I remember when I first moved to Brooklyn — anything past the Bedford stop might as well have been Suffolk county, and once I memorized my path to and from the Atlantic/Pacific station, I dared venture almost nowhere else. It was silly and sad, really. And that’s why I’m not quite as damning as many online commenters toward poor Bonnie Lee, who wrote up some really terrible summations of her newly adopted borough’s ‘hoods for the Brooklyn Examiner. Not only were they plain wrong (no white people in Windsor Terrace?!), they also betrayed her own naivete and proved just how soaking wet she was behind her Brooklyn ears. Why was she writing this guide to the multifaceted county of Kings?
Well, I guess her editors eventually came to question her authority, too (perhaps after getting some unwanted attention from Brownstoner, who called her out originally), because all of the descriptions have now been taken down! Where’s the Internet Miss Manners when you need her? Lee now says she’ll resume a more thorough exploration of Brooklyn this weekend.
But really, I have a feeling Flavorwire readers could do a much more comprehensive job, anyway. So: keeping up the abbreviated memoir trend, I’m asking all NYC residents to describe their nabes in just six words. Leave your odes to Sheepshead Bay, Jackson Heights, or the Upper West Side in the comments section below. The best and brightest will go into an open letter we plan on addressing to Ms. Lee and the Examiner, so please be both witty and precise.
Not in New York? Don’t worry, we’ll be asking folks in all the Flavorpill cities to contribute in the near future.
[Editor’s note: The kickass image accompanying this piece is an Ork Poster that we own. You should own one too.]