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Brazilian Martial Arts and Dance at Union Square

September 3, 2007

Hey, it was a Brazilian sort of time in Manhattan over Labor Day Weekend.

On Saturday, I showed up at Union Square, mostly from boredom and hoped to find something interesting. Remember, something is always happening in Union Square. (Maybe that should be a sub-heading for this blog.)

Well, there was a lot of stuff going on in Union Square. There were tax protestors, artists, farmer markets, crowds, more crowds, and a group of….dancers? Fighters? I heard some Carribean-sounding music and went over to see what was going on. I was confronted with a small circle of people surrounding two men who were fighting in slow motion.

I didn’t know what it was, but it was obviously a friendly demonstration. All done to music and chants from the surrounding members who would occasionally switch out with one another.

The style is actually called “Capoeira” and is reputed to be created by Brazil’s African slaves during the 1800’s and was disguised as a dance to assuage any concern by the slaveholders. It definitely looked more dance than martial art. I never saw a fast move or a strong contact between any of the participants. No grappling holds either. Just fluid motion that had the appearance of both martial art and dance.

It was also obvious that the moves were more-or-less spontaneous and not part of a choreographed routine.

If you saw Jackie Chan’s “drunken master” style in one of his movies, it seemed to have that sort of disjointed, but floating movement. I saw the movie once in the mid-1990s so I don’t know if capoeira really does resemble the style (which, in the movie, was extremely exaggerated), but when I was watching the demonstration, it certainly seemed to have some sort of parallel.

The women also participated. Their movements were definitely more dance-like, but they certainly enjoyed themselves.

Sunday was Brazil Day in Manhattan. I’ll be posting on it soon, but I found this one very interesting and wanted to put it up quickly. (Oh yeah, I’ll also post on the other happenings in Union Square. Especially the tax protest. It was…odd and not what I expected.)

-H

Categories: Manhattan, Union Square, Wanderings

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A short ankle through Greenwich Village

September 2, 2007

Actually, I had a nice leisurely stroll through Greenwich Village, but this will be a short post with just a couple of pictures.

Greenwich Village is often called “the Village” or even “the West Village” (but I don’t know of anyone who actually says “West Village”). It’s located west of Fifth Avenue, north of Houston Street, and south of 14th Street. It’s architecturally different than a lot of the rest of Manhattan. Low buildings predominate. Oh, and the crooked streets. In a land of mostly straight avenues and streets, Greenwich Village lives on old cattle paths.

But, that’s the stuff of future posts. Here, I just want to show a couple of pictures. For me, two places are emblematic of the Village. First,there’s a little parklike spot called LaGuardia Place.

And set near the middle of it is Fiorello LaGuardia himself (or at least a statue of him).

It’s one of my favorite statues. LaGuardia, of course, is a former mayor of NYC. He was a bundle of energy and led the city during the Depression. The artist who did this statue captured that energy.

The other area I think of is Washington Square. That’s a big park at the foot of Fifth Avenue. It has a magnificent arch that’s been in a lot of movies.

Until recently, Washington Square was where a lot of the weirdness in Greenwich Village centered. It’s a much mellower place than it used to be (or so I understand) and maybe Washington Square’s loss of the “crazies” is part of that. I may have witnessed how they do it. When I was taking these pictures, a police car pulled into the square and drove around slowly with their lights flashing. They never stopped, they just slooooowwwwwlllly cruised around, and then left.

So what happened to the “crazies”? To the protestors? To the wild artistic types? They went to Union Square, where (as I say) something is always going on.

-H

Categories: Greenwich Village, Manhattan, Wanderings

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Wandering Chinatown

September 1, 2007

This isn’t a real easy post. In my LES post, I confessed that I find nothing “cool” about Chinatown. I don’t. That doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy it, but I don’t get a frisson of anticipation when I go there.

