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Tue | February 28, 2006

next meeting

The next meeting will be on Tuesday, March 14th, in honor of Pi Day.

Details: 7:00 pm, Space Cafe, on 32nd Street by 5th Avenue, northeast corner.

Posted by Lily at 07:49 PM

Tue | February 21, 2006

District Under the Lincoln Tunnel Overpass

A.

I live in a part of the Manhattan’s West Side that time has forgotten, a tough knuckle that has resisted the booms and busts of the economy, that has been ignored by politicians and avoided by those seeking coolness and fashion. This forgotten part of a neighborhood known by many names including Clinton, Midtown West, Chelsea North, the Wild West and, of course, Hell’s Kitchen.
I’ve named this piece of it DULTO. The acronym stands for the District Under the Lincoln Tunnel Overpass, in reference to the overpass above Ninth Avenue and Fortieth Street upon which commuter busses rumble across to get directly into the mouth of the Lincoln Tunnel from the Port Authority terminal and avoiding the noisy clutter of rush hour traffic strangling life below.
The name is my little joke because this place is nothing at all like the other trendy neighborhoods in the city that have earned an easy acceptance to be nicknamed with more clever acronyms like TRIBECA, like DUMBO, like NOLITA, NOHO, and so on. These once dark, uninhabited valleys now overcrowded for its cutting-edge restaurants opened by rising-star chefs and for boutique shops to purchase five-hundred dollar shirts and thousand dollar shoes.
In contrast, this part of town, DULTO, is resistant to change. The city wanted to build a football stadium here for the New York Jets and the Olympics and they failed miserably.
The reason for this, as many property investors who have passed over the area know already, is the Lincoln Tunnel traffic, an impenetrable moat of steel and rubber that locks in the land from Forty-second to Thirty-fourth Streets between Eighth and Eleventh Avenues, four times a day, morning, lunch and after work and then late evenings when the theaters let out.
Even Starbuck’s won’t come here.
And lately, it seems like the rest of the city beyond DULTO has become a completely different world. North of Forty-second and south of Thirty-fourth, and east of Seventh Ave., the lights are brighter, the sidewalks are smoother, the stores are cleaner, and the people are much, much more attractive to look at.
The people of DULTO, are not so attractive. Or maybe they are where they originate from. This is still an immigrant working class neighborhood, one of the few left on the island of Manhattan, and fashion is simply not at the top of lists around here. Or maybe it is and just simply unaffordable to maintain. I am very much a citizen of DULTO for these very reasons.
My name is Vincent Yoo and I am an American, New Jersey born and raised, though this is never the first impression people have of me. If I’m riding on a bus or waiting for a subway, waiting on line at a Duane Reade’s for shampoo and shaving cream, or watching a movie at the AMC theater, or having a burger at a diner, if I am doing any of these things, and I am not speaking, I am often mistaken for a from any Asian country. Sometimes an immigrant.
My parents moved to Clifton, New Jersey from Seoul, South Korea in the Sixties. I was born after they arrived, born a citizen, the first American after how many generations of Korean births, an interruption in a long family line, a historical birth. But you wouldn’t know I was American unless you heard me speak because English is the only language I speak. American English. I do it fluently and after a few alcoholic beverages, beer, wine, whiskey, a strong Jersey accent comes through loud and clear.
But if I don’t say a word and simply look out into the world, it is just assumed that I am not from around here. That my home is far, far away and that the expression on my face is that of loneliness and longing. I do have a sad face which is also an inherited trait, something brought over on a strand of DNA from the old country, and I can have this sad look even as I am deciding what to have dinner or what to watch on TV.
