I saw a woman die on the street today. Sirens, chest compressions, gawkers. Outside of May Day in Berlin I have never seen so many police in one place before. I assumed she had been shot. This was Bed - Stuy after all. But I have to be careful about assumptions that amount to a species of prejudice. We're staying in Bedford - Stuyvesant, a Brooklyn neighborhood that largely remains old Brooklyn, although the hipsters with their elaborate Edwardian facial hair and cucumber lemonades served in mason jars are lapping at the edges. This Brooklyn is funky, this Brooklyn is mostly poor and partly chaotic, this Brooklyn still has an edge. This Brooklyn has, I dunno, at least a dozen "Dominican Style" hair salons, an equal number of gospel ministries and countless murals celebrating black power heroes. And this Brooklyn does not have a single Starbucks, a single hotel or anything resembling a tourist amenity. This is decidedly not Williamsburg or Brooklyn Heights, although given the treasure trove of brownstones it will inevitably become them.
She hadn't been shot. Once I penetrated the accent I figured out that the old guy in the Marcus Garvey t-shirt beside me was telling me that she choked on a chicken bone. Some sort of Caribbean street party was underway. Sirens and calypso and soca and dancehall reggae and shouting and swearing and laughing and more sirens and horns and not one other outsider like me in sight. I got less stares in Zimbabwe.
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