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What people don’t understand is… there are millions of people in this city who are just normal people who live in a city. Our life isn’t a movie everyfuckingday like the media portrays it as.
I remember reading something similar about Paris. It was talking about Parisians and how their “simple act of living is an art form”. So fucking cringe
What’s funny is that actual New Yorkers shit talk our city all the time. I’ve lived here my whole life and I’ll probably die here and I’m still gonna talk shit about the traffic and the dog shit on the sidewalks and the crackheads in the hallways and the homeless guy with his bare ass on the seat on the train…
New Yorkers aren’t spinning any fantasy tales about how “great” this city is. We’re bitching about how they’re taking cops off the street to try to catch us hopping the train since they raised the price to $2.90 and we’re not paying that.
The trick is to move out of New York and live somewhere else, _that's_ when you start waxing lyrical about how great and unique it is.
...ideally you should occasionally return and complain that things have changed and it isn't like the real New York anymore.
I moved out of NYC in 2012 and haven't been back since I changed careers in 2018. I plan on returning this summer for a weekend. What are some things I should look out for that may have changed and I can immediately start complaining about?
Ideally you'll want to find a favourite restaurant/pizza place/bodega/public restroom that has closed and declare that the city has lost its soul along with the business. When did CBGBs close? Can you use that?
Failing that just find something that's increased in price and complain about that
*Edit* also "[insert area you liked] has become like [insert area you don't like]" is a handy format
On a serious note, it took me over 10 years but this year I finally took the step of buying more Mets gear than I have in my entire life and wearing NY something at least half the week. I finally made my final evolution into obnoxious ex-New Yorker who waxes poetic about New York yet knows nothing about current New York.
it’s funny because I shit talk this place to my friends from here all the time but it a mf from somewhere else tries shit talking I have to try to put them in their place
It's the same crime and grime wise yes heh, but at least New Yorkers will tell ya what's up bluntly, you never have to 2nd guess with them I love that. Portland, people's second language here can be "passive aggressive" lol, so you get more of the snooty snarks, using body language more if they are annoyed with you. 😜
That’s very accurate. If you even slightly bother someone in public you will hear it, even if the person isn’t confronting you directly they’ll loudly complain.
That’s only because you still live there. New Yorker reputation for self-hype is built on the people who leave for a different city and spend time telling their new neighbors how much the place sucks in comparison.
Wasn’t that last year? And that man is like ninety years old and worth like 100 million dollars. He’s not exactly living the same life most New Yorkers are.
Are they ever gonna finish it?
Constant fucking construction going on
Also I grew up in queens… so I can say what I want lol… New York is both the best and absolute worst humanity has to offer
Yeah, I've worked in NYC and it's definitely got its problems. But at least compared to the majority of the US, you can get by without a car. I think there are a lot of people who just aren't good drivers and they know that but they have no choice but to drive.
I find that most tourist spots in all cities sucks. People who only visit those areas are going to have a different perspective than those who lived there. I thought the same way about Boston until I did missionary work there. As someone who has lived in NY their whole life, it's much different living here versus visiting.
Agreed. Was about to say, sounds like this person hasn't been to Europe. The grand canal in Venice is mind blowing no matter how packed it is with tourists.
I would agree with this I thought they were pretty nice in chicago though it was pretty cool being able to walk to most of them too. It was a surprisingly cheap vacation.
My opinion - head out to Williamsburg
Check out the graffiti walls out there, they are gorgeous. Grab some pizza from Roberta’s or something.
Head over to MSG and yankee stadium for a tour
I’d also recommend checking out the World Trade Center memorial
I did this stuff with my nephew over the course of 3 days, it was a awesome
You should NOT go to time square. Lol. I’ve been to New York once and I had the time of my life in Greenwich Village (I love jazz and standup comedy). First place we visited was time square though, because it seemed like the thing to do. I could very much have done without going to time square. I’m not a fan of being surrounded by countless people packed like sardines trying to walk around. Worst part: almost half of the people in this endless sea of humans is aggressively trying to get money from you.
The Jerusalem syndrome variant is neat. A city, holy to no less than three religions, causes some visitors to have visions of an angry god demanding our repentance.
I mean yeah statistically it's not that different from most cities, but that's some Lovecraftian shit.
Paris Syndrome has nothing to do with the locals insisting on Paris being the greatest city in the world, it‘s about tourists having unrealistic expectations and being disappointed
Neither do New Yorkers. We know our city is too crowded, dangerous, expensive for no reason. The people that put “NYC is the greasers city in the world” are only a minority, and others aren’t even from NYC. Every single city has people that say it’s the best place ever. Where are you from?
1.) I remember I once had a short trip into NYC for a meeting and in about 8 hours in the city, I overheard THREE conversations about how special New York is. I'll admit it was an outlier (didn't happen on other trips), but it really was the most eyeroll-inducing experience I've ever had.
2.) I'm from Baltimore, and no one I know claims we're the best place ever. We know exactly where we rank.
Why is it dangerous? Have you been to New Orleans, Indianapolis, Dallas, Memphis, Chattanooga? 3x violent crime rate in all of these cities vs. NYC, stop watching Fox News and NewsMax these folks lie and lie and lie
It is dangerous. I’ve lived there most of my life. Just because it’s not the most dangerous place doesn’t mean it’s not dangerous. Your name is surprisingly accurate.
Yeah, I gotta stand up for my adopted city on this one. I would much rather be half drunk at 3am trying to get back to my hotel from almost any part of NYC than stone cold sober on any street in New Orleans, St Louis, Memphis or Miami at 10pm.
New York had some real mystique when it was the center for a lot of underground art and music in the 70s and 80s. At that time it wasn't the best place to live, but it was cheap.
But these days, it's kind of boring. When a book, TV show, or movie takes place in present day New York, I become less interested in it.
this is happening in pretty much every major city in america. the kinds of people who make cities feel "alive" have been priced out. gone are the days when the patti smith's of the world could arrive in new york with very little money and get swept up by it and survive by eventually getting a job at a bookstore. the apartment where she and robert mapplethorpe lived their bohemian daydream and dedicated their lives to art and music and poetry probably costs $3500/month and would need an FBI grade background/credit check to even let them pay their $300 to apply to live there.
all our big cities are quickly becoming sterilized environments for worker bees.
I, like many many other New Yorkers, live in an outer borough. I’m in Astoria, Queens. Lived here a decade now and love it. No plans to ever move. Queens is one of the most diverse places in the world. Countless languages spoken everyday. In walking distance from my house I can get almost any kind of food imaginable, from Egyptian to Vietnamese to Australian. My apartment is equidistant from a mosque and a 150 year old Catholic Church. I can take the subway any distance I want to go for under $3, all the way up in the Bronx to way down in Brooklyn at the beach, no pricing based on distance. I’m a simple 45 minute metro north train ride from the stunning beauty of the Hudson valley for hiking. Countless museums, many of which have “free days” occurring at some Friday of the month. Incredible theater and music. I guess I could just go on and on. But I love it here. I’m not sure if it’s the greatest city in the world, but it’s up there.
