Our Town - July 6, 2017 by Our Town

The local paper for the Upper East Side

WEEK OF JULY A SLICE, A CEL-RAY AND A SCOWL < P. 16

6-12 2017

Governor Andrew Cuomo boards an E train at Chambers Street for the ride to Penn Station in September 2014. Photo: Marc A. Hermann / MTA, via Wikimedia Commons

‘SOMETHING DID NOT GO WELL’ TRANSIT WOES How the MTA uses jargon to camouflage what the real problems are. A guide to subwayspeak BY DOUGLAS FEIDEN

Derailment. Track fires. Signal failure. Power outages. Inoperable switches. Hourly breakdowns. Sardine-like overcrowding. Meaningless, crackling, inaudible messages about “train traffic ahead.” Unannounced, unexplained, multi-minute, mid-tunnel stops between stations. And the blowing of swamp-like air from airconditioning ducts. Those are the 10 plagues afflicting the city’s subway system, and absent locusts, pestilence and wild beasts — at least so far — it still sounds positively biblical. But there is an 11th plague, under the radar, largely unexamined, just

as toxic, which also must be addressed: Obscurantism. This is the deliberate use of language to mask or obscure facts from becoming known. It’s the practice of evading clarity in communications and suppressing or inhibiting the dissemination of knowledge. It is actually one of the rare things at which the MTA excels. And no, it doesn’t cause cascading delays. But it camouflages them. It’s not the source of ineptitude, human error or mechanical failure. But it conceals them. As Joseph Lhota reprises his role as MTA chairman, he must curtail the jargon and bureaucratese that bars a fuller understanding of the history, causation and nature of a dysfunctional system. Start with a single overused word. “Disinvestment.” Yes, cash for capital projects has been withheld for decades. But when MTA Communications Director Beth DeFalco claims the subways are hobbled

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A new study from Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer catalogs the borough’s supermarkets and makes recommendations for ensuring their viability. Photo: size4riggerboots, via ﬂickr

BREWER TAKES STOCK OF MANHATTAN SUPERMARKETS COMMUNITY Some neighborhoods underserved by affordable food stores, study says BY MICHAEL GAROFALO

The importance of access to healthy food options in affordable supermarkets needs little additional explanation. How to ensure that all Manhattan residents can easily access such stores, however, is a more complicated matter. A study released last week by

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Restaurant Ratings Business Real Estate 15 Minutes

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Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer catalogs the borough’s existing grocery stores and prescribe solutions for maintaining and expanding the supermarket options available to Manhattan residents. “We need to make sure we do not have food deserts,” Brewer said in a telephone interview. “In Manhattan we don’t drive — we take public transportation — and we need to have the ability to get to a supermarket in our neighborhood. As the population gets older it’s even more important.” The study, titled “Manhattan Supermarkets: How to Keep them Alive,”

features a comprehensive survey of 229 Manhattan supermarkets, organized by community board, and reports the senior-friendly features available at each store, including

CONTINUED ON PAGE 15 Jewish women and girls light up the world by lighting the Shabbat candles every Friday evening 18 minutes before sunset. Friday, July 7 – 8:12 pm. For more information visit www.chabaduppereastside.com

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A DESIGNER’S ‘THIRD ACT’ FASHION Diane von Furstenberg’s latest project is a new Statue of Liberty museum BY JOCELYN NOVECK

Designer Diane von Furstenberg’s current favorite model is, not surprisingly, tall — more than 100 feet, actually. And though this model’s 225 tons don’t exactly ﬁt into a DVF wrap dress, she does have some rather iconic accessories: a tablet and, most importantly, a torch. Von Furstenberg’s latest project — part of a redirection of her energies in the year since she handed over the creative reins of her company — is the Statue of Liberty. More specifically, it’s a new museum that aims to better serve the four million-plus visitors who come to Liberty Island each year, since the vast majority can’t get into the statue itself due to increased post9/11 security. The goal is to raise $100 million for the project, which is slated to open in 2019; Von Furstenberg has already raised $74 million in a year and a half, according to the Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation.

But the veteran designer, who recently turned 70, says she had one key request when signing on as chair of the fundraising campaign: “Don’t call me chairwoman. Give me the title of temporary godmother.” It’s an apt title in a number of ways. For one thing, “Diane really is a godmother of fashion,” says Steven Kolb, president and CEO of the Council of Fashion Designers of America, where von Furstenberg serves as board chair. In her role — she was president of the organization for about a decade — she is a key inﬂuence and source of support for up-and-coming designers, Kolb says. And as she shifts into the latest stage of her career — a year ago, she ceded her company’s creative director position to Scottish designer Jonathan Saunders — she has focused increasingly on projects that promote women, including her annual DVF awards, now in their eighth year. She also often speaks to groups of women and girls, and is on the board of Vital Voices, the women’s leadership organization. The designer calls this time in her life and career her “third act.” “I always used to say that life has three moments,” she says, sitting in her downtown office on a recent af-

ternoon. “One is development, until about (age) 30. One is enjoyment, and then the third, the last season of your life, is somehow about fulﬁllment.” She says she’d been preparing for the milestone of turning 70 — which she reached on New Year’s Eve — for about a year, asking herself, “What kind of senior citizen do I want to be? How do I stay relevant?” What she decided, she says, was to use her voice to focus on women from the inside, rather than the outside. “All my life was about creating a product, fashion, something [women] could use to be the woman they want to be, and now in my third act I want to use my voice to help women be the woman they want to be, but from the inside,” she says. “Because it doesn’t matter how successful and powerful women are ... sometimes you wake up in the morning and you feel like a total loser. I know I do.” When the Statue of Liberty-Ellis Island Foundation came calling, von Furstenberg says, she thought, “‘Oh my God, my husband is going to divorce me if I join one more board.’” She also professes to not enjoy asking people for money. But then, as she recounted to guests last week at a sunset event on Liberty

Diane von Furstenberg. Photo: David Shankbone, via ﬂickr Island, she read about the statue’s story, and found herself riveted. As for the foundation, they were looking for “a woman who spoke French,” quips president Stephen Briganti. He says the Belgian-born von Furstenberg was also perfect because she herself arrived as an aspiring designer in America — those jersey dresses in her trunks — by boat, catching sight of Lady Liberty as she arrived. Von Furstenberg says her new project was also inspired by her late mother. As she recounts in her 2014 memoir, “The Woman I Wanted to Be,” the designer’s mother served in the Resis-

tance in Belgium during World War II, was arrested in May 1944 and sent to Auschwitz. She was one of the very few who survived — the camp was liberated by the Soviets in January 1945 — and when she made it back to Belgium she wrote on a form that she was “in excellent health” even though, her daughter says, she weighed about 50 pounds. “My mother always said God saved her so she could give me life,” she says. “And she used to add, ‘You are my torch of freedom.’ So it’s kind of the end of a cycle.”

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CRIME WATCH BY JERRY DANZIG PARK AVENUE ASSAULT

STATS FOR THE WEEK Reported crimes from the 19th precinct for

At 1:06 a.m. on Monday, June 19, a 79-year-old man was walking on 61st Street when an unknown perpetrator grabbed him in a choke hold and pulled him into a stairway at 531 Park Avenue. A second perpetrator took a wallet from the victimâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s pocket that held $250 in cash and credit cards. Police are still searching for the two muggers.

Week to Date

AMPED UP AND TAKEN DOWN A thief was arrested after being involved in two recent robberies. In the ďŹ rst incident at 2:30 a.m. on Thursday, April 27, a 21-year-old woman entered the 7-Eleven store at 1453 Third Avenue and stuffed 16 cans of energy drinks into a bag before attempting to leave the store without paying. According to the police account, a store employee confronted her, when she pulled out a pair of scissors and said, â&#x20AC;&#x153;Donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t come near me, or Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ll smash your face with these scissors!â&#x20AC;? Then at 6:45 a.m. on Sunday, May 7, the same woman entered a CVS store at 1172 Third Avenue and tried to make off with 21 packs of bubblegum and 40 cans of energy drinks. As she tried to exit the store without paying, she pushed an employee, and once outside,

Year to Date

2017 2016

% Change

2017

2016

% Change

Murder

n/a

-100.0

Rape

n/a

500.0

Robbery

-33.3

48.8

Felony Assault

-60.0

-6.1

Burglary

0.0

6.5

Grand Larceny

31.6

662 647 2.3

Grand Larceny Auto

-75.0

-54.1

Tony Webster, via ďŹ&#x201A;ickr

bit a 31-year-old man who attempted to help the storeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s employees hold her, before she struck the same man on the side of the face and knocked him to the ground. She was later arrested on Tuesday, June 27 and charged with two counts of robbery.

LAWDY MISS FRAUDY Chanel bags seem to be all the rage among Bloomingdale shoplifters these days. At 3:05 p.m. on Thursday, June

29, three young women from Queens entered the store and attempted to purchase merchandise using fraudulent credit cards. These items included a Chanel bag valued at $750, another Chanel bag priced at $3,400, four Chanel bags totaling $19,700, and three more totaling $12,500, making a total stolen and recovered of $36,350. All three women were apprehended and arrested: a 22-year-old on charges of grand larceny and criminal possession of stolen property; a 17-year-old on a charge of grand larceny; and a 21-year-

old on charges of grand larceny and criminal possession of a controlled substance found in glassine envelopes in her purse. Then less than hour later at 4 p.m., a 42-year-old woman from Queens also attempted to buy two Chanel handbags, each valued at $3,200, using another forged credit card. She too was arrested and charged with grand larceny, criminal possession of stolen property, and attempting to make an illegal purchase using a forged instrument.

