According to the weather prophets it should have been raining but it wasn’t raining so I went to the Tompkins Square Library to see if I could get Vol. 1 of Proust, but they didn’t have any Proust, and probably never do have any Proust (“Who’s Proust?”), so I decided to take out another novel instead, only to realize I didn’t have a library card, a wallet, or any form of ID, unless you count a cell phone, which I don’t. I did have cash, though.
On to Mast Books, five blocks down Avenue A, but first I encountered… The Racist. A drably turned-out white woman in her thirties, looking like a hipster gone to seed, possibly a junkie. In fact I’d already passed her a few minutes earlier on the way to the library, where I heard her shout racial slurs at more darkly hued people than herself outside the deli on 10th Street, but I wasn’t really paying attention, and frankly it just seemed weird. She looked like a dyed-in-the-wool East Villager. Down on her luck, maybe, but a characteristic member of the neighborhood nonetheless. It was almost unthinkable. Read more…
Kevin FarleyChess continues at Tompkins Square Park despite yesterday’s earthquake.
When I was growing up in California, earthquakes were kind of fun. You got to hide under your desk or in your doorway, and whether you were in sixth or second grade your teacher always freaked out and rushed outside to the baseball field without providing any instruction to the kids.
The feeling of a southern California earthquake was unmistakable; it rattled the house and shook you with quick jolts. My sister and I would drop to the ground to feel the earth move, because we knew the sweet and powerful force would not last long. I loved earthquakes – their unpredictability, their distaste for shelves, and their short lifespan prevented me from getting bored. My mother used to tell me that earthquakes were the same feeling as riding the subway, which is maybe why I moved here (she was wrong). Read more…
A posh condo at 40 Bond is cited in a $50 million lawsuit involving Sly Stone and his ex-manager, Curbed reports. The $7.5 million condo, which will be foreclosed next month, is used in court documents as an example of the former manager’s alleged mismanagement of the music legend’s assets. Mr. Stone — yes, of Family Stone fame — sued his ex-manager back in January for $50 million, charging that he had used music royalties to fund an opulent lifestyle.
Stephen Rex BrownThe incident occurred at the Lower East Side II Houses.
Five people taking target practice with a BB gun on Friday night were arrested for accidentally shooting a passerby in the leg, police reported.
The 44-year-old victim told the police that she was walking by 716 East Sixth Street at around 8:15 p.m. when she was struck, according to an NYPD spokesman. Police then canvassed the area and found a broken window on the third floor of the building between Avenues C and D, as well as a bottle on the windowsill, leading them to conclude that an errant BB had struck the woman. Read more…
Photographer David Schmidlapp shares photos (his own as well as a couple by Marlis Momber) from the archives of El Jardin del Paraiso on East Fourth Street between Avenue C and Avenue D, where he has volunteered for nearly 30 years. His work can currently be seen in the Nepenthes New York Gallery on 38th Street.
Marlis MomberThe garden in the winter of 1982 or 1983.
They demolished a lot of buildings in the neighborhood around the mid-1970s. This is how it looked east of First Avenue back then. You could see all the way to Seventh Street, and from Seventh Street you could see all the way to the Con Edison plant. There was plenty of parking back then. Read more…
Stephen Rex BrownBad news for lovers of $3 Schaefer and cigarettes.
Falling bricks from a neighboring building have forced the International Bar to close its backyard, eliminating a haven for locals who enjoy cigarettes with their cheap beer.
According to a spokesman for the Department of Buildings, an inspector slapped the bar with the vacate order last month after noting the plummeting masonry from 93 East Seventh Street.
A bartender at the popular dive told The Local over the phone that the blocked backyard was only temporary, and that any barflies who were looking to drink outdoors should go to sister bar the Coal Yard nearby. Read more…
People are judging you everywhere you go. Do you have visible panty lines? Are you paying for that in all pennies? Who actually wears those shoes with individual toes?