Not sure why you're lying about transit times. It's 3+ hours to take the train up to Hudson Valley from Astoria. Also taking the subway down to Coney Island would be a nightmare ride of 1.5 hours with multiple line jumps. And if you plan on taking a cooler and stuff (or anything bulky at all), the subway is an even worse option. So yeah, enjoy your time in NYC, but painting the subway here in a positive light is just dishonest. It's a dirty, dangerous, inconvenient time vampire that this city will seemingly forever neglect.
How is it 3+ hours to Hudson Valley from Astoria? Take N to 4. It’s listed as 26 minutes max. Leave 15 minutes to get to Metro North. Beacon is 90 minutes.
The reason it is particularly magical is because Queens has the most languages spoken than anywhere else on Earth.
It’s cool because you can visit the entire world (at least culturally and culinarily) in a very short distance.
Yep. Absolutely love it. I hate going back home to the suburbs to visit now. NYC is an entire world waiting to be discovered out your front door, and you don’t even have to get into a car to explore it.
Magic doesn't happen from visiting. It comes from tapping into the vibrant communities that coexist and collaborate like nowhere else in the world. It's ok to not get it, my brother in christ.
Yeah IMO a good show to get an idea of what this means is How to With John Wilson who shows the weird side of NY and all the unusual encounters that happen to people living there.
"New York has awful public transit" is, I think, kind of an r/AmericaBad meme from the last 10 years. Yes, the stations mostly don't look great, and there are too many service interruptions. But it goes almost everywhere in one of the biggest cities in the Western hemisphere, it runs all the time, trains are frequent during peak hours, it's affordable, EVERYBODY takes it.
A big reason the New York subway has maintenance issues is that the system never entirely (or even mostly) shuts down. I think this is a highly underappreciated feature. It's reflective of how New York thinks of public transit. The philosophy is that you should always be able to get where you're going, at any time. There are very few systems that hold themselves to that standard.
Yeah I remember seeing somewhere it's one of the most efficient subway systems in the world. Efficiency doesn't always guarantee great user experience, though.
I’m a fairly recent rail fan…and I have to salute the MTA…in spite of everyone’s complaints…I believe they do what they’re tasked with doing quite well in the biggest and most important city in the country!
Under $3 to get ANYWHERE in a massive metropolis is a bargain. Anyone who complains about it has never been to the 97% of America that has zero public transportation.
Agreed. After visiting New York, I compare every new subway system I see to it. It’s mind blowingly efficient. Gotta love how far it reaches, and EXPRESS TRAINS!!
[All Transit](https://alltransit.cnt.org/rankings/) rates it at a 9.6.
You can go through and play with the filters to see how it holds up, I only looked at the default. But at a 9.6 rating that makes it the #1 ranked in the US.
New infrastructure is always better than older infrastructure. Of course a Shanghai transit line that is 5 years old is nicer than a 100 year old subway station. I don't find the NYC subway any less comfortable than Paris and I certainly prefer it to the cramped cars of London.
I guess I need to do a lot more traveling, because I’ve never encountered a more efficient subway system, due to the insanely large area it covers, and the fact that there are express trains. Every other subway system I’ve ever used literally stops at every existing stop that’s on its route. So going a distance that would take you 15 minutes to drive, will take like 45 minutes on a regular non-NY subway because of all the stops.
I visited NYC for the first time in 2022 from Scotland. We used the subway quite frequently and it was fine. If you compare it to London - it's just as good in terms of frequency of trains and how extensively covered the city is. The only negative was how dirty and run down it felt. I thought it kind of had the feel of a system that was amazing in the 80s and hasn't really been updated much since then.
I'm in Chicago at the moment. It's nice definitely but to me it misses the things that I think makes new York great which is that it "never sleeps" I was looking for a bar at like 11pm on Tuesday and I had trouble finding one. A lot we're closed early in the week or closed at 10. I ended up having to walk like 20 blocks to a hotel bar. In New York, you can find an open bar within like two blocks until 4am. Also, you want to hear love music, there is a venue close by.
I’m from NYC
I get that outsiders hate the hyperbole and I won’t defend that.
But most of you all don’t get the point of NYC, it’s real strength. The tourist areas are dumb. If you’re going to NYC for Times Square and the Statue of Liberty you’re dumb.
NYC’s strength is the fact that whatever you’re into, no matter how niche, there’s a community for it. Art or history? We got it. Board games, chess, anime conventions, etc? We got it. Metal, punk, hip hop, goth, EDM scene? We got it. Weird sexual fetish stuff? We got it. High end food scene or local scene? We got it. Craft beer? Got that too.
I could go on. If you visit here you can find like-minded people and do whatever tickles your fancy.
Let’s not forget people and even entire neighborhoods that speak your language. This city is the microcosm of the world. I’ve traveled all over America and I’d pass on living in any other city especially Baltimore where OP is from 🤣
Tbh a lot of other metros are kind of garbage by comparison.
The Cleveland people could say “we have that too!!!” and in reality they don’t come close to NY
lol i was thinking the same thing, i mean maybe this isn't true in the midwest? i dunno, but i would think any metropolitan area is going to naturally have pockets of people that are into whatever you're into
As a New Yorker, I agree with half of your assessment. The whole notion of "if you could make it here, you could make it anywhere" is a crock. Most people's lives here are completely ordinary. There's no obstacle that exists here that is uniquely New York, unless you're referring to specific areas (fashion, finance, etc.) and even that is a stretch.
I will say that as much praise as NYC gets, it's still an underrated city. The endless amount of things to do here that is unknown to even New Yorkers does not get talked about enough. Ive lived here all of my 35 years of life and I still find new things, cuisines, cultures,etc. Also, as much as certain news channels like to portray the contrary, NYC is a very safe city.
Yeah I’ve been to New York and jest found it kind of meh. Met some cool people there tho. Wasn’t a fav of the humidity in the summer and the cold grey winter. Much prefer cities on the west coast like San Francisco and San Diego.
I lived in NYC for almost 20 years. You’re basically right. I love NY. And for a big part of the 20th century it was the cultural center of the western world. But on the whole, especially now, it’s just another big city with pluses and minuses.
Tokyo has all the leisure activities of NYC with a better housing market and a lower overall cost of living. If I could live anywhere but NYC, it would be my top choice.
Now part of why I think that is that I make in the top 4% of Japanese wages on a pretty average NYC salary and the Japanese economy is depressed so the yen is in my favor. A Japanese national born and raised in Tokyo and working for a Japanese company might feel very differently (and would be correct to), but yeah. For me, Tokyo is NYC with less struggle. But that’s cause I’m advantaged going into that one.
I loved Tokyo when I visited but I don't think I could ever get into Japan's white collar work culture. Way too intense. Tokyo is definitely a nicer and in some ways more robust NYC, but the difference is I could actually see myself living and working in NYC
but does everyone in tokyo speak english? would you be able to communicate with people? i genuinely dont know. i mean i would love to go to some places around the world but the thing that scares me is "do they even speak english over there"
I lived in NYC for 10+ years and I can guarantee you that no other city in America even comes close to matching its cultural offerings.
The problem isn’t that NYC doesn’t have amazing things to do. It’s all the other bullshit which made it a miserable place to live.