It’s harder to know where I’m really from even more so now that I’m older. I am in my thirties and way beyond society’s tolerance for rebellious, identity establishing, outer wear which quickly and easily places one in a tribe to the casual observer. I would look silly in a Metallica t-shirt at my age. These days, Dockers and golf shirts are what I feel most comfortable in both physically and psychologically, even though it means stepping back into obscurity and letting my face misinform everywhere I go.
I am unmarried and currently without a girlfriend. I don’t think I ever really had a girlfriend. And this has my mother and father worried and frightened beyond words. I almost had a girlfriend once when I was in college. I met her my freshman year. She wore black from head to toe. Her hair was colored orange and green and she painted her face white and she talked about how much she hated other people. We were friends. We studied in the library together. We went to see movies together. And then one night after a party where we had both gotten drunk she said she felt sorry for me and then she kissed me. And then after that, there were some awkward moments we were never able to move past.
Of course, I have argued with my parents about not being married or having a girlfriend, uttering predictable lines claiming ownership of my life and all its consequences, good and bad. Like so: “It’s not your problem so don’t worry about it. It’s my life and if I don’t get married, that’s okay. I enjoy my independence. I am not willing to give it up. I prefer being alone. For some people, like me, it was just never meant to be so stop worrying so much about it. You’ve got your own life to live. Leave me alone. My love life has nothing to do with you.” These arguments began to sound more ridiculous the older I got.
Eventually, it occurred to me how upsetting my situation could be to a mother and father like mine and how it could be that my life may very well belong to them as long as they are my parents. I’ve imagined conversations among their Korean friends about the progress and well being of their children. By this time, they have passed the point of conversation regarding profession (doctor or lawyer?), just as they have passed the point of talking about what colleges they had gained admission to (Harvard or MIT?). At their stage of parenthood, talk of marriages and weddings have also waned, (Korean or American?). And now they must be chatting about grandchildren (boy or girl?). And I have imagined my parents, since I am the only child, sitting quietly and sadly at a gathering of friends, utterly silent and pathetic. Tears have welled up at the thought of it.
I am sure they have wondered if I were “a gay”, without ever saying anything of it aloud to each other or anyone else, arriving at the possibility separately, on their own and only for split seconds at a time. Such an unspeakable idea that would be. Unthinkable yet forced to think it. As long as their fears go unspoken, I have no opportunity to assure them that I am not. At least until I can provide physical sexual proof. A girlfriend. A wife. A child.
I prefer to believe in a more blunt, straight forward truth, as to the reasons why I am unable to meet the woman I am supposed to meet and fall in love with, live the rest of my life with, buy property and parent children with. Or any woman for that matter, which I have accepted more recently in life along with my age, my Dockers and my golf shirts.
A truth that has liberated me from a suffocating existence of labor intensive maintenance and exhausting never-ending assessments of my place everywhere I happened to be. All of it based on a false sense of self. A series of games I had no idea I was playing but continually felt the sting of disappointment with every loss.

