The Chipped Cup

Sometime before or after noon I gather my books, my computer, my thoughts and head to the cafe a couple short blocks from our apartment. It's on the lower level of one of the buildings right in between 148th and 149th and has a blue, chalkboard easel out on the sidewalk to attract customers with phrases written on it like, "Tired? Come inside and have a cup!" It stands out from the other shops because it's painted bright blue and most places around it embrace the concrete look and have dingy signs in both Spanish and English.

It's called The Chipped Cup and I go there just about every day. I buy an iced coffee or hot Moroccan mint tea depending on the weather. Then I plop myself down at whatever seat, table, bar stool happens to be closest to the outlets, plug my computer in, and get to work. Work being a perusal of gmail and facebook before I finally start studying. I read chapters from my textbooks or assigned articles online. I write papers or projects for class. I re-teach myself Excel with helpful youtube videos cuz I have no idea how that program works anymore. It's boring but necessary.

Sometimes I slyly people-watch. I have to be sly cuz it's kind of small and you can't really people-watch in an enclosed space without people wondering why you're staring at them. Eye-contact in these situations is common and always awkward. Sometimes I smile and look away and sometimes I make a weird face and pretend that I jut caught them staring at me instead of the other way around. People vary from obviously hipster to obviously student to obviously just like going to a cafe to chat with friends or relax. It's nice. However, this place does not really include the typical resident of this area. It's gentrification at work. I imagine, with the popularity of this place, that more places like it will pop up soon and more and more people will be drawn to an area where you can spend $5 on a cup of coffee - something not before typical of Harlem.

Outside, there's a small patio area that's adorably decorated and very comfortable when the weather's nice. If my roommates and I had similar schedules, it might be nice to sit out here with them and chat. I wonder if our loud-Americans-in-public personas still exist. Maybe they do but they're not obvious cuz everyone else is loud too. They've painted the word "Harlem" in giant letters across the back wall, proud of the area maybe or just trying to be cool - I don't know. There's also a huge mirror propped up in the corner that kinda freaks  you out and makes you think you're going to run into yourself but it also makes this small space seem much larger and is pretty brilliant.

After hours of sitting here without being bothered or feeling obligated to order another drink, when my once scalding hot tea is too cold to drink, when the others have come and gone again and again, I pack up my stuff and head home.

I love this place.

-Age

The Commute

It’s late morning and I’ve only been up for an hour. This city keeps me up until the wee hours as my day often doesn’t end until 10:00 or even 11:00pm. Between school and studying and running around trying to get my life in order, sleep is elusive and inconvenient.

It rained all last night so the morning is beautiful, sunny, and crisp – shiny and clean and re-set. It’s always noisy here but the sounds are beginning to feel familiar, more of a soundtrack for a life that is becoming less new or noticeable. I don’t stare at the old buildings anymore or listen to the conversations of my neighbors (if I can understand them) or try to memorize the different stores so I can decide which ones I want to peruse in the future. I live in Harlem, near the Hudson and Riverside Park. I am the minority. Gentrification is new to me but very much a part of the choice I’ve made in moving here. I walk down our street towards Broadway.

Once on the main drag, I turn left and pass C-Town, the closest super market which is convenient but lacking the fresh produce that I miss so much from Bulgaria. There are farms in New York and opportunities to buy fresh veggies and fruits but, in the lower-income areas, it’s not always easy. There’s lots of small stores, fast food, a new bar that just opened up, packed every night with people watching a variety of sports – flirting and chatting and drinking, trying to relax for a few hours or trying to be seen. It reminds me of the night my friends and I went – the Grand Opening – I liked that the walls were chalkboards and had funny phrases written on them. The beers weren’t too outrageously priced and the staff was friendly and wearing unpretentious t-shirts which I found refreshing.

Onward for six full blocks as our apartment is smack-dab in the middle of the subway stations on both 145^th and 157^th. I walk in the direction of downtown since my school is on 13^th street.

Down to the subway, quickly digging through my purse to get my metro card before I hit the turnstiles that are often crowded with people trying to get in and out of the underground. It’s hot, stuffy. I would complain but then I think about how freezing and bitter this place must be in January. I see that my train, the 1, will be approaching the station in 3 minutes. I stand, waiting. When it pulls up, dozens of people poor out of the sliding doors and dozens more replace them, including me. Today there are spots available and I quickly sit down, squishing myself between a man who’s hat is pulled far down over is face in an attempt to sleep and a woman who is clutching her purse close and sitting on the edge of her chair as though she may make a run for it at any moment. Some people stand and chat, so accustomed to the swaying, backward and forward momentum of the train that they don’t feel the need to sit. I pull out a textbook and start reading. Economics. Statistics. Policy Analysis. It doesn’t really matter, I’m behind on my reading in every class, always trying so hard to catch up. I’d kill for 30-hour days.

