FBT Diary (2001)
by Rachel Emma Silverman

A year ago, strapped for cash and too late to find cheap fares and vacant hotel rooms, Alex and I decided to spend Labor Day weekend in New York, where we live. But we didn't just want to putter around our cramped apartments watching TV or reading old magazines. We wanted adventure. So we decided to create it. We would embark on what we dubbed a "Five Borough Tour." Our mission was to spend the weekend in New York as tourists, doing something funky and fun in all of New York's boroughs: the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Staten Island and Queens .

I wanted to rediscover New York, to rekindle my passion for the city, a mood that had dimmed with daily stress, traffic, crowding and other exasperations of urban life. Here is what ensued, in a city far different than today:

Friday Night (7/31/01)
To kick off our expedition, we dressed up fancily and met at the grand stairs of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, open late on summer Fridays. The warm evening was just right for a stroll alongside Central Park to the Plaza Hotel and FAO Schwarz, where we took plenty of tourist snapshots. For dinner, we hopped in a cab to Café Des Artistes, one of New York's most romantic, Old World restaurants.

Old World was right. It seemed like Alex and I were the only people in the restaurant born after 1950. At first the host wouldn't seat us because Alex didn't have a dinner jacket. But they eventually loosened up and let us in nonetheless.

Over dinner, we gave ourselves noms-des-weekends: Alex dubbed himself "Clint Westwood" while I choose the name "Bonnie Sterling." We decided that we were dairy farmers from Wisconsin, visiting the big city for the first time.

Saturday (8/1/01)
We went to a trippy installation at Ace Gallery in SoHo. Each room in the gallery was lined with hundreds of mirrors and pulsing strobe lights. It was like being trapped in an enormous disco ball or kaleidoscope.

In one room, an impish blond boy jumped to a different spot whenever the lights went off. "I'm over here!" he'd shout when the blinding lights flashed on. The room blackened. Flash. It brightened again. "I'm over here!" the ghostly boy squealed, this time from a different corner of the room. Flash. "I'm over here!" from another place. The gallery owners should have hired him to be part of the exhibit. It was perfect site-specific performance art.

Walking out of the gallery, we stumbled upon the New York City Fire Museum on Spring Street. Inside were funky old fire trucks, uniforms, emblems and other ephemera, with fanciful names like the "End Stroke Hand Pumper" (c. 1790). The Fire Museum had few visitors--how things would soon change-and staffed by volunteer fire-fighter aficionados. I felt bad for the forlorn-seeming place and donated a few bucks in the collection box out front.

After lunch of crusty pizza at Sullivan Street Bakery, we went to midtown to the International Center of Photography to see the Sebastiao Salgado show. Salgado, a Brazilian photographer, catalogs global poverty and overcrowding, human suffering and human dignity, in rich black and white. The pictures were all taken in places far from Manhattan. Only days later, I was struck by how much New York and its inhabitants would resemble the subjects of Salgado's photos.

We walked East to the New York Public Library-my favorite place in the world-and took lots of pictures with the lions out front. There we met up with three more friends, Brad Peckler, Mai Nguyen and Charlie Stocks. Next stop: Queens. We took the 7 train to PS-1, the contemporary art museum, which has a summer DJ series. The courtyard had a temporary installation of water-themed architecture, with dipping pools, outdoor showers, hammocks, barbecue pits and lots of beer. Hundreds of hipsters were lounging under the lazy sun, drinking beer, eating hot dogs, smoking, zoning to the DJ music. No one looked older than 30.

As the sun was setting, we headed to Astoria for Greek food. Every place was mobbed, but we found a spot at Telly's Taverna. We ordered plate after plate of mezze, small appetizers. Delicate, paper-thin fried zucchini. Warm saganaki, a sharp cheese. A perfectly seasoned Greek salad. Tender, grilled, fresh fish. And glasses of strong Greek wine. Heady with rich food and wine, we all agreed: it was one of the greatest meals we had ever had.

To cap off the day, we headed down the street to the Bohemian Beer Garden. One of few remaining in New York, the bar has a large garden with picnic tables and dozens of Eastern European beers and ciders. There is a small bandstand for Polka players or other musicians. Inside is a musty social club for Czech emigres, with vinyl furniture and fake wood paneling. We sat outside, enjoying the late summer breeze, drinking our beers, smiling.

Sunday (8/2/01)
Today was Bronx Day. Using Brad and Mai's car, and joined by Brad's friend Jon Richman, we drove to the New York Botanical Garden. We were all surprised by the pastoral feeling of the place, with its winding creek, large boulders, sloping lawns and thickly wooded areas. "This was the Bronx?!" we thought!