What I get is a stench. This is coming from a man with a minimal sense of smell. Chinatown stinks…odorwise. In other ways, perfectly enjoyable. It all depends on how much of a connection there is between your sense of smell and your sense of adventure. Because you can explore Chinatown for a long, long time.

Okay, where’s Chinatown? Uhh…..southern Manhattan. It’s kinda all spread out and amorphous. It is growing at a pretty good clip from what I see. It isn’t all of southern Manhattan, of course. The Financial District and the government district are still alive and healthy.

Amongst Manhattan neighborhoods, Chinatown makes the least allowance for the rest of America. There’s at least one McDonalds on the periphery and I know there’s a Subway Sandwich Shop somewhere right in the middle of the place, but they are just sort of add-ons if you know what I mean. A lot of the street signs are actually in Chinese script (alongside the western alphabet name of the street).

And what stinks? The grocery stores. Mostly the meat places.

They’re all over the place. The locals like their food fresh. Lots of the stuff is still alive. I’ve seen buckets of moving crabs and swimming frogs (with the occasional dead frog floating on the surface). There’s lots of relatively large fish swimming in aquariums, ready for the net and dispatching. Already dead fish are generally kept on ice, but that doesn’t stop the smell. I’m hopeful that I’m just smelling the stuff that dripped yesterday or so.

The grocery stores are of several sorts. There are indoor ones, which I really don’t want to go into, and there are the outdoor stalls. They’re interesting.

Okay, on the right are some plums, the center are Lychees, and the right….my notes say “Logan Berries” but the sign says “Sweet Apples”. I don’t think either fits.

And, veggies…

And, something called “Durian”. Apparently it’s a fruit. I’ve seen it many times but I just saw some “foodie” show that described it as a horrible-tasting/smelling food. I think the commentator (Andrew Zimmern) said it smelled like feet and tasted similar. That’s it in the yellowish mesh bag.

It looks like a mutant pineapple. At present, I’m not feeling adventurous enough to test the description.

And no post on Chinatown would be complete without a shot of dead poultry in the window.

Okay, that’s a baldfaced lie. Future posts may not have one at all. But you would have complained if I didn’t include at least one duck picture somewhere.

-H

Categories: Chinatown, Food, Manhattan, Wanderings

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Ankling through Little Italy

August 31, 2007

In my previous post on the Lower East Side, I called Little Italy’s current status as an independent area questionable (I had earlier entered “laughable” but thought twice about it, and now I’m thinking of it a third time). That sentiment isn’t original to me. If you saw one of the very last episodes of “The Sopranos”, there was a little in-joke where two of the characters are walking through Little Italy plotting evil deeds and all of a sudden…they’re in Chinatown. They do a bit of a double-take and the scene cuts away.

It’s sad, but Little Italy is almost gone. Yeah, it’s there, but only in spirit. For the couple of years I’ve been wandering through Little Italy, it’s been relegated to Mulberry Street only with parts of a couple of side streets. Famous Little Italy streets such as Elizabeth and Mott…all are parts of Chinatown now. Even Mulberry Street’s claim to Little Italy status is truncated. Below Canal, pure Chinatown. Above Broome, mostly non-Little Italy. There’s just a couple of blocks left, but even they are no longer “pure” Little Italy. I haven’t seen a Chinese restaurant open yet, but it’ll come.

But is it bad? Nah. The neighborhood is evolving and the Italians have moved on to greener pastures. Little Italy will continue for a while simply because it’s a pure tourist attraction. But I don’t think the Italian heart remains…except perhaps within the church near Canal.

Saturday on Mulberry Street. Notice the decorations in the distance. It’s the annual Little Italy Festival. Not to be confused with the Feast of San Gennaro (now, that’s a spectacle in and of itself despite the vanishing of Little Italy). This festival is muted and pleasant. It does the traditional blocking-of-the-streets-to-all-traffic. I think most residents of streets in that part of Manhattan would love to close off their streets, but only Little Italy seems to get it done on a regular basis.