Sometimes, there are performers down here. If you have to wait for a train for 5 minutes or more you may be serenaded by a young guitar player with a surprisingly wonderful voice and a sad, original song that makes you want to close your eyes and wait for the train just a little longer. The sounds bouncing off the walls that serve as appealing acoustics to these buskers, makes our wait just a little better. If they are bad, they have a few dollars in their open guitar case. If they are good, people are continuously walking over to drop anywhere from a combination of coins from the depths of their pockets to a few dollars. I love it when they’re good. I’ve been known to give a dollar or two.

When the subway hits my stop, I quickly walk out, through the turnstiles, up the stairs and back into the sunlight. The difference between Greenwich Village in downtown Manhattan is strikingly different from where I just came from – taller buildings, lots of trees, more well-known stores and eateries. I walk quickly down the busy streets, constantly millimeters away from running into the hordes of people coming from the opposite direction going to equally as important and pressing places as myself.

When I get inside my classroom and sit down, I mentally prepare myself for the massive amounts of information that will be flying my way over the next two hours and take a deep breath. 

-Age

No Longer Destitute.

In some ways, I like the idea of being a transient person. Though, having a place to call home is also pretty awesome.

We have an apartment!!! Thank goodness.

Also, Katelyn got here and has been furnishing the apartment with me by looking up tons of free stuff on craigslist, renting a car super cheap for a day and running around picking up things from bookshelves to beds to couches. All free. We have an eclectic apartment with a price tag of nearly $0. Well done us.

We live in Harlem. Which is pretty great. I'm learning Spanish because it just seems like a great idea and because the opportunities to practice abound in our neighborhood where most people are from the Dominican Republic. It's similar to Bulgaria in that everyone around us speaks a language other than English but different from Bulgaria...in pretty much every way.

However, here are some other Bulgaria similarities:

There's a cute cafe called The Chipped Cup that we love and spend hours at. Reading, studying, taking our time with our coffee like true Bulgarians.

In the grassy and tree-lined island in the center of the main street, Broadway, there are benches full of old and young men playing what I think is majong and gossiping in Spanish. It's the gossiping that reminds me of Bulgaria. The game-playing actually reminds me of Turkey as men love to get together and play backgammon at tea shops.

That's all. Everything else is extremely different.

I've been trying to get a part-time job so I don't run out of money. It hasn't been going too well but I'm going to keep plugging away.

School is really difficult right now. A lot of reading. A lot of studying. A lot of pressure. I'm trying to get used to being a student again and it's proving difficult. Though, I'm loving this really intellectual environment. I feel my brain burning and I love the challenge of keeping up with all of the other students. It's been fun and interesting and a completely different experience than the one I was living in Bulgaria.

I can't really think of anything else to add.

If I do, I'll let you know.

Okay. Ciao ciao.

-Age

I Read Sometimes

"For several years I had been bored...a dense, blanketing malaise. It seemed to me that there was nothing new to be discovered ever again. Our society was utterly ruinously derivative. We were the first human beings who would never see anything for the first time. We stare at the wonders of the world, dull-eyed, underwhelmed. Mona Lisa, the Pyramids, the Empire State Building. Jungle animals on attack, ancient icebergs collapsing, volcanoes erupting. I can't recall a single amazing thing I have seen firsthand that I didn't immediately reference to a movie or TV show. A fucking commercial. You know the awful singsong of the blase: Seeeeen it. I've literally seen it all, and the worst thing, the thing that makes me want to blow my brains out is: The secondhand experience is always better. The image is crisper, the view is keener, the camera angle and the soundtrack manipulate my emotions in a way reality can't anymore. I don't know that we are actually human at this point, those of us who are like most of us, who grew up with TV and movies and now the Internet. If we are betrayed, we know the words to say; when a loved one dies, we know the words to say; If we want to play the stud or the smart-ass or the fool, we know the words to say. We are all working from the same dog-eared script.

It's a very difficult era in which to be a person, just a real, actual person, instead of a collection of personality traits selected from an endless Automat of characters.