BANANA BANDIT Shortly after noon on Saturday, June 24, a 53-year-old man entered the Shell gas station store at 1855 First Avenue and began eating bananas on display. He then knocked down some of the display shelves and tried to make off with other merchandise valued at $250. Police arrived, and he was arrested and charged with criminal mischief and disorderly conduct.

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212-828-5829

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1850 Second Ave.

212-490-9535

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360 E. 57th St.

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1365 First Ave.

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Peace of mind begins by planning today! The Sanctuary at MOUNT LEBANON CEMETERY Aaron Foldenauer, right, a City Council candidate, speaking about a federal criminal complaint he ﬁled June 28, alleging that his rights to free speech were violated when NYPD officials conﬁscated campaign literature prior to allowing him and others into a June 21 event hosted by Council Member Margaret Chin and Mayor Bill de Blasio.

COUNCIL CANDIDATE ALLEGES WRONGDOING POLITICS A challenger to Margaret Chin’s District 1 seat says campaign literature was confiscated illegally BY RICHARD KHAVKINE

A challenger to Council Member Margaret Chin’s District 1 seat has ﬁled a criminal complaint alleging that the confiscation of his campaign literature prior to a June 21 town hall meeting hosted by Chin and attended by Mayor Bill de Blasio violated his right to free speech. According to the 7-page complaint by Aaron Foldenauer, which he submitted to the office of acting U.S. Attorney Joon Kim June 28, uniformed and plainclothes NYPD personnel at a security tent seized political flyers, banners and signs critical of either Chin or de Blasio or that supported opposition candidates before allowing people in to the June 21 event at the YMCA on Bowery. Foldenauer said he and a number of his campaign staff had

been outside the event space handing out political literature both in support of his candidacy and critical of Chin’s record. Representatives from other organizations, including the National Mobilization against SweatShops, Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden, and opponents of the Real Estate Board of New York, were also outside the YMCA passing out material critical of Chin and de Blasio. Those flyers were also taken from people entering the event. Flyers and literature supportive of Chin were also conﬁscated. But speaking after submitting the complaint, Foldenauer called those confiscations a “smokescreen” since, he said, the vast majority of political literature being passed out that evening was critical of Chin or of de Blasio or of both. He also noted that inside the venue, members of Chin’s staff were passing out an “update” from Chin to her constituents, her spring newsletter to the community and other material. “She had full incentive to ensure literature was confiscated,” he said. “She had free rein to distribute her literature.” A spokesman for Chin’s cam-

paign called Foldenauer allegations “baseless and absurd.” “The truth is, the NYPD and Mayor’s police detail prohibited all campaign literature from being brought into the town hall facility, including Council Member Chin’s own volunteers. Council Members have zero input regarding the actions of the Mayor’s NYPD detail, and Mr. Foldenauer knows that,” the spokesman, Jake Dilemani, said in a statement. Police officials deferred questions about the seizures to the city’s law department, which did not respond to emailed questions. The mayor’s office also did not respond to an inquiry. “It’s viewpoint discrimination, in violation of the First Amendment,” Foldenauer said. “I don’t think there can be an explanation of this conduct.” Foldenauer’s complaint cites several court precedents he said are supportive of his claim that his rights to free speech and against unlawful search and seizure were violated. The complaint suggests that Chin and de Blasio conspired to keep political opponents from exercising their free-speech rights.

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TALKING POPS

public — with interest that don’t always perfectly align?

PLANNING Urban planner Raquel Ramati on Manhattan’s open spaces BY MICHAEL GAROFALO

Privately Owned Public Spaces, or POPS, have been a feature of Manhattan zoning for decades. The basic concept is simple: private developers create public plazas and other open spaces in or around their buildings; in exchange, the city permits the developers to build additional floor area, which generally translates into more high-value stories at the tops of buildings. POPS haven’t always lived up to their goals — more than half of the spaces included in a recent city comptroller’s audit were found to have failed to provide the required public amenities. And the legislation has been periodically revisited by the city council, most recently last week, when the council passed a bill mandating a comprehensive database of all POPS locations and regular compliance inspections. Few people know more about POPS and incentive zoning than Raquel Ramati. As director of the Department of City Planning’s Urban Design Group and Chief Architect of Manhattan, Ramati had a close hand in drafting and improving open-space zoning legislation and worked throughout her career to improve the city’s streetscapes. Today, she continues to advocate for public urban space as a professor at Columbia and NYU and as a private consultant through her ﬁrm, Raquel Ramati Associates. Ramati joined Straus News for a conversation on open space in Manhattan.

How have POPS changed since they were ﬁrst introduced?

SUBWAY CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 due to the “sins of 1970s neglect and disinvestment,” she is eschewing responsibility, shamelessly ﬁnger-pointing, and basically saying, “Don’t blame us for today’s conditions, it happened 40 years ago.” Likewise, when Governor Andrew Cuomo’s chief spokesman, Richard Azzopardi, tracks the “rapid acceleration” of MTA woes to ex-Governor George Pataki’s “disinvestment” in the system, here’s what he’s really saying: “Even though we’ve run the sub-

We have to think about the street as an urban room, as an important place ... The parks and streets are our public spaces.” Raquel Ramati

The first incentive zoning was in 1961. There was no real definition of a POPS, and as a result, there were many POPS or plazas that were sunken. Developers, because retail underground does not count towards Floor Area Ratio [FAR], sunk the plazas down. They got incentives and created retail. The plaza where the Apple Store is now used to be a sunken plaza. Nobody ever used it. So the first legislation in 1961 created open space, a lot of which was influenced by the Seagram Building plaza. But in the late sixties, the city realized that the plazas had not really met the goals, and since then, in different iterations, some of which I was part of, we tried to create plazas that are an extension to the street. We created the requirements that plazas would be at street level, that they had to have a certain size. We introduced covered pedestrian spaces and arcades.

In general, do you feel that POPS achieve the goals that they are intended to achieve? In general, I think the idea is an excellent idea, because the city will

ways and controlled the MTA since Cuomo took office 6.5 years ago, it all went to hell in the 1990s.” It may be unkind to note that when Pataki was elected in 1994, the incumbent he toppled was Cuomo père, the liberal lion his son calls “Mario.” In his spare time, Lhota should pick up the MTA glossary, read it, junk it and start afresh. Where to begin? Try these imprecisions: • “Dwell time” and “throughput.” It may not be particularly helpful, but here’s how the words are used in MTA-speak: “Increased dwell time leads to a degradation of throughput,” an online agency report says. What this means is that a train on

JULY 6-12,2017

A POPS at the Kimpton Hotel Eventi, near 29th Street and Sixth Avenue. Photo: Michael Garofalo never be able to purchase open space that is as expensive as in Midtown Manhattan. We have over 500 plazas now. I think some of them are very successful. If you look at the old IBM building, which I take my students to each semester and is now owned by Ed Minskoff, it has a covered pedestrian space that is very successful. And why is it successful? It’s large enough, it’s well-maintained, it has a small commercial area where you can buy a cup of coffee (but you don’t have to), it connects two streets, 57th and 56th, and it’s transparent so from the street you can see it. In many areas between 7th and 8th Avenues, where the block is very wide, the idea of having another way for pedestrians to cut through the block is also very successful. Several of the plazas are not very successful. For instance, on Third Avenue there are several plazas that ... don’t have seating; they don’t have all the requirements that POPS have now. They were built after 1970, but they don’t meet today’s requirements.

What aspects of POPS deserve more attention?

you address it? You see these truck attacks all over the world — what do we do? Are we putting back the bollards that we used to be against? That, to me, is a major issue that nobody has addressed yet. I’m very interested in it and I was thinking about doing some research about that.

How could POPS be further improved? The question is: is there any thing that you can replace the plaza with if it doesn’t work? The city hasn’t addressed that. I think it’s a mistake, because many developers are very frustrated because they want to improve the public spaces and they ﬁnd it extremely difficult. The process has been too lengthy, in my opinion, too demanding, while the developer has been willing to invest a lot of money. City planning has been spending so much time on every detail, every tree, every seat, and I think after 30 years, these spaces need renovation. It’s become extremely difficult. There has to be a way to encourage developers to renovate their spaces rather than discourage them by creating such a long process.