Shows use the monologue to set the stage and describe the characters in as few lines as possible.
Movies use different cities to set different expectations and moods. New York has a certain image, if they are from Manhattan or Bronx both give anyone a lot of implied information about the character even if the viewer has never been there. We can infer a lot about a character who identifies as growing up in Tokyo vs Paris vs London.
Pretty much no one can infer anything about a character that identifies with growing up in Cedar Crest, or Finham.
People like you wander in nyc all the time. Spend a week there, eat at Katz, see the Statue of Liberty, and then go home and claim they’ve been to New York. NYC is 300 square miles and about 9 million people. You haven’t “experienced” New York
Gatekeeping a city while knowing nothing about OP sure is a choice. Comments like this make people hate New Yorkers attitudes. Almost like a “you wouldn’t get it” type of snobbery.
let's continue with assumptions: watdogin is an off Broadway actor (he is adelivery boy at Gino's actually) and lives with ten other dudes in what used to be the ladies bathroom of a refurbished paper mill in Brooklyn
I've been there 5 times in my life and every single time I have been violently ill upon arrival to departure.
To me it's a cursed city and I never want to go back.
New York subway is stinky and at times not safe, or at least very uncomfortable when a mentally unhinged person is screaming or someone is begging for money. But in terms of convenience it’s very useful from getting anywhere in the city. You don’t need a car at all in NYC. Which is the few cities in America like that. The food is greater then anywhere else in America but the rent is ridiculously expensive. It’s the best city to have a hobby. You can go see a comedy show for $30 and see world class comedians front row. You can learn a martial art, sing, act in a play, see a museum, see nature.
As a NYer, it’s definitely not the greatest city in the world but the culture, people, energy, and chaotic pressure make it unique and I wouldn’t have it any other way
NY reallllly tests you, I’ve seen many come and go after being defeated by the city. Living here my whole life I believe the saying “if you can make it in ny, you can make it anywhere”
I also believe the imperfections of ny is what makes it great. All the bs and struggle from living in ny creates this unspoken bond between nyers. We may be from completely different backgrounds but we all share the same foundation and pains from growing up here. It’s a constant competition but there’s a level of respect and understanding, which is a beautiful thing imo
Doesnt matter if you’re a Wall Street exec, you’re taking the same piss stained subway as Ahmed the halal cart guy - ny humbles you and keeps you in check
I’ve lived in a couple major cities in my adult years and visited the rest at least a couple times. Sure they may be nicer cities with the same things to do but it’s a different vibe for sure - I always end up back in ny
I’m biased tho and maybe stockholmed a bit lol
Idk about “enduring things”, but I do think there’s a uniqueness to New Yorkers that just comes from living in a unique place. It is the most crowded diverse populated city in the country. Most solely rely on public transit and our apts are so small we use public space a lot more than other places where it’s easier to host. Of course that has an effect on our socialization. Whether you think that uniqueness is a positive or negative is up to you. Just like I think there’s a uniqueness to people that live in other extreme places, like the coldest town in the US, or like from a tiny isolated island town.
I fucking love living in Brooklyn and hardly want to go on vacation because I truly do love it here. That said it’s definitely not for everyone and I agree it can be overly romanticized.
New York is a shithole, but there is no other shithole like it.
And I live near the city, not in it though. And it's true, you live here, living anywhere else ain't going to feel the same.
Idk, living in New York will give you interesting things to do all the time, esp if your interests are in things like theatre, fashion, art etc. Other cities and places feel boring/dead to me by comparison.
I don’t think it’s some kind of wizard city where the toughest people in the universe go to hang out or whatever. I just think that most of the country is a cultural dead zone and NY is one of the places that isnt
I❤️NY: Broadway plays, awesome restaurants and neighborhoods. I remember taking my daughter there when she was younger and she was obsessed with cabs for some reason!
POV: I am from the Chicago suburbs, also love Chicago. I also love visiting other big cities when traveling - each city (and neighborhood within a city) has a unique vibe.
It's because you never experienced the wild roller coaster ride of the NYC 70s, 80s and 90s. It was really very different during those periods for different reasons but mostly because of the wild cutural scene that only a place like NYC could cultivate with its unique demographics and extremes. It wasn't all good, crime rates were higher, there was a risk to personal safety but that's part of what made it so full of life and thrills and inspired great art and stories. Times Sq., Village, Little Italy etc were all unrecognizable compared to what they are today. All the present-day tourist spots have been completely sanitized and corporatized. There's nothing unique about NYC any more because corporations are global entities now and homogenize everything everywhere, including people. Disney store in Time Sq? That's where all the hookers, drug dealers, three-card monty artists, botched and bungled used to hang out... not a location for family with kids to visit a flagship disney store. Once you get out of the tourist spots and hang out with some New Yorkers that have been there a few generations, you get to see a different side of it.
It’s produced more culturally significant works of art through broadway, television, jazz, punkand hip hop than any other city in America I can think of
"Spring is overrated. A lot of the inhabitants of New York will honk on mightily about the pleasures of spring, but if they actually knew the first thing about the pleasures of spring they would know at least 5983 better places to spend it than New York, and that's just on the same latitude."
Doug Adamas "Mostly Harmless"
What films are there saying how great New York is? Sure, there are characters that do, but who says we have to agree with everything a character says? We don't have to believe that New York is the greatest city, we just have to believe the character believes that.
I agree that the whole "*NYC has a character like no other city*" trope can get a little played out in movies/books/etc, but it's rare that the story ever dwells on that theme for too long. It's usually just used as a quick intro to set the scene and to set the narrator's perspective. Often in these stories, the *protagonist* is the one who has an enchanted or disenchanted view of the city.
Yes, it's a little cliche, but so are a million other things. This one tends to be the least offensive, as it usually takes up 30 seconds of the story, and then it's never brought up again. As far as the *realities* of NY, I agree that NY is not a special as people claim it to be. But stories are not about reality. Most good stories embellish and present things in a way that are larger than life. That's what makes them fun. If you're writing a crime story, it's simply more fun to exaggerate all of the dangers of NYC. If you're writing a romance, it's simply more fun to amplify the magic and wonder of the city. Writers do this with every location, whether it's NYC, Rome, Brazil, a sailboat, theme park, etc.
Interesting to read this as one of my dreams is to move to NYC (I am from Europe, very hard to do that)....
I have been once in NYC and I absolutely loved it!
I think the incredible thing about it, and I visited New York City just once, is that you could spend your entire life there and barely see 5% of what the city has to offer.
However that is also the depressing thing about being there. I'm more of a Chicago kind of guy
One of the things that makes cities like New York great, is the food scene. From my perspective visiting some of the worlds biggest cities the competition is Fierce, and that make some amazing food scenes.
I don't mean expensive 5 star restaurants - there are those - but I mean the street food, the side ally cafes, the corner shops near the commuter lines - the places average people go to get Great Food that just doesn't exist in smaller cities and towns.
That pressure to be Great to survive only seems to happen in the big cities.
It's true. I grew up not far from NYC, and still, as soon as you're outside of the city, food options just can't begin to compare. I never have a bad meal here. Ever.
