Stockholm, U.S.

"Stockholm Street was named for the Stockholm brothers, Abraham and Andrew, who owned farmland in Bushwick during the mid-nineteenth century. 

The land had earlier been inhabited by the Mespachtes Indians, who were driven out by Dutch, French Huguenot and English settlers during the 17th Century. The settlers grew lettuce, corn, potatoes, cauliflower, fruits and tobacco sold to Brooklyn and Manhattan.

As Brooklyn and New York City grew in 19th Century, immigrants from other European countries joined the Dutch and English settlers. Germans became the dominant population in Bushwick. Factories were founded, and brewing industry became so successful, that the area was dubbed the beer capital of the Northeast.

Another wave of immigrants settled in the neighborhood. After WWI, the Germans were replaced by Italians, mostly from Sicily and Southern regions.

In 1960s and 1970s the breweries in Bushwick were closed. Meanwhile, a new  policy of raising rent for welfare recipients meant that they now brought higher rents for landlords than ordinary tenants. Landlords begun to fill vacant units with welfare recipients, and by the mid-seventies, half of Bushwick’s residents were on public assistance.

On the night of July 13, 1977, a major blackout occurred in New York City. Arson, looting, and vandalism followed in poor neighborhoods across the city. Bushwick was among the worst hit areas. Shops and stores were looted and burned, and fires spread to residential buildings. After the riots were over and the fires were put out, residents saw "some streets that looked like Brooklyn Heights, and others that looked like Dresden in 1945".

Those who could afford to leave abandoned the area. Following white flight, the area became populated by working class African American, Puerto Rican and other Caribbean American families.

The neighborhood was a hotbed of poverty and drug dealing. In the 1990s, it remained a dangerous area, with 77 murders, 80 rapes, and 2,242 robberies in 1990. In the middle of the 2000s, the City of New York began pouring resources into the neighborhood, through a program called the Bushwick Initiative. Narcotics Control Unit and the NYPD joined to reduce drug dealing in the area.

Today, ethnic groups common in the neighborhood are Puerto Ricans, Hondurans, Dominicans, Mexicans, Ecuadorians, African Americans, Haitians, Jamaicans, and Afro-Caribbean. There are also smaller numbers of Chinese, Koreans, Filipinos, and Arabs. Since 2000, reduced crime rates and a shortage of cheap housing in nearby neighborhoods have brought an influx of young professionals and artists, moving into converted warehouse lofts, brownstones, limestone-brick townhouses and other renovated buildings."

And so, here I am, in the corner of Stockholm and Myrtle avenue!

"Since 1998, Ingo Giezendanner alias GRRRR documents the urban spaces in which he stays at the moment. From Zurich via Nairobi, New York and Karachi to Cairo and New Orleans he drew his surroundings on location with pen on paper..."

The great, great "Urban recordings" by GRRR is now completely online.
http://www.grrrr.net/urban/grr30_002.html
Here's a few beautiful ones from NY:

I finally got my camera fixed! I had to wait for the Jewish New Year holiday to end first, since apparently all decent camera shops in Manhattan are run by Jews. At least the famous (and huge) B & H is - nice work outfits!

NYC Subway would have done just fine without this ad


Despite controversy, I'm not worrying about the inner life of NYC subway riders. Xenophobia doesn't fly when more than a third of people have been born abroad, as a permanent fact of life, from 18th century onwards or so.

I ride the L, 1 and A trains 1-2 hours a day, and I've never been in such a cozy metro environment. New Yorkers spend a lot of time in the trains (1m+ every day), and they have a nice casual way about it. There not always much talk, but it never feels lonely. People-watching is a nice: average car of average train, there's incredible human variation, with every form and shape of homo sapiens wearing every style imaginable. Endless diversity of nice girls, too. And many of the artists are simply great. Its a rare I come home not having handed a dollar or two for performers really worth it.

(Another example, Subway Theatre:)
http://www.nyc.subwaytheater.com/documentation/irt.html

today is the first day that its colder outside than in Butler Library, Columbia University, where I spend my days with the MacBook youth. (They ALL have it.)

today I learned that when bicycling after dark, going straight down Broadway all through Times Square is not a handy shortcut, but a crazy futuristic acid trip that could end up badly, for both you and the naked cowboy / batman / break-dancing statue of liberty.

What a city to bike in! It's difficult to do it safely when eyes automatically tend to go up the unbelievable, wild, amazing skyskrapers straight out of Blade Runner. At the same time, NY cabs are a force to be taken seriously. One thing I's still struggling to understand is why bikers seem to be driving on both left AND right sides of the road. But the exploration goes on, with my faithful horse, a beutiful old Renauld racer (that cost me laughable 200 $!).

today I want to write a thank you letter to Little Skips, a café two blocks down Myrtle avenue where I live. You can see LS (or one wall of it) and a bit of my street in the first 30 secs of this otherwise crappy music video:

In days of hangover, laundry or when I don't feel like riding the metro to Manhattan, Little Skips is my home, living room and office. A big plus about this: EVERY time I go, they play some great music there I haven't heard before. I always have to ask them about it.

Example # 1: local Brooklyn band Diiv (which Tomas also likes):

Example # 2: Tame Impala. Ok, it's only news to me (so says Mikko). But what a riff!

I think Tuomas would like it too, since Swervedriver is regularly on the playlist. As is J&M Chain, Mazzy Star and the rest, right when my worn out brain needs them, to go with the 2nd fillup cup of coffee.
So, thank you Little Skips and see you soon again.

may this destroyed Total recall-poster be my first entry, since it reminds me of the nerve-wrecking jetlagged day and a half before finding a room of my own in Bushwick, Brooklyn - my dear new home for 6 months. 

That relief was yet to come. I stood on Bedford metro platform, feeling sleep deprived, lonely and doomed in my flathunting efforts, when I noticed a string of ads on the wall, improved by an unknown artist/vandal.

Somehow all this happy meticulous anarchism cheered me up and made me feel a little less desperate. (I took these pics with my old Nokia the unsmart phone so maybe the feeling does not quite come through.)

This dance school ad was the only one that had not been turned into a multi-layer collage, probably since it was just so... FaNtastic!

It was also the last pic I took before the L-train arrived. I rode it to Decalb - and got a room!