The security issues of today create a new reality, which really, really worries me. And the question is how do

How can the city work to ensure good outcomes in projects like these, which involve multiple stakeholders — planners, developers, architects, the

the Lexington Avenue corridor that’s scheduled to dwell for 30 to 45 seconds, to alight and load passengers, may in fact take one to two minutes or longer, thus reducing the number of trains per hour than can pass through a station. •“Guideline capacity” and “crush capacity.” As used in a hypothetical sentence: Ideally, the No. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 trains should operate at guideline capacity, but unfortunately, they’re now likely to operate at crush capacity. Guidelines call for three square feet of space for every standing passenger, something you might possibly see at the Whitehall Street station of

the R train at 3 a.m. on a Sunday. At more common crush times, a subway train’s maximum physical capacity is utilized or exceeded. If guidelines were met, there’d be 1,400 to 1,450 people on a typical A, B, C, D, E, F, G, J, L, M, N, Q, R and W train, according to the MTA’s online glossary. At crush capacity, the so-called lettered trains can and do pack in a suffocating 2,010 to 2,300 riders or more. •“Something that did not go well.” This translation is easy: An inexplicable, indefensible nightmare underground. Wynton Habersham, acting vice president of MTA subways, used

I am teaching a course at NYU that I call “Good Design is Good Business.” I am a great believer that the developer eventually beneﬁts out of these public spaces, and the city beneﬁts as well. The dynamic between the developer and the architect and the developer and the community is often not as smooth as it should be, because the developer is not as familiar with the process of what architecture is, and the architect or the community is not very interested in the financial pro forma of the developer. It doesn’t have to be an adversarial relationship, and in many places it works really well. If you look at the plazas or the entrance to the subway at the Bloomberg building, for example, because the site is big enough, the subway entrance does not impede the value of either the residential or the commercial space. On big sites, there’s a lot that you can do with mixed use. It’s more difficult at smaller sites — and Manhattan is made up of a lot of small sites. I think that the developers in Manhattan are pretty sophisticated today, much more than they were 20 or 30 years ago or when the plaza legislation was written. When I came to the city, when you had a new building you never knew who the architect was, because it wasn’t an important part. Today, architecture and amenities are part of the branding of buildings. The developer gets an advantage, often, off the amenities that he provides, and part of it is the public space.

What other lessons about open space can you share? We have to create real plans for the linkage of buildings to each other. The incentive now to developers is site by site. We have to think about the street as an urban room, as an important place. I think those linkages between buildings is really what creates a street. In New York, we have such small apartments. The public space is even more important here than in other places. The parks and streets are our public spaces.

those words to describe a June 5 incident in which riders were trapped for 48 sweltering minutes on an F train with no power, air or lights — and no live announcements, only a bogus recording about “train traffic ahead.” The bottom line: Lhota’s mission is to rescue the rush hour — and order his apparatchiks to stop calling it “concentrated commutation time.” Now, tell us what subway-speak, language, terminology or bureaucratic jargon you ﬁnd most objectionable. Write Douglas Feiden, at invreporter@ strausnews.com. To brush up on the lingo, you can consult the MTA’s own online glossary, http://web.mta.info/capital/ sas_docs/sdeis/glossary.pdf

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SEEK AND YOU WILL FIND LEX IN THE CITY BY ALEXA DIBENEDETTO

One of the most wondrous things about New York City is that it never fails to surprise you. You might expect that I’d be jaded by now, having lived here for most of my life. Not quite. In a few ways, yes. I’m jaded by the MTA issues, the indecisive weather. I’m immune to the odors that out-oftowners notice immediately (what really is fresh air?) and unfazed by the mystery substances that trickle onto my shoulder when I stand beneath awnings and air conditioners. I’m accustomed to the oddballs yelling Bible verses at me while I wait on the corner for my Uber to arrive or the 100 pop-up eateries that open

every week, each attempting to be more eclectic than the rest. Beyond these things, I view the city with the same sense of awe as those who’ve just arrived. So often I discover some bizarre new experience, some hidden haunt or quirky club that I couldn’t possibly imagine how one could ever truly become bored here. It’s a place that has something to offer for everyone; if you have an interest or a hobby, you’re sure to ﬁnd hundreds of others who share it. Beneath the surface, 1,000 subcultures thrive. Art gallery-goers and poets share the street with analysts and antique dealers, who stand in line for their coffee alongside ravers and race-runners. My mindset is that if you open the door to opportunity — if you are willing to step outside of your comfort zone, to say “yes” more often —

you’ll naturally uncover the corners of New York that surprise you. The same goes for people — following this method, you’ll meet the most interesting folk. Said mindset — unfortunately or not, I’ve yet to decide — has pervaded into my dating life. This is the story of how I ended up on a date with an Irish-American rapper almost twice my age. Everyone has a different approach to dating in New York. Dating apps have gathered more steam than I’d have expected. I’m a “hopeless romantic” (queue eye roll). I envision that I’ll meet my future spouse in a scenario that involves toppled books, coffee spills, or any other circumstance which entangles my constant clumsiness with his modest generosity and unabashedly good looks. On a Saturday afternoon I walked through St. Marks place, looking for a book. I passed a noticeably handsome guy. He had the aesthetic of someone who also enjoys books. Or

Voices

so I assumed. I think I was projecting. We made eye contact as we crossed paths. I looked back, and he did too. I kept walking and looked back again — so did he. So I stopped. In a 3-second time frame, I needed to make a decision: did I want to be forward and approach him, or did I want to do what I would normally do, what my gut told me to do, which was to just keep walking. I approached him. He seemed cool. We exchanged numbers and agreed to meet sometime soon. I felt bold. Walking home, I envisioned all of the other bold things I would do, like open bills I was afraid to open and tell my crabby bodega owner where to stuff it. The following weekend, we made plans to meet at the Standard, per his suggestion — a little “bougie” for my tastes, but sure, why not. I spotted him at the bar. He was wearing a fedora. Welp. I swallowed hard. In the light of restaurant, I saw wrinkles in his face that I hadn’t

noticed when we ﬁrst met. He was definitely older than me, but how much older? Over the next hour, I learned that he was nearly 20 years my senior. He was in advertising but quit to perform music at parties and functions. His real joy, however, was rapping. He liked to battle, and he frequented the rap battle scene. Listen, I’m all for pursuing the things that make you feel like your best self, no matter the medium. Baking, web design, yodeling, or rapping — if it gives you joy, go for it! Sitting with this man, though, I knew almost immediately that we did not jive. I needed to abort mission. I’d been bold enough. I can’t remember the excuse I used in order to abandon ship, but we ended the date on good terms and I headed home. Later, I searched the web for his songs, to understand what an advertising aﬁcionado turned lyrical performer sounded like. If you’re wondering — he’s not half bad.

THE DOCTOR IS NOT IN GRAYING NEW YORK BY MARCIA EPSTEIN

The women in my group were talking about the difficulty of finding doctors who accept traditional Medicare. One member said it took her two years to find a doctor when hers retired. It seems that one has to make many phone calls and be told that the doctor is no longer taking Medicare before finding one who will. Even calling hospitals for referrals will not assure you of a doctor who will take Medicare and not just submit the papers after you pay upfront. Many won’t even submit papers – pay the fee and that’s it! To me this is a moral failure on the part of the medical profession. Yes, doctors have the right to make money, as does everyone else, but to toss aside a whole part of the population in the search for riches is stomach turning. The best way to find doctors who take

Medicare is networking: Ask everyone you know, send e-mails to friends and acquaintances, ask on Facebook. I’ve found wonderful doctors this way, but it takes work. Also, most of the walk-in clinics take Medicare. I’ve heard of seniors who use these centers as their primary medical care and it works out ﬁne. It might be the future for us if doctors don’t realize that their obligation is to take care of people. The ﬁrst question I ask when I phone a doctor is “Do you take Medicare?” Usually I’ve done my research and have a recommendation, but I still ask. It can change from day to day if a doctor decides his or her Medicare list is closed. We seniors are being thrown under the bus, and I resent it enormously. If you’re living on Social Security and a small pension, as many are, the situation can be dire. Let’s hope it’s not going to get even worse in the years to come because of what’s going on in Washington, D.C. Don’t forget to check out the Senior

Planet website. It includes may of Senior Planet’s own events, as well as community happenings, such as free weekly chair yoga at Rutgers Presbyterian Church at 236 West 73rd Street. You can attend from 1 – 2 p.m. on Thursdays. The website is a trove of information about movies, museums dances, walks and more. DOROT also has chair yoga, as well as many other free activities. Not much is free these days; it’s worth checking out. I am guilty of not using all the senior discounts available to me. Hey, if I’ve got to be a senior, I might as well reap the beneﬁts. For example, many retailers offer discounts to oldsters. Walgreens offers 20 percent off on certain Tuesdays. Applebee’s Restaurant offers a senior discount, but you must remember to ask for it. Ben and Jerry’s and Blimpies also offer senior discounts. You can check out websites such as the Senior List and Retired Brains which post and update businesses that give breaks to senior

Photo: Sole Treadmill, via ﬂickr customers. The Sciddy App has lists of U.S. businesses that offer discounts to those 50+. The discounts consist of food, entertainment, home services, travel, heath and some others. The app has alerts to notify you of the discount when you are at that particular establishment. You also can search for senior discounts near you by us-

President & Publisher, Jeanne Straus nyoffice@strausnews.com

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ing the Around Me feature on Sciddy. Some of the senior discounts available to seniors are at the 9/11 Memorial Museum, the Rubin Museum of Art and many Broadway shows. Ask at the box office. And remember, there’s no shame in asking. We went through a lot to get where we are.

Editor-In-Chief, Alexis Gelber editor.ot@strausnews.com Deputy Editor Staff Reporters Richard Khavkine Madeleine Thompson editor.otdt@strausnews.com newsreporter@strausnews.com Michael Garofalo Senior Reporter reporter@strausnews.com Doug Feiden invreporter@strausnews.com

JULY 6-12,2017

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Eastsiders are uncompromising, and so are Duette ® honeycomb shades with Top-Down/Bottom-Up by Hunter Douglas.

