I am a dedicated reader and appreciator of your blog. I am also 21, have lived in the neighborhood for less than two years, and am, in the eyes of many, part of the East Village's central problem. I have always wanted to voice my opinion on this matter, as it is one on which I feel very strongly, and such a feeling is only ever heightened after I read the many user comments on Grieve.
I recognize fully how the influx of young, yuppie college students and 20-somethings has dramatically altered the neighborhood, but I want to defend myself and say that while I can easily be grouped into this category (and I'm not arguing it — 21-year-old NYU student living in an over-priced apartment that still happens to be cheaper than living in an NYU dorm), I have found myself resenting this more and more.
Before I moved into an apartment (versus a dorm) in the East Village, I did my research. I investigated the shady and unlawful landlords, corrupt management companies to avoid, the best small businesses around the apartments I was considering, and the like.
As an 11th Street resident, I protested 7-Eleven when it arrived, I devote all my business to the local deli beneath my apartment, and I agree that many things happening in this neighborhood regarding rent, landlords, what have you, are truly absurd.
However rambling this may seem, I just want to give a voice to those younger residents who consider themselves to be on the same page. We are not all the same — I don't get belligerently drunk and hang off of fire escapes, I don't scoff at the rent-stabilized tenants in my building, I don't ignore my super and the other supers on the block. In fact, it's quite the opposite. I recognized immediately upon moving here that in order to make the most of the two years I'd be spending on this street, I would have to earn some respect by developing relationships with the people who've been here the longest and are truly residents of this neighborhood.
I also recognized that this is, in many ways, just how the growth of a city unfolds. My entire family grew up in a building on Christopher Street beginning in the 1940s, and they were priced out far before gentrification was a term being thrown around. While I did not live through the gentrification of this neighborhood, I can appreciate the good and bad it has done.
All I am trying to say in the end is that I want to enjoy and appreciate the East Village's quirks and unique charm as much as those who have resided here for decades, not drunkenly puke all over them in the early hours of a Saturday morning.
Sincerely,
Olivia
11th Street Resident
At around 11:20 pm, July 19, a group of drunk friends (who obviously were all still in college) were playing truth or dare outside 97 East 7th. They were obnoxious and loud.
Bro #1 dared bro #2 to climb the fire escape.
Bro #2 foolishly did, but he immediately fell from hanging onto the 2nd floor fire escape to the basement staircase.
There was a loud thud.
The girl friends of the bros started to panic and a commotion ensued. Bro #2 was unconscious. Calls to 911 were made.
The ambulance came to the scene 10 minutes later and bro #2 seemed seriously injured. I witnessed the whole thing … from the moment the group of friends started hanging outside the bldg till bro #2 got injured and was brought to ambulance. Everything happened so quick.
I don't know how to feel about this whole situation. I am livid about how these kids think that it's okay to just party like that on the sidewalk. They were bothering several neighbors as they were loudly hanging out on the sidewalk and they bothered even more neighbors the moment bro #2 fell to the basement up until the ambulance came.
I also feel quite sorry for bro #2, but he clearly brought this upon himself and it's sad how NO ONE among his friends tried to stop him from climbing the fire escape..
Oh, by the way, seconds after the ambulance left, his "friends" who were left at the scene started to laugh and giggle about what just happened.
Anyone hazarding a guess about the demographics of Manhattan might name the East Village the youth capital of the island. It's a place where anyone over 30 starts to notice that her standard fashion go-to's are suddenly has-beens and that everyone else in the environs has preternaturally dewy skin. One friend decamped from the neighborhood when she turned 32 and decided that that was too young to be the oldest person in her building...
[U]nlike the rest of the responsible adult population, fear of unemployment among recent college grads is not quite as evident as one might expect. For a generation trying to find its place in the job market, the excuse of a "bad economy" has actually been a relief -- even a breath of fresh air -- for recent grads. At least for some of them. The post-graduate summer for recent NYU alums has been freckled with rooftop barbecues, typical bar gatherings on Manhattan's Lower East Side and apartment parties in Brooklyn.
Several weeks ago, during cocktail hour with some new acquaintances, the subject turned, inevitably, to unemployment. Once it was established that nearly everyone just graduated from NYU, the dreaded question was posed: "What are you doing now?" Financially speaking, the answers were unsurprising: freelance photography, an unpaid internship, waitering. And yet no one seemed to mind that income was slim to none and the jobs unassuming. "The economy's bad," someone said.
The thing is, some lucky (some may say "spoiled") recent college grads are OK with the idea of unemployment--at least temporarily. As a generation once defined by SAT scores and the number of clubs on our resumes, we have found ourselves suddenly free of the conventions of school and the pressures of finding a "good" job. "We're young. We should enjoy not having a lot responsibility," a friend recently told me.
In June of this year, I moved into an apartment in Brooklyn with several recent NYU grads and spent the summer interning and finishing up one last course. One of my roommates, who graduated in May, spent the summer in a part-time, paid internship. Another was able to find a few freelance editing jobs earlier in the summer, and another has yet to find any job at all. But it's not the end of the world that none of us are able to fully afford rent.
That's because, thankfully, our parents can.
Yes, our generation has traditionally been criticized as selfish, spoiled and coddled by boomers, but we aren't the only generation to have this experience. Flip through the pages of F. Scott Fitzgerald's "lost generation" masterpiece This Side of Paradise, and you'll find the relevant tale of the young Amory Blaine, who hauntingly reflects a generation privileged with minimal responsibility and a sense of exciting uncertainty.
