In our prior discussions of New York City gentrification, we’ve mourned how the rundown old bars we frequent are losing ground to too-trendy hotspots filled with banker types.
Well, we were thrilled to go back to the East Village and find that it was still fairly hip. Somehow a couple of years had slipped by since the last time we had been around that particular portion of the Village, and as we approached the neighborhood (on our way to Dallas BBQ’s), we feared the worst.
We were expecting it to resemble the corner of Bleecker and MacDougal. This is where the guidebooks tend to place the so-called "heart" of Greenwich Village, and as a result, the place is overrun by tourists. Huge tour buses now pass through seemingly every few minutes. Worse, the last generation’s colorful residents are slowly, inexorably, being replaced by Wall Street types.
Fortunately, the East Village, especially the area on St. Mark’s Place between say 3rd Ave and Tompkins Square Park, seems to have kept its tattoo and body piercing stores, and there was hardly a banker anywhere to be seen. Sure, there were tourists, but at least there weren't any tour buses.
Uh, it's spelled "Henna."
Thank goodness: a tiny oasis of tradition in an inexorably gentrifying city. We'll see how long it lasts.
Well, we were thrilled to go back to the East Village and find that it was still fairly hip. Somehow a couple of years had slipped by since the last time we had been around that particular portion of the Village, and as we approached the neighborhood (on our way to Dallas BBQ’s), we feared the worst.
We were expecting it to resemble the corner of Bleecker and MacDougal. This is where the guidebooks tend to place the so-called "heart" of Greenwich Village, and as a result, the place is overrun by tourists. Huge tour buses now pass through seemingly every few minutes. Worse, the last generation’s colorful residents are slowly, inexorably, being replaced by Wall Street types.
Fortunately, the East Village, especially the area on St. Mark’s Place between say 3rd Ave and Tompkins Square Park, seems to have kept its tattoo and body piercing stores, and there was hardly a banker anywhere to be seen. Sure, there were tourists, but at least there weren't any tour buses.
Uh, it's spelled "Henna."
Thank goodness: a tiny oasis of tradition in an inexorably gentrifying city. We'll see how long it lasts.
2 comments:
love the spelling correction... :)
Thanks. It's kind of a curse going around and spellchecking everything, so it's a plus if I can get some blog -humor mileage out of my compulsion.
DK
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