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I left in 1991 after several close calls being shot at, robbed, and witnesses friends and relatives shot, stabbed and robbed as well. During the late 80's and early 90's NYC was at it's worst. I had enough. My neighborhood went from being a middle of the road working class area (Ridgewood) to an extension of Bushwick, which at the time was one of the worst sections of NYC. People were getting robbed right on their own stoops. At night I would hear gunshots in the distance from the rooftops of Bushwick. I watched my best friend get shot in the back at a busy intersection of Union Square in front of dozens of witnesses and was shot at myself. I had a guy stabbed at my feet in the subway and witnessed violent crimes every night. It was out of control.
I took a look around and thought the city would never get better. I enlisted in the air force and my first assignment was upstate NY in Rome. It took some time getting used to but I enjoyed all the things most people took for granted like being able to take my son to the park without fear of picking up a hypodermic needle or being caught in the cross fire of a random shooting. Within three years the garbage I was trying to get away from started moving into Rome and setting up shop. It started getting bad just as the base was closing. From there I went to California and spent the better part of 8 years on the suburban central coast. After a few years though I got restless and bored in the burbs.
Now that NYC is much improved, I wouldn't mind living there, however the schools are not that great. I live outside of Boston and I'm in NYC every month. It is way overcrowded with too many cars. On any weekend you never saw traffic in places like Glendale or Middle Village, now it's congested and gridlocked every day of the week. Demographics have changed from Irish, German and Italian in my youth, to Puerto Rican in the early 90's, to what is now a mix of Polish, Puerto Rican, South American and Slavic. The mom and pop stores of Myrtle Ave are now 99 cent stores and most of the proprietors don't know your name nor do they care to know you. The great German bakeries, butchers and deli's I freqented in the 80's are gone, replaced with Dunkin' Donuts, convenience stores, and real estate offices. The bars on every other corner are now banks, laundromats and Albanian coffee shops.
I miss NYC, but not the NYC it is today. I miss the NYC that will never return to it's old glory. I understand that you have to roll with the changes, but I'm finding there is less and less to go back to and it's saddening. I love NYC, and it will always be my home, and I consider myself fortunate enough to live there when each neighborhood had a sense of community and quality establishments. Too much of it resemble's a third world country now since that's what is representing NYC today. Either that or it's become trendy and plastic like the Lower East Side or Williamsburg where I used to hang out back when it was actually a dangerous place to be. Alphabet City is unrecognizable today as compared to the 70's and 80's, which is both good and bad.
To the OP: in answer to your third question, I was born in Brownsville (OK, it wasn't exactly the same as the present neighborhood!) My parents bought a house in the New Jersey suburbs when I was 13. And to put it mildly, I hated the suburbs from Day One. As artificial as anything could possibly be. I told my folks I had every intention of moving back to Brooklyn when I got out of school and landed my first job. They didn't believe me; in fact, my Mom said that one day I'd come to appreciate what they did "for me." I told her there was no chance of that ever happening.
To the OP: in answer to your third question, I was born in Brownsville (OK, it wasn't exactly the same as the present neighborhood!) My parents bought a house in the New Jersey suburbs when I was 13. And to put it mildly, I hated the suburbs from Day One. As artificial as anything could possibly be. I told my folks I had every intention of moving back to Brooklyn when I got out of school and landed my first job. They didn't believe me; in fact, my Mom said that one day I'd come to appreciate what they did "for me." I told her there was no chance of that ever happening.
P.S. My zip code starts with 112.
Brownsville has always been a slum of some sort - I know it got much worse after the 50s and 60s, but it was never anything fantastic.
I tend to agree; "logic" tells me that if you're an old-timer so to speak there's much less chance of being actively harassed versus newcomers. Some newcomers may be clannish but that's just NYC for you. I think that everyone is clannish, even among there "own kind" here. It's probably a question of developing your own network of friends. When I lived in Manhattan, for example, I did not find that people were going outta their way to meet anyone. When I was younger and living on the UES for 12 years, I only knew my next door neighbor (slightly, but he was a nice guy). Others in the building not only didn't talk to you but some would look at you very cockeyed (lol).
For a young person, of course you can move anywhere but I think that NYC is probably the best place to meet up with others who have more in common with you. May involve some traveling or convincing people to come out to the "hinterlands" but if there are attractions of some sort to offer it might overcome that infamous NYC lethargy (lol).
Sigh, New York City - a place of 8 million strangers
And its not necessarily lethargy - I bust my tail at work for 8 hours a day and when I come home I have none of this energy you speak of
hey all. I noticed a lot of people answering the questions on this site tend to be people in their 30s, 40s, and 50s, so some have a question for you guys about the places you grew up in and what you might have left behind.
First, a little background: I am 28 years old (born 1981) and lived my entire life in sheepshead bay \ kings highway section of brooklyn. I was a regular middle class kid, had friends that were irish, italian, jewish (like myself, only mildly observant), black, spanish etc - it didn't really matter to me. I remember playing basketball with bangladeshi kids.
