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An EVG reader shared this... from a Cemusa bus shelter on Avenue A between Third Street and Fourth Street ... taped (on paper) over a Swarovski ad...
Previously
"We were able to take this area, reclaim some of it from the automobile, make it safer and more inviting," said DOT Commissioner Polly Trottenberg.
"This was a big project and I know, looking at some of the elected officials and the community members, I know it took a long time and there was a lot of disruption, and I thank them for their patience. But now we will have beautiful public space, new benches and trees, water mains replaced underneath."
Name: Eric Paulin
Occupation: Musician
Location: Tompkins Square Park
Time: Thursday, Nov. 3 at 6:30 p.m.
I’ve been coming down here a really long time, almost 50 years. I was born in the West Village. A few months after I was born, my parents moved to the Upper West Side, and we lived there until 1964, but at that time there was a lot of really bad crime coming down from Harlem, mostly related to drugs, so we moved to Forest Hills.
I’m a musician. I’m a drummer. My parents weren’t musicians, but they were very creative people. My mother was an abstract painter in the ‘50s and ‘60s, and my father was a photographer and artist. They were taking me to art galleries, to live concerts, to photographic exhibits, and to museums when I was 3 or 4 years old, in the late 1950s. My mother and father were very big on exposing us to that.
I moved into the East Village, down a block from here, in May 1979. I’m very appreciative of being able to live in a neighborhood like the East Village. I was playing a lot of gigs, rehearsals, and sessions down here, and I was very attracted to the modern jazz movement.
When I was in my late teens, I started to study and hang out with jazz musicians more, and that’s what got me into it. I appreciated all the people here. I had a lot of knowledge and history of this neighborhood, of the great jazz musicians, because I was always reading and asking questions to people who were a lot older than me.
The thing is that even after Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie and Charles Mingus lived down here in the 1950s because there were so many places to play, you had a lot of great musicians who recorded for Blue Note Records, Riverside Records, Prestige Records, Debut Jazz Records ... They were living down here because of the low rent and the opportunity. Their next-door neighbor was a guy they just did a record with for Blue Note Records in New Jersey a week before; the guy across the street is the new drummer who just came to town; the woman downstairs was a dancer; the guy above you was a poet. You were around all these creative people. This is the embodiment of the East Village for me.
My first experiences in the East Village were in the summer of 1968 at the Fillmore East. I was coming into Manhattan a lot with my older brother or my mother to see shows. People talk about the East Village being rough in the ‘80s and ‘90s. They have no idea how rough it was – it was very dangerous in the ‘60s. If you stood out and you looked like you had money or were an affluent person of any kind, you were targeted.
I have a lot of stories about seeing things in the street, scary stories about friends of mine coming here to buy records or see music or do creative things, who were hassled or physically accosted. Fortunately, none of that ever happened to me, but I saw a lot of music down here from ’68 until the Fillmore East closed in ’71.
I had a couple interesting experiences with the late, great promoter Bill Graham. I would see Bill quite a bit when I was either here to see a show or I would come early in the morning to get a concert ticket before I went to school.
He was a very tough guy, but he did a lot for music all over the world. He exposed a lot of people who went to the Fillmore East to great music... not just the classic rock and blues rock of that time, but he would also have, for instance, the Grateful Dead with Miles Davis opening for them, or some other rock group with the great Rahsaan Roland Kirk Quartet opening for them.
There are a lot of stories about Bill, but I have a lot of respect for what he did. He also did a lot for the neighborhood. He wasn’t just a concert promoter who made money and got in a limousine and went back to his townhouse. He cared about the neighborhood. The Fillmore East did a lot to keep us safe and to keep it clean, and he had a lot of pride in what he did. He was a good human being, but if you crossed him or if he thought you were being disrespectful to him, he could really let you have it.
There was a very organic and open feeling about the neighborhood. You could meet interesting people in a coffee shop or on the street. I would be walking down the street with my cymbal bag and my snare drum on the way to a gig, and a guy would stop me and say, ‘Oh, you’re a drummer, yeah my wife and I knew Charlie Parker in the early 1950s,’ and you end up talking for 10 or 15 minutes.
For me [this neighborhood] was part of the whole picture. It was not only that they were such great musicians, but it was where they were living, and what their life experiences were at that time. I appreciate being able to live in a neighborhood like this.
Carmen Pabón, who was born in June 1922 in Ciales, Puerto Rico, died Saturday night surrounded by her family.
Pabón migrated to New York City in 1946. She lived in the Bronx and worked in a factory. A few years later, she relocated to Manhattan and, in 1955, moved into NYCHA’s Lillian Wald Houses where she lived until a few days prior to her death.
Pabón, well-known for her humanitarian acts, was fondly referred to as the “Madrina of Loisaida” (the Lower East Side Godmother). She volunteered in not-for-profit organizations such as Charas/El Bohío and Loisaida, Inc. Among other things, she was active in the Committee to Save Charas and the Coalition to Save St. Brigid’s Church.