B.
Like many young men of the city, I spared no expense in the creation and ongiong maintenance of my exterior, making sure to be clothed in the right designer clothes, joining the right gym, working out religiously in the right sneakers. And almost every night, after work, after eating and momment of rest, when others might be ready to settle in for the night to watch television, to curl up to a good book, I showered and dressed and trimmed and smoothed out my exterior before heading out in search of lost temples where legends have told of treasures of love to be found. The truth, I found, that such treasures were never meant for me because, I accepted. I do not have a face that is open or welcoming or friendly or anything a modern, woman of the city would willingly approach, would ever feel the slightest curiosity about. Perhaps, they probably think, I might be considered handsome wherever it was that I came from, someplace in the East, where I longed to be, and am so lonely to be away from. But I am from here. I am an American. Just not as obviously.
This truth arrived, I believe, the way most truths do as humans mature, grow, find themselves burdened with responsibilities unrelated to emotional desire. Vibrant chemicals in our brains that fuel passions in our youth, suddenly evaporate through the pores in our chests and our scalps while the base chemicals responsible for responding to the world with neutrality, acceptance, apathy, submission, and surrender, pour in from nervous glands to maintain proper viscosity.
And for me the truth arrived while walking home from work one late afternoon, quite naturally, almost imperceptibly, a small idea that stayed and grew until I realized, I am not who I think I am. My face is my face. Live with it.
What a relief. Liberation. Freedom. A rock solid fact to put tiresome mysteries to rest. There are people in the world who will never become the object of another’s love and affection, never get married, never have children, never make it to a house in the suburbs with a white picket fence. They will live alone and stay alone and will leave this life without having left a single mark as if they had never existed to begin with and happiness happens occasionally to everyone probably the same amount of times in different ways, but is not a long term condition for anyone.
And over the next few months I effortlessly phased out my fancy wardrobe, my Armani’s and Hilfiger’s, Cole’s, Lauren’s, and Beene’s. Expensive, useless hardware which only succeeded in keeping my expectations strenuously high while failing to attract any sustained attention in my direction. I plummeted into jeans and t-shirts for a while, bounced back up into ridiculous hip-hop wear before settling into comfortable acceptability if not total obscurity. Dockers and golf shirts.
And along the way, my words had become weightless, free of risk and value.
Like an unexpected side effect, my brain began to produce spontaneously spoken comments and conversation on the streets with total strangers, effortlessly and happily. “Give me a break. Forget about it. What are you going to do? Nice job. Have a good one. Same to you.” The language of the city.
Even in DULTO, where I’ve been for almost ten years, I ventured to act beyond just hand waving and head nodding to acknowledge my neighbors whom I’ve observed ambling along the DULTO sidewalks with plastic bags and wire hand carriages, sitting behind counters, guarding cars in the outdoor parking lots.
And they knew me too.
But the moment I spoke, the reaction was as if I had magically appeared out of thin air.
“How’s it going. The food there is excellent. The Boat Show is going on at the convention center. I get my meat at Esposito’s. Did you know those two are suing each other? Too bad since they’re related. Yeah they’re brother and sister.”
But that’s it. Nothing more. Remarks, references, quick one-liners that happen to leave my lips before I know it. Other than that, the hand wave and the head nod. But most of the time, nothing.
In DULTO, like the rest of New York, you go out, you do what you have to do and you come back, pretty much as quickly as you can, which means as little engagement as possible. For years, you can see the same face every day and never say a word.
And whether you were halfway across town or halfway around the world, you would recognize that face should your paths happen to cross and the reaction would be the same.
Nod head. Wave hand. If they happen to be looking.

