Photo of the Day: Maracas

I couldn't resist the colors of these Maracas and other color laden objects on sale at the 5th Avenue Festival this last Sunday..

Photos of the day: 5th Avenue Festival Sept 15, 2013

Looking towards 60th street from 48th street. It was a nice sunny day and everyone was out. The Verrazano Bridge in the distance..

From 60th street towards 39th street.

Store of the Day: Arnold's Bicycle Shop

Arnold stands by the door of his shop.

Arnold's Bike shop has been a fixture on 8th Avenue in the neighborhood since he opened his shop in the early 70's. I've been a satisfied customer of his ever since. I don't know anyone with a love of bikes as he does. I don't think he does it for the money since he charges the lowest rates of any bike shop I know. I ride about 30 miles a day and the equipment takes a lot of wear. I see Arnold quite often and he fixes things for me. He also sells a full line of quality bikes at his shop. If you're in the market for a bike check him out. He knows more about bikes than anyone I know. He's near the corner of 43rd street. You can check out his page on my website. Pay him a visit and tell him I sent you. 

Happenings: Sunset Park 5th Avenue Festival Sunday Sept. 15, 2013

The Annual 5th Avenue Festival  in Sunset Park is coming this sunday September 15, 2013. There will be vendors, food and hopefully sunshine to take in the day. Stole the above shot from the 5th Ave. BID. I hope they don't mind LOL!! Get ready for some fun..

 

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Store Of The Day: Royal Aqua World, Bait and Tackle

With the recent closing of World Electronics on 8th Avenue the only bait and tackle shop I knew of in the neighborhood. Sunset Park's fishing community has been left with few alternatives. I had forgotten about Aqua World on 65th street and 8th Avenue till I passed by it recently. The place also doubles as an Aquarium where you can purchase Koy fish and other exotics which are big in the Chinese community. Well, if you're into fishing the place has a full selection of tackle equipment as well and of course bait to entice those little fishies to bite that hook. They're located on 65th street just off 8th Avenue.

Openings: Tin Cup Cafe

With the closest Starbucks to Sunset Park being the one in Bay Ridge at 75th street and 3rd Avenue. It's always good news when an alternative opens in the neighborhood. A few years back Starbucks was going to open a location in our neighborhood but due to financial problems it instead closed a few Brooklyn locations and plans to expand here were scrapped. So when I stumbled on the Tin Cup Cafe and the fact they offered free Wi Fi it was rather welcome. On the downside is the fact they close rather early around 7 whereas most Starbucks are open till 10 or thereabouts. That being said the price is right and the location convenient if you need a spot to sit down with your laptop and you need to do some work. They have been open a relatively short time. Part of a wave of new cafes in the Greenwood Heights neck of the Sunset Park woods. They are located at 719 4th Avenue near 24th street. Go check them out and tell them I sent you.

I will be posting on some of the other cafes in the area as well.

Photo of the Day: 911

This was my block right after 911. The neighborhood was a sea of red, white and blue. There were no Mexican, Puerto Rican, Dominican, Chinese or flags of any of the other ethnic groups that abound the neighborhood. It was all red, white and blue. There were US flags everywhere and candle light vigils. It didn't last long. Did it......

Photo of the Day: Jade on 8th

Woman selling Jade artifacts and jewelry on 8th Avenue in Brooklyn's Chinatown.

Outings: Owl's Head Park

Although technically located across the border in Bay Ridge the park is designated as part of the Sunset Park Greenway by the Dept. of Transportation so it kind of belongs in a way partly to Sunset Park. It is one of the hidden gems in our area. Originally it was an estate that was left to the city to turn into a park. The following is a brief description from the Parks Department website;

Owl’s Head Park, Brooklyn

The Canarsie Indians and early Dutch settlers once fished along the shore and farmed the fertile soil that is now Owl’s Head Park. Henry C. Murphy, an Irish–American who held many political positions, including Mayor of Brooklyn and United States Congressman, built a mansion on the glacial ridge overlooking the harbor. In 1866 Eliphalet W. Bliss, a wealthy manufacturer, bought the estate and renovated the mansion, adding a horse stable and observatory tower known as “the castle.” In his will Bliss, who died in 1903, offered his property to New York City for less than its true value stipulating that it only be used for parkland, and in 1928 the Bliss estate was officially designated a public park. Though impressive at the time the City it, the land and structures fell into neglect with the onset of the Depression. Between 1934 and 1937 Federal funding helped convert the estate into a scenic park, incorporating the extensive collection of established trees and adding paths, playgrounds and play fields, park houses, and a seating plaza that took advantage of the magnificent vista from its southwesterly perimeter. A 2002 renovation of the park restored the historic Bliss gate that had been salvaged decades before.