In the 1970s, Pabón became active in the community garden movement. With the help of other residents she removed the rubble from several empty lots located on the southwest corner of Avenue C and East 7th Street. The garden, named “El Bello Amanecer” (A Beautiful Dawn), bears the same name as a mural on the side of the building abutting the garden. She tended to the garden for several decades where she was known for feeding the homeless and providing social services referrals.
In the late 1990s, the City of New York under then Mayor Rudolph Giuliani conveyed many community gardens sites to developers for housing construction. The Lower East Side community lost Esperanza Garden located on East 7th Street and two of the three lots that comprised El Bello Amanecer Garden for the construction of the Eastville Gardens building. A year later, Pabón had to leave the garden to make way for construction equipment.
In 1999, a NYC Council land use hearing with then Councilwoman Margarita López determined that the lot known as Carmen Pabón’s Garden would be a permanent community garden with a not-for-profit garden association that would receive a 99-year lease. After many obstacles, the garden finally re-opened on Wednesday, Oct. 26, 2016. Pabón attended the re-opening ceremony of the garden that was renamed in her honor — Carmen Pabón del Amanecer Garden.
[Photo by Dave on 7th]
Councilwoman Rosie Méndez said: “I will miss her dearly. All of Loisaida will. I am grateful that she was here for the re-opening of St. Brigid’s Church and that we were able to clear all the hurdles to re-open her garden. I was so thrilled that she was able to go to the garden and cut that ribbon.”
“Locals and every Bishkek fun guide will be quick to point out that Bishkek has one of the most thriving nightlife scenes in Central Asia, filled with young people that hang out in clubs and small cafes,” said franchisee Daniyar Monolbaev, who already owns other bars, restaurants and cafés in Bishkek, and will also be developing several Papa John’s franchises in the area over the next few years. “I honestly couldn’t be more excited about bringing Coyote Ugly’s fun and unexpected antics to Bishkek.”
Widely recognized as the most famous bar on the planet, Coyote Ugly thrives on booze, bar dancing and girl power. Each night sexy, sassy, tough-talking “Coyotes” go well beyond serving drinks; they ascend the bar to entertain the crowd with choreographed dance routines, songs games, body shots and much more that celebrate the wild side of American culture.
“There was no part of me that ever thought my little dive bar in New York’s East Village would have taken off like this. And now it continues to steam roll into a global brand – from the United States to Russia, Japan and the United Kingdom to Kyrgyzstan,” said Coyote Ugly founder Liliana Lovell. “Sometimes I have to pinch myself as I watch Coyote Ugly’s fame continue to grow. I can’t wait to see where else we go.”
We would like to extend an open invitation to the community to attend our Official Ribbon Cutting Ceremony for The Astor Place/Cooper Square Reconstruction Project and The reinstallation of The Alamo Cube.
Patisserie Florentine brings a little of France, Stateside; the French bistro setting is a charming fusion of rustic & modern offering a convivial friendly atmosphere. Chef Tomer Zilkha introduces approachable European delicacies using produce from The Garden State. The artisan bakery & petit bistro is managed by a passionate family of cooks & bakers & genuine hospitality is provided by our Baristas & Waitstaff.
“Fat Cat Kitchen will offer the convenience of selling creative sandwiches, fresh salads, quiche, soups and home-style bakery items, plus a full coffee program in a warm, inviting shop with a knowledgeable, friendly staff and a frequently changing menu, offering consistency and variety that similar shops lack,” Swartz emailed.
"[A]s a result of the negative feedback the Board has received the last few months regarding privatization, the Board met ... and passed a motion: to cease any further discussion of privatization, including a feasibility study, unless and until such time there is a clear indication from a large percentage of shareholders that there is an interest in learning more about privatization. We hope that shareholders can now come together and move forward in a peaceful manner."
Swiss Institute has hired Selldorf Architects to oversee the transformation of its new building. The 7,500 square foot space features four levels – basement, ground, second floor, and roof. The design for the building will create spaces for exhibitions, projects and public programs, a library, a bookstore, and a usable rooftop.
It's the nearest supermoon in almost 70 years — and we won't see another like it until 2034.
"When a full moon makes its closest pass to Earth in its orbit it appears up to 14 percent bigger and 30 percent brighter, making it a supermoon," NASA says.
In the U.S., we'll get three chances to see the moon at its brightest and biggest, from around sunset Sunday to Monday's predawn and sunset. On both days, the moon will rise around sunset.
East Village residents Kevin Golden, 44, and Catherine Talabac, 52, had been planning their big day since March. “McSorley’s is just one of my favorite places. I live two blocks away, and I always gravitate here,” said Talabac. “I asked if they do weddings there and they said no. But when I asked if we could, they said ‘ f – – k yeah.’ ”
“Some girls dream about the Plaza,” she said. “That wasn’t me.”