La Ciudad y los Cuervos

Cual peregrinos en La Mecca

Toda moda sale de alguna parte. Todo comienzo tiene una raíz. En Lima, usamos la palabra hipster casi como un derrogatory term, nos autoacusamos de ser alternativos en la sociedad más conservadora del mundo. Quite frankly, ¿quién no lo es? La hippie de mi profesora de Laboratory Class (clase que todavía no descubro el verdadero significado pero que amo cómo amo a la nutella) nos dejó de tarea escribir un narrative de un paseo a una parte de NYC a la que no habíamos ido antes. Por ende, les dejo un recuento de la primera experiencia de la Mamama @ La Mecca de la Hipstería, me disculpo de antemano porque es en inglés, pero me lo dejaron de tarea y me pareció relevante/feeling publicarlo acá. Pronto más risas en spanglish, I promise....

Aquí les va:

Stairs. We climb stairs every day. We climb them on our way up to class, on our way down to the laundry room and in the different middle grounds in between. When we’re late for class, we get dizzy in them. Sometimes, we even climb them to avoid running into someone on the elevators. Stairs. Flights and flights of stairs.

Every flight of stairs is exactly the same, conceptually at least, to every other flight of stairs on Earth. They get you from point A to point B, after quite a workout, in my humble opinion. However, I gather that there is something special about stairs leading up and down a metro station, they differ from all the other kinds of stairs on the planet. On the way down, metro station stairs indulge the traveler into what could be understood as an underground parallel universe. However, from the very first step found at street level, the stairs do not reveal a single glimpse of the cosmopolitan paradise that is waiting for you at the very last step. Once we descend, especially in New York, the word “multicultural” translates into people’s paces, their dress codes and their faces. By looking at people walk, the viewer is able to learn about the purpose behind the travelers’ journey, what is expected from them and where they need to be. On the way up from the metro station, stairs will never slide a clue of what the outside world is going to look like. The traveler’s gaze is fixed on a pitch black spot that follows you until the last step, slowly converting from an abstract shape to concrete objects. This happened to me when climbing up the stairs from Bedford Station, in an area known as Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Here, the light at the end of the tunnel translated itself into graphic manifestations of costumer-begging signs. 

I like to call them “customer-begging” instead of regular “signs” because I feel like the amount of colour and creative potential spent on them clearly reveals the angst behind them. Delis want you to choose theirs instead of the others, and thrift shops want to look as hipstery as possible, so they come up with reverse psychology slogans like “Don’t you dare come in,” hoping that you probably will. I noticed a local fruit shop, where a  hispanic-looking guy arranged the fruit from the outside. Did he even speak Spanish? How long has it been since he last went to his home country? Maybe he was born in Brooklyn and little did know about the history of the language his mom tried to teach him when he was just an all-american kid. Then, more Spanish caught my eye. A local grocery shop called “La Isla,” which is Spanish for “The Island,” was reminiscent of my last family trip to Cuba. There’s something about the immigrants from the Caribbean, common in New York City and it surroundings, that touches the deepest core of my Latin roots. Being away from home and with a Spanish-craving tongue, I enjoy eavesdropping into their conversations, interrupting them at random times, just to have a taste of the thing I miss the most, my language. Brooklyn satisfied my needs and showed me another side of the Latin population in New York City, one that was happily settled at a welcoming neighborhood.

This is the next observation I was able to to gather from Williamsburg, it was welcoming: wide streets, cars actually flowing through traffic, people talking to each other. I did not see Crackberry adicts, people wearing iPods or angry businessmen. Being able to pay attention to what is going on around you, I discovered, was one of the main characteristics present in Williamsburg’s residents. Everyone I saw claimed, through the way in which they were dressed, that they were from another era. Some may call it vintage, that lucky middle ground area between your grandmother’s closet and whatever Lady Gaga wears on stage. I just like to refer to it as “special,” which reminds me of a quote I read not so long ago:“originality is not sold in stores.” After a trip to Williamsburg, I decided that whoever said that was not looking in the right places. From simple Salvation Army thrift stores to the extremely profitable “Beacon’s Closet” shops, Williamsburg customers seem  not to settle for what regular High-Street chains like Zara or H&M have to offer. Red lipstick and flannel t-shirts will never run out of fashion, or will they?