And if all of us are play-acting, there can be no such thing as a soul mate, because we don't have genuine souls.

It had gotten to the point where it seemed like nothing matters, because I'm not a real person and neither is anyone else.

I would have done anything to feel real again."

Something I read from a book recently that I thought was interesting. Especially the part about us all working from the same script. We know just what to say and do in certain situations cuz we've seen it done "properly", not by parents or real-life people, but by someone on television. Crazy.

How real am I? How much of me is what I think I'm supposed to be? You all know I'm big on GENUINE. But, we've got to really fight for it now-a-days.

Anyway.

-Age

At This Point, I Would Literally Live in a Big Apple

I’ve had one thing on my mind for days now. Well, a lot of things really but they all boil down to one theme.

I DON'T WANT TO BE HOMELESS...please.

Since Bulgaria, life’s been a whirlwind of traveling and planning and to-do listing.

I flew into LA and met my parents, brother, and sister, who I spent the next two weeks with, catching up and annoying one another just like we always do. Just about the time I began to remember with striking clarity just why I moved out of my parent’s house, it was time to move on to the next adventure.

My very best friend and her family were planning a trip to Kauai and I was invited along! It was a dream vacation, a majestic place that no person in their right mind would ever leave willingly. Then a week later we left...

a red-eye back to LA.

The exact same day, only a few hours later, was my red-eye to New York. I got no sleep on either red-eye and was to the point where exhaustion didn’t quite seem to cover it when I dragged myself to the baggage claim to take all of my worldly possessions…to Brooklyn.

I decided to be bold and take both of my exactly-50-pound bags on the subway. HAHAHA. Silly, silly California girl. The subway’s underground. You have to use the stairs. Big, giant bags and four different subway lines turned into 2 hours of me sweating my way to our hostel. Three  lovely gentlemen helped me with my bags at the different stops and I’ll forever be grateful to them – already men here are more polite than in that other place I lived for 2 years.

The hostel smells. The staff are stupid. That gives Bulgaria 1 point for having much better hostels than NY.  I can’t wait to leave this place. It’s pricier than I’d like too. (A guy who works there yelled at me one day for spilling milk - I've never wanted to punch someone more)

I should pause here to let you know that I am moving to New York for graduate school. I’ll have 2 other roommates, both friends from the Peace Corps: Tom and Katelyn.

When Tom and I arrived at the hostel, we left almost immediately and not just because of the smell. We had an appointment with a broker and we wanted to get the search for an apartment started as soon as possible. Our broker’s name was Vu and he had taken the subway to meet us at our hostel because the first apartment he wanted to show us was only a few blocks away. Turns out he doesn’t know Brooklyn too well. It was more than a few blocks and it took us forever to get there. But, luckily, along the way we got to talk about what a terrible neighborhood our hostel was in and then heard gunshots an appropriate 2 minutes later. We laughed. Sometimes all you can do is laugh.

When we got to the apartment, it was in a much nicer, quieter area and we felt a wave of relief. We were shown a 3-bedroom apartment on the second floor. It was perfect. Newly remodeled, exposed brick, nice kitchen, big bathroom, and two adjoined bedrooms so Katelyn and I can whisper at night about new boys we met and what noises ducks make when they get a good idea - these are the variety of things we talk about on a daily basis. There’s a park across the street, a Baptist church next door, and within the first 20 minutes a very friendly lady welcomed us to the neighborhood. We were sold. We started the paperwork without even considering another apartment.

Then a rollercoaster whirlwind of expenses and forms and second-guessing and biting of fingernails made us teeter back and forth between continuing with this plan and ditching it and starting all over. Without a broker. Don’t use brokers, people. They be pricey, yo.

But we wanted out of that hostel. It was taking our money and it smelled. Seriously, the kind of dank, damp smell that makes you feel dirty even after you’ve showered and scrubbed. Bleck.

Currently, we are still trying desperately to get this one apartment we love but things are looking bleak. Our broker is plugging away, trying his darndest to get us something. Anything. It’s not looking good. We’ve started to go back to Craigslist and look for temporary sub-leasing places. We’ve found a few that seem promising. We’ve also found a few that are complete scams. Hey, people, don’t ever wire someone money if you don’t know them personally. Even if they promise to mail you the keys to their too-good-to-be-true, incredibly affordable 2-bedroom apartment. They’re lying. Some people are jerks but I know there are people sweet and innocent enough out there to think something like that sound legit. It’s not.

