At 157 Mott Street, between Broome and Grand Streets in Chinatown, Pho Bang does not at first blow one's mind with its banal facade. Inside it looks normal as hell. But check it out: the prices, as Crazy Eddie Antar used to say, are innsannne. We ate the hot pho soup, a soothing Vietnames beef broth packed with rices noodles, bean sprouts, basil leaves, brisket and thin slices of steak for an absurd $4.99. Yes, it more than filled our capacious tummy.
It is not often one sees a street band that's got chops and charisma.
Here is Mr. Foon of the Sun Wah Barbershop, who cut my hair (not the world's hardest job) for $12 ($3 tip), and did so not cheefully, yet perfectly and swiftly. At this corner of Chinatown (Pell and Doyers) I counted six barshops. Not sure how they make a living. Another odd thing--no cars. Live a movie set.
And close by I found this exuberant graffito:
Shit like that makes life worthwhile. Know what I mean? And then to the Doyers Vietnamese Restaurant, 11 Doyers Street, an under-street level enclave that features summer rolls with shrimp, grilled beef papaya salad, steamed rice cakes, and crepes with shrimp and pork. Also entrees of chicken with lemon grass and fried squid with salt and pepper. Eel with lemon grass, caramel pork with black pepper, watercress with garlic sauce hi-lighted the meal. Our bill? $15.
Balthazar is not cheap, but it is worth a visit. We had steak au poivre, an exruciatingly pleasurable meal, and squid appetizer. But the food is not the only reason one goes to Balthazar. The decor, including the altitudinous ceilings and back-soothing banquettes, transport you to 19th century Paris (as opposed to the real 19th century Paris). Even the bathrooms are cool. Best of all, as we sat in the warm, soft-lit, food-fragranced glow inside, outside it was pouring.
With June a week away, we must search desperately, at summer's brutal height, for relief.
Upon its completion in 2002, the Westin Times Square Hotel was slammed by the poobahs of modern design. In the New Yorker, renowned architect critic Paul Goldberger claimed the Westin was "both shrill and banal, less a piece of architecture than a developer's box in drag."
We haven't always been fans of the South Street Seaport, one of those San Francisco, built-to-attract tourists spots that somehow lacks the oomph, the organic sense of place that will make your visit at least memorable. But given the right camera angle, the sun, and not too many tourists, it can be charming. And it's right in the middle of the financial district.
Cafes with second floor seating are some of our favorite places to waste time in New York. Here, we can read, nurse a cup of tea, stare out the window, share space with other losers who aren't in a hurry. The Market Place Cafe, nicer than most boites with second-story seating, is a prime example.
Once a courthouse adjoining the Women's House of Detention, the Jefferson Market Library was originally a courthouse, built in 1874. It has a long, haunted history. Now you can enter this gorgeous structure, inspired by German castles and Venetian Gothic buildings, and read. Be sure to descend the spiral staircase to the periodicals room in the basement. If you stand outside on Sixth Avenue, you can easily imagine the unfortunate women, jailed for prostitution and other crimes, from their upper story cells, raining insults on confused pedestrians below.
Bigelow, the oldest apothecary in the country--Mark Twain used to fill his prescriptions here--is a New York institution par excellence. (Mr. Bigelow, the store cat, had his obituary in the New York Times.) Shopping at Bigelow feels like an experience out of another, chain-free world, not only because of the old-fashioned wooden counters, but also because of the unusually varied selection of goods.
For many years, to bike to Manhattan, we had to use the Brooklyn Bridge--not such bad thing, but it got boring after a while. In March, 2001, the city finally open the bikeway over the Manhattan Bridge (the Williamsburg and Queens Borough Bridges had bike paths, but they were far away). We like this one better because it's cozier. It's more like a secret alley; and when the subway passes, several feet away, we can smile mockingly at the morose faces.
The Union Square subway station, with its long passage between the IRT and IND lines, is a prime showcase for musicians, human statues (those people who stand perfectly still for 15 minutes stretches) and, during code orange, heavily armed homeland security guys. Above we see Lankandia Cissoko, a Senegalese Kora player. Three things we love about the Kora. It is built from a calabash, it is acoustic, and it sounds like a harp. Two things we love about Senegal--it is probably Africa's most stable democracy, and polygamy is legal.
If you look close, you'll spot the NYU graduation celebrations (music, food, crystal meth) at the pic's vanishing point. Who cares. What we like is the cobblestone street, this one starting at the corner of Green and Waverly in the West Village. You can still, thank god, find cobblestone street all over New York, either peeking through the panting asphalt, or splendidly exposed.
Stumbled upon this astonishing facade while stumbling, dazzled and confused, past the blisteringly-dressed and coiffed youth of Nolita, which, we just learned (because we are retarded) means North of Little Italy. Who knew, according to Rice to Riches website, "that by scientifically combining optimum hand-picked ingredients from around the world, we would stumble on a RICE PUDDING so threatening to other desserts that we
