Dear New Neighbor
OR To the 10.000 People "just" sleeping in JC
Dear New Neighbor,
welcome. I see your lights on. I know you’re here. Well kind of. You only sleep here. Allow me to be THAT neighbor. The nosy one. The one who knocks.
See, I moved to Jersey City in 2013 and almost immediately got pulled into an exhibition called Gentrification. It was curated by Allison Hall who’d interviewed all kinds of people. Longtime residents, newcomers, people who’d lived here their whole lives. And then there were others. the ones who described Jersey City as the place where they slept. Nice apartment, great PATH access, see you never. I remember listening to those interviews and thinking…HOW? How do you live somewhere and not get curious about it?
I’ve since learned the answer. You get busy. You get tired. You get comfortable with the communte to New York EFFING City - I mean - people come from all over the world to go there, after all. And you know three restaurants here - that’s all that there is, no? My friend Nirupa did that for fifteen years. Fifteen years in Paulus Hook before she walked the city in earnest. She drove to her yoga studio seven minutes away. She took the PATH. She worked in Manhattan and came home and slept. And then she left Wall Street, did the Camino de Santiago - and something clicked. She came back and started mapping Jersey City with her feet. She fell completely in love with it. The irony is that she’s leaving it now, priced out, grieving it, crying on her early morning drives. But that’s a different story and you can listen to it on my podcast.
Consider this your onboarding. The one nobody gave you when you signed the lease.
WALK THIS THING. the whole city is intact and walkable - and yes, don’t get distracted by the stupid turnpike overpass- that sucks, we all know but once you get past it - there are other worlds that are full of surprises. Tris McCall, who knows a lot about Jersey City, once pointed out that the towers around Journal Square are basically designed to funnel you to the PATH. But don’t let them. You are not sheep, are you? Take a detour. Look up. There are street signs painted by hand still surviving at certain street corners. There’s a street sign on top of St. Peter’s Prep that will stop you cold if you could actually look at it. My friend Kelly Carroll who is the director of the Atlantic Avenue BID in Brooklyn, calls these things in Jersey City, little treasures hiding in plain sight. She’s right.
THE PARKS ARE NOT JUST PARKS. Liberty State Park, our crown jewel, with, let’s be honest, the best view of Manhattan on the entire East Coast. It exists only because one man named Morris Pessin spent nineteen years fighting to turn a garbage dump into a green space. Nineteen years and his son is still fighting the fight to keep it a public park. Maybe go and feel grateful - it is free…not much in our area is actually free. Lincoln Park has free outdoor concerts on summer evenings by a fountain that looks like it wandered in from a European city and never left. You can plunk yourself right on it’s wall or bring a chair and join us. Van Vorst has a farmers market, beautiful trees, and as my friend Nirupa reminded me, a bulletin board where actual humans post actual things that are actually happening this weekend. Revolutionary!
THE ART SCENE will surprise you. Deep Space gallery has a vibe that is channeling the spirit of the legendary 111 First Street. Arthouse Productions does theater and runs several exhibitions in their gallery a year. Novado Gallery. IMUR, Drawing Rooms, Smush Gallery, Curious Matters- I am forgetting a couple and that will make me look bad - but we need a whole space here. And then there is Project Greenville - Elizabeth opens her own home in winter, her backyard garage in summer, for local art. The last time I was there, an Indian wedding was playing out next door and someone’s neighbor was hanging laundry on a line out the window. If you don’t find that magic, I honestly can’t help you. Keep sleeping.
THE MUSIC IS WORLD CLASS and almost nobody knows it. Ted Chubb’s The Statuary in the Heights brings NEA masters into his literal living room. In summer it spills into the backyard, people dance in the street, there’s a taco cart on the corner. Moore’s Place in McGinley Square has been there for decades. Walk in on the right night and you’ll watch someone who just finished a gig in the city come through the door, unpack their instrument, and join the jam session while tap dancers make the floor shake.
THE FOOD. I can’t onboard you on the food in one paragraph but I’ll try. Go to Little India. Get the pani puri at India Square like Rimli recommended to me. Find Saigon Café on Newark Avenue, there is a grandmother in the kitchen and you will taste it. Find Korai Kitchen, a tiny Bangladeshi place that has been quietly reviewed by the New York Times multiple times and seats about twelve people. Branch out. Become a regular somewhere. The day the owner knows your oder is the day Jersey City actually becomes yours.
When you’re ready to go deeper: your neighborhood association meets monthly and is full of people who will tell you everything. The Museum of Jersey City History has programming, not just artifacts. John Gomez leads walking tours through the Landmarks Conservancy which are genuinely fun. Not docent-voice fun, actually fun. And maybe, if you’re curious, there’s a podcast called Nat’s Sidewalk Stories where I’ve been having conversation with people who make this city what it is, for three seasons now. Every guest teaches me something new about a place I thought I already knew but I’m also still new and I’m only one or two steps ahead of you in the long scheme of things.
Jersey City has always been here. The people have always been there. Scultpor Jerome China once lived here and used it as a bedroom and left, came back yars later, and found everything completely different. Because he was different. My friend Nirupa mapped it with her feet after fifteen years of driving past it.
You don’t have to wait that long. We’re right here.
Your neighbor
Nat
P.S. Longtimers, I see you too. What did I miss? What’ the place you’ve been going to for years that nobody talks about? The corner, the café, the Saturday morning ritual. Drop it in the comments. Consider this a living document.