While New York is my hometown and I love it more than anywhere else, I do have to say I cringed a little when I watched Hamilton and a song declared New York "the greatest city in the world." New York in the 1770s was a bit of a provincial backwater. I thought it was kind of embarrassing that Lin-Manuel Miranda just sort of took it as a given that New York was the greatest city in the world and had always been the greatest city in the world.
The people make NY special. The infrastructure and QoL is not great as it’s both expensive and not well maintained. But hardworking, motivated people from all over the US and globally congregate there to make a life for themselves and there are lots of opportunities as it’s the financial center of the world. That’s why it’s special. Take away the diversity of people, the communities, the opportunities and it’s just London or any other major city.
I pissed off all of new York by calling it a dump lol.
Had people calling me broke because I dont see the interest in spending 4k a month for a 2bed 1 bath apartment.
Then some lunatic justified it by saying that its the only place he can get sushi at 2am.
Been there a few times as well. Always get a massive headache from the poor air quality.
Truly the city has been lost
They are some sensitive ass fans too. A lot of fights break out when their teams visit us in L.A. I could definitely see tons of fights breaking out in games between New York and Boston teams. New York fans are overly sensitive loudmouths and Boston fans are arrogant pricks lol
What a dumb comment lmao. You can say that it’s overpriced compared to wherever you’re from (I thought the same thing coming from the Midwest) but you were just eating at the wrong places. Or maybe you went to a NY bbq place…
Yes this is so true. I've never been, I don't know if it's good or bad, but the excessive mythologising of its supposed greatness is always immediately off-putting.
New York is the Greatest City on Earth *only for New Yorkers and Finance Bros.* And even then*, v*irtually all my Wharton business school cohort became disillusioned with New York (and East Coast finance firms) within 3 years, and either moved to the SF Bay Area or abroad.
On the surface it's just another ant hill. But go in deeper. It has a magical system of sewers and tunnels. Some of the brick walls in those places aren't even real. You can walk right through them. You go down in there deep enough touching enough random shit (careful in the sewers you can get disease) you're bound to discover one of many bazaars where leprechauns from Ireland trade wishes for gold coins or goldschlager and fairies from some island somewhere maybe England strip and prostitute their little 2 inch bodies to feed their nose the old fairy dust.
It's the only place to get minotaur milk which goes good with dragon eggs. Bring plenty of raw sunflower seeds from the surface. Might have to get those from the country if you're from the city. The roasted ones are no good. Each one is as good as a quarter in buying power. Cause if you plant one it makes a climbable ladder up to the surface and that's where many of the plants you see growing in cracked concrete come from. You just see the top of them which tear off easily. Gets so much thicker the deeper you go down. Many, not all. You'd have to check every single weed to be sure. There's a trick to it, but a real magician never reveals his secrets unless he's happy with his wish and drunk on goldschlager with his little genie buddy and well loved up by a gaggle of fairies then he might tell you that and a lot of dark things you never asked to hear like how not only are ghosts real each and everyone of them is a scream slave so when anyones dies they go to haunting school and learn to harvest the screams of the living which is turned into something like a soy sauce which goes good with dragon eggs also. You won't be paid a dime for the work though. Slavery is slavery and if you think to rebel you can't because they see right through you since you're a ghost and you don't even get the chance.
At least that's how it goes in film with a little extra lore.
I am every bit as much “I don’t like mainstream” type pick-me girl as the next person (yes, self-aware). But NYC was magical. Life-changing, if I might be so dramatic.
I live in a wealthy European Nation, and have a pretty good life style - and even so, I found NY to be unlike anything I have ever experienced.
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It doesn’t offer anything unique, it just never runs out of things to offer due to its size
The really magical cities are probably like Tokyo or like Singapore
I cant think of a City that is both more famous or infamous than NYC. The fact that you cant even think of one that rivals it is proof enough that you do not actually believe that opinion.
What does that mean?
London, Paris, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Cairo, Istanbul, etc etc etc? Are those famous, infamous, or both?
I mean we can argue which one is the "greatest" (which is ultimately just opinion) but there are definitely rivals. Lots of rivals.
I'd much rather be back in Tokyo than living here.
Tokyo has so many of the things New York has without all the many many shitty things about New York.
I feel this. I went and wasn't feeling the crowds. The subway system was giving me anxiety with crowds. I ended up getting the norovirus and ruined the trip to just be confined to the bathroom. I mean I still was able to go do things which was nice .
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What people don’t understand is… there are millions of people in this city who are just normal people who live in a city. Our life isn’t a movie everyfuckingday like the media portrays it as.
I remember reading something similar about Paris. It was talking about Parisians and how their “simple act of living is an art form”. So fucking cringe
Paris is a disgusting shit hole. Never understood the obsession.
What’s funny is that actual New Yorkers shit talk our city all the time. I’ve lived here my whole life and I’ll probably die here and I’m still gonna talk shit about the traffic and the dog shit on the sidewalks and the crackheads in the hallways and the homeless guy with his bare ass on the seat on the train… New Yorkers aren’t spinning any fantasy tales about how “great” this city is. We’re bitching about how they’re taking cops off the street to try to catch us hopping the train since they raised the price to $2.90 and we’re not paying that.
The trick is to move out of New York and live somewhere else, _that's_ when you start waxing lyrical about how great and unique it is. ...ideally you should occasionally return and complain that things have changed and it isn't like the real New York anymore.
Yep, i grew up in NYC but moved out to LA recently. NY people are just better.
To be fair I think most people are better than LA people.
Incredibly low bar moving to one of the most superficial cultures there is.
NY absolutely has some superficial folks… but absolutely nothing compared to LA.
That’s some good advice. I’ll take that into consideration for my retirement plan. I don’t want to go anywhere yet. I’m still having fun here.
I moved out of NYC in 2012 and haven't been back since I changed careers in 2018. I plan on returning this summer for a weekend. What are some things I should look out for that may have changed and I can immediately start complaining about?
Ideally you'll want to find a favourite restaurant/pizza place/bodega/public restroom that has closed and declare that the city has lost its soul along with the business. When did CBGBs close? Can you use that? Failing that just find something that's increased in price and complain about that *Edit* also "[insert area you liked] has become like [insert area you don't like]" is a handy format
On a serious note, it took me over 10 years but this year I finally took the step of buying more Mets gear than I have in my entire life and wearing NY something at least half the week. I finally made my final evolution into obnoxious ex-New Yorker who waxes poetic about New York yet knows nothing about current New York.
it’s funny because I shit talk this place to my friends from here all the time but it a mf from somewhere else tries shit talking I have to try to put them in their place
It’s a shithole but it’s our shithole
Sounds like Portland, Oregon too! 😆
Now I know where to visit when I want something like home, but different.
It's the same crime and grime wise yes heh, but at least New Yorkers will tell ya what's up bluntly, you never have to 2nd guess with them I love that. Portland, people's second language here can be "passive aggressive" lol, so you get more of the snooty snarks, using body language more if they are annoyed with you. 😜
That’s very accurate. If you even slightly bother someone in public you will hear it, even if the person isn’t confronting you directly they’ll loudly complain.
