“Old-fellow-Jim / in the entire Harlem...”, went a song by Greek composer (and social justice advocate) Manos Loizos in one of the cassette soundtracks of our family excursions on the Fiat 128 in the '80s. I had a lot of questions on the lyrics, but what was clear was that the song darkened my soul, no matter how joyful the Attic landscape through which dad was driving us was. Little did I know that, a few decades later, I would be given the nickname “Harlem girl”, since, as fate would have it, I have been residing in the aforementioned NYC district since 2017 (after having first spent twelve years in the nearby Morningside Heights of Columbia University).
Other people's musics
So, in Harlem, my village, if you wake up (or go to bed) and it's quiet, something's wrong. Deafening musics penetrate your home and head day and night, rain or shine. My neighbors believe that whatever music they are listening to, those around them have to listen to too, by force. From the windows, from the walls, from the prewar apartment-building air shafts, boom-boom at a pumped up volume shakes the floors and our nervous system.
But where decibels break all records and glass is squeaking is with the cars, which are, essentially, dance clubs in motion. The volume is intolerable for us who are inside our homes – imagine the degree of hearing loss incurred onto those inside the car. Pedestrians follow suit: wretches, destitute creatures who seem to be barely surviving, yet they have found a way to be carrying shopping carts with loudspeakers the size of microwave ovens, if not bigger, so that they can “carry” with them their own music, wherever they go.
The type of music is beyond the point (though, admittedly, this noise sounds to my ears like a barrage of palpitation-causing gusts, mixed with an endless slur of words that would all get censored if I attempted to quote them here); what is the point is that the music is imposed on you, and at an outrageous volume for that matter. You see, the problem with music is that you can't filter it – once it enters your brain, it starts influencing your world, regardless of your will. (The classic question of my piano teachers comes to my mind: “What types of music have you been exposed to?”)
To the explosive mix are also added the NYPD and FDNY cars' sirens (I have signed the petition to turn down their volume, but to no avail).
But in Harlem, my village, we do not only have unique customs as far as entertainment is concerned; we also have our very own traffic laws: we double-park wherever our heart desires, and then, if, by chance, we have blocked another vehicle -which, surprisingly, desires to get out of its spot-, we simply wait to be notified by its driver's honking -an activity which, of course, wrecks the nervous system of the whole neighborhood. (This technique is applied on a daily basis.)
On top of all of the above, as soon as the weather opens up a little, to the mess are added the motocross motorcycles, in a herd, demonically gunning, with their lovely “quiet” exhausts piercing your skull like a jackhammer. Marvelous – the last thing we needed in this ecosystem was aggressive dirt bikes.
Outside: chaos continued
I make up my mind and get out. In the hallway I run into the building's exterminator. Nice guy, average efficiency. On the sidewalk of our 137th Street, with its exquisite prewar buildings, idyllic scenes offer recreation: rat families are playfully chasing each other jumping here and there. The critters are so well acclimated that they do not hide in order to avoid passers-by: it is not the mouse who waits for the human to pass, but vice-versa (otherwise the rodent will get entangled in your feet). A few rarely seen semi-feral cats are hiding because they're afraid of the rats, I think.
On the sidewalks rise piles of anything imaginable anybody feels like getting rid of: from entire home furnishings to tv sets, and from printers to gigantic plastic monstrosity-toys, as well as clothing of all types and sizes. Poor mayor: he's leading zero waste campaigns; what a joke. I'm not sure how many generations it will take to change (if it can ever change) the mentality “whatever I don't feel like seeing in my place anymore, I just dump on the street.” Notions like “repair/reuse/exchange/donate” are non-existent. The civilization of single-use and overconsumption is exposed in all its sad grandeur every single day in Harlem. The most incomprehensible aspect is seeing baby accessories in perfect shape ditched in the bins. It makes you wonder: those striving parents do not have a trace of solidarity for next-door striving parents? Doesn't it cross their mind that the (almost unused) stroller they toss in the bin, could be used by another family?
An extension of the issue of traffic laws not being valid in the streets is what happens on the sidewalks: delivery bikes circulate matter-of-factly on sidewalks from all directions, crashing on the helpless pedestrians.