And a nice historic little place: Umbertos Clam House. It calls itself the “Heart of Little Italy” and that’s not a problem for me. But I tend to remember it for the biggest even associated with the murder of Crazy Joey Gallo in 1972 while he was there for a party. I recommend Jimmy Breslin’s book “The Gang that Couldn’t Shoot Straight” for a humorous roman a clef about Joey Gallo. But the real Crazy Joey was a murderous thug who may have been actual killer of Albert Anatasia and behind the shooting of Joe Columbo. And who know how many others.

I’ve eaten at Umbertos. It’s pretty good, and I won’t say that about a lot of other Little Italy restaurants. (Truth: I never found them memorable enough to bother remembering which one I went to; but Umbertos has history.)

And now the interesting part. Google maps still says that Umbertos is at Mulberry and Hestor. That ain’t true at all! It’s up on Broome. Apparently, after the murder of Crazy Joey, the restaurant was moved to escape the notoriety. But Famous Ankles remembers…and apparently so does Google.

A nice shot of Mulberry and Hestor…

And finally, the last really authentic part of Little Italy: the Church of the Most Precious Blood. It’s apparently run by the Franciscans. I don’t know if there’s an actual monestary associated with it, but maybe.

My best memory of the church is during last year’s Feast of San Gennaro (held each September so I’m going back soon!). The streets get incredibly jammed with people and restaurants spilling out onto the street and pushcarts everywhere and the like. You look at it and see a lot of money changing hands (good old fashioned capitalism). When I got to the church, I saw a statue of San Gennaro next to a board with money tacked onto it (sort of like “The Godfather Part 2” and the statue going down the street, but this time the money was simply tacked to a board). There must have been…$50 or $60, max. The Church sponsors the feast, but doesn’t seem to get to partake in the commerce surrounding it (they try with some trinkets, but I didn’t see many borrowers). I’m hopeful they got recompensed somehow and were able to use the money to good ends. It sure doesn’t look like they spend it on luxurious digs.

Stay tuned for an update from the Feast of San Gennaro.

-H

Categories: Little Italy, Manhattan, Wanderings

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The Lower East Side and mighty good pickles

August 30, 2007

As good/wonderous/cool/interesting/artistic/gritty that the Lower East Side’s Rivington Street and Ludlow Street are; in my book, the real street in LES is Orchard Street. Ya wanna see Orchard St? Go a bit further south than the Rivington St and Ludlow St area and cross Delancey St. Physically and interesting-wise, Orchard actually parallels Ludlow St., but below Delancey, there’s no contest. First, Orchard St. has the historical Tenement Museum, which I would encourage you to visit if you have the chance. My favorite part of that was when I looked at one of the places they’ve restored to it “tenement” condition and saw how closely it resembles my own place (before I had it completely renovated).

But the real reason is the greatest, most wonderous, most awe-inspiring place for many a block around: Guss Pickles.

Sad to say, they are closed on Saturdays. The pickles are unbelievably good (get the spicy! Get the Spicy!! GET THE SPICY!!!!). They sell them singly or by the small bucket. Note: this is not the place you’ll find if you google Guss Pickles. I’m told there are legal proceedings over the name and that this one on Orchard Street is the original. UPDATE (9/8/2007): I talked with Pat Fairhurst, owner of Guss Pickles on Orchard Street and she said the proceedings are resolved. The other Guss Pickles has obtained the trademark, but the Orchard Street Guss Pickles can keep the name. She re-iterated that they are the last of the “old-time pickle makers” in the LES, established in 1920 by Izzy Guss).

If you get there, you’ll discover that the storefront is a sham. You wanna buy pickles: they roll the barrels out into the street every day and you buy them there. GET THE SPICY!!!!!!!!!!!!

I like them pickles.

I once took a bucket to work and some people complained that they smelled up the place. They still grabbed three or four pickles each, but that was beside the point.

GET THE SPICY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I now have a hankering for pickles. Soon…soon…

-H

Categories: Food, LES, Manhattan, Wanderings

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