Why New York City?

(May 2014)

I love New York City. I have since I was a teenager, who, in answer to my English teacher in 11th grade who asked us what we wanted to do when we finished school, answered “I don’t know job-wise, but I know that I want to move to New York City”.

By that time I had never even been there. I wouldn’t visit New York until June of 2011, after I had already spent a year living in Iowa, including trips across the country and all the way to Hawaii, and a five-week vacation travelling down the West coast a year later. I purposely never included NYC in my travels; I was scared that experiencing New York as a tourist might ruin it for me. I feared that my expectations were too high for the city to meet even just half of them.

However, the longing was too strong so, at age 22, I visited New York City for the first time. My friend and I stayed in Brooklyn. We got into Brooklyn late at night—straight from the airport—and when I first walked across the Brooklyn Bridge to spend my first day in the city, I knew that my expectations were about to be blown. My dream of moving there has since only gotten stronger. However, when people ask me why I am so madly in love with this far-off city, I usually can’t answer straight. My heart starts beating fast and it feels as if I were trying to tell them about a crush of mine. I don’t find any good reason for why I love it, so I simply give the fastest and easiest possible answer, which is usually something about architecture and food and culture, which isn’t untrue, but it’s also not the main reason why. There is so much more to it. There is a reason why, when in the movies I see shots of the city—any part of the city—I immediately tear up. There is a reason why I feel a physical longing for that place. I think that, in short, it all boils down to this: I love cultural diversity especially when it is in such a geographically limited space. I love excitement, which exudes from every fiber of this city. And, most of all, I love the potential the city has, to turn every person into the best and hardest working and most deeply experiencing version of themselves.

Stepping out of the house in New York City is like a mini-vacation in itself. There are constantly new and exciting things to try. Be it a new, unconventional exhibit at one of the countless galleries, any type of performance at underground or world-class venues or simply amazing food. New York-life will never be boring if you don’t want it to be. For people who are open to new and unexpected things, there will always be something new around each corner. Around one of those corners (in the East Village), I once stumbled into the tiniest restaurant (8 tables tops!) and had the most unexpectedly fantastic Japanese dinner of my life (Shabu Shabu). I have been to a fourth of July burlesque show in Brooklyn where all the cool kids were hanging out. I saw “Phantom of the Opera” on Broadway, which left me and my mom so emotional, we were still tearing up by the time we got to Times Square. I raced across mid-and downtown on a bicycle, then took the Brooklyn Bridge and rode all the way up to Williamsburg. I lived in apartments—and had the most inspiring conversations with “my” neighbors—in Fort Greene, Brooklyn as well as on the Upper East- and Westside. I walked in and out of friends’ apartments in downtown, in midtown, heck all over the place. I celebrated the first hours of my birthday by myself on the rooftop of Le Bain (because my friends got lost on their way back from dinner in the Bronx) only to make the acquaintance of one of the most interesting people I ever met. And then I got presented with beautiful dessert at a fancy bar. I have taken morning strolls along the Hudson river, coffee in hand, friend by my side and I have never in my life felt quite as emotional as when I walked along a public basketball court in the meatpacking district, stood atop the Empire State Building or looked out at the skyline from Governor’s island. I have had dinner at Da Marino’s (220 W 49th street) where not only do they have fantastic live music and where legendary show-business people are regulars (and an episode of Sex and the City was shot), but where the owner also showered me and my friend with cheese, bubbly and wonderful conversation. I had brunch at Smorgasburg in Brooklyn (a food- “fleamarket”), sitting on the grass and eating from cartons and paper bags. New York City truly has it all. And while I have only spent an extremely limited amount of time there, I have had the pleasure of experiencing such an array of different things, I can only imagine what it would be like to spend every single day for the rest of my life there. (With the exception of vacations abroad, of course).

New York City’s diversity in such simple and superficial things as music, food and entertainment never ceases to amaze me. And while the events in themselves might be superficial, they most certainly touch me on a very deep level. They make me feel the most alive. They make me excited.

And excitement is my second ‘because’ to the “Why NYC?”. New York is a tourist destination with countless sights that have had entire books written about them. And yet, New York is also always new and fresh and sometimes really ugly and brutal, but always exciting. To me, there is nothing comparable to walking through downtown Manhattan. Manhattan, with its bustle of cabs, business people rushing to their next appointment, tourists standing in the middle of the road, trying to find the right angle to fit both, the Chrysler Building and Grand Central Station into one picture. Manhattan is full of people. It exudes energy. And that is what makes me excited. Often do I hear from people that it is exactly because of the many people, that they do not like big cities. They think cities are too anonymous and nobody cares about their neighbors. This is where I strongly disagree.

Firstly, to me, being anonymous can be a great thing at times. I find it refreshing that, when I leave the house, most people don’t give a shit about what I look like or what my story is. Everybody is so caught up in their own lives, they don’t usually have time to also care about the other one million (and more, depending on the neighborhood). However, the sheer mass of people is also what enables one of my favorite things about the city: It enables a sense of community, hell it does not just enable it, it makes it completely necessary. If you live in a city of millions of people, you will feel insignificant at times. And it is exactly because of this that I believe that NYC is the city where it is the easiest to meet new people. Sitting down at a bar by yourself is, first of all, not weird at all. But it doesn’t stop at “not being weird”. It’s not just that people are going to politely accept your presence and not stare at you for being by yourself, instead, people in NYC will actually talk to you. I can’t tell you for sure why this is the case but I can surely tell you that—for me—it keeps happening. Little interactions between people seem normal, almost required. If you were one amongst millions of people, maybe you too would cherish those few little moments a day when you actually communicate with one of those others. Those moments where you feel that you’re “all in this together” and when the city stops feeling like this scary aggregate of strangers who might be dangerous psychopaths for all you know.

Additionally, living in New York City, you probably once were a stranger as well. Tons of New Yorkers are not New Yorkers by birth but by choice. Now the first way in which this influences New Yorkers’ behaviors is that they know what it is like to feel lost in the city. Be it in literal terms when you have no idea whether you’re supposed to be on an up- or downtown train and whether you should hop on a local or an express train to actually be able to get off at your stop, people will help you. If you ask nicely they will do their best to help you figure out where it is that you’re trying to go. New Yorkers are also never short of advice on where to have dinner or where to go party. Additionally, they will also understand when you feel lost, figuratively speaking. When you feel like you can’t keep up with the city, there will always be somebody (friend or stranger) to remind you of all the beautiful things this city has to offer, so that you can look past your struggles and still be appreciative of your city. Because most New Yorkers are New Yorkers by choice, they will be sure to tell you that there is no greater city in the world. And, really, what makes a city more worth loving than when its people are its biggest fans?

Many of these fans came from other places. They came here because New York City is full of opportunities. However, these opportunities are limited. So if you can’t manage to be the best version of yourself and work your ass off for what you want to achieve, you might as well stay at home. You cannot simply exist in New York City. You have to prove yourself. You have to live. And that, to me, is the greatest gift a city could give to its people. The challenge to be more than what you were the day before. The challenge to reach higher, work harder, because you care. The challenge to make this life as full of experiences as you possibly can. New York will never hand you anything for free. And the reward for all your hard work? It is not only that you will achieve your dreams and spend your time doing fulfilling things, but also will the city reward you with admission. It will open up its arms and take you in as one of its children. It will give you all it has. And it will give you the greatest feeling of all: The feeling that you’re a New Yorker.