Anyway, now we're looking at other apartments as well that aren't as appealing but much more realistic. We're beginning to accept the fact that this elite city is going to humble us before it allows any one of us to feel like true New Yorkers. Fair enough. Bring it on, New York. We can play this game. We were in the Peace Corps. We are the definition of resilience. 

Yesterday, I was eating a sandwich in a cute deli called Potbelly near my school, sitting on a bar stool by the big front windows, watching people walk by on the busy streets of Manhattan when I saw this little girl being pushed in a stroller. She was probably about 2 ½ and looking up at all the buildings, dragging her little toes along the ground, and looking completely content with life. Completely taken care of. For a split second I wished I was her. That happens sometimes. I see a kid maybe, I don't know, acting out some great epic battle scene in his mind right there on the sidewalk, or singing out loud to herself, not caring at all who’s watching and I think how great it must be to have no cares, no worries. But I’m not 2 ½. I’m 28. Better get my shit together, huh?

-Age

Don't Brush Those Near Me

So you know how everyone has those really specific pet peeves? Those things that just really bug them but are a little, maybe, irrational. Everyone has them. For instance, some people hate to hear other people chewing. And not chewing-with-your-mouth-open kinda chewing or smacking-your-gum-really-loud kinda chewing. EVERYONE hates that. Hear that? Everyone. Don't do it. Have some self-awareness. I'm talking about the kind of chewing that is perfectly normal but could be kinda loud cuz it's nuts or cereal or something. Some people can't stand to hear even that. It's not really fair but it's the way they feel and they can't really help it so, since you know that about them and you generally like their company, you don't sit next to them when you eat or you turn the TV or radio on or something. Easy fix.

I personally cannot stand to see people brush their teeth. If people like to brush their teeth for about 5 straight minutes cuz they have ADD and can't stand over the sink for more than a few seconds without getting real antsy and then walk all over doing things while simultaneously brushing, I always appreciate it if they stay the hell out of my area. Stay away. It's gross and I hate it. Even if it's in a bathroom I'm sharing with someone, I'd like to take turns. I'll brush, quickly and efficiently, and then you can brush once I've left. If I was ever in a serious, committed relationship where the guy got so comfortable he tried to give me a toothpaste kiss or even a toothpaste smile, I'd punch his face and walk out the door. Gross.

But, I figure, since everyone has something and accommodating their eccentricities probably isn't all that difficult, we should just suck it up and make them comfortable. Right?

That's how I feel. You could feel differently but it doesn't really matter.

-Age

Sunglasses Weren't Enough

Something about my life here in Bulgaria before it ends:

Today was the last day of school. We said good-bye to our 8^th and 7^th graders. The 8^th graders have to leave cuz I work at a primary school but the 7^th graders are leaving this year because most of them are super smart and got really great test scores on their big, national, 7^th grade exams and get to go to fancy schools throughout Bulgaria. I’m really happy for them cuz they’re all great kids. You know how I feel about my 8^th graders.

I cried. Not like a sweet, welling-up of tears but actual sobs. It was awful. I tried to hide behind my sunglasses but people noticed and then they cried and there were hugs and flowers and tears and pictures and it was just such a big, wonderful mess that I can’t imagine there was any other way to end my two years teaching here. I really love my kiddos. Saying good-bye was not easy. It sucked.

Then we went to the restaurant in town to celebrate. We took tons more pictures and, of course, I cried again. I joked with my 5^th graders, told my 6^th graders how special they are, and watched my 7^th graders prance around in pretty dresses and button-down shirts and realized how much they’ve grown up since I got here. 

Now I’m at home baking cookies for my close friend, Lenka, who I’m about to go to coffee with so I can give a her a letter in Bulgarian that tells her how much she’s meant to me and I just don’t think I can handle any more tears today. Seriously. They give me a headache. 

I’ve known volunteers who just take off. They leave Bulgaria and no one ever hears from them again. They don’t answer emails, they don’t skype or facebook. They are just gone and their colleagues and friends and kiddos don’t know why. I understand why. It’s hard to move on to a new life and hold onto this one at the same time. Moving on completely, severing all ties seems easier, less painful. But, I don’t want to do that. I want to keep in touch. I want to know how my friends here in Bulgaria are getting on and I want to know about all the wonderful things my students do with their futures. I’m gonna try my best.

That’s all for today. Parting is such sweet sorrow, am I right?

-Age