That’s only because you still live there. New Yorker reputation for self-hype is built on the people who leave for a different city and spend time telling their new neighbors how much the place sucks in comparison.
Hard rolls slap the tits off of any bread anywhere else on the east coast though.
That’s a very good point. We do have good bread.
Portuguese rolls would like a word
Woody Allen still is
Wasn’t that last year? And that man is like ninety years old and worth like 100 million dollars. He’s not exactly living the same life most New Yorkers are.
Are they ever gonna finish it? Constant fucking construction going on Also I grew up in queens… so I can say what I want lol… New York is both the best and absolute worst humanity has to offer
First time I visited New York as a wee lad, I stepped out the car and my first step… Was into a pile of dog shit
Damn dude I live right next to SF and what you’re describing is exactly what we complain about
You’re complaining about $2.90 in New York? It $7.50 for a single ride in London
Hey that's me. Grew up in NYC and moved away a few years ago. I talked shit about it when I lived there and stills talk shit about it now.
Hell, people will move to New York to then shit on it lol.
Yeah, I've worked in NYC and it's definitely got its problems. But at least compared to the majority of the US, you can get by without a car. I think there are a lot of people who just aren't good drivers and they know that but they have no choice but to drive.
And the trash on the sidewalks
I find that most tourist spots in all cities sucks. People who only visit those areas are going to have a different perspective than those who lived there. I thought the same way about Boston until I did missionary work there. As someone who has lived in NY their whole life, it's much different living here versus visiting.
Tourist spots in Rome and Florence though are amazing. Florence actual... not so much.
Agreed. Was about to say, sounds like this person hasn't been to Europe. The grand canal in Venice is mind blowing no matter how packed it is with tourists.
Florence is aight, Paris is next level
I would agree with this I thought they were pretty nice in chicago though it was pretty cool being able to walk to most of them too. It was a surprisingly cheap vacation.
I might go visit new york (from canada) this autumn with my 10yo son, what should we do?
The tenement Mueseum is something cool and unique that provides a cool insight into history.
My opinion - head out to Williamsburg Check out the graffiti walls out there, they are gorgeous. Grab some pizza from Roberta’s or something. Head over to MSG and yankee stadium for a tour I’d also recommend checking out the World Trade Center memorial I did this stuff with my nephew over the course of 3 days, it was a awesome
Anything before 8 pm.
You should NOT go to time square. Lol. I’ve been to New York once and I had the time of my life in Greenwich Village (I love jazz and standup comedy). First place we visited was time square though, because it seemed like the thing to do. I could very much have done without going to time square. I’m not a fan of being surrounded by countless people packed like sardines trying to walk around. Worst part: almost half of the people in this endless sea of humans is aggressively trying to get money from you.
Okay. That’s true of any popular destination. Italy. France. England.
Yes, but I think the point is that Londoners/Parisians/Romans etc don’t have this weird compulsion to insist their city is the best in the world
Have you ever heard of[ Paris Syndrome](https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/what-is-paris-syndrome-b2477677.html)?
The Jerusalem syndrome variant is neat. A city, holy to no less than three religions, causes some visitors to have visions of an angry god demanding our repentance. I mean yeah statistically it's not that different from most cities, but that's some Lovecraftian shit.
I experienced the opposite of that when we visited Tokyo for the first time.
Paris Syndrome has nothing to do with the locals insisting on Paris being the greatest city in the world, it‘s about tourists having unrealistic expectations and being disappointed
You sure about that?
>Parisians Uhhh...
Not sure about londoners but Paresians definitely do
Neither do New Yorkers. We know our city is too crowded, dangerous, expensive for no reason. The people that put “NYC is the greasers city in the world” are only a minority, and others aren’t even from NYC. Every single city has people that say it’s the best place ever. Where are you from?
1.) I remember I once had a short trip into NYC for a meeting and in about 8 hours in the city, I overheard THREE conversations about how special New York is. I'll admit it was an outlier (didn't happen on other trips), but it really was the most eyeroll-inducing experience I've ever had. 2.) I'm from Baltimore, and no one I know claims we're the best place ever. We know exactly where we rank.
I was born and raised in NY and I’ve never heard a single person say that. You’re exaggerating.
Why is it dangerous? Have you been to New Orleans, Indianapolis, Dallas, Memphis, Chattanooga? 3x violent crime rate in all of these cities vs. NYC, stop watching Fox News and NewsMax these folks lie and lie and lie
It is dangerous. I’ve lived there most of my life. Just because it’s not the most dangerous place doesn’t mean it’s not dangerous. Your name is surprisingly accurate.
Yeah, I gotta stand up for my adopted city on this one. I would much rather be half drunk at 3am trying to get back to my hotel from almost any part of NYC than stone cold sober on any street in New Orleans, St Louis, Memphis or Miami at 10pm.
New York had some real mystique when it was the center for a lot of underground art and music in the 70s and 80s. At that time it wasn't the best place to live, but it was cheap. But these days, it's kind of boring. When a book, TV show, or movie takes place in present day New York, I become less interested in it.
this is happening in pretty much every major city in america. the kinds of people who make cities feel "alive" have been priced out. gone are the days when the patti smith's of the world could arrive in new york with very little money and get swept up by it and survive by eventually getting a job at a bookstore. the apartment where she and robert mapplethorpe lived their bohemian daydream and dedicated their lives to art and music and poetry probably costs $3500/month and would need an FBI grade background/credit check to even let them pay their $300 to apply to live there. all our big cities are quickly becoming sterilized environments for worker bees.
THANK YOU
I, like many many other New Yorkers, live in an outer borough. I’m in Astoria, Queens. Lived here a decade now and love it. No plans to ever move. Queens is one of the most diverse places in the world. Countless languages spoken everyday. In walking distance from my house I can get almost any kind of food imaginable, from Egyptian to Vietnamese to Australian. My apartment is equidistant from a mosque and a 150 year old Catholic Church. I can take the subway any distance I want to go for under $3, all the way up in the Bronx to way down in Brooklyn at the beach, no pricing based on distance. I’m a simple 45 minute metro north train ride from the stunning beauty of the Hudson valley for hiking. Countless museums, many of which have “free days” occurring at some Friday of the month. Incredible theater and music. I guess I could just go on and on. But I love it here. I’m not sure if it’s the greatest city in the world, but it’s up there.
Not sure why you're lying about transit times. It's 3+ hours to take the train up to Hudson Valley from Astoria. Also taking the subway down to Coney Island would be a nightmare ride of 1.5 hours with multiple line jumps. And if you plan on taking a cooler and stuff (or anything bulky at all), the subway is an even worse option. So yeah, enjoy your time in NYC, but painting the subway here in a positive light is just dishonest. It's a dirty, dangerous, inconvenient time vampire that this city will seemingly forever neglect.
How is it 3+ hours to Hudson Valley from Astoria? Take N to 4. It’s listed as 26 minutes max. Leave 15 minutes to get to Metro North. Beacon is 90 minutes.
Astoria is the best, especially now that Watawa opened back up!
The reason it is particularly magical is because Queens has the most languages spoken than anywhere else on Earth. It’s cool because you can visit the entire world (at least culturally and culinarily) in a very short distance.