Some time around the early to mid nineties, things started to change. Many families started leaving for jersey, long island, etc. And now, the neighborhood is mainly chinese, russian, remnants of the families like my own (namely, the parents) who stayed, and old folks. I have nothing against any of these groups e, but it feels like my home, the place where i and countless other middle class families grew up in, is gone. It feels like an ethnic ghetto now, due to the majority population seeming to be russian and chinese, which is only exacerbated by the fact that they seem to stick to their own kind.
Question 1: Why did you guys all leave new york city? An answer i hear frequently are the schools, its not safe, etc. But anyone who knows my neighborhood knows that it was never considered a "bad" neighborhood by any stretch of the imagination.
Question 2: If you didn't leave, where are your children, the people my age, go? A lot of time given to the hipsters coming to brooklyn or the long island kids living in the city, but what about the people like me? Brooklyn isn't some fantasy place like midwesterners think it is to us, and we all aren't able to afford the city. I have no idea where to meet people of similar background to myself.
Question 3: Is long island \ jersey really that much better? I loved where i grew up, everything was close by, you could see kids playing in the streets and parents hanging out outside. Its all gone now here, but i get the impression it never even existed in li\nj. Images of those places are the snobs, the guidos, the blandness, the infidelity, the hollow pursuit of money and so forth. Am i just stereotyping?
Question 4: Do you think your kids would look back on their lives in long island the way you look back with fondness about your new york city neighborhood?
I understand that new york city has always been a place of ethnic succession, and that's all well and good, but doesn't give me my home back. It seems like i either accept being forced out, or stay here and feel culturally isolated. People talk a lot about gentrification "destroying the original feel of neighborhoods", but isn't that what happened to mine?
Finally, i don't mean to offend anyone with anything i've said, i'm really just looking for answers. Comments appreciated.
sol111:
Excellent discussion topic!
I grew up in canarsie, and was one of the families that left because the neighborhood was becoming bad in the 90's. We moved out to li, and i have always missed brooklyn. My parents thought getting us 'out of the neighborhood' was the best thing to do, but we miss the old days all the time. Canarsie is now sadly overrun by crime and not what it used to be. The streets i grew up on used to be jewish and italian, and are now all black/carribean.
My aunt lives in sheepshead bay, and constantly feels excluded because of the enourmous russian population.
Neighborhoods have changed both for the good and bad, but i sure do miss the brooklyn of my childhood. Long island is by far one of the most boring places to live.
Brownsville has always been a slum of some sort - I know it got much worse after the 50s and 60s, but it was never anything fantastic.
Not quite true; it was a middle-class (well, all right, perhaps lower middle class) neighborhood through the 1950s.
Incidentally, relative to the fourth question in your original posting...I don't doubt that the kids who've grown up on Long Island--or in any other suburb--will look back on those days the same way New Yorkers who left the city do. The difference, of course, is that they'll only have known the city by word of mouth. Unless they happen to move back, of course.
Neighborhoods have changed both for the good and bad, but i sure do miss the brooklyn of my childhood. Long island is by far one of the most boring places to live.
Wow, I thought this thread was dead...
I think it really comes down to the idea that I have a lot of stereotypes about LI and have felt that NYC had more down to earth folks - the baby boomers grew up as street kids, are now successful in the burbs and want to flaunt it. The ones who couldn't afford to leave NYC were more humble because they had to be.
And Fred, remember that Brownsville was the home of Murder Inc.
I grew up in canarsie, and was one of the families that left because the neighborhood was becoming bad in the 90's. We moved out to li, and i have always missed brooklyn. My parents thought getting us 'out of the neighborhood' was the best thing to do, but we miss the old days all the time. Canarsie is now sadly overrun by crime and not what it used to be. The streets i grew up on used to be jewish and italian, and are now all black/carribean.
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Canarsie definitely isn't overrun by crime. I had relatives who used to live there in the 90s/early 2000s and it was always average crime wise. Looking at the crime stats, it was still ok back in the crack days. Only thing that has really changed is that is it's an Afro-Caribbean dominated neighborhood.
I grew up in canarsie, and was one of the families that left because the neighborhood was becoming bad in the 90's. We moved out to li, and i have always missed brooklyn..... Canarsie is now sadly overrun by crime and not what it used to be. The streets i grew up on used to be jewish and italian, and are now all black/carribean...
So how can you say that it is now "overrun by crime and not what it used to be?" It seems like it has only gotten better crime wise since it transitioned from a Jewish/Italian neighborhood to a black/carribean neighborhood.
And it's Long Island that has actually had the big crime increase since the 90's.
Born and raised in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn and still here.
I admire people who have packed up and left to reach the dream of home ownership. I could never do that. I never earned a lot of money and now that I earn a reasonable salary and have some savings, finding a job gets harder when you're older so giving up this stable as a rock job for chance elsewhere is way too risky. I also grew up in a family that was ultra-cautious about everything (too cautious, I'd say) and never took the plunge on anything. That shapes a person's personality and unfortunately I am the same way. It doesn't help that I have no friends or family out of my immediate neighborhood.
Would I leave if I could? I don't know. I love it here. It's home. I also want to own before I die though. Nothing fancy, it just has to have outdoor space whether that be a balcony/terrace or small patio or deck. Will that ever happen for me here? I don't think so. Prices just won't go down far enough.
All of my siblings are still Brooklyn as are my parents.
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