You are currently viewing the stories for November, 2020
Life and Death in Chinatown
by Eric Gabriel Lehman 11/22/2020Neighborhood: Chinatown
I didn’t know Chuen Kwok, an 83-year-old homeless man bludgeoned to death last year while sleeping in the entryway of a Chinatown store. Chances are, I wouldn’t have, since I speak neither Cantonese, Fujianese nor Mandarin. I am one of a growing cadre of non-Chinese moving into the neighborhood and contributing to the area’s gentrification. […]
Sublet on Thompson St
by Jennifer Marcus 11/15/2020Neighborhood: Caroll Gardens, West Village
A friend from high school told me about a sublet on Thompson Street. It was a perfect location for a student at NYU. Norman Fayne, a heavy man with stringy hair and wire-rimmed glasses, showed me the apartment on the second floor. It was the one just above the barbershop with the large, sun-faded […]
Philadelphia Story: Four Seasons Total Landscaping
by Jacob Margolies 11/11/2020Neighborhood: Philadephia
It’s the morning after the election, and the results are unexpectedly close. It seems like vote counting will be going on for a few days. I speak with the Bureau Chief for the Japanese newspaper where I work. We decide to go to Philadelphia to report the counting there. I stick my computer in my […]
The Cemetery Exercist
by Vanessa Beatriz Golenia 11/01/2020Neighborhood: Brooklyn, Ridgewood
A cemetery was never a place I imagined myself doing squats. But in late March, when New York City shut down gyms and public parks and braced itself for a deadly COVID-19 outbreak, I found myself at the gates of Evergreens Cemetery in Queens, sporting black leggings and a pink hoodie, ready to sweat. Like […]