You’d think in a world full of judgment, that at least the supermarket would be a safe place, but it isn’t. People are peering into your basket left and right and scoffing at your Muscle Milk or chocolate-covered edamame. You can tell a lot about a person based on what is in their grocery basket. I’m not sure what it says about me, but sometimes I look down at my own basket and all I see is various cheese products. While my basket clearly communicates that I like coagulated milk, most baskets tell more of a story about those who carry them. Here’s some baskets and their owners to avoid:
Bomb Shelter Bro (see photo above) – It’s good to date a planner, but dating someone who is always preparing for the next apocalypse is just a bad plan. A good test to know if they’re for you, is to picture them eating canned baby corn. If you’re still attracted to them, then you’re on your own on this one. Read more…
The Lower East Side’s most deadly street tragically reaffirmed its reputation yesterday, as a cyclist was killed at Delancey and Chrystie Streets. The Lo-Down reports that the rider was turning at around 6 p.m. when he lost control of his bike and fell under a cement truck. Earlier this month, we noted that the Lower East Side has the most dangerous intersections for cyclists of any neighborhood in Manhattan, with most of them on Delancey Street.
The Observer discovers that model and MTV personality Alexa Chung has purchased a one-bedroom apartment on East Third Street.
According to The Villager, two brothers have made a documentary about the neighborhood hip-hop scene during the seventies and eighties. “No Place Like Home: The History of Hip Hop in the Lower East Side” will screen at Clayton Patterson’s gallery next Sunday. A coloring book of Lower East Side personalities is also in the works.
A handicapped resident of the Lillian Wald Houses says his apartment is in such a sorry state that it is literally killing him.
Robert Campbell is a burn victim who sleeps on a couch because his roughly 9-by-11-foot apartment doesn’t have room for an electric bed that would allow him to sleep on an incline, as ordered by doctors. He says odors from a dumpster beneath his 12th-floor studio hurt his lungs, which were severely damaged by an electrical fire in 1988. The blaze burned over 80 percent of his body and resulted in numerous surgeries and the amputation of fingers on his left hand. His doctors have implored the New York City Housing Authority to put him in a three-room apartment since 2003, because even the pilot light in Mr. Campbell’s oven hurts his skin.
“I just want to get in a proper apartment and have this nightmare be over with,” said Mr. Campbell, 58. “I’ve never lived like this before.” Read more…
Flaming Pablum shares a clip of Cro-Mags vocalist John “Bloodclot” Joseph leading his tour of the East Village. Mr. Joseph promises, “It’s the only place you can hear about murders, drugs, and vegan food all on the same tour.”
According to East Village Eats, Casimir’s new owner Mario Carta has started a brunch deal that gets you bottomless mimosas and Bloody Marys for $19.95.
An episode of “Let Them Talk” just posted to YouTube features playwright Juan Valenzuela recalling the glory days of the Nuyorican poetry movement. Along with Pedro Pietri, Mr. Valenzuela led the Latin Insomniacs Motorcycle Club.
Tompkins Square Park Playground and Parents’ AssociationThe truck carrying 5,000 mint-scented trash bags arrived at Parks Department offices in Lower Manhattan this morning.
A truckload of mint-scented trash bags have been donated to the Parks Department in the latest volley in the ongoing war against the rats of Tompkins Square Parks.
A spokesman for the Tompkins Square Park Playground and Parents’ Association, which secured the 5,000 minty bags, said that Mint-X recently made the offer to donate all the bags after seeing all the publicity the rats were attracting.
“If the rats don’t touch it, the Mint-X guy is looking at a big purchase from the city,” said the spokesman. “I’m hopeful that they’ll work.” He added that the bags should be in trash cans at Tompkins Square Park today. Read more…
K.L. ThomasEmily Bennett, Jeff Sproul, Annelise Rains and John Hardin in The Horse Trade Theatre Group’s “Lines”
When was the last time you went to a play where you were asked to sign a petition to release a political prisoner before getting to your seat? “The play deals with human rights, so it makes sense that we would be here,” the woman from Amnesty International explained to me. “The script is very powerful.” With these words and director Heidi Grumelot’s introduction emphasizing the play’s interest in social justice, “Lines” was framed: I was ready to have my mind blown by some political theater.
And yet, if I hadn’t been told the play was about human rights, I’m not sure I would have known.