The park affords a magnificent view of New York Bay and a bit of countryside in the middle of Brooklyn. As most people in the city tend to gravitate a mere seven blocks from where they live they rarely explore the boundaries beyond that. So if you live in Sunset Park and want to explore the borders of the nabe you can visit the park before winter sets in. I highly recommend it. The park is located by 68th street and Colonial road. You can walk the four blocks from fourth Avenue to it. If you live on 8th Avenue, you can take the B70 bus which stops on the  corner of 69th street (AKA Bay Ridge Ave.)

Openings: Pho And Banhmi Inc. Vietnamese sandwitches

A new eatery has popped up on 63rd street and 8th Avenue catering for the Chinese fast food market. The place was doing brisk business on it's opening day which is a good sign that it will survive. Another addition to the culinary variety that has been a hallmark of Sunset Park's destination for ethnic cuisine.

Photo of of the Day: Greenwood Cemetery Entrance

The entrance gate to Sunset Park's Greenwood Cemetery on 5th Avenue and 25th street. Built in 1861 and a City Landmark it is described in Wikipedia's article on it as:

 "The gates were designed by Richard Upjohn in Gothic Revival style. The main entrance to the cemetery was built in 1861 of Belleville brownstone. The sculptured groups depicting biblical scenes from the New Testament including Lazarus, The Widow's Son, and Jesus' Resurrection over the gateways are the work of John M. Moffitt. A Designated Landmarks of New York plaque was erected on it in 1958 by the New York Community Trust."

Photo of the Day: Minerva

The Statue of Minerva waves to her sister the Statue of Liberty from the highest natural point in Brooklyn in Sunset Park's Greenwood Cemetery. An important engagement in the Battle of Brooklyn took place here. Troops from Delaware fought a holding action and suffered heavy casualties. They were buried where they fell. The statue commemorates the event. About 50 yards from this spot on what is appropriately named Battle Hill is the grave of celebrated American composer Leonard Bernstein. There is also a monument dedicated to the Civil War near this spot.

Photo of the Day

Elderly Chinese woman sells her homegrown plants along 8th Avenue in Brooklyn's Chinatown (now the largest in NY).

Closings: Sneaker Warehouse No More

Sneaker Warehouse which has an interesting story behind it, is closing it's doors. Perhaps in a week or two. It's other older location on 58th street and 2nd Ave. has already closed it's doors. When Costco Warehouse Opened it's doors on 39th street and 2nd Avenue back in 1996 a guy showed up and sold high end sneakers out of a van at a lot across the street from the entrance. He was there every weekend and soon he picked up a following by word of mouth. A couple of years later Costco acquired the lot for extra parking and he had to find a new location. He found himself at 58th street near Lutheran Hospital. A couple of years later he opened another location at 39th street and 4th Avenue, the one pictured above. Like any success story this has kind of a happy ending. He is retiring and closing because business was good rather than the other way around. Looking for a deal on high end sneakers? If they have your size I would stop by and look before they close their doors for good. They will be missed. I still have a pair of Timberland shoes I got from them. At least they're not closing because the economy and business was bad. It's a success story of hard work and determination.  We all have to move  on at some point, I guess. 

Related Link:

• Store of the day: Sneaker Warehouse

 

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Photo of the day: Makeshift Memorial on 39th street

A makeshift memorial was put up at the spot on 39th street between 7th and 8th Ave. where Johnny Rosado aged 35 was murdered, gunned down in the early morning hours of Saturday August 24, 2013.

Realated link:

• Murder on 39th street

Closings; Wah Fung Mall Experiment Over

In what was the first of the Hong Kong style malls on 8th Avenue filled with small stalls and all kinds of services and fashion boutiques which opened four years ago. The mall has fallen victim to a combination of factors in the neighborhood. Though it catered mostly to Chinese it  was an interesting place to browse. It also got hefty competition from various other smaller malls that opened in the area. There is also the new larger and more elegant (complete with a food court) mall that opened at Fei Long Market on 63rd street. The only constant in Sunset Park these days is change..

