Monday, January 11, 2016

A place that is so infinitely unknowable

"Walking is the best way to see a city"

The link is a vide of two dudes walking every street of every New York borough and share their insights about the benefits of walking. Both of them are so taken by the city they walk it all day long.

There is more to their story at the New Yorker than the video allows.

Everything in the world is in New York City. And you challenge, "Everything?" And I go, "Yes, pretty much, even Cleopatra's needle." Nailed it. You can see how the city can cast its spell completely.

Comments on another site that linked the video are all positive, and that from a group that can be described in a word: cynical. They brag about all the walking they've done and how well they've known cities that way.

7 comments:

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

David Bowie has died. RIP.

Methadras said...

RIP David Bowie, The Thin White Duke.

Ashes to ashes, funk to funky
We know Major Tom's a junkie
Strung out in heaven's high
Hitting an all-time low

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

The old guy lost me when he revealed himself to be a Hitlery supporter.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

That said. it's tru. walking a city is a great way to see it. warts n' all...

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

I walked downtown Chicago a few times in different seasons. February with a painful tooth was interesting.

ricpic said...

With the exception of New York on the east coast and San Francisco on the west coast are there really any other walkable cities in the States? Quaint little cities with tiny preserved downtowns - like Savannah, Georgia - don't count. Even Portland, Oregon or Portland, Maine, you get beyond their compact downtowns and it's pure residential, not really city walking.

The French have a word for the type who becomes so besotted with walking around Paris that he basically throw his life away "studying" the streets -- a flaneur.

deborah said...

Once I read something about a branch of (social) science called urbanology, or something. Or maybe it was a form of walking meditation. Something about walking in an urban environment an looking at it/exploring it like an archeologist would(?)