My grandmother and I used to frequent the essex market and she could makethe poorest cuts of meat and poultry taste better than any 5 star restaurant. My grandfather took us to the deli’s down there at least twice a month, and I finally learned how to share a pastrami on rye and fries with my sister when my grandfather forced me to eat an entire huge sandwich at the table alone for being greedy.

My first apartment was on Rivington Street.I was an eighteen year old bike messenger, One of the few females who were. My neighbor above me was a counselor from Covenant house (she told me about the available apt.). Her boyfriend (he was my age, she was not) lived directly below me. Needless to say when they had a lover’s quarrel, they usually had it on my portion of neutral fire- escape. Drama Galore! When I moved into that apartment there was a huge demonic circle (as my neighbor called it)dead in the center of the studio apartment. I didn’t place a carpet over it nor try to erase it. My counselor/neighbor suggested we try to see if it was a portal to some parallel-dimension. She bought by phenol barbitol to aide in the transport. She was a rich girl from conneticut into recreational drug use, but me and her boyfriend grew up watching people like her invade our slums for this purpose. We knew that drugs for sport always ended up as another junkie statistic.

Anyway I ended up with a boyfriend of my own (minus the drama) and the apartment worked out fine until I let some jealous friends watch it for me while I visited relatives in the poconos for a week. They tried to torch place and I got thrown out.

My favorite chinese restaurant was located on Catherine Street between Henry and East Broadway. Every Wednesday this tiny place was filled with only New Yorkers. My favorite dish was chinese vegetables with rice noodles.