Firefighters at the scene of a five-alarm fire on East Ninth Street and Broadway Wednesday evening. Photo: Bryse Ciallella

VILLAGE BLAZE DISPLACES HUNDREDS FDNY A five-alarm fire burns for hours near Astor Place BY BRYSE CIALLELLA

Hundreds of residents were displaced and 19 firefighters injured, none critically, by a five-alarm fire in a six-story building on East Ninth Street near Broadway Wednesday evening, FDNY officials said. The building, at 60 East Ninth Street, was extensively damaged by ﬁre, smoke and water, a department spokesman said.

“It was a long operation, a lot of water,” he said. Fire crews were on scene at 5:48 p.m., three minutes after the first call came in, he said, and worked for about three hours to extinguish the blaze. The fire might have sparked in a ground-floor deli, FDNY Commissioner Daniel Nigro said, although no definitive cause has been determined. No residents were injured by the fire, although one person did have a medical emergency during the blaze the spokesman said A 36-year-old woman who asked to be identified only as Melissa lives in an apartment

on the third ﬂoor of the building. She was at work at Credit Suisse but learned of the fire when a friend who lives in Spain saw social media posts of the ﬁre and alerted Melissa. Melissa headed home, sidestepping her way around the mass of onlookers watching the smoke billowing out of the building’s windows. Although no people were trapped inside the building, Melissa’s four-year-old dog, Finnegan, was. A half an hour or so later, a firefighter came out of the building with his arms cradled around the pup. Finnegan had made it.

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GRAMERCY PARK 292 3rd Avenue @ 23rd St 212-777-3030 YORKVILLE 1491 3rd Ave @ 84th St 212-289-6300

UPPER EAST SIDE 888 Lexington Ave @66th St 212-772-1400

HELL’S KITCHEN 766 10th Ave @ 52nd St 212-245-3241

UPPER WEST SIDE 159 W 72nd St @ B’way 212-595-2500

LOWER EAST SIDE 80 4th Ave @ 10th St 212-477-6930

SOHO 55 Thompson St @ Broome 212-627-1100

CHELSEA 215 7TH Avenue @ 23rd St 212-646-5454 212-645-5454

UPTOWN WEST 2680 Broadway @ 102nd St 212-531-2300

LONG ISLAND CITY 30-35 Thomson Ave 347-418-3480

JULY 6-12,2017

Our Town|Eastsider ourtownny.com

MARBLE COLLEGIATE CHURCH Sunday Worship at 11:00am Sunday Worship, led by Dr. Michael Brown, is the heart of the Marble Church community. It is where we all gather to sing, pray, and be changed by an encounter with God. Marble is known throughout the world for the practical, powerful, life-changing messages and where one can hear world class music from our choirs that make every heart sing.

More Events. Add Your Own: Go to nycnow.com

Busy? Live stream Sunday Worship with us at 11:00am at MarbleChurch.org.

Summer Spirituality Series Jesus, Popcorn, & Me Sundays at 10:00am Seeing the Sacred in the Secular: How Secular Films can be Utilized to Engage in Theological Discussions with Dr. Ava E. Carroll, Rev. Kirsty DePree, Mario Sprouse, and Chris Vega. Explore the sacred in the secular and how movies can be utilized to engage in theological discussions. All sessions meet in the Labyrinth Room at 10:00am and will be live streamed.

Upcoming Events

Marianne Williamson

in Partnership with Marble Collegiate Church Tuesdays 7:30pm - 9:00pm New York Times bestselling author, Marianne Williamson brings her weekly lecture series to Marble Church. The cost to attend is $20, however, no one is turned away for lack of funds. The evening is also available via Livestream by donation.

Event listings brought to you by Marble Collegiate Church. 1 West 29th Street / New York, New York 10001 212 686 2770 / MarbleChurch.org

Thu 6

Fri 7

Sat 8

▲COCKTAILS AT COOPER HEWITT: LOLO

LEARN HOW TO PLAY CHESS

SUMMER SATURDAY: GET PERSONAL

Cooper Hewitt, 2 East 91st St. 6 p.m. $15 Summer performance series in the Arthur Ross Terrace and Garden, featuring Lolo, a show-stopping artist from Tennessee whose music evokes hot southern night. All ages welcome. Rain or shine. Cocktails and light fare. 212-849-8400. cooperhewitt. org

Webster Library. 1465 York Ave. 3 p.m. Free Whether you’re a chess master or just starting out, stop by Webster Library for some board time. Learn how to play, practice your skills or just play a game. All materials provided, and experienced instructor Timothy Mobley will lead the group. 212-288-5049. nypl.org

Guggenheim Museum, 1071 Fifth Ave. 9 a.m. $35-$50 Spend an hour exploring and discussing a single artwork or artist from “Visionaries: Creating a Modern Guggenheim” with Stephanie Jeanjean, gallery educator, who will help unpack their meaning. Pre-register to reserve space. 212-423-3500. guggenheim. org

FICTION WRITING

FIRST FRIDAYS

Bryant Park, 41 West 40th St. 7 p.m. Free Pen your own story, poem or screenplay, at writers workshops guaranteed to improve and perfect. In case of rain, events are held under a tent at the Reading Room. 212-768-4242. bryantpark.org

The Frick Collection, 1 East 70th St. 6 p.m. Free Enjoy gallery talks, music performances and sketching, or simply ﬁnd yourself in the company of the Old Masters and art enthusiasts from around the world. Please note that children under 10 will not be admitted. 212-288-0700. frick.org

MET SIGNS IN THE STUDIO: ASL PHOTOGRAPHY WORKSHOP The Met Fifth Avenue 2 p.m. Free Families with children ages 5-12 are invited to be inspired by The Met collection to create their own works of art. THe workshop includes a discussion in the galleries followed by an art-making activity in the studio.

JULY 6-12,2017

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Comfort, Security & Community Straus News’ Senior Living Guide In American Sign Language only, without voice interpretation. Reservations required. 212-650-2010. metmuseum. org

Sun 9 SUMMER DRAWING SERIES Guggenheim Museum 1071 5th Ave. 10:30 a.m. $20 Celebrate the 150th birth year of Frank Lloyd Wright through a series of activities related to the architect’s masterpiece. Cost is per family and includes admission, workshop materials and tour for two adults and up to four children. 212-423-3500. guggenheim,org

▲LE CARROUSEL MAGIQUE Bryant Park, 41 West 40th St. 1 p.m. Free Voila! Bring the whole family over to Bryant Park to see world’s best magicians perform fun-ﬁlled tricks for kids of all ages. 212-768-4242. bryantpark.org

Mon 10 TOUR THE PARK AVENUE ARMORY 10:30 a.m. $15 Take a guided tour of the Park Avenue Armory led by a staff

member and view the unique qualities of this landmark building, from the soaring 55,000 square foot Drill Hall to the extraordinary interiors. 212-933-5812. armoryonpark.org

TRIVIA NIGHT Mid-Manhattan Library, 455 Fifth Ave. 6:30 p.m. Free Test your knowledge in a challenging, entertaining 30-question trivia quiz. There are questions and categories for all, spanning subjects from music and movies to New York history, sports, literature and others in between. Individuals and teams welcome. 212-340-0863. nypl.org

Tue 11 TASTE OF THE TERMINAL Grand Central Terminal, 89 East 42nd St. 11 a.m. Free Select vendors from around the Terminal will offer tastings, treats and special offers in Vanderbilt Hall. Get a taste of the many dining and retail options Grand Central has to offer, and enjoy live performances by Music Under New York. 212-340-2583. grandcentralterminal.com

VAN GOGH FIND YOURSELF 59E59 Theaters, 59 East 59th St.

How To Improve Your Life! Make A Better Decision with All The Right Info at Your Disposal

6:30 p.m. $15 Written and performed by Walter DeForest. Audience members create art along with Vincent while the artist reveals his deepest secrets. DeForest blends storytelling, theater and live art creation in this engaging portrait of Vincent. 212-753-5959. 59e59.org

Reaching 150,000+ loyal readers weekly in Doorman Buildings and Key Locations

Wed 12 ‘THE COST OF COURAGE’

The dominant circulation based neighborhood newspapers in Manhattan and 80,000+ visitors each month to our websites

Albertine, 972 Fifth Ave. 7 p.m. Free Author Charles Kaiser and Hendrik Hertzberg, senior editor and staff writer at The New Yorker, discuss Kaiser’s account of three children of a bourgeois Catholic family who worked together in the French Resistance. 212-650-0070. albertine.com

Issue Date Thursday, July 27, 2017 Ad Deadline Thursday, July 20, 2017

HOW TO CREATE A WINNING ONLINE PRESENCE Southbridge Towers, 90 Beekman St. 6:30 p.m. Free Learn how to shine online in a limited amount of time. In this workshop, you will learn how to assess which mode(s) of online communication is right for your group, the pros and cons of creating and maintaining a website. 212-360-8120. partnershipforparks.org

Call NOW for more information! 212.868.0190 x407 or advertising@strausnews.com The local paper for the Upper East Side

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JULY 6-12,2017

ANCIENT CHINA UNEARTHED A stunning view of history at the Met

IF YOU GO

BY MARY GREGORY

When a group of Chinese farmers hit an obstacle while digging a well in 1974, they unleashed an army. The Terracotta Army of Emperor Qin Shi Huang had stood watch over his funerary complex for more than 2,000

WHAT: “Age of Empires: Chinese Art of the Qin & Han Dynasties (221 B.C.–A.D. 220)” WHERE: The Met Fifth Avenue WHEN: Through July 16 www.metmuseum.org/