Invigorated by the fresh air, we scampered through the park, hopping from rock to rock in the creek. We were delighted by the fuzzy leafed plants that looked like lamb's ears. We became mischievous, daring each other to co-opt one of the open-air tour vans and cruise around the place, giving our own tours with the megaphones.

Getting back to nature made us hungry, so we went to Arthur Avenue-- the Little Italy of the Bronx-in search of food. This is the real deal. It's nothing like the ever-diminishing Little Italy of Manhattan, with its handful of mediocre restaurants targeted for tourists. Arthur Avenue remains vibrant and Italian American and its restaurants are tasty. The streets in the neighborhood are lined with kitschy stores selling velvet paintings and plaster saints. We chose Roberto's, an outdoor café, where I had fresh basil pesto, home-baked bread and a perfectly-made cappuccino.

We drove to City Island, another transporting experience. The small island village, off Pelham Parkway, is like a Cape Cod shanty town transported to the Bronx, complete with sea food shacks, ice cream stands and several marinas. Brad called a friend who owned a cottage and a large sailboat on the island. He graciously took us on a twilight sail in the Long Island Sound.

As we started to sail, the moon rose. It was a full Harvest moon, glowing yellow and then white. The sky was clear, the air was chilly and the sea foamed fluorescent-white from the moonlight. We silently cruised past landmarks with evocative names like "Executioner's Rock." Our motley crew had a little trouble tacking the boat and returning to harbor, but we landed safely. We had a late dinner at the Black Whale, a suitably nautical-themed place, and quietly drove home.

Monday (8/3/01)
After bialys and bagels from Kossar's in the Lower East Side, we drove to Jamaica Bay wildlife refuge, on Broad Channel, an island in Queens. The park was a jewel. Long-legged egrets and ibises grazed and flew amid the salt-water marshes, mirroring the planes that took off in the distance from nearby JFK airport. The green marshes stood out against the Manhattan skyline. In the background loomed the World Trade Center.

While hiking, we met a man named Mason M. An avid birdwatcher, Mason M. was a frequent visitor to Jamaica Bay. He latched onto our group, barraging us with enigmatic jokes and tales about being in the military and working as a steamfitter. He somehow knew a lot about the prison system and the penal code. He was also with a young girl who was not his daughter. She didn't look very happy. It was all a little sketchy.

Eager to leave Mason M., and overheated from our walk at the reserve, it was time for the beach. "Welcome to Rockaway Beach, New York City's largest ocean bathing beach," said the large sign greeting our arrival. We settled at a great bar called Sand Bar. It's close to the beach, has cheap beer and frozen drinks and is full of neighborhood locals, mainly from Russia, Eastern Europe and Puerto Rico. We lounged for hours at Sand Bar, watching the afternoon unfold. We told jokes and funny stories. We laughed a lot. Several of our group ventured into the cold water, bouncing around in the waves.

As the evening set, we drove through Brooklyn to Staten Island over the Verrazano Bridge to the piece-de-resistance: Jade Island, an old-school Tiki bar in a Staten Island strip mall. Inside the Polynesian-style restaurant, we could have been in Vegas, circa 1963. A tiny waterfall flowed next to a fake volcano. All drinks were served with umbrellas, in glasses shaped like tiki heads, bamboo or coconuts. The candy-colored libations had names like "The Headhunter," "The Scorpion," and "Pineapple Paradise." The place was pretty empty, but I don't think our Hawaiian-shirted waiter was thrilled by our high-spirited group. The food was greasy and MSG-laden, the drinks were strong and syrupy sweet, but the ambience made it all worth it.

The sky was almost dark as we left the restaurant and drove onto the Staten Island Ferry. Standing on the deck of the ferry, we watched the World Trade Center and the lower Manhattan skyline twinkling, welcoming us home. Little did we know, that only days later, our view, our city, and our world would change forever.

As I sit in traffic, feel suffocated in a crowded subway, get stressed out by long hours and deadlines at work, or am despondent by the grief and fear that have recently enveloped the city, the Five Borough Tour reminds me of New York City's offerings, so rich and diverse and surprising. The wooded landscape of the Bronx Botanical Garden, only minutes away from the bustling neighborhood of Arthur Avenue's Little Italy. Egrets flying over the marshlands of Jamaica Bay as jets fly in the distance over the Manhattan skyline.

These contrasts, these surprises, are why I live and love it here. Sometimes, we must experience our homes as tourists, to strip out our daily routine-the commute, the work, the stress, the gym-and discover a place's essential beauty.

This Labor Day weekend, we will sample new sites and revisit some old favorites, as we set off on an encore Five Borough Tour (FBT2) and rekindle our delight with this ever-changing city.


» Five Bourogh Tour Photo Journal 2001
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