Sooner or later, I discovered that the vibe of the place consisted in being different, in claiming one’s own identity in a world that is slowly struggling to snatch it away from us. But then again, isn’t purchasing an item that was once worn by somebody else, stealing away their identity? How would you feel if I said that a person is as close to a pair of shoes as they are to their dogs, or their diaries? Clothing is not alive, however, people tend to bond to it and depend on it in the same way as we depend on each other. That warm winter jacket, those comfortable running shoes. Somehow, we all know that we are going to be safe in the clothes that we already trust. This is the hardest part, for me at least,   when deciding if I should buy a new piece of clothing: will it really keep me warm, or is the label lying to me? This reminds me of the packing I had to do before moving to New York City, and the shopping spree that that involved; the uncertainty associated to how my body would respond to “extreme” temperatures, and how well my clothing would shelter me from these reactions. I still feel vulnerable, as banal as that may sound. 

I let this idea wander in my mind as my body wandered through the different racks. I could not find two identical pieces of clothing, after all, I feel like the store would lose its whole purpose if that were to happen. So, what about mass-production? Why would buying a used Ralph Lauren scarf from Beacon’s Closet be any different than buying a new one from a regular Ralph Lauren boutique, except for the price? They were both mass-produced, and they were both once available to customers. Then, I discovered the key ingredient: that Ralph Lauren scarf (and here, I’m actually refering to one I was on the verge of purchasing) is not presently on sale anymore. It would be very difficult to find a copy of any piece of clothing sold in a vintage store, available to customers in any other store. Hence, the items enter a parallel universe called the present. Through this way, an illusion is created. In such, we forget the fact that those Ralph Lauren scarfs were once mass-produced and sold to the public, which means that your grandmother and all her friends are probably keeping them in huge boxes in the cellar. Your grandmother, along with all her friends, seeked their individuality through the purchase of a piece of clothing that was in fashion. They, as well as you, were building their identity. So, does that make vintage clothes customers, identity thiefs?

Leaving “Beacon’s Closet” behind, I wandered through the streets from which one could gaze at the famous Manhattan skyline. Beer advertisements embellished the walls, especially Brooklyn Lager, which displayed Egyptian hieroglyphics that supposedly said “beer has dispelled the illness which was in me.” I took a picture of this wall and continued analyzing the rest. Blue Moon appealed to an impressionist approach when trying to sell beer.  A warm countryside, the product and the “Autumn. Artfully Crafted” slogan were displayed through heavy brush strokes and an artsy atmosphere that felt televant given the context in which I found myself. Beer, a product present in everyday life, was placed in an open countryside and even connected to Ancient Egyptian culture.  Rapidly, I established an analytical point of view on the “illness” that the lack of beer had created in the Brooklyn Lager slogan. Did this mean that Egyptians led permanently drunk lives? If so, should we be like them so that we can develop great art? To what extent does a great artist, such as Impressionists for example, rely on drugs to help inspiration? These were all questions that kept floating in my mind as I stared at both ads, which were conviniently placed in front of each other, on the same street. The fact that they were both gigantic also caught my attention, and I focussed on the extent to which a piece of advertisement could overwhelm a human being.

Slowly walking down the street, focussing on the clouds and the pale blue sky, I noticed five pairs of what looked like Converse shoes hanging in an electricity cable. How on Earth did they get there? They were so far up that I was not able to see their proper colours. I kept questioning who the owners of those shoes where, and why had they decided to hang them there? Was this an advertisement campaign made by the company that made them. Focussing on each pair of shoe, I realized they were all from different brands but they kept a sense of uniformity since they were all urban shoes. They were not shoes that one would use to go hiking in the woods, instead, they looked like shoes which would be very useful for someone living right there in Williamsburg. Why would they then just hang them there, instead of wearing them? The way in which they were arranged revealed that it was done on purpose, that irritated me, although, as I walked away I felt comforted by the fact that they made the street seem real, alive and vibrant. To me, these shoes represented the kids that once played here, and the adults they will grow up to be. Whoever the owners of these shoes were, they placed them there for a reason, the only problem is, will they be able to get them back?

I suddenly rememberd the time, the pressure of going back to my dorm room and finishing my homework suddenly hit me. I looked for Bedford Avenue again, turned right, walked and into the stairs I went.

Y con esto me despido de ustedes también, ya era hora de que aprendan un poco de cultura.

Beso grande

Tu Mamama.