C.

And so it is easy for me to recognize Paco when I realize I am being followed on my way to work this morning. A kid from the neighborhood who used to push around a shopping cart full of empty cans and bottles doing his share for his family. I also remember when his mother and father, hobbled around the neighborhood, both on crutches, both with the same left legs bent inside of casts. It was either a scam or a warning, but it certainly wasn’t a coincidence.
Paco is older now and walks in baggy pants and a shapeless back pack swinging from one shoulder. Probably in junior high by now.
I stop at the corner of Eighth and Broadway, look across the street. I nod and smile but he looks away. I do not wonder what errand is sending him in the same direction as me.
The light changes and I turn to face the oncoming crowd.

I am an account manager for a marketing agency whose main clients are businesses who service businesses who service businesses who produce things for people to buy.
The agency creates and places advertisements in publications with titles like Bead Magazine and Chemical Digest and Candles Quarterly. These magazines do not exist for the outside world. They cannot be found on newsstands anywhere.
I’ve been at the firm long enough to know more people who have left the agency than the number of people who presently are employed by it. I perform well at my job but secretly despise every moment that I am doing the most important part of it.
While some people utilize their strengths to succeed, I am somehow forced to face my weaknesses and depend on my abilities to overcome them for my achievements.
My greatest weakness is in my dealing with clients. It is irrational, it is phobic. I believe it is possible for a client, at any moment, to reach through the telephone, grab me by the throat and choke me to death if he is unhappy with what I do. I can imagine it so I’ve seen it and each time I am on the phone to speak to a client my stomach turns cold and hard as stone, and a cold dampness covers my skin beneath my shirt.
To help cope with my fears, I learn everything there is to learn about my clients so that I would never make a mistake which I never have. Instead of merely taking notes about them, I write biographies and manuals about the companies they work for. And then I memorize each word. I know their names, birthdates, places of birth, family history, where they attended schools, what teams they played on, the names of their pets, all the jobs they’ve ever had, paper routes, cookie sales, highs school jobs and summer jobs and every job that came with a W-2, I know their birthdays, the birthdays of their husbands, wives, sons and daughters, anniversaries, graduation dates marked for every newborn, favorite restaurants, favorite hobby, food allergies, songs, music, films and everything else. And with all that I know, I feel more comfortable with what little I say. I do not waste words in my conversations with clients but I am deadly accurate with what I do say. Going beyond the call of duty each time I make a call, is a dry description. I am winningly successful, and have lead them to sign contracts, to increase budgets, to try new and untested strategies, anything to keep them from turning against me. This is one of my secrets. I do not brag about this or discuss this in meetings. I have never won any awards. My name has never been mentioned in the company newsletter. My successes fall to the bottom line unrecognized and unnoticed. But I still have a job. I’ve outlasted all of my peers. But I am aware, every day, that I am just one irresponsible, off-the-cuff remark away from certain death. So, I spend my mornings preparing for the off-the-cuff remarks I intend to use that day.
I step out of the office midmorning for a late breakfast and walk quickly to the Smiler’s Deli around the corner. Again, I see Paco who is across the street in front of the Chase bank, his hands in the front pouch of his hooded sweatshirt, leaning back, ankles crossed, maybe uncomfortable with the gangs of business suits and briefcases strutting around him. Maybe not. He doesn’t see me and I turn my head away as if I haven’t noticed him.
I wait for my two-egg-whites-with-tomato-on-toasted-whole-wheat-with-a-dash-of-hotsauce, among a tired looking, grumpy crowd of bacon-egg-and-cheese-on-a-roll, eaters.
I glance at the middle-aged Korean woman at the register. She wears make up which does not go with her floral apron, her serious expressions, her dry, gravel voice and the way she shouts as if the store were empty. I think she is the owner’s wife, but maybe she’s the owner herself. “Juan! Canada Dry! Sunkist! Snapple! Coke! Red Bull!” and from below, through the trap door to the basement behind the counter I hear Juan reply, “Ad-dass-o!” which is Korean for “I understand!”
When I was young and new to the city a trip to the deli was never complete without a conversation with the Korean owners. “Are you Korean?” Yes, but I was born here. My parents moved her in the sixties but they’re from Pusan. They live in New Jersey. “Do you speak Korean?” No but I understand it. “You should really learn to speak Korean.” Yes I know.