Jade was believed to have magical powers, protecting the dead in the journey to an afterlife. Princess Dou Wan had a whole suit made for herself. Photo: Adel Gorgy

An ornamental plaque of agate, surrounded by golden and turquoise animals and dragons, bears witness to cultural influences from afar. Photo: Adel Gorgy years. Modern replicas fill theme parks and have traveled the globe. But The Met Fifth Avenue has the real deal. And “Age of Empires: Chinese Art of the Qin & Han Dynasties (221 B.C.–A.D. 220)” is an imposing show of might. A darkened gallery behind a wall of text greets the audience with a display of power. A life-sized kneeling archer is poised at one side of the room. Four standing warriors face from the opposite wall. Behind them, a shadowy photographic representation gives the sense of endless rows of additional soldiers, ready to fill in for vanquished comrades. In between, two charioteers reign a phalanx of four horses (replicas of the originals) into formation, ready to charge. All the pomp of a royal audience is expressed in the silent timelessness that fills the room. It’s designed to give a sense of the Emperor Qin Shi Huang’s Mausoleum Museum, a UNESCO World Heritage Site near Xian, China. Whether it at all corresponds with being in the presence of the actual Terracotta Army is something only those who’ve visited it can say. But for those who haven’t, it’s an excellent introduction and a chance to see some of the most important archeological finds of the past century. The warriors stand at the gateway to an extraordinary exhibition filled with rare works of historical import, most of which have never been seen before in the United States. More than 160 ancient Chinese works of art are included. There are examples of sculptures and painting, ceramics, textiles, bronzes and calligraphy. Arms and armor, spiritual and civic texts, decorative yet functional objects like lamps

and vessels, and a spectacular one-ofa-kind mummy wrapped in jade ﬁll the galleries. Together they give a sense of life at the highest court two millennia ago. All are on loan from museums and archaeological institutions in the People’s Republic of China, so don’t expect to have another chance to see them in one place at one time. “The Han Empire represents the ‘classical’ era of Chinese civilization, coinciding in importance and in time with Greco-Roman civilization in the West. Like the Roman Empire, the Han state brought together people of diverse backgrounds under a centralized government that fostered a new ‘Chinese’ identity,” explained curator Jason Sun. But, before there was a Han dynasty, there was the Qin. The Qin lasted only from 221–206 B.C., but laid the groundwork for a new civilization. The dynasty led by emperor Shi Huang is credited for introducing standardized weights and measures, examples of which are on view, as well as legal and monetary systems that extended across regions, and for building roads and canals, and beginning the Great Wall. Beyond that, he sought immortality. Some 700,000 laborers were reportedly used to create both his army and a comfortable afterlife. His and other funerary sites were ﬁlled with musicians and dancers (whose charming forms grace the exhibition), feasting (stunningly naturalistic replicas of goats, cows, pigs and chickens are a highlight), and lots and lots of bodyguards. Shi Huang started his tomb as soon as he took power. According to some historians, Shi Huang, want-

ing to protect his burial site in eternal elegance, had his son bury alive all the artists and workers who’d fashioned it, so its location would remain a secret. Building upon the Qin’s foundations, the Han dynasty, which lasted by contrast for more than 400 years, took to maintaining and continuing a lasting, powerful and productive society. The sections that follow the focus on the Qin dynasty present artifacts from the Han, as well as objects that testify to the growing importance of international commerce. Both the Silk Road, which evolved during the Han dynasty, and maritime trade brought Persian and Hellenistic influences, as well as exotic materials like amethyst, aquamarine, beryl and rock crystal. Don’t expect a lot of imperial bling in this exhibition, though. These ancient works represent, largely, the stuff of life, even if transported to the afterlife. As you go through the exhibition, marvel at the artworks, learn more about our world, but don’t envy the lifestyles of the rich and famous. The emperor Shi Huang, who built an army of warriors that lasted 2,200 years, ruled for little more than a decade, during which he survived three assassination attempts. His first son was forced to commit suicide by political enemies, and another son ruled for a scant three years. But the advancements started under the Qin and developed under the Han led to a unified China. “Even today,” curator Sun said, “most Chinese refer to themselves as the ‘Han people’ — the single largest ethnic group in the world.”

JULY 6-12,2017

Our Town|Eastsider ourtownny.com

LOVE, LOSS AND OPERA THEATER “Bandwidth: The Ups & Downs of a Lesbian Diva,” explores co-writer Ilene Sameth’s decision to leave opera as a young woman, and how, 30 years later, she’s returning to the stage BY OSCAR KIM BAUMAN

As a young woman, Ilene Sameth gave up her burgeoning opera career to live openly as a lesbian. This decision was followed by a tumultuous period in her life during which Sameth gained weight, lost weight, found love, and completely re-examined her outlook on life. Now, 30 years later, she’s returning to the stage to confront her past. In “Bandwidth: The Ups & Downs of a Lesbian Diva,” playing at Dixon Place in the Lower East Side on July 11th, Sameth tells the story of her experiences with life, love, and more than one kind of loss. The story of Bandwidth begins during Sameth’s time as a professional opera singer. A favorite role of hers from this time, which features in “Bandwidth,” was Carmen, which she said is “just so well known that you feel this incredible responsibility to perform it well.” Though she loved the opera, she would soon have to leave it behind. As much as Sameth loved pretending to be someone else on stage, she couldn’t keep on pretending after the show ended. At the time, there were no out lesbians in the world of opera, though there were some openly gay men. This lack of lesbian representation, for Sameth, made coming out while continuing her career “basically impossible.” Around the same time she decided to give up her opera career, Sameth had been gaining weight. Though the pressure to maintain a certain appearance was another factor that pushed her towards leaving opera, Sameth said she believes her weight gain may also have been related to the pressure of keeping her sexuality a secret, noting that she “was having to hide so much of myself in the world.” Sameth began work on “Bandwidth” two years again, during a period of self-reﬂection that began when she turned 50.

Ilene Sameth in “Bandwidth.” Photo: Shelby Zoe Colby Now 58, Sameth said that her 50th birthday was a turning point in her life, prompting her to lose almost 100 pounds and change her lifestyle in the pursuit of health. As a part of this change, Sameth looked back an earlier turning point, her departure from singing. She would write out vignettes of incidents and experiences from her past, and her partner, writer Barbara Raab would, as Sameth put it, “make them more cohesive, make them funnier.” Sameth said that all the words spoken in “Bandwidth” are hers, making it “a very honest play,” that is “completely autobiographical.” The title emerged from Sameth’s new philosophy on life. When changing her lifestyle, she said she came to the conclusion that “in order to make changes in your life, you need to expand your bandwidth to understand what you need to do,” and that the title “Bandwidth” came almost instantly. The show’s subtitle, “The Ups & Downs of a Lesbian Diva” took some more work. Sameth said it was “about the 27th version of a tagline” she thought of, but when she did, everything clicked into place. One of the challenges of keeping “Bandwidth” honest was making sure to portray people accurately. Statements taken out of context and put in front of an audience can make even the best of people come off poorly. Sameth says that this was at the front of her mind as she crafted “Bandwidth,” saying that “people say things and do things in your life that can feel hurtful at times, but you learn through life that it’s not intentional and that they’re only doing their best,” and that she tried to depict everyone mentioned in the show, includ-

ing herself, in an honest light. Despite the challenges she faced, creating and performing in “Bandwidth” has been a largely therapeutic experience for Sameth. Much of this connection comes from the warm reception the show received at its ﬁrst performances in May. Sameth said that the reaction from the very first audience was “really wonderful,” and that as the show went on, she felt that there was a “profound connection” between herself and the audience, and that they were able to bond over the shared experiences and “battles that we all face.” During an interview with Straus News, Sameth also shared her advice for those who may be struggling, as she was, between being true to their identity and having a successful career. To Sameth, the two go hand in hand: “You can’t fully achieve what you want in life unless you’re honest about yourself,” she said, and “if you can’t be who you are, you’re never going to be as successful.” Sameth also highlighted the numerous resources that exist to protect LGBT individuals from discrimination. She noted that there are “certainly more than when I was coming out,” and said that people in situations like she once was should “hopefully turn to those.” Summing up her experiences with “Bandwidth,” Sameth said that “returning to the stage after almost 30 years, to a sold-out first performance was pretty good.” She described the show as “a funny and moving evening” that she hopes will “really make [the audience] think about things in a different way,” and take them through the same process of reflection and selfdiscovery that she experienced while creating it.