“Lines” is set in an imaginary country where an actual line has been drawn, segregating blacks from whites. On one side of the line is white funeral director Doc; on the other is Bullet, a black football coach. Their lives get intertwined in scandal when a young black man, Keys, dies on the “white” side. Doc’s decision to bury Keys, which breaks the town’s segregation laws, leads to a series of mix-ups and subplots — some funny, some somber. Read more…
Stephen Rex BrownSigns outside of the shuttered Nublu.
Presenting DocuDrama, in which The Local has a look at documents that dramatize goings-on in the neighborhood. Today, a look at Nublu’s fight to reopen at its Avenue C location.
One of the East Village’s last bastions of avant garde music has been forced to leave its home on Avenue C after an anonymous tipster alerted State Liquor Authority investigators to its proximity to a Kingdom Hall belonging to the Jehovah’s Witnesses. Now, Nublu is hosting shows in the basement of Lucky Cheng’s while the owner of the business, Ilhan Ersahin, struggles to find a loophole in liquor laws so that he can return to his original location.
“Really honestly and truthfully, I had no idea that the building across the street was a house of worship until six months ago when I received this letter,” Mr. Ersahin wrote in a letter to the liquor authority in May. (You can see the full letter as well as other documents below.) “I just don’t think it’s fair to blame me for all of this and after nine years in good, willing business.” Read more…
The lines are sure to get longer at Motorino now that its Williamsburg location has closed. Fret not: DNAinfo has more on earlier reports that NoLita pizzeria L’asso is opening an outpost at 107 First Avenue. Partner Greg Barris admits “there’s an endless amount of pizza in that neighborhood,” but wants in anyway: “The East Village is more classic New York City.”
WPIX interviews Aaron Goldblum, the Fordham Law student behind the “Rats of Tompkins Square Park” trailer, and gets still more footage of rodents chasing squirrels and pigeons. A resident says dogs are getting rat-borne illnesses at the park. Meanwhile EV Grieve notices some new “Feed a pigeon, Breed a rat” signs.
Jeremiah’s Vanishing New York musters an overview of “the battle for Astor Place— and how Cooper Union helped hatch the plan to turn Astor Place into a suburban office campus.”
EV Grieve points to a trove of photos of the neighborhood from the seventies and eighties taken by East Village resident Michael Sean Edwards.
Stephen Rex BrownThe Flea Market Café, hours before it will reopen.
Workers at the Flea Market Café have swept up the ashes and are preparing to reopen at 5 p.m. — less than 24 hours after an alleged arson left the eatery a messy crime scene.
While cleaning counter tops earlier today, the manager of the restaurant, Haveen Bonnet, bemoaned the blaze that has been the talk of the neighborhood.
“Two napkins catch on fire and the fire department comes in and smashes everything,” Mr. Bonnet said as deliverymen hauled in fresh loads of food. Read more…
Mike Zohn of Obscura Antiques got a reality show, and now another one of the neighborhood’s antiques-and-oddities dealers, Billy LeRoy, is giving him company in the limelight. DNAinfo points to a new energy drink ad that stars the Billy’s Antiques impresario giving The Most Interesting Man in the World a run for his money with lines like “Do you want to be me? I want to be me,” and “I’m not on Facebook, but I will be soon.” (Turns out the latter isn’t a joke: Billy’s created a Facebook page a few weeks ago.) Best line: “What is it with you guys with the flip-flops?”
According to Grub Street, the 2nd Avenue Deli opened its Upper East Side location today. The Jew & The Carrot interviews owner Jeremy Lebewohl, and NBC New York reports that Jeremy and his brother Josh have decided to “rededicate themselves” to the hunt for the killer of their uncle Abe, by upping the cash reward to $150,000. Meanwhile EV Grieve follows the deli’s van and finds that it doesn’t always lead to “the best chopped liver” as advertised.
The Local was a journalistic collaboration designed to reflect the richness of the East Village, report on its issues and concerns, give voice to its people and create a space for our neighbors to tell stories about themselves. It was operated by the students and faculty of the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute at New York University, in collaboration with The New York Times, which provides supervision to ensure that the blog remains impartial, reporting-based, thorough and rooted in Times standards. Read more »
(c)2011 Nanci Ezzo, All rights reserved. 