I have had this conversation with the woman behind the counter years ago and haven’t said much more since. Now, when I take my egg white sandwich to her she chews her gum, breathes out through her nose in an annoyed way and nods her head slightly and without a smile, she hands me back my change. But I smile back.
Outside, Paco is still there.
The day goes by from task to task in a way that I have become too obsessed with over the years to find too tedious and boring the way most Americans who hate their jobs, do.
I call clients, leave messages on voice mails and send out carefully crafted emails, all to remind them that I exist to serve them. I check updates on spreadsheets maintained by Production, Creative and, Sales and Marketing teams.
I order in for lunch, choosing something healthy but filling so I won’t run out of fuel too soon. A barbecue chicken breast sandwich, soy chips, yogurt, a diet iced tea. Then I let calls ring into my voice mail so I am able to review the messages and know what is expected of me before returning calls, should they be coming from clients.
The end of the day beings with the first metal desk door slammed shut by the first commuter who needs to catch an early train. The skin has been pierced. The departures hasten after that. There is the crescendo of the cubicles in the office as if they are shifting and reshuffling. When the activity begins to recede, that is when I shut down for the day.
I ride an elevator crowded with fellow office workers, all of us carrying bags of various urban designs and fidgeting with them like nervous skydivers ready to jump from a plane, opening and closing the latches, putting in keys, taking out MetroCards.
I exit the building and submerge myself into the tide that is receding in all directions, flowing out of the island of Manhattan through the drainage system of underground railroad tunnels. I move along gently, step lightly, turn sideways to my left and then to my right, pausing and resuming and slipping through and weaving in and out. Crowds swelling at every corner, time-released at the light of green lights, rampaging on collision courses then passing through each other like ghosts. I am sure that if I were to lose all sense of direction, if my memory were to go blank by sudden amnesia, this wave would carry me to safety.
But this small feeling of security and the wisdom of experience in an otherwise chaotic and ignorant city turns inside out when I notice Paco again, behind me, taking long, loping, street-gangster strides which separate him from the smooth efficiency of the crowd of suits around him. I am being followed and realize that I may have been marked for a mugging from someone in my own neighborhood.
Ten years ago, when I first moved to DULTO, it was known as The Wild West Side. (At the time, it was also bad news if you found yourself on an avenue named with a letter, Avenue A, B, C or D). The neighborhood was rotting with an infestation of crack. Locals without the means to move out were held captive by a failing economy, its drug dealers and addicts and slept throughout the nights under the constant threat of violence. Having had to move into such low rent neighborhoods back them, ones that do not exist in Manhattan today, taught newcomers to become New Yorkers and tough in ways beyond just dealing with rude cashiers and incompetent waitrons.
I use what I’ve learned from these early days, and veer off course. I turn corners randomly and step in and out of stores to throw the predator off my scent. I even climb into the subway entrance on the corner of Thirty-fourth and Eighth, cross the street underground and pop up on the other side, like an urban prairie dog. But I glance over my shoulder and there he is.
It appears that there is no hope. Whatever it is that he wants of mine, he is determined to get it. I do a quick, mental checklist of what I am willing to give up. Five twenties in my wallet. Drivers license. American Express Gold card. Chase Bank card. Duane Reade Dollar Club card. Red Cross Blood Donation card. My house keys. The keys to my office cabinets and desk drawers. A fifty-dollar Swiss Army watch. A cell phone that takes pictures. There is nothing worth fighting over. And since he knows where I live and I am tired of the bullshit and just want to get back to my apartment with or without my wallet, I turn around to confront Paco.
“What’s going on? What do you want from me?”
Paco takes a deep breath and a step back and then bows at the waist like a Japanese salary man. When he recovers he says, “I want to be your student.”
I think this is a joke. Maybe for a television show which has become popular. I am relieved that his is not a mugging. But there’s too much adrenaline in the way for true relief and the confusion tunnels my vision.
“Student of what?” I ask, throwing up my hands.
“Kung fu.”
“What? You’ve got to be kidding me. This is the most ridiculous…”
“No sir.”
“And what makes you believe that I can teach you kung-fu? Wait, back up. What makes you think I even know kung fu?”
Paco looks away, embarrassed and does not answer. My reaction is getting the slightest attention from passersby, but they only glance while maintaining the quick-step pace.
“Is it my face? Is it because I look Chinese to you?” I ask.
“No sir. I know you’re Korean. Lady in the fruit and vegetable store told me. She’s Korean, too.”