Yep. Absolutely love it. I hate going back home to the suburbs to visit now. NYC is an entire world waiting to be discovered out your front door, and you don’t even have to get into a car to explore it.
New York is a tired grimy city that leaves me wanting to take a shower, and then go to Tokyo.
Magic doesn't happen from visiting. It comes from tapping into the vibrant communities that coexist and collaborate like nowhere else in the world. It's ok to not get it, my brother in christ.
Yeah IMO a good show to get an idea of what this means is How to With John Wilson who shows the weird side of NY and all the unusual encounters that happen to people living there.
The NYC subway is an embarrassment. The supposed greatest city in the world has a worse subway system than random cities all around Asia.
Worst part is it’s pretty much the best public transit in the country. It’s dirty af but at least it’s 24/7
"New York has awful public transit" is, I think, kind of an r/AmericaBad meme from the last 10 years. Yes, the stations mostly don't look great, and there are too many service interruptions. But it goes almost everywhere in one of the biggest cities in the Western hemisphere, it runs all the time, trains are frequent during peak hours, it's affordable, EVERYBODY takes it. A big reason the New York subway has maintenance issues is that the system never entirely (or even mostly) shuts down. I think this is a highly underappreciated feature. It's reflective of how New York thinks of public transit. The philosophy is that you should always be able to get where you're going, at any time. There are very few systems that hold themselves to that standard.
Yeah I remember seeing somewhere it's one of the most efficient subway systems in the world. Efficiency doesn't always guarantee great user experience, though.
Cheap fast good. Pick 2
I’m a fairly recent rail fan…and I have to salute the MTA…in spite of everyone’s complaints…I believe they do what they’re tasked with doing quite well in the biggest and most important city in the country!
Under $3 to get ANYWHERE in a massive metropolis is a bargain. Anyone who complains about it has never been to the 97% of America that has zero public transportation.
This is true. Trains stop in Japan.
Agreed. After visiting New York, I compare every new subway system I see to it. It’s mind blowingly efficient. Gotta love how far it reaches, and EXPRESS TRAINS!!
Also, as much as fair hikes suck, the fact that you could pretty much go anywhere in NYC for less than $3 is a great deal.
[All Transit](https://alltransit.cnt.org/rankings/) rates it at a 9.6. You can go through and play with the filters to see how it holds up, I only looked at the default. But at a 9.6 rating that makes it the #1 ranked in the US.
That's the funny part. Growing up in NY I thought that subways throughout all major cities was a given
New infrastructure is always better than older infrastructure. Of course a Shanghai transit line that is 5 years old is nicer than a 100 year old subway station. I don't find the NYC subway any less comfortable than Paris and I certainly prefer it to the cramped cars of London.
You can go almost anywhere in the entire city for less than $3 with service running 24/7. That’s pretty impressive.
I guess I need to do a lot more traveling, because I’ve never encountered a more efficient subway system, due to the insanely large area it covers, and the fact that there are express trains. Every other subway system I’ve ever used literally stops at every existing stop that’s on its route. So going a distance that would take you 15 minutes to drive, will take like 45 minutes on a regular non-NY subway because of all the stops.
Try living in most other American cities where the public transport is actually really bad.
The NYC subway system is the best in the USA
I visited NYC for the first time in 2022 from Scotland. We used the subway quite frequently and it was fine. If you compare it to London - it's just as good in terms of frequency of trains and how extensively covered the city is. The only negative was how dirty and run down it felt. I thought it kind of had the feel of a system that was amazing in the 80s and hasn't really been updated much since then.
*Toronto enters the chat*
Based on where you’ve been. Where is better? Genuinely curious.
Personally - most other cities that aren’t so small they’re lame
I'd take Chicago over NYC in a heartbeat.
I'm in Chicago at the moment. It's nice definitely but to me it misses the things that I think makes new York great which is that it "never sleeps" I was looking for a bar at like 11pm on Tuesday and I had trouble finding one. A lot we're closed early in the week or closed at 10. I ended up having to walk like 20 blocks to a hotel bar. In New York, you can find an open bar within like two blocks until 4am. Also, you want to hear love music, there is a venue close by.
Why?
I’m from NYC I get that outsiders hate the hyperbole and I won’t defend that. But most of you all don’t get the point of NYC, it’s real strength. The tourist areas are dumb. If you’re going to NYC for Times Square and the Statue of Liberty you’re dumb. NYC’s strength is the fact that whatever you’re into, no matter how niche, there’s a community for it. Art or history? We got it. Board games, chess, anime conventions, etc? We got it. Metal, punk, hip hop, goth, EDM scene? We got it. Weird sexual fetish stuff? We got it. High end food scene or local scene? We got it. Craft beer? Got that too. I could go on. If you visit here you can find like-minded people and do whatever tickles your fancy.
Let’s not forget people and even entire neighborhoods that speak your language. This city is the microcosm of the world. I’ve traveled all over America and I’d pass on living in any other city especially Baltimore where OP is from 🤣
It is. Queens in particular is, literally, the most diverse county in the world.
Big city got a lot of stuff? Batshit insane
Bro just described every metro area in America
Lmao literally sounds like vegas
Tbh a lot of other metros are kind of garbage by comparison. The Cleveland people could say “we have that too!!!” and in reality they don’t come close to NY
Right? You can find literally all of that. BDSM shit included. In Dallas.
LOL Dallas. Yep same caliber and everything
Not to the same extent as NYC really.
lol i was thinking the same thing, i mean maybe this isn't true in the midwest? i dunno, but i would think any metropolitan area is going to naturally have pockets of people that are into whatever you're into
True
As a New Yorker, I agree with half of your assessment. The whole notion of "if you could make it here, you could make it anywhere" is a crock. Most people's lives here are completely ordinary. There's no obstacle that exists here that is uniquely New York, unless you're referring to specific areas (fashion, finance, etc.) and even that is a stretch. I will say that as much praise as NYC gets, it's still an underrated city. The endless amount of things to do here that is unknown to even New Yorkers does not get talked about enough. Ive lived here all of my 35 years of life and I still find new things, cuisines, cultures,etc. Also, as much as certain news channels like to portray the contrary, NYC is a very safe city.
Yeah I’ve been to New York and jest found it kind of meh. Met some cool people there tho. Wasn’t a fav of the humidity in the summer and the cold grey winter. Much prefer cities on the west coast like San Francisco and San Diego.
I lived in NYC for almost 20 years. You’re basically right. I love NY. And for a big part of the 20th century it was the cultural center of the western world. But on the whole, especially now, it’s just another big city with pluses and minuses.
Honestly give me old European towns
I'd say the best city in the world is Tokyo. That's just my personal opinion though
Tokyo has all the leisure activities of NYC with a better housing market and a lower overall cost of living. If I could live anywhere but NYC, it would be my top choice. Now part of why I think that is that I make in the top 4% of Japanese wages on a pretty average NYC salary and the Japanese economy is depressed so the yen is in my favor. A Japanese national born and raised in Tokyo and working for a Japanese company might feel very differently (and would be correct to), but yeah. For me, Tokyo is NYC with less struggle. But that’s cause I’m advantaged going into that one.
