Archive for December, 2006

Above Death Avenue

Published at December 19, 2006 in new york. 0 Comments
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looking west towards jersey




Yesterday a few of us took a walk on the High Line– the abandoned elevated train tracks that stretches for 22 blocks on the West side of Manhattan.

It will soon become a park. Development has already begun. A park is better than a bunch of overpriced condos, which would have inevitably sprung up had the High Line been destroyed (Rudy Giuliani tried his best). But still, it’s hard not to be skeptical. So often, parks are at best sterile, inhospitable and underused- and at worst ill-planned and unsafe. Mostly, it’s that the High Line, like Coney Island, like the Red Hook waterfront, is a piece of an older, very different New York City that is disappearing piece by piece.


Conventionally, neighborhood parks or park-like open spaces are considered boons conferred on the deprived populations of cities. Let us turn this thought around, and consider city parks deprived places that need the boon of life and appreciation conferred on them. This is more nearly in accord with reality, for people do confer use on parks and make them successes - or else withhold use and doom parks to rejection and failure.

Jane Jacobs, Death and Life of Great American Cities



metro north

Final Exams and the Bolivarian Process

Published at December 18, 2006 in friends. 0 Comments
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The other night I was instant-messaging with my friend and former student Karina. I met Karina when she was 14 and joined the youth-media program that I was facilitating. Over the four years that I worked with her she grew into a talented and insightful filmmaker; and she’s taught me a lot.

She’s now a first year at Mount Holyoke in Western Masschusetts, and dealing with her first round of final exams. Here’s an excerpt from our IM sesh:

12:07 AM

karina: aww man.
you’re so lucky you’re done with college. :/

me: ha
dude, i’m SO done with college

karina: haha

me: like a decade done with college.

Anyway, despite the drudgery of finals Karina continues to do awesome work. I continue to be thankful for long-standing friendships and am super inspired by what all my far-flung friends and former students are up to (how’s that for alliteration).

Check out Karina’ website about the Bolivarian Revolution:

Ride with Love and Rage.

Published at December 5, 2006 in friends. 0 Comments

I didn’t know Eric, but we have a bunch of friends in common. His death is fucking tragic. It’s sad and infuriating and was easily avoidable.

There’s a memorial ride for him this Saturday. Details below.

eric ng

This is reposted from the Visual Resistance site:

On Friday, December 1, Eric Ng was riding his bike up the West Side bike path. He was on his way from a show to a party — that was Eric, always busy, always seeing people — when a fucking drunk driver ran him down. The driver had traveled at speed for over a mile on the bike path, ignoring dozens of exits, literally dozens of chances to return to the road. Dozens of choices. The car hit Eric with such force that his bike was crushed, he was thrown into the air, his tire and shoe landing fifty feet away. The horrific details are in the news, if you want them.
—–
A big group of Eric’s friends spent the weekend mourning, talking, and, finally, making. We made a ghost bike for him on Saturday and sunflowers on Sunday. Eric’s memorial plaque reads “Love & Rage” — no resting in peace for this rock star.

There’s a memorial ride this Saturday, December 9th, meeting at 1pm in Washington Square Park and then proceeding to the site of Eric’s death. Non-bikers can head straight to the site, on the West Side bike path near Clarkson St. Please bring flowers (especially sunflowers), sidewalk chalk, paint, whatever you want. There will be a memorial service after the ride with music and a slideshow, and a party later that night.

Check the VR site for more updates.

Coming Soon to an F-Train Near You:

Published at December 3, 2006 in friends. 1 Comment
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Movies on the subway! About 20 of us met on the platform of the Jay Street F train at 10:30pm. We jumped on the last car, wheeled on the projector and taped over the lights with craft paper as people took their seats. Refreshments were served (Junior Mints, popcorn, etc). “Coming Attractions” and “Now Playing” posters were put up on the walls. Movies were generally subway-themed, including Michael Jackson’s “Bad” video, a Buster Keaton film called “Cops,” a 1940’s educational film about the New York City subway, and the segment from the Borat movie where Borat lets the chicken loose on the subway.

Some passengers didn’t know what to make of it and kept their distance by sitting at the front of the car. Most, though, started munching on jujubees and enjoyed the show. i talked with an elderly woman and a teenage kid, both of whom said it was the coolest use of public space they’d seen in a while. I would have to agree.

Thanks Jeff. You have great ideas and pull them off with style…totally inspiring.

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Above My Head

Published at December 1, 2006 in reading. 0 Comments
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James Baldwin is a goddamned prophet. Each time I read his words I’m left standing, stunned, without words. I’m not even sure how much I can understand of what he’s writing, but I what I get is something about the mess of humanity– the devastation and cruelty and beauty of people, of how we love each other and tear each other apart.

I seldom underline in my books, but I have to keep a pen in my hand when I read Baldwin because it helps me remember. There’s much in there that I need to remember. So I’m going to write some of it down here…every now and again…because over the next bunch of months I’m going to read all of his books. I can’t bear not to. I can’t afford not to.

Right now I’m reading Just Above My Head. I’ll start with something that’s pretty easy to swallow. Before we get into the shit.

I was traveling before the days of electronic surveillance, before the hijackers and the terrorists arrived. For the arrival of these people, the people in the seats of power have only themselves to blame. Who, indeed, has hijacked more than England has, for example, or who is more skilled in the uses of terror than my own unhappy country? Yes, I know: nevertheless, children, what goes around comes around, what you send out comes back to you. A terrorist is called that only because he does not have the power of the State behind him–indeed, he has no State, which is why he is a terrorist. The state, at bottom, and when the chips are down, rules by means of a terror made legal–that is how Franco ruled so long, and is the undeniable truth concerning South Africa. No one called the late J. Edgar Hoover a terrorist, though that is precisely what he was: and if anyone wishes, now, or in this context, to speak of “civilized” values or “democracy” or “morality,” you will pardon this poor nigger if he puts his hand before his mouth, and snickers–if he laughs at you. I have endured your morality for a very long time, am still crawling up out of that dungheap:all that the slave can learn from his master is how to be a slave, and that is not morality.

James Baldwin, Just Above My Head, 1978