“I am an American!” I say, too defensively. I power down and try to explain, “You know, not every Asian dude you see on the street is a kung fu master. That’s a little racist. You can’t tell a book by its cover. You know what I am saying? You’re Hispanic right? Maybe you’re from Mexico. Does that mean I am going to assume that you’re a bull fighter? Can you teach me how to bull fight? Now that’s not cool, is it. Make’s you feel lame doesn’t it?”
Paco takes another step back. He bows again, but sinks lower until he is on his knees and his forehead rests on the cement “Please. I want to be your student. I am begging.”
I am instantly embarrassed and reach down to pull the kid up by his elbow. When I walk away he is right at my side. “You know me from the neighborhood. You’ve seen me around. I’ve watched you grow up. So If you have a problem, I’ll try to help you. If you need tutoring in a class or help with a test or a book report, I’m your guy. But if you want to learn how to fight, there are plenty of places to go in the city. Karate schools. Boxing gyms. Tae-Bo. But I will tell you now, violence never solves anything.”
Paco stops and quickly falls behind me and for a moment I am surprised by the success of my words and instantly proud of being the responsible adult to pay the attention he needed and confident that he is now just overwhelmed by a sense of great relief. He just needed someone to acknowledge whatever problem that he is facing that seems to mean the end of his world, is fixable.
However, I am wrong. Paco turned around while I preached and is now sprinting in the opposite direction being pursued by a man on a motorcycle who is illegally driving down the sidewalk, popped up on its back wheel, commuters diving out of its way.
I know that Paco, like all city kids, see the city on a microscopic level. They are aware of nooks and grooves, pockets, pipelines and deep water wells in the spaces between the buildings that are invisible to those of us who rush from A to B to C. I could only imagine where escape from a motorcycle in hot pursuit would take me.
But, for no good reason that I’ll ever remember, I try. I take off running.
I can hear the buzzing of the motorcycle’s engine, the skidding of its wheels, screams of those caught totally by surprise and I run at full speed around the corner in the opposite direction toward an asphalt parking lot that cuts through the next block and about half way down the block I see that I am too late.
Paco is on the ground, laid out flat on his back on the sidewalk. A small crowd of open mouths is pointing at the motorcycle headed down the street. The bike is making a doughnut at the corner, spinning around, a small funnel cloud of burning rubber at its back wheel, and comes back to run Paco over, perhaps to break his spine.
I am still running toward the scene and to the guys in brown uniforms loading a hand truck full of packages into the back of their delivery truck, I look as if my plan is to throw my body in the path of the rubber tire. They are frozen as I pass them. I am moving too quick for them to react.
I have no plan. I have no thought. I cross the street sprinting. The world has fallen completely silent and my vision shakes. All that I am capable of hearing is my heart beat and my breathing. The bike closes in ahead of me. Between us is a fire hydrant. When I am close enough, I leap for it and land on it and leap off again with my left leg to become airborne. My body twists sideways and my right leg thrusts outward and there is a great, gushing feeling of release and relief when the heel of my shoe smashes into the helmet of the motorcycle rider and my heart skips a beat. When I land, it is on my two feet and I just need a couple of steps forward to stop the motion. I am proud of the fact that my hands never touch the ground. Behind me, the motorbike slides on its side, metal screeching against the asphalt creating a wake of sparks that sprinkle the sidewalk and the rider is on his knees, head against the wall.
I have executed what is called a jumping side kick. An advanced technique. It had been developed in ancient times as a way to unseat a warrior on horseback by courageous and desperate unarmed fighters.
I did tell Paco just moments ago that not all Asian dudes he sees on the street is a kung fu master and that to assume so would be a little bit racist. In this case however, he happened to be right. I come from a martial arts family that owns a chain of schools throughout three states. Though I’ve trained all my life, professionally, I have chosen a different path. With my family’s blessing.
I stay on the scene awaiting the police. But once they arrive, almost immediately, they tell me I can leave and I assume it is because I am dressed in a business suit and might be considerably late for my train. They too know the plight of commuting. One of them asks, “So what’s your relationship to the victim.”
“He’s a kid from the neighborhood,” I answer.

Posted by Charles at 08:12 AM | Comments (3)

Tue | February 14, 2006

Feb 11 meeting

date: Saturday, February 11
time: 1:00 pm
place: New York Public Library, 5th Av. and 41st St.
attendees: Lily Huang, Nina Huang, Tsz Fong, Charles Kim

After a late start, we had a writing session, and then Tsz and Charles read. I worked on a rewrite of a scene from Catcher in the Rye for homework. This inspired a discussion about serial killers.

Posted by Lily at 10:50 AM