NYC: The Apple that never sleeps

My first memory of NYC was coming out of the airport, into a cab and having the cabbie get his wallet stolen from off of the passenger seat a few minutes later. Not a great first impression New York. Especially not for a young kid. So, suffice it to say, since then, I always had a hint of fear associated with NYC. Of course, all it took was one trip there as an adult to realize that what I had that last time was a glimpse, a tiny inconsequential spec of time in a universe of moments that NYC floods its populace with on the daily.

NYC is an incredible city.I don’t know if any other city can offer the amount of variety that NYC can, not just in terms of neighborhoods, but in lifestyles, entertainment and therefore employment options, and of course cultures. It’s true that in general the US likes to make sure other cultures melt into theirs, and for the most  part I think that does happen, but in NYC you get the impression there’s also something else at work there, something more accommodating and magical. There’s room there for everyone, every race, every gender, every fantasy, every heart, every culture, and it all helps feed into this living beast of a city that is in fact something more than a city. It is by no means the largest city, or the most populated. It’s not the tallest, widest, oldest, and certainly not the greenest, but it lives in its own universe and creates its own worlds, and for that I think it has earned the respect, ire, and love that no other city on earth has. I for one, think it’s deserved. This isn’t to say it isn’t a crazy place that wreaks of consumerism, of excessive patriotism, and in fact, all the isms out there, but as much as it’s a birthing place for new ideas, new frames of mind, new cultural shifts, it’s also the tomb of some of those same isms. In NYC you’ll often find the minds that begin revolutions sitting next to those who perpetuate the world’s worst practices and perspectives. Like many large and old cities, it’s home to a huge amount of disparity and contradiction, but NYC does it with style.