Friday Fuckery: CHUMBO, NYC!

What do you get when you marry gentrification with self-absorbed “creative types” and a splash of exotification?

CHUMBO! NYC’s latest “cool” neighborhood (sorry Bushwick)! Known among the common folk as uh, Chinatown or East Chinatown — new settlers (read: high-rent, non-Asian, yipsters) have taken it upon themselves to unofficially re-name their new “hood” by combining Chinatown & Dumbo to reflect it’s um, edginess. Synergy!

A recent Wall Street Journal article called “Cool Arrives in a Slice of Chinatown” gives an earnest nod to the up-and-coming CHUMBO!, saying: “Upscale restaurants such as Fat Radish and Pulqueria and nightclubs such as the soon-to-open Le Baron have popped up as the Lower East Side nightlife district spills into Chinatown, bringing with them fashionistas, expensive cocktails and new high-rise apartments” (Curbed gives a more critical angle here).

The WSJ also profiles several of the newer residents, who naturally come off like pretentious douchebags. Billy Rennekamp, a 25-year-old artist who decided to move to Bayard Street (arrrrghh!! nooo!) from Berlin, says “[Chinatown] is the last cool neighborhood on the island (Gaakk!)….the most attractive place for an artist today”. (BLARG!) “It’s a typical setting for avant-garde activity.” FFFFFUUUUU!

Yes, I can just imagine Billy being totally avant-garde by shoving his Canon EOS IDs Mark III into the face of some old Pau Pau struggling across Bayard with her sacks of groceries. White people love doing that shit. Cutting-edge cultural exposé, dude!

Uh, your avant-ness is blocking traffic, Billy.

So who loses in all of this giddy trendiness? Low-income, longtime Asian residents of course, who due to limited English, mobility, poverty, and a host of other reasons, are severely restricted in their choice of places to live. The most obvious, and thus saddest, quote from the article is from Yan Chen, “a 19-year-old resident concerned about being able to live in the neighborhood and with people she grew up with: “Chinatown is important for Chinese people“.

What can be done to protect the ethnic integrity of a neighborhood, and thus the people whose cultural and economic well-being are dependent upon it? Community-based advocacy groups CAAAV Organizing Asian Communities and the Urban Justice Center released a report yesterday  that: ...offers up an alternative vision for rezoning Chinatown and calls for the creation of a Special Zoning District around the area. “Reimaging Rezoning” is based on extensive community research…The report highlights the need for protections for residents and businesses and details how rezoning the area can curb harassment and gentrification. Read “Reimaging Rezoning: A Chinatown for Residents is a Chinatown for All” here.

via Curbed and Wall Street Journal

Thanks Char Char! Keep an eye out and a bottle of hot fish sauce for Billy!

Chinatown Street Vendor Crack Down

Looks like the NYPD is up to more of its trademark “community policing” — this time kicking out street vendors in the busy green market on Forsyth Street along the Manhattan Bridge.
image from Bowery Boogie

Some people think the practices of vendors are foul, and that the sweep makes the streets cleaner and more sanitary (some vendors are accused of selling without a license, selling rotten produce, or leaving out trash overnight). Others believe the thousands of people who shop there every day attests to the necessity and quality of food, and that the crack down is egregious and destroying the merchants’ livelihood.

image from Bowery Boogie

I gotta say, while the market’s location right under the bridge lends some appearance of shadiness, I’ve bought fruit here before — and it was perfectly fine. Even if there are a few sketch vendors, they are the ones who should be targeted, as opposed to busting up the market as a whole. Many folks in the community rely on these merchants for produce — not everyone can skip on over to Whole Foods for their dietary needs.

image via Bowery Boogie

Since incidents of harassment of locals has reportedly increased along with the rising gentrification of  the area (like the violent arrest of an elderly musician in Columbus Park in May), one has to wonder if this is just another effort to reinforce the interests of new, wealthier residents to make Chinatown more aesthetically pleasing and a sanitized, trendy clone of the Lower East Side (plus, as The Bowery Boogie points out, the timing of it all is rather shady, with plans underway to construct a new park on the bridge).

Who are the boys in blue really serving and protecting?  They should be making the neighborhood safer to live and work in for vulnerable poor and working class immigrants  — not messing with folks who are contributing to the economy and fabric of the community.  Let’s hope that the vendors get to return eventually. For more info on street vendor issues and advocacy, go to the Street Vendor Project.

via Gothamist

and the Bowery Boogie

Thanks Char!

The Powerful Photography of Annie Ling

Annie Ling’s photos were was featured in a New York Times slideshow today, focusing on Chinese residents of the 81 Bowery tenement who occupy 64 square foot cubicles, with room for little more than a mattress.  Some tenants have been there for over a decade, and make up the neighborhood’s kitchen workers, laborers, and elders.

photos: Annie Ling

While living in Manhattan’s Chinatown, I continually saw hipsters and other cultural tourists stick their cameras in the faces of residents for their latest exotic art project and whatnot. It’s refreshing to see respectful photojournalism about elderly and low income Asian folks that demonstrates sensitivity to the reality and resilience of their daily lives, and makes a connection to important community issues.

photo: Annie Ling

Annie Ling’s website includes more excellent portfolios related to Chinatown tenants. “Shut In” concerns migrant worker elders who, due to poverty and poor health, live in indoor isolation.  “Tenements” was shot after a tragic fire broke out in a St. James St. building where Ling lived — killing two and making over 200 homeless. This was only one of a series fires over the past couple years — many of which I remember seeing the flames or smelling the smoke — that have devastated hundreds of Chinatown families and businesses. Often, these buildings had several fire violations and were poorly maintained.