ACTIVITIES FOR THE FERTILE MIND

thoughtgallery.org NEW YORK CITY

The Seasons Alter: How to Save Our Planet in Six Acts

MONDAY, JULY 10TH, 6:30PM Mid-Manhattan Library | 455 Fifth Ave. | 212-340-0863 | nypl.org Philosopher of science Philip Kitcher gives an illustrated lecture with everyday solutions to the challenges of communicating about climate change. (Free)

Mental Health: The Latest

MONDAY, JULY 10TH, 7PM 92nd Street Y | 1395 Lexington Ave. | 212-415-5500 | 92y.org Psychologist Dr. Robert Reiner explains common mental health conditions like anxiety, depression, and ADHD, as well as the most recent information on research-based interventions. ($30)

Just Announced | Lust, Brains, and Taste

THURSDAY, AUGUT 3RD, 6:30PM Museum of Food and Drink | 62 Bayard St. | 718-387-2845 | mofad.org Guerilla Science and You’re the Expert host Chris Duffy lead a session of hands-on activities that will give you insight into the subconscious processes that drive attraction. ($30)

For more information about lectures, readings and other intellectually stimulating events throughout NYC,

JULY 6-12,2017

Our Town|Eastsider ourtownny.com

RESTAURANT INSPECTION RATINGS JUN 21-26, 2017 The following listings were collected from the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene’s website and include the most recent inspection and grade reports listed. We have included every restaurant listed during this time within the zip codes of our neighborhoods. Some reports list numbers with their explanations; these are the number of violation points a restaurant has received. To see more information on restaurant grades, visit http://www1.nyc.gov/site/doh/services/restaurant-grades.page. The Sweet Shop Nyc

404 E 73Rd St

Campagnola Restaurant

1382 1St Ave

Grade Pending (40) Hot food item not held at or above 140º F. Evidence of mice or live mice present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas. Personal cleanliness inadequate. Outer garment soiled with possible contaminant. Effective hair restraint not worn in an area where food is prepared. Sanitized equipment or utensil, including in-use food dispensing utensil, improperly used or stored.

Starbucks

1488 3 Avenue

Alice’s Tea Cup

220 East 81 Street

Grade Pending (29) Evidence of mice or live mice present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas. Filth flies or food/refuse/sewage-associated (FRSA) flies present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas. Filth flies include house flies, little house flies, blow flies, bottle flies and flesh flies. Food/refuse/ sewage-associated flies include fruit flies, drain flies and Phorid flies. Personal cleanliness inadequate. Outer garment soiled with possible contaminant. Effective hair restraint not worn in an area where food is prepared. Food not protected from potential source of contamination during storage, preparation, transportation, display or service.

Burgerﬁ

240 East 82 Street

Firenze Ristorante

1555 2Nd Ave

Not Yet Graded (65) Hot food item not held at or above 140º F. Evidence of mice or live mice present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas. Hand washing facility not provided in or near food preparation area and toilet room. Hot and cold running water at adequate pressure to enable cleanliness of employees not provided at facility. Soap and an acceptable hand-drying device not provided. Insufficient or no refrigerated or hot holding equipment to keep potentially hazardous foods at required temperatures. Tobacco use, eating, or drinking from open container in food preparation, food storage or dishwashing area observed.

Lorenzo & Maria’s

1418 Third Avenue

The York Social

1529 York Ave

Mcdonald’s

1499 3Rd Ave

Dulce Vida Latin Bistro

1219 Lexington Ave

Not Yet Graded (30) No facilities available to wash, rinse and sanitize utensils and/or equipment.

Metropolitan Museum Balcony Lounge

1000 5 Avenue

Fresh & Co

1260 Lexington Ave

RIVERSIDE RESPITES BARS On the Upper West Side, a few spots for waterfront drinking, eating and relaxing BY VICTORIA EDWARDS

I’m a runner and my favorite place to run in the city is along the Hudson riverside — from 130th Street to midtown usually. And there’s no better motivation to run than exploring the bars on my route. I got drinks at

Ellington Park, Boat Basin and Pier I. All three share beautiful waterfront views — but each offers a varying experience, from nearby mini gyms to outdoor parties.

Pier I Cafe This cafe/bar is right on the Hudson River, at about 70th Street. The outdoor space also includes a coffee bar with large green umbrellas over plastic chairs and tables. But don’t expect table service: It’s the kind of spot where you get in line, order and then take your food and drinks back to your table. The cafe is usually

Inase Sushi Restaurant

1586 1 Avenue

Starbucks

1378 Madison Avenue A

Barking Dog Luncheonette

1678 3 Avenue

Naruto Ramen

1596 3 Avenue

Grade Pending

Reif’s Tavern

302 East 92 Street

Grade Pending (35) Food Protection Certificate not held by supervisor of food operations. Filth flies or food/refuse/sewage-associated (FRSA) flies present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas. Filth flies include house flies, little house flies, blow flies, bottle flies and flesh flies. Food/refuse/sewageassociated flies include fruit flies, drain flies and Phorid flies. Food not protected from potential source of contamination during storage, preparation, transportation, display or service. Food contact surface not properly washed, rinsed and sanitized after each use and following any activity when contamination may have occurred.

Wine Bar & Ristorante

1742 2 Avenue

Drunken Munkey

338 E 92Nd Street

Grade Pending (16) Hot food item not held at or above 140º F. Food worker does not use proper utensil to eliminate bare hand contact with food that will not receive adequate additional heat treatment.

Bonjour Crepes & Wine

1442 Lexington Ave

Grade Pending (17) Cold food item held above 41º F (smoked ﬁsh and reduced oxygen packaged foods above 38 ºF) except during necessary preparation. Food not protected from potential source of contamination during storage, preparation, transportation, display or service. Sanitized equipment or utensil, including in-use food dispensing utensil, improperly used or stored.

Tenzan 89

1714 2Nd Ave

Korali Estiatorio

1662 3Rd Ave

Grade Pending (23) Hot food item not held at or above 140º F. Food worker does not use proper utensil to eliminate bare hand contact with food that will not receive adequate additional heat treatment. Sanitized equipment or utensil, including in-use food dispensing utensil, improperly used or stored.

Timmy’s By The River

1737 York Avenue

Corado Bread & Pastry

1361 Lexington Ave

Lolitas Kitchen & Burger House

1364 Lexington Ave

Mitz (Mellow Yellow Coffee & Vibes)

1729 1St Ave

Grade Pending (37) Cold food item held above 41º F (smoked fish and reduced oxygen packaged foods above 38 ºF) except during necessary preparation. Food not cooled by an approved method whereby the internal product temperature is reduced from 140º F to 70º F or less within 2 hours, and from 70º F to 41º F or less within 4 additional hours. Food Protection Certificate not held by supervisor of food operations. Evidence of mice or live mice present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas. Filth flies or food/refuse/sewage-associated (FRSA) flies present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas. Filth flies include house flies, little house flies, blow flies, bottle flies and flesh flies. Food/refuse/ sewage-associated flies include fruit flies, drain flies and Phorid flies.

crowded and most patrons who score tables have their own methods, one that usually involves multiple people — one to order and the other to scout out and hold a spot. Best Feature: Sunset & great place to take part in Summer on the Hudson festivities. Keep Best thing to eat: Hamburger & Old Bay fries ($13) Recommended drink: Spiked blueberry lemonade ($12) and sangria ($9) piericafe.com/

Boat Basin Cafe Easier to miss than Pier 1, but once spotted to the side of the Riverside running trail at about 79th Street, the Boat Basin Cafe looks a little bit like a fort from the outside. About halfway up a winding staircase are two carts

selling everything that is good about summer: Hot dogs ($2) and gelato ($3 for a small and $6 for a large). The place is buzzing with enthusiastic 20-somethings drinking piña coladas and rosé sangrias. Best Feature: Live music & high energy. It’s its own scene. It’s also another great spot to watch the sunset over the Hudson. Best thing to eat: Nachos ($15) Recommended drink: Rosé sangria with fresh chunks of peach, apple and blueberries ($11). The frozen drinks are also great: Choose from piña coladas, daiquiris and margaritas. boatbasincafe.com/

Ellington in the Park A deﬁnite bar to lock into your GPS — Ellington in the Park is a an amaz-

ing spot, particularly because it’s close to the riverside. There’s an upstairs and downstairs, with a great open air bar with the Hudson River stretched out in front of you. There is also a sand pit with volleyball courts, ping-pong tables and exercise rings just a few feet away. What Stands Out: You can exercise on the rings or play soccer nearby. Best thing to eat: Pizza was a customer favorite and runs between $12 and $14, depending on toppings. Recommended Drink: Schofferhofer Breeze — Hefeweizen and grapefruit beer blend that I had as a frozen drink ($9). Drink $$ Range: $7-$14 Food $$ Range: $9-$16 www.ellingtoninthepark.com/