Related Link:

• Photos of the day: Fei Long Food Court

Closings: Podlasie Meat Market and Deli

The last store catering to the dwindling and disappearing Polish community on 8th Avenue has closed. The location will likely be taken over by a Chinese store as 8th Avenue is becoming almost exclusively Chinese from 65th street to 39th street. Last week I reported on the abrupt closing of  World Electronics another Polish owned store that catered to the Polish community and others. Many Poles have either returned back to Poland or moved elsewhere. If there is one constant in our neighborhood it is change. The demographics are changing. More and more Chinese are moving in and spreading towards 5th Avenue. A wave of gentrification is slowly making it's way south from the Greenwood Heights section of Sunset Park driving out the Hispanic population and others who can no longer afford to live in certain parts of Sunset Park.

Related links:

• Polish Deli closes
• Sunset Polish Deli on Fourth Avenue to close it's ...

Murder on 39th street

It is dark night at 1 AM or a little after and I hear pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop and instinctively I knew it was gunfire from a pistol. Less than a second later I hear a scream, a woman screaming and the sound of a car burning rubber. Someone got shot. I run downstairs and I see a commotion across the street. I approach the scene and there is someone on the sidewalk on the ground with massive bleeding to the head. Immediately I fear it's fatal.

This scene is being repeated in our neighborhood with more frequency and throughout the city more frequently and even across the nation. Another useless, senseless killing over nothing. Since the revocation of the "stop and frisk" policy murder has seen an uptick in South Brooklyn and particularly in our neighborhood. The politically correct opportunist cowards who represent us and live in guarded apartment buildings have just made the neighborhood a lot less safer and far more dangerous to live in when they over rode the Mayor's veto of two bills which essentially do away with policies that were responsible for the huge downturn in crime in our neighborhood. They don't have to live among us, they get to make social experiments, but we pay the price. In my conversations with some of the police officers at the scene, some of whom were also  Hispanics, they related to me that they will do as little as possible to effectively curtail crime because the bills put them personally at risk of being sued. from one of the articles on the recent votes in the city council  ""Opponents feared the bills would have a chilling effect on police. “It will send paralysis throughout the ranks of the NYPD,” said Councilman Vincent Ignizio (R-Staten Island). “That hands off approach nets what? Additional murders, additional crimes.”"

This morning a man is dead, one of my neighbors. Nothing can change what has occurred. But perhaps had these thugs been stopped and frisked or stopped for any reason I would not have to rant this morning. We have the toughest gun control laws in the nation. And yet, thugs still manage to obtain them. The tactics employed by the NYPD were working to keep crime low. Those of us who are long time residents remember what it was like here in the 70's. Sunset Park was THE "Needle Park". The DEA practically occupied 4th Avenue and we still had one of the highest crime and homicide rates in the city. I fear that we may be headed in that direction. We need to reverse course and put back into place what worked. Even if that riles the crap out of some people who are over sensitive. As a Hispanic I don't mind being stopped and frisked. It rarely happens though. I don't dress like a thug and I am at the age where I would not be thought of as a criminal. This is not the time for "progressive" social engineering or feel good policies because some idiot got dissed or thinks he got stopped for some imaginary reason. A man is dead this morning and I can't get my head around the fact that it was pointless, useless and because some young thug felt dissed and the cowardly piece of shit thought he had to pull out a gun and blast away to stroke his bruised animal ego. Both the victim and the perps were Hispanic, as it is with most crime these days in minority communities the criminal and the victim are of the same demographic. Let's stop the bullshit and stop playing politics with our safety and that of our neighbors and their children./ END RANT



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Popeyes is open and ready for business

Things move quickly in our Chinatown. Popeyes is now open on 61st street and 7th Avenue. If you are into fast food chicken and are looking for an alternative to KFC Kentucky Fried Chicken or Kennedy's, here it is. I reported a couple of weeks ago that they had moved from their location on 8th Avenue. When I passed by the location was busy with people coming in and out of the place. I think they will do very well at their new location. Anybody hungry for some chicken?

Sunset Park, Bay Ridge ferry extended till January 2014

The recently reopened ferry service to Manhattan due to disruptions on the R train has been extended until January of next year so reports the Daily News. A campaign has started in some of the other neighborhoods being served by the ferry to make this change permanent. Perhaps the residents of Bay Ridge and Sunset Park should start a similar effort. The flier below appeared in a Queens publication the Queens Gazette  also served by the ferry.