81 Bowery has also had problems with fire hazard and unsafe living conditions, which resulted in the City’s sudden eviction of over 50 residents in 2008. CAAAV Organizing Asian Communities was able to mobilize actions to get the tenants back in the building and advocate for safer tenements.

photo: Tara MacIssac/The Epoch Times

Unfortunately this isn’t an isolated incident, but had occurred in at least 6 other buildings within the 6-month period, and is part of the larger context of  increasing gentrification in Chinatown (as well as countless other urban neighborhoods) , which incentivizes displacement of low-income, indigenous residents and new constructions and renovations to bring in higher-paying renters. CAAAV released a report in 2008 which found that 75% of Chinatown residents had experienced some form of landlord harassment or received a serious housing violation within the previous year. To learn more about CAAAV’s work to preserve Chinatown as a community for working class Asian immigrants through their Chinatown Justice Project, go here.

Thanks Char Char!

From the NYT

Where LES Boutiques Meet Chinatown

I didn’t want to be “That Guy“, the one that takes pictures of Chinese folks out and about. But I couldn’t pass this up, and I’m 1/8 Chinese, so its ok, right? It was on Orchard St. near Broome St., an area the City has dubbed “Lower East Side Shopping District”. An area that easily shows the signs of Bloomberg condoned gwei-lo gentrifying Chinatown and the spreading of hip, urban boutiques. This photo was taken at Still Life, a custom hat shop that can custom tailor you a rice straw (how ironic) bike racer hat to fit your specific head shape for a paupers’ price of $250 a pop. And flanking either side of this boutique were entrances to an apartment/condo complex, brand new, that housed old Chinese folks. The housing development that oozed of a developer’s “low income housing requirement” made me wonder if these Chinese folks wanted to live like this?

I know it’s not their choice, but if the point of living in an ethnic enclave is to have your local needs (food, entertainment, shopping) met by local services owned by people with similar ethnic backgrounds, once you take away the Chinese gorcery stores and community centers and replace them with sneaker boutiques, brunch cafes, and high end fashion stores, what’s the point of living there? Finding housing for these folks just ain’t enough if you’re chipping away at the existing community. You’re just fulfilling government quotas, kicking out local Chinese and bringing back token housing units reserved for the original inhabitants while leading to siuations like this old man chilling on a boutique’s outdoor bench, smiling at me cause I was the only Asian cat there and asking me what time it was. I said 3:45 and he sat there, apparently waiting for 4:00 to roll by so he could meet someone for a $14 cocktail and Brie sandwiches across the street, or to shop for a limited edition Alife/Lacoste collaboration polo shirt down the street ($175 at a local Alife store near you, gwei-lo).

Get the Fuck Out of Chinatown, Bloodsuckers

So when I found out about this my heart just sank. Apparently there’s some new uber pretentious bar called Apotheke (German for apothecary) opening today in Chinatown for fashion week- and not just anywhere in Chinatown, but fuckin’ DOYERS STREET, in the former Gold Flower Restaurant.

How in the hell did owners and restauranteurs Albert Trummer and Heather Tierney finangle this location? I’m guessing rising rents, displacement, and the “progress” of gentrification. How long until hipster boutiques, cafés, and condos start dominating the hood?  

 

 

Even before opening, this “already hot cocktail bar” got apple-polishing press from the New York Times and Thrillist.

  

Doyers is one of the quieter streets in Chinatown, home to family associations, barber shops, Malysian restaurants, hang out spots for locals,  and a small post office where elders line up early to send packages overseas.

Doyers is also one of the most culturally and historically significant streets in Chinatown- known as the bloody angle for gang wars, it also houses Nom Wah Tea Parlor – opened in 1920- “Chinatown’s first dim sum parlor”, Ting’s Chinese gift shop (open since 1957), and an old Chinese opera house and artist’s residence.

 

Apotheke’s owners obviously have no regard for Doyers indigenous residents or history, but seem more interested in exploiting it for their own profit and popularity on the NYC bar scene. With a serving of dumplings. Can’t they just stay where they belong in Midtown? 

 

 

And of course, these muthafuckers are reviving tired Chinatown stereotypes to attract their upscale and hipster clientele- marketing it as a former opium den (and selling opium and absinthe cocktails) with a dark, mysterious dungeon-like quality. Not all that different from sensationalist tours back in the day that paraded outsiders through Chinatown to gawk at its exotic and depraved conditions.  

 

I’m sure having a super trendy bar and accompanying loud obnoxious drunks will really improve the quality of life for Doyers street elders, who, unlike the owners and clientele, are extremely limited in where they can live, shop, and “be entertained”. 

 

White people. Always seeking “adventure” on other people’s turf and the thrill of “slumming it”, with no consideration of who they’re intruding on. Overprivileged, spoiled, culture vultures. 

 

I hope this place gets overrun by rats and loogie-hawking old timers. I think I may have found a new dumping ground for my garbage. Who’s with me?