JULY 6-12,2017

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SUPERMARKET CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 wheelchair accessibility, delivery availability and costs, senior discounts, and whether SNAP or EBT beneďŹ ts are accepted. Brick-and-mortar supermarkets in Manhattan face challenges on a variety of fronts, according to Charles Platkin, executive director of the New York City Food Policy Center at Hunter College. â&#x20AC;&#x153;There are all these forces which have changed that landscape for supermarkets,â&#x20AC;? he said. (Platkin was not involved in Brewerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s study.) High commercial rents have impacted Manhattan retailers across the board in recent years, Platkin said, but the supermarket industry has been hit particularly hard due to its razor-thin proďŹ t margins, which have grown even tighter in recent years with the emergence of stiff competition from online grocery delivery services like FreshDirect. To meet the demands of the market, many stores have started offering home delivery services of their own (including 185 of the 229 Manhattan supermarkets surveyed in Brewerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s study), driving up transportation costs and further reducing margins. â&#x20AC;&#x153;Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s the hardest business imaginable,â&#x20AC;? Brewer said. Many Manhattan supermarkets bear the added cost burden of the commercial rent tax, which imposes an effective tax of 3.9 percent of base rent on the boroughâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s business tenants south of 96th Street (certain businesses below Chambers Street, as well as tenants with annualized rents below $250,000, are exempt from the tax). â&#x20AC;&#x153;If youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re trying to encourage supermarkets to offer healthy food, especially fruits and vegetables, the additional cost of the commercial rent tax can be a burden,â&#x20AC;? Platkin said. Brewer has championed a city council proposal that would eliminate the commercial rent tax for supermarkets. The beneďŹ ts of making it easier for supermarkets to do business, she said, would far outweigh the negative impact on the cityâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s coffers. â&#x20AC;&#x153;It would only be a little over $5 million from the City of New York in terms of lost tax revenue â&#x20AC;&#x201D; not a lot of money,â&#x20AC;? she said. â&#x20AC;&#x153;We want brick-and-mortar supermarkets to be able to survive, and the CRT bill is one example of what needs to be done,â&#x20AC;? Brewer added. There are nearly 2,000 establishments in Manhattan that sell food, but the study included strictly supermarkets that offer a full range of fresh options like produce, meats, and prepared foods. While residents of many underserved communities rely on bodegas and delis for their food

needs, such stores often lack unprocessed options that promote good health outcomes. â&#x20AC;&#x153;Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s nothing against bodegas, but youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re not getting the healthiest selection of foods that you could potentially get if you shopped at a supermarket,â&#x20AC;? Platkin said. Brewerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s report calls for an update and expansion of the Food Retail Expansion to Support Health (FRESH) program, which offers zoning and ďŹ nancial incentives to encourage the establishment of affordable grocery stores offering healthy foods in underserved areas. FRESH eligibility zones were based on a 2008 study commissioned by the city that identiďŹ ed areas without sufficient grocery options; as a result, beneďŹ ts in Manhattan are available to supermarkets mostly in neighborhoods above 96th Street. But according to Brewerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s report, due to supermarket closures since the cityâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s study was conducted 2008, there are a number of underserved communities further south that could beneďŹ t from FRESH but are currently ineligible for the program. The survey identiďŹ ed several East Side communities that suffer from a lack of affordable food options, including Kips Bay, Murray Hill, and Turtle Bay. â&#x20AC;&#x153;Unlike much of Harlem and Washington Heights, these East River neighborhoods are not mapped or zoned to beneďŹ t from the FRESH program, and there are no incentives in these neighborhoods to include a purpose-built supermarket unit into new construction,â&#x20AC;? the study reports. â&#x20AC;&#x153;Furthermore, the remaining supermarkets in this area are all at risk, competing for business and for their own spaces with national chain pharmacies, which often outbid supermarkets for their commercial leases all across the city.â&#x20AC;? When a supermarket closes, the impact extends well beyond the reduced access to healthy food in the surrounding neighborhood, according to Platkin. Supermarkets are community anchors, he explained â&#x20AC;&#x201D; a local grocery shuttering its doors inďŹ&#x201A;uences real estate prices in the area and can have a very real psychological impact on the community. When a neighborhood market shuts down, Platkin said, â&#x20AC;&#x153;You feel like somethingâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s being taken away from you. You feel like your areaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s not worthy.â&#x20AC;? In addition to a call to expand FRESH eligibility to underserved areas not currently covered by the program, Brewerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s report recommends the establishment of commercial loading zones in front of all supermarkets to reduce expenses through improved shipping efficiency and calls for a review of unnecessary rules and regulations that could be rolled back to further reduce supermarketsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; costs.

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Business

A SLICE, A CEL-RAY AND A SCOWL At Sal and Carmine, tradition endures BY NOAH WILLIAMS

I’m not local to New York City, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned quickly, it’s the difference between good pizza and bad pizza. I grew up in Knoxville, Tennessee, went to a small liberal arts college in the middle of Ohio, and moved to Manhattan exactly 10 days after graduating last year. My dad grew up in Brooklyn. My grandma, who I now live with, has lived in a “classic six” apartment on the corner of West 101st Street and Riverside Drive for 53 years. Two blocks away, on Broadway, is Sal and Carmine Pizza: the staple neighborhood pizza shop owned by a family of Italians. It was started by two immigrant brothers from whom the store received its name. It’s not an impressive space — the store is roughly 10 feet wide, 15 feet high, and 40 feet deep, akin to a large shoebox turned on its side. The pizza is displayed on the counter to the left when you enter, and there are some chairs and tables in the back of the space. The front window is often hazy, lightly coated with ﬂour. There’s a red neon sign in the corner of the window that reads, “Crispy Pizza Large Slice.” In the center of the window, an old, iconic cash machine rests on a counter. Originally from a candy shop, it’s an antiquated machine with keys similar to those of a manual typewriter, dedicated almost entirely to transactions of less than a dollar. The keys read one through 10 — or the number of cents needed to purchase candy way back when. There is a $5 key, but that sum

was likely not often exchanged during the machine’s heyday. A plain slice costs $3; an additional topping brings the total to $4 — fair prices for what many consider to be one of the city’s best slices. I find taste hard to describe. But, I would describe Sal and Carmine’s pizza as sweet, with salty undertones. The dough is made in the shop’s back room every day, the sauce comes from a private distributor, and the cheese is fresh mozzarella. “No basil, no Parmesan,” the current owner says. “The pizza doesn’t need it.” How Sal made the pizza is how the pizza is still made. As the arrangement went, Sal made the pizza and Carmine worked the counter. Both operated with a type of religious zeal that I have come to understand is unique to Italian immigrants: They never closed the store, never got sick, and never sat down behind the counter. Sal died eight years ago. The funeral procession reportedly shut down an entire section of the New Jersey Turnpike. Several of Sal’s and Carmine’s

descendants worked in the store, but when Sal passed, the store closed for a week — the longest it had ever been shut. The family was unsure how or if the store would reopen, and if it did, how it would continue. After several legal disputes and a significant brotherly feud, the store was left entirely in a single grandson’s capable hands. Behind the counter now stands Sal’s grandson, who runs and owns the place. Luciano Gaudiosi, 33, is a sturdy man at 5 foot, 9 inches. He is always wearing his Ford Mustang cap, a white apron, and a look of apathy that can border upon contempt. As was common for Sal’s grandchildren, Gaudiosi began working in the store while barely in his teens. He briefly left for mechanic’s school in 2003 and then for a stint fixing and maintaining Delta’s fleet at LaGuardia Airport. “I tried to get out, but they pulled me back in,” says Luciano, quoting from “The Godfather.” Luciano has made few changes to the store. The most significant being that the store now delivers. Sal believed that the time involved in a delivery would spoil the quality of the pie. But Gaudiosi maintains the work ethic and atmosphere instilled by his grandfather and great uncle: always standing behind the counter with a tough countenance, which sometimes becomes almost amiable. On one occasion, a worker brought in a stool and served the public while seated. Gaudiosi waited until the end of business hours and then smashed the stool into pieces in front of him. The store has now been in operation for nearly 60 years and it still sells out almost every day. As Gaudiosi puts it, “There’s no stopping this train.” Throughout the day, customers line

Luciano Gaudiosi has instituted a few changes at Sal and Carmine Pizza, but his grandfather’s recipes remain the same. Photo: Noah Williams

up, sometimes out the door. They’re there for the pizza and the experience. The transaction usually occurs with only one word spoken by the counterman. Entering customers are often met with a look that may be construed as saying, “What do you want? Why are you here?” It’s often abrupt, and borderline curt, but that’s just tradition. It’s business. After an undetermined amount of time, a customer might become acknowledged as a “regular.” This just means that Gaudiosi and the counterman will respond with more than a grunt if you ask a question. It’s a vague invitation to have a conversation while standing at the counter. I knew I had become a regular when I walked into the store one night near closing time. There was just one slice, with sausage, left on the pizza tray. The day had been particularly rough for me. I ordered by pointing at the slice. Gaudiosi slung it in the oven. When I went to hand him the $4, he waved it away, saying “don’t worry ‘bout it.” And just like that, my day had

been salvaged and I my appreciation for the shop exponentially increased. It’s not just a store. On rare occasions when Gaudiosi must close for a day (such as, for instance, when his young son, Sal Jr., is sick), would-be patrons gather outside the store, assuming the worst and discussing where they will get their pizza if the shop ever closes. But Gaudiosi has built a strong team: Barry, an older, African-American gentleman who prepares ingredients and keeps the place clean; Jimmy, an Asian-American man who works the counter on occasion; Francisco (Gaudiosi calls him Saint Francisco), a former Navy man from the Dominican Republic who works the counter; Reuben, a strong-legged MexicanAmerican who works delivery every night except Sunday; Napoleon, a Mexican-American and the only other pizza maker besides Gaudiosi; and the newest addition, a guy from Knoxville who delivers pies on Sunday nights, and works the counter Mondays and Tuesdays.

ON THE SIDE STREETS OF NEW YORK THE CHILDREN’S GENERAL STORE — 168 EAST 91ST STREET The Children’s General Store is everything one could desire in a toy shop. It is well organized with different sections for bath play, outdoor items, and dress up. On one wall, there are dozens of puzzles

and craft kits for a variety of ages. A rack of animal hand puppets greets customers as they enter, and in a central aisle, the “novelty” items, including yellow taxi cabs, slinkies, and other old-school toys call out for attention. Laura Pintchik, who now runs the store with her daughter Tess, has a design background and, back in the mid 90’s, decided to turn

the downstairs waiting area of the indoor playground that she and her husband ran into a toy shop. On the ﬁrst day, she sold out of almost everything. She credits her success to the fact that she “created an expression of what a child really lives with.” To read more, visit Manhattan Sideways (sideways.nyc), created by Betsy Bober Polivy.

