing, because it is so many at any given time. 

I only got a tiny slice of the city on this visit, and I both loved and hated what I saw, but it can be said that there is absolutely nothing quite like New York City.