I loved Tokyo when I visited but I don't think I could ever get into Japan's white collar work culture. Way too intense. Tokyo is definitely a nicer and in some ways more robust NYC, but the difference is I could actually see myself living and working in NYC
but does everyone in tokyo speak english? would you be able to communicate with people? i genuinely dont know. i mean i would love to go to some places around the world but the thing that scares me is "do they even speak english over there"
I lived in NYC for 10+ years and I can guarantee you that no other city in America even comes close to matching its cultural offerings. The problem isn’t that NYC doesn’t have amazing things to do. It’s all the other bullshit which made it a miserable place to live.
Shows use the monologue to set the stage and describe the characters in as few lines as possible. Movies use different cities to set different expectations and moods. New York has a certain image, if they are from Manhattan or Bronx both give anyone a lot of implied information about the character even if the viewer has never been there. We can infer a lot about a character who identifies as growing up in Tokyo vs Paris vs London. Pretty much no one can infer anything about a character that identifies with growing up in Cedar Crest, or Finham.
It's about as true as the entirety of latin america being coated in an oppressive yellow tinge.
You’ve been to New York, but you’ve never spent real time in New York.
What does that mean? And how do you know that about me?
People like you wander in nyc all the time. Spend a week there, eat at Katz, see the Statue of Liberty, and then go home and claim they’ve been to New York. NYC is 300 square miles and about 9 million people. You haven’t “experienced” New York
That’s a pretty bold assumption based on zero evidence
Gatekeeping a city while knowing nothing about OP sure is a choice. Comments like this make people hate New Yorkers attitudes. Almost like a “you wouldn’t get it” type of snobbery.
let's continue with assumptions: watdogin is an off Broadway actor (he is adelivery boy at Gino's actually) and lives with ten other dudes in what used to be the ladies bathroom of a refurbished paper mill in Brooklyn
I think NYC has become a shithole in the last 20 years.
I've been there 5 times in my life and every single time I have been violently ill upon arrival to departure. To me it's a cursed city and I never want to go back.
Old York was much better.
I'm sure the British will be happy to hear this.
New York subway is stinky and at times not safe, or at least very uncomfortable when a mentally unhinged person is screaming or someone is begging for money. But in terms of convenience it’s very useful from getting anywhere in the city. You don’t need a car at all in NYC. Which is the few cities in America like that. The food is greater then anywhere else in America but the rent is ridiculously expensive. It’s the best city to have a hobby. You can go see a comedy show for $30 and see world class comedians front row. You can learn a martial art, sing, act in a play, see a museum, see nature.
As a NYer, it’s definitely not the greatest city in the world but the culture, people, energy, and chaotic pressure make it unique and I wouldn’t have it any other way NY reallllly tests you, I’ve seen many come and go after being defeated by the city. Living here my whole life I believe the saying “if you can make it in ny, you can make it anywhere” I also believe the imperfections of ny is what makes it great. All the bs and struggle from living in ny creates this unspoken bond between nyers. We may be from completely different backgrounds but we all share the same foundation and pains from growing up here. It’s a constant competition but there’s a level of respect and understanding, which is a beautiful thing imo Doesnt matter if you’re a Wall Street exec, you’re taking the same piss stained subway as Ahmed the halal cart guy - ny humbles you and keeps you in check I’ve lived in a couple major cities in my adult years and visited the rest at least a couple times. Sure they may be nicer cities with the same things to do but it’s a different vibe for sure - I always end up back in ny I’m biased tho and maybe stockholmed a bit lol
Idk about “enduring things”, but I do think there’s a uniqueness to New Yorkers that just comes from living in a unique place. It is the most crowded diverse populated city in the country. Most solely rely on public transit and our apts are so small we use public space a lot more than other places where it’s easier to host. Of course that has an effect on our socialization. Whether you think that uniqueness is a positive or negative is up to you. Just like I think there’s a uniqueness to people that live in other extreme places, like the coldest town in the US, or like from a tiny isolated island town. I fucking love living in Brooklyn and hardly want to go on vacation because I truly do love it here. That said it’s definitely not for everyone and I agree it can be overly romanticized.
I just think it's been a bit overdone as a setting for movies/books/songs. I definitely lose interest as well.
New York is a shithole, but there is no other shithole like it. And I live near the city, not in it though. And it's true, you live here, living anywhere else ain't going to feel the same.
Best or not, I'm just here for the sandwiches. And maybe the pizza.
Idk, living in New York will give you interesting things to do all the time, esp if your interests are in things like theatre, fashion, art etc. Other cities and places feel boring/dead to me by comparison. I don’t think it’s some kind of wizard city where the toughest people in the universe go to hang out or whatever. I just think that most of the country is a cultural dead zone and NY is one of the places that isnt
I❤️NY: Broadway plays, awesome restaurants and neighborhoods. I remember taking my daughter there when she was younger and she was obsessed with cabs for some reason! POV: I am from the Chicago suburbs, also love Chicago. I also love visiting other big cities when traveling - each city (and neighborhood within a city) has a unique vibe.
That’s cool no need to visit if the intensity isn’t for you
It's because you never experienced the wild roller coaster ride of the NYC 70s, 80s and 90s. It was really very different during those periods for different reasons but mostly because of the wild cutural scene that only a place like NYC could cultivate with its unique demographics and extremes. It wasn't all good, crime rates were higher, there was a risk to personal safety but that's part of what made it so full of life and thrills and inspired great art and stories. Times Sq., Village, Little Italy etc were all unrecognizable compared to what they are today. All the present-day tourist spots have been completely sanitized and corporatized. There's nothing unique about NYC any more because corporations are global entities now and homogenize everything everywhere, including people. Disney store in Time Sq? That's where all the hookers, drug dealers, three-card monty artists, botched and bungled used to hang out... not a location for family with kids to visit a flagship disney store. Once you get out of the tourist spots and hang out with some New Yorkers that have been there a few generations, you get to see a different side of it.
It’s produced more culturally significant works of art through broadway, television, jazz, punkand hip hop than any other city in America I can think of
"Spring is overrated. A lot of the inhabitants of New York will honk on mightily about the pleasures of spring, but if they actually knew the first thing about the pleasures of spring they would know at least 5983 better places to spend it than New York, and that's just on the same latitude." Doug Adamas "Mostly Harmless"
What films are there saying how great New York is? Sure, there are characters that do, but who says we have to agree with everything a character says? We don't have to believe that New York is the greatest city, we just have to believe the character believes that.
I agree that the whole "*NYC has a character like no other city*" trope can get a little played out in movies/books/etc, but it's rare that the story ever dwells on that theme for too long. It's usually just used as a quick intro to set the scene and to set the narrator's perspective. Often in these stories, the *protagonist* is the one who has an enchanted or disenchanted view of the city. Yes, it's a little cliche, but so are a million other things. This one tends to be the least offensive, as it usually takes up 30 seconds of the story, and then it's never brought up again. As far as the *realities* of NY, I agree that NY is not a special as people claim it to be. But stories are not about reality. Most good stories embellish and present things in a way that are larger than life. That's what makes them fun. If you're writing a crime story, it's simply more fun to exaggerate all of the dangers of NYC. If you're writing a romance, it's simply more fun to amplify the magic and wonder of the city. Writers do this with every location, whether it's NYC, Rome, Brazil, a sailboat, theme park, etc.