Strivers' Row
And yet, as soon as I walk half a block and cross Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard (Seventh Avenue), it's as if I've been transported into another zone, another city: as if a magic switch has turned off noise pollution and a conjuring stick has made trash and rodents disappear (they exist here too, it's just that rich people hide them better): 138th and 139th Streets between Seventh and Eighth Avenues form the illustrious “Strivers' Row” -an architectural gem.
Wondrous and incomprehensible the readiness of the human species to forget about the bad things and to turn to the beautiful: deep-red and yellow brick, terracotta geometric motifs on the arcs. Light pillars elegantly frame the windows. Splendid railings twine along the stoop stairs. Iron little gates lead to pretty pocket gardens irresistible throughout the year, but most delicious when snow piles on benches and jardinieres. The whole is spirited by the breath and shade of the magnificent trees of the street, with their robust, reassuring trunks. The leaves provide reflections in the summer while the bare branches draw poetic silhouettes in the winter.
Favorite details abound, since, seven years now, like a pilgrim, I've made a vow to pass through the fairy-tale-like streets at least once a day, as fate cast me across from them: the two lions that guard one of the 139th Street row houses; the little pine tree in a pot on a charming balcony on 138th. Decorated with taste throughout the year (with cute ornaments at Christmas, with colorful Easter eggs in the spring, with magical lanterns for Lunar New Year now in February), it functions as a perpetual source of high aesthetics and feast alike – feast for “beauty that will save the world”. But the top detail of the neighborhood, and quite possibly unique in all New York City, is the sign “Private Road: Walk Your Horses”, preserved on some of the gates of the private cross streets of the complex. Gilded Age nostalgics are kindly requested to get off the carriage here.
Designed by prominent architects (including Stanford White of the firm McKim, Mead & White) around 1891, these two blocks had been conceived as a model of urban planning and aesthetics, with high-end construction-wise residences intended for white New Yorkers. However, after a combination of economic depression and departure of white populations from the area, the project was finally inhabited by Black Americans in 1919, when Harlem was experiencing its artistic and spiritual bloom. The two sparkling streets owe their appellation to the ambitious, hard-working African-American professionals who strived to rise socially and who moved into the enviable residential complex.
From Dutch village to Renaissance
Today's feel of independence and autonomy is not mere rhetorical hyperbole. Baptized by the Dutch settlers in honor of their motherland town of Haarlem in the 17th century, this northern part of Manhattan was truly a village (pasture and farmhouses) until approximately 1830, at which point it started rapidly developing into a suburb. Its regular connection to urban transit in 1880 catapulted it to one of the most sought-after New York City districts. But real explosion came in 1920, when the neighborhood evolved into a magnet for and symbol of all Black America. The celebrated Harlem Renaissance gave rise to leading music, literature, politics and civil rights figures. The secluded “islet” turned into a spiritual cradle.
Harlem's geographic isolation proved a blessing for its current aesthetic image. Compared to the rest of NYC, it is one of the rarest cases of preserved historical architecture: churches, aristocratic apartment buildings and entire row houses have remained intact because they escaped the waves of galloping demolition and development the rest of Manhattan has undergone.
Unfortunately, it is precisely this invaluable preservation of the architectural identity that is proving fatal to the economic survival of the historical community: the gorgeous buildings are being renovated to attract - at beyond-reach rents or at astronomical sell-prices - the financially privileged; the rich invaders are expanding, while the poor locals are forced to flee.
“You look happy today”, whistles good-heartedly to me a delivery guy from his bike as I'm crossing the street (surprisingly, he has stopped at the red light). “Yes”, I'm thinking, “I am happy because I survived yet another day here.” But I don't say it out loud. Perhaps he's right. I realize I'm smiling as I'm walking in my village, which I hate and I love. And which is the only place in all of the City of New York where you can walk around 24/7 and not be scared, because the neighbors may not be aware of the notion “quiet hours” but they're open-hearted and friendly, and they talk to you without knowing you and without sexual nuances. Only in Harlem, my village.
This essay first appeared in Greek in the TA NEA newspaper (online) on March 19, 2024.
Το κείμενο αυτό πρωτοδημοσιεύτηκε στην εφημερίδα ΤΑ ΝΕΑ (ηλεκτρονική έκδοση) στις 19 Μαρτίου 2023.
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