Tess Pintchik. Photo: Tom Arena, Manhattan Sideways

JULY 6-12,2017

Our Town|Eastsider ourtownny.com

JULY 6-12,2017

Scene in New York PHOTOS BY STEVEN STRASSER

NEIGHBORHOOD LANDMARKS “After working with words as a journalist and journalism educator for more than 40 years,” writes Steven Strasser, a longtime editor at Newsweek and a former professor at CUNY Graduate School of Journalism, “I had an intense interest in learning something about photography. I really had to start

Flatiron building

Belvedere Castle, Central Park

from scratch on digital SLR cameras, as I had no idea how aperture, shutter speed and ISO worked together. I’ve been focusing mostly on things that just sit there — ﬂowers, landscapes, buildings, and so on. The photos printed here were taken with my new tilt-shift lens, a wonderful piece of equipment that’s

Sunrise at 72nd and Broadway

ideal for shooting buildings with the proper perspective and landscapes that remain in focus from front to back. It’s my latest favorite toy, and I’m sure I’ll do many, many more architectural shots before I’m ﬁnished.”

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YOUR 15 MINUTES

VERSES FOR THE SMALLER SET Howard Eisenberg on chronicling World War II, being Eddie Fisher’s press agent and “Adorable Scoundrels” BY ANGELA BARBUTI

When Howard Eisenberg traveled with his wife, Arlene, during book tours for “What to Expect the Toddler Years” (the follow-up to “What to Expect When You’re Expecting”), he would entertain the audience with original poetry inspired by the little ones who were the very subject of her book. A self-proclaimed “Toddler Poet Laureate,” Eisenberg recently published a collection, “Adorable Scoundrels.” It is dedicated to Arlene, who he said would entertain his grandchildren by

reading poems aloud and pausing to let them complete the rhyme. The Upper West Sider has a storied career with fascinating highlights that include starting as a 18-year-old journalist covering World War II and working as pop singer Eddie Fisher’s first press agent. He’s written hundreds of articles, many of which were co-authored with Arlene. After she passed away and he was ready to date, he even penned a book with his thengirlfriend, entitled “It’s Never Too Late to Date.” Even at 90 years old, he is constantly updating his resume. His current project involves streaming all his children’s books for classrooms.

Did you always know you wanted to be a writer? I was 18 years old and had spent

six weeks in the last part of the war as an infantryman. And we wound up in what had been an SS barracks and it got kind of boring after all the excitement we’d been going through. So my commanding officer said, “I’ve been looking through the ﬁles here and Private Eisenberg, I understand you had a couple years of college. How about you write us a newspaper?” The Germans had left a mimeograph machine and I just sat down and interviewed some of the guys and all of the sudden I was a journalist. And out came “The Company K Riﬂeman.” So I put out two issues and apparently that got me some attention from war headquarters and I was called up to work on the 90th Division newspaper, “The American Traveler.”

How did you meet Arlene? We met at the Paramount Theatre. I was Eddie Fisher’s ﬁrst press agent and he had just come back from being in the U.S. Army band in Korea. And it was his big break, and I was thinking, “Well, Frank Sinatra got started at the Paramount.” That’s where the Bobby Soxs craze began. So I needed a Bobby Soxer to start some fan clubs for Eddie. And as I approached the stage door, there she was, with her mother. She was 16 at the time at Hunter High School. But it was her mother who had insisted on going there because she had heard Eddie on the radio and loved his voice. So after exchanging pleasantries, I asked Arlene if she perhaps would like to start a fan club. And she said, in effect, “Hunter girls don’t do that.” But I didn’t give up. I told them about an interview with Barry Gray that Eddie was doing that night. And so the whole family showed up — the father, mother, brother, Victor and Arlene. And they sat at a table. And I was told just last year by my brother-in-law Victor something that is perhaps my most precious memory. That Arlene’s mother pointed at Eddie and said, “You’re going to marry him.” And Arlene pointed at me and said, “No, I’m going to marry Howard.”

How did her and your daughter’s book “What to Expect When You’re Expecting” come about? They just knew that they wanted to answer the questions that Heidi, my daughter, had been unable to ﬁnd in any of the books she bought. And she bought them all. Two of her questions were, “Walking across the street, I fell on my belly. Would this damage my fetus?” and “Before I knew I was pregnant, I was drinking a glass of wine every night. Would that cause fetal alcohol syndrome?” So they wrote this book as mostly Q&A, which I thought, at the time, was not a good idea. I thought it should be anecdotes.

Smith Davis Photography But once again, I was wrong. [Laughs.] And it turned out to be a rather successful book.

Ooh! Fire truck. Very pretty tree! Toddlers open our eyes to things we’ve forgotten to see.”

Arlene read poems aloud to your grandchildren in a unique way.

As far as other projects, you co-authored “It’s Never Too Late to Date” with your girlfriend at the time, Shirley. What made you want to write that?

That was kind of wonderful. And of course, that was Arlene .... And I’m going to start to cry. It’s been 16 years, but I had 48 with her. Plus two when she was 16 years old .... She did two things with them. She was a great grandmother. She’d always be doing jigsaw puzzles; she loved doing them, and would gather the kids around to help her. And she’d be teaching them at the same time; she was always teaching morals and good behavior. She just was a natural-born wonder woman. But what she did when she read poetry was she would read a line and pause to let them come up with the rhyme.

How did you get the ideas for the poems in “Adorable Scoundrels?” Well, I met an awful lot of toddlers when Arlene was doing “What to Expect the Toddler Years.” I often traveled with her, partly because the one time she went by herself because I couldn’t, she lost her ticket. After that, she insisted I go with her. I enjoyed going anyway. She would introduce me when she did her lectures on toddlers and she’d say, “If you’re gonna have a toddler, you’re gonna need a sense of humor.” Then I’d come up and read some of these poems that I’d been writing. I’ve been at restaurants in town and see a child throwing a tantrum at the next table, and I’d tell the appropriate poem. For example there’s one called “Just Looking.” I was on the bus and there was someone in front of me, she might have been a nanny. And this little girl was pointing out the window at things that she marveled at. She was 3 years old. And the nanny was totally ignoring her. So I wrote that poem. “Look at the bird!

Arlene was gone. And affection is a very important part of all of our lives. And I kind of went nuts when she died. It took a long time for me to get over it. And ﬁnally, one of my relatives put me on JDate. I didn’t know how to do it. And I started shopping. [Laughs.] And I had some dates and found someone who was very interesting and we had a fairly long relationship. She had lots of great stories and I thought, “Well, this could be a really good book.” Here I am, in my seventies. And she just died recently. But we had already broken up, because she liked to ﬁght and I don’t.

What are your future plans? I suppose living is one of them. But I’m starting to stream all my children’s books on something called Streaming Learning which goes into schoolrooms all over the country and into homeschool homes. I’ve done one already with the “Guess Who Zoo” [His three-book series]. I asked kids in the classes to write poems about their favorite animal and to my surprise, an envelope came in with 23 poems in it. So apparently I made some kind of impression. But because I did the zoo streaming, I was asked to do six more. howardeisenbergauthor.com

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Down 1 Lord of the Rings evil warrior 2 Deface 3 Time long past 4 Sartre novel 5 Reposed 6 Decorated, as a cake 7 Battle 8 Stainless 9 Throw gently 10 In poor health 11 Keats’ forte 16 Ink dispenser 19 Duck’s home 20 Jocularity 21 Be gaga over 22 Excited, with “up”

24 Catchall category 25 Clamor 27 Drawstring tote 28 Summer month, for short 30 Part of the intestines 32 Father ﬁgures 34 Coarse 35 Babysitter 37 Amaze 39 Kosher-style store 40 “Put a lid ___!” 41 Bread roll 42 Collector’s suffix 43 Not for love __ money 45 Worker issues international agency 46 TV network 47 Golf driving area

O V B D E N E Y Q I I G N Q N

48 Small bovid 49 40 thieves leader, Baba 50 European river 51 One of Henry VIII’s six 52 “Shoo!” 53 Wine choice

Z P R O U W G Q T P R B B Q E

U T A O L F N G G F C V O H R

P I W W B O V Q C O N D O R W

R O

WORD SEARCH by Myles Mellor

Level: Medium

Across 1 Saudi neighbor 5 Sue Grafton’s “___ for Lawless” (2 words) 8 Award for TV commercials 12 Sitar music 13 Make a play..... 14 Texas ___’em 15 Casino employee 17 Legally authorized 18 Humorous parodies 20 Stir up 23 Mounted 26 Brain wave 27 Small generator 29 Plaything 30 Might be able 31 Cool 33 Retaliation 35 Mountain table 36 Elicit 37 Capital of Argentina, Buenos ____ 38 Establish 41 Fringe over the forehead 44 Frequent Papal name

37 38

Each Sudoku puzzle consists of a 9X9 grid that has been subdivided into nine smaller grids of 3X3 squares. To solve the puzzle each row, column and box must contain each of the numbers 1 to 9. Puzzles come in three grades: easy, medium and difficult.

N O

SUDOKU by Myles Mellor and Susan Flanagan

by Myles Mellor

JULY 6-12,2017

Our Town|Eastsider ourtownny.com

JULY 6-12,2017

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