After experiencing a not-so-pleasant Chinatown on Saturday, I decided to explore Nolita, Little Italy and Chinatown with the help of a tour guide on a walking tour. Nolita is the area north of Little Italy. Some info the tour guide shared with us at the beginning was so helpful that I want to also share it. I have so much trouble upon exiting a subway station that I'm not familiar with getting my directions straight. He said that if we look at the slope of the avenues, uptown is always going uphill (even if it is only a slight slope) and downtown is always downhill. Uphill/uptown is always north and downhill/downtown is always south. So if you know where they are, then you know east and west. Wish I had known this earlier in my visit!
We started our tour at a place called "God's Love We Deliver." They provide meals for all terminally ill people in all five boroughs each day, all at no cost to the recipients. This is done with a staff plus a whole bunch of volunteers each day. Reminds me of our Meals on Wheels.
While I have been here, the water towers on the tops of many buildings have intrigued me. I don't really know why, I'm just drawn to them. I learned a couple of interesting facts today about those water towers. Any building built before World War II has a water tower to supply that building. And those tanks are made out of wood. That just totally surprised me. I thought they were some type of metal. I even got to see one that had been recently redone, and it was easy to see that the rounded sides were made of wood.
In Soho (since all these neighborhoods run together), we saw these multi-story buildings that had columns on them. Interestingly, these are cast iron, which was cast in a pre-fab type way thus allowing these industrial buildings to be constructed quickly. After they were constructed, a coating of masonry was put over it to give its appearance. The only windows were in the front of the buildings. This is where the term "sweat shops" came from. Imagine how hot a cast iron and metal building can get with just a few windows, no air conditioning, and several floors of metal. Scary!! Years later, after these buildings were abandoned by industrial users, artists started recognizing the large windows and the amount of light those windows provided. The first artists actually squatted in these buildings leading the way for the artists who later came and helped to revive this area.
While Little Italy used to make up a large portion of this part of the city, it is today, only a few blocks. There are a still the traditional type red sauce restaurants. Our tour guide recommended Angelo's for pasta and then to go around the corner to Ferrara's for dessert. I am, for sure, looking forward to trying out the desserts at Ferrara's. We stopped for Italian ice or gelato (dessert before your meal) and then explored a little more before stopping for pizza at Pomodora Ristorante. I got a slice of excellent pizza here and a bottle of water for $5. The slice was large and it was definitely enough for a meal. So if you are ever in Little Italy and want a good, cheap meal, this is one place to try.
Chinatown has expanded and taken over much of what used to be Little Italy. Our tour guide pointed out that many of these people never leave this area and never become a part of the city as a whole. They never learn English, they don't go to doctors, hence the large herbal medicine shops, all their shopping is done right here. An interesting concept, that I had never thought about, is that the people here consider us "foreigners." Of course, there is the main drag that has so many of the tourist attraction shops, but exploring the side streets here was much more relaxing and gave a much nicer impression of Chinatown.
A very good tour -- this country mouse just needed a little help. I knew there had to be a better Chinatown than all those (I'm scared to say this -- terrible) shops on Canal Street.
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| Cast iron facades in Soho |
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| Little Italy |
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| Chinatown |
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