I write often about my neighborhood. Sure, we always hear about Astoria being “Greektown USA” and the central focal point of New York City’s Greek community.
And again, sure– the cliches are there… The dancing Zorbas, the kitschy Greek key writing that has been now forever immortalized in My Big Fat Greek Wedding— even transforming the Greek sigma into an epsilon… but anyways, who’s talking about “minor” details like that?
I walked to the bank yesterday… Just a few blocks down Crescent Street, to 24th Avenue and onto 31st Street to the Ditmars Boulevard station. A Greek flag on someone’s mailbox led me to pay closer attention to my walk… And everywhere, beyond the kitsch, I realized more and more just how Greek my neighborhood really is. I hope you enjoy my walk to the bank, where I needed to go and order some temporary checks because I had run out.
Incidentally, as my (Greek) banker walked away to the printer, he asked me if I wanted my “addressa” printed on the “tsekia.”
Θέλεις την αντρέσσα απάνω στα τσέκια? He asked me.
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This was my neighborhood in the middle of Chelsea where I grew up in New York City.
http://www.bournias.net/personal/places/25th-street-and-8th-avenue-in-chelsea.html
It was truly a mixture of cultures that are captured in the photographs.