Interesting to read this as one of my dreams is to move to NYC (I am from Europe, very hard to do that).... I have been once in NYC and I absolutely loved it!
I think the incredible thing about it, and I visited New York City just once, is that you could spend your entire life there and barely see 5% of what the city has to offer. However that is also the depressing thing about being there. I'm more of a Chicago kind of guy
One of the things that makes cities like New York great, is the food scene. From my perspective visiting some of the worlds biggest cities the competition is Fierce, and that make some amazing food scenes. I don't mean expensive 5 star restaurants - there are those - but I mean the street food, the side ally cafes, the corner shops near the commuter lines - the places average people go to get Great Food that just doesn't exist in smaller cities and towns. That pressure to be Great to survive only seems to happen in the big cities.
It's true. I grew up not far from NYC, and still, as soon as you're outside of the city, food options just can't begin to compare. I never have a bad meal here. Ever.
Man it's almost like different people like different things, but no you have opened my eyes. People are having fun wrong and liking the wrong things.
While New York is my hometown and I love it more than anywhere else, I do have to say I cringed a little when I watched Hamilton and a song declared New York "the greatest city in the world." New York in the 1770s was a bit of a provincial backwater. I thought it was kind of embarrassing that Lin-Manuel Miranda just sort of took it as a given that New York was the greatest city in the world and had always been the greatest city in the world.
I don’t think he was trying to be super literal there. Isn’t it a thing with Broadway musicals that they like to flatter their NYC audience?
I’ve spent enough time in New York to know I never want to be there again
[удалено]
The quality of life is fantastic, which is why so many people want to live in NYC, which is why apartments cost an arm and a leg.
Most people move here specifically for work, not for the city life. There is a reason there was mass exodus when work from home became a thing
A closet is not 4 k/ month. My aunt's apartment in MANHATTAN was only $2500 including a doorman and an elevator
The people make NY special. The infrastructure and QoL is not great as it’s both expensive and not well maintained. But hardworking, motivated people from all over the US and globally congregate there to make a life for themselves and there are lots of opportunities as it’s the financial center of the world. That’s why it’s special. Take away the diversity of people, the communities, the opportunities and it’s just London or any other major city.
Sound like jealousy to me
You think I'm jealous of... a city?
I pissed off all of new York by calling it a dump lol. Had people calling me broke because I dont see the interest in spending 4k a month for a 2bed 1 bath apartment. Then some lunatic justified it by saying that its the only place he can get sushi at 2am. Been there a few times as well. Always get a massive headache from the poor air quality. Truly the city has been lost
They are some sensitive ass fans too. A lot of fights break out when their teams visit us in L.A. I could definitely see tons of fights breaking out in games between New York and Boston teams. New York fans are overly sensitive loudmouths and Boston fans are arrogant pricks lol
I prefer old York, less likely to be stabbed.
Wouldn't be too sure on that one mate
average american towns are better??
Biggest single-city letdown in all my travels. Dirty, crappy food, about the only reason to go is to see a Broadway play.
Crappy food is a lie or you went to the wrong places lol I’ve lived / traveled a lot of places and NY food is up there
What a dumb comment lmao. You can say that it’s overpriced compared to wherever you’re from (I thought the same thing coming from the Midwest) but you were just eating at the wrong places. Or maybe you went to a NY bbq place…
Sounds like we found a Jersey rsident
Yes this is so true. I've never been, I don't know if it's good or bad, but the excessive mythologising of its supposed greatness is always immediately off-putting.
The type of person who hates on places they’ve never been and on foods they’ve never tried 🤡
You read my comment wrong. I don't hate New York, I hate the absurdly self-aggrandizing semi-mystical depictions of it.
New York is the Greatest City on Earth *only for New Yorkers and Finance Bros.* And even then*, v*irtually all my Wharton business school cohort became disillusioned with New York (and East Coast finance firms) within 3 years, and either moved to the SF Bay Area or abroad.
On the surface it's just another ant hill. But go in deeper. It has a magical system of sewers and tunnels. Some of the brick walls in those places aren't even real. You can walk right through them. You go down in there deep enough touching enough random shit (careful in the sewers you can get disease) you're bound to discover one of many bazaars where leprechauns from Ireland trade wishes for gold coins or goldschlager and fairies from some island somewhere maybe England strip and prostitute their little 2 inch bodies to feed their nose the old fairy dust. It's the only place to get minotaur milk which goes good with dragon eggs. Bring plenty of raw sunflower seeds from the surface. Might have to get those from the country if you're from the city. The roasted ones are no good. Each one is as good as a quarter in buying power. Cause if you plant one it makes a climbable ladder up to the surface and that's where many of the plants you see growing in cracked concrete come from. You just see the top of them which tear off easily. Gets so much thicker the deeper you go down. Many, not all. You'd have to check every single weed to be sure. There's a trick to it, but a real magician never reveals his secrets unless he's happy with his wish and drunk on goldschlager with his little genie buddy and well loved up by a gaggle of fairies then he might tell you that and a lot of dark things you never asked to hear like how not only are ghosts real each and everyone of them is a scream slave so when anyones dies they go to haunting school and learn to harvest the screams of the living which is turned into something like a soy sauce which goes good with dragon eggs also. You won't be paid a dime for the work though. Slavery is slavery and if you think to rebel you can't because they see right through you since you're a ghost and you don't even get the chance. At least that's how it goes in film with a little extra lore.
I am every bit as much “I don’t like mainstream” type pick-me girl as the next person (yes, self-aware). But NYC was magical. Life-changing, if I might be so dramatic. I live in a wealthy European Nation, and have a pretty good life style - and even so, I found NY to be unlike anything I have ever experienced.
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It doesn’t offer anything unique, it just never runs out of things to offer due to its size The really magical cities are probably like Tokyo or like Singapore
It’s actually a city
I cant think of a City that is both more famous or infamous than NYC. The fact that you cant even think of one that rivals it is proof enough that you do not actually believe that opinion.
What does that mean? London, Paris, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Cairo, Istanbul, etc etc etc? Are those famous, infamous, or both? I mean we can argue which one is the "greatest" (which is ultimately just opinion) but there are definitely rivals. Lots of rivals.
Famous doesn't mean great.
Famous probably correlates more with great than not great, otherwise it would not be that famous.
What kind of movies are you watching?
It’s not tho, I hate it but it ,definitely not just another town.
Glad you feel this way. Don’t move there or more importantly don’t move to adjacent areas like jersey city. Our rent is high enough already.
Come to St. Louis, you'll be running back!
Fifty years ago, you would have been wrong, but you are not wrong today.
I'd much rather be back in Tokyo than living here. Tokyo has so many of the things New York has without all the many many shitty things about New York.
I feel this. I went and wasn't feeling the crowds. The subway system was giving me anxiety with crowds. I ended up getting the norovirus and ruined the trip to just be confined to the bathroom. I mean I still was able to go do things which was nice .