Asking For Directions

New York isn’t known for its hospitality. You could probably go as far to say that there’s almost none to note on. The city doesn’t lend its self to want to ask for directions from a passerby, or to even stop for too long, staring up at the skyscrapers, for fear of proving that you’re a tourist. Everyone’s appears to be in a rush and too busy to answer questions, mostly. However, you can find those people, but usually, they too, are not “from” the city.

I really began to realize what this inhospitable nature meant for how people visiting feel towards New Yorker’s. I recently went to Holland, Amsterdam in particular, and almost everyone there was the exact opposite of New York. If you had a question of where to go, or how close you were to such and such, they’d not only answer but most of the time would go out of their way to help. This really did make the city that much nicer. When speaking with one of my cousin’s friends, a Dutch student living in Den Haag, a city just outside of Amsterdam, he commented about New Yorkers by simply telling me “they look a lot nicer than they really are.” He continued by telling horror stories of his first trip to New York, when he didn’t speak English as well as he does now and how hard it was to ask and receive directions. His picture of the city was definitely tainted by these experiences and didn’t enjoy New York as much because of its inhospitable nature.

The way people view a new place is weighed very heavily by not only how the city looks; buildings, museums, etc. But also by the people they see living there. Holland seemed to have it right. Not only was the city it’s self-beautiful, but also the people matched with their friendliness towards foreigners. People genuine liked to help you and were proud to show of their English or knowledge of their city. New York could certainly benefit from learning a few things from the Dutch. It takes almost no effort to simply point someone in the right direction, or to serve him or her with a smile at the cash register, but for some reason you don’t see a lot of effort ever being put in to make visitors welcomed.

Living in the city now I can feel the city hardening me slowly. I no longer stop to answer questions as much as I did the first few months. I push past people to get to the front of the line. I even ignore some people asking for directions without thinking about what it was like when I first got here and had to do the same. After visiting Holland I’m going to try to reverse the effects the city has had on me. I’d really like to change, even if only in a small way, how people see this beautiful city. New York is a beautiful place, people just need to take time to continue to make it that way for not just those living here, but also those just visiting.

The Child's Way Out

I recently discovered, while stumbling, a man by the name of Stephen Wiltshire. Stephen is an artist who draws by memory, his specialty being aerial views of cities. What’s most amazing about these drawings is that they are drawn completely by memory, without the aid of pictures or previous sketches. Now as if that wasn’t hard enough he also remembers these aerial views from only an hour helicopter ride in which he views the city below, taking a mental snapshot of each building, each street, down to every window of each building.

What struck me was his childhood however. Stephen is autistic, and growing up was a mute child, unable to relate to people, and until the age of 5 was incommunicable to the world. He found his voice through art. I take a drug cultures class at the New School and this stemmed a thought of whether children are possibly missing their true calling, being prescribed a medicine that makes them socially able, but removes an intrinsic part of them in the process. Are we too quick to prescribe drugs to children when they have a problem, without taking other paths of action, like in Stephen's case of going to the right school. We seem to be taking the easy way out by prescribing children.

This quick fix is explored in blogs such as Kevinmd and the issue of children and prescription drugs is rising, with parents and doctors preferring to use pharmaceutical means as opposed to psychotherapy. Are we taking away what makes kids, kids? Or are we taking away the part of people that might be their nature or their gift? These questions have to be asked and the epidemic of over medicating children is spreading.

Our World Becoming 3D

I recently went to the movies to see the new Alice in Wonderland, a Tim Burton film, and wasn’t pleasantly surprised. However what I was impressed by was the amount of commercials. I arrived in Boston yesterday and thought that a movie would be a nice relaxation after a long bus ride, however, I spent close to the same amount of time watching commercials as the real movie, only a slight exaggeration. What this brought to mind is the seemingly recent influx of commercials in almost every type of media. I expect the commercials from movie theaters, however even YouTube it seems has commercials. Our media forms are taking a turn towards an even distribution of commercial time and actual media. Possibly this is the new tend to follow.

Now not to move away from commercials the real issue that is pressing from my movie outing is the new 3D craze. Alice in Wonderland was in 3D, which I hadn’t experienced yet and thought was cool. You get a very different movie experience in three dimensions, however I felt that the movie lost something being in 3D. No longer do movies have to depend on a flawless plot, or cinematography that blows you away, all you need is cool landscapes with the occasional bug to fly virtually into your face. This new trend of movies is blowing out of proportion. Since Avatar it seems every new movie will be in 3D, and I can’t help but think this is a turn for the worse for movies. People want the instant gratification of seeing bad ass scene without any “traditional” art of cinematography. All of the scene in Alice that caught my eye were simply because they quite literally popped out at me. There wasn’t a shot in the movie that I thought, “wow this is a beautiful shot,” I rather thought “wow that’s cool animation, but not a real image.” We are moving towards a movie generation that nothings real, everything’s either enhanced or animated, and this disturbs me.

Just like commercials are becoming now movies need to do the same, and that is an even distribution of “real” movies and 3D. It’s nice to have a variety but this is not the case. We need to keep movies in some way about art and to me the traditional is art.