Inside the Russian Market

The Russian Supermarket
a video explaining the inside of the Russian Supermarket.
NetCost Supermarket
97-10 Queens Blvd, Rego Park, NY 11374
Cross Streets: Near the intersection of Queens Blvd and 64th RdNeighborhoods: Rego Park

Maria, from Colombia came by one Sunday morning.  I poured her a cup of coffee. On the kitchen counter I had staged the ingredients for a chicken soup:
CarrotsParsnipsTurnips Dill 
Maria recognized the carrots.  As she examined  the other root vegetable I explained, they were the root vegetable of the Northern European Plains.
I mentioned in an earlier entry that a century ago my grandparents and great grandparents immigrated here.The language is lost.  We never much identified with the mother country but the food tradition remains.
The above is a short video about one of the many Russian Supermarkets in Brooklyn and Queens.
On a personal note;The herrings, pickled everything and multi-varieties of sour cream bring back memories of a time when the best possible summer meal was fresh fruit hidden underneaths mounds of sour cream. 
My mother's definition of  a vegetarian meal.

Queens Night Market

The Queens Night Market is held on Saturday Nights behind the Hall of Science in Flushing Meadow Park, from May to September.more informaiton

Enjoying the hula hoops and banjo music.

Nothing like a fluorescent lavender curved wall for the backdrop of your international night market. 

Unless, of course, you are more impressed with rocket ships.

Why Riding the #7 Train Is Never Boring

Hot Friday afternoon.  I get on the #7 train at Roosevelt Avenue.  At 82 Street two well dressed older women sit across from me.  They try to tell me something.  I can't quite figure it out, but then I do. There are three high school age young woman sitting next to me and one is very busy decorating another's hand.  So here are some snippets of the conversation between Junction Boulevard and Main Street.

Me: to my neighbor.  The women across from you are very interested in your hand.

In Spanish

Ladies:   to the young woman next to me after she shows off the hand.

               Are you Colombian?

Young Woman One:  Yes,  followed by some discussion about where in Colombia everyone comes from and how long they have been here.

Ladies:  How long does it last?

Young Woman Two:  About a week.

Ladies:  How much does it cost?

In English

Young Woman Two:  I don't charge my friends- but about $5

                                    Do you want it done?  I won't charge you.

Ladies:  The woman show off their hands and note they are no longer smooth -wrinkled with age.

Me:  Where are you from?

Young Woman Two:  Afghanistan, well my mother is from Afghanistan and my father is from the Ukraine.

Me:  Oh my family too, the Ukraine part.  Luckily it didn't generate the where and how long discussion.  Since the answer to the latter is 100 years and the former - I'm not really sure, Odessa I think was the original home of my paternal grandparents

Then the train entered the tunnel to the Main Street Station. Young Woman Two puts on a long skirt, hands her jeans to Young Woman Three (who never said anything- but stored the jeans in her backpack) and Young Woman Two donned the traditional Muslim head scarf.

We all wished each other a very good afternoon and a pleasant weekend, and headed our separate ways.

Kissena Park

The story I know, is that Kissena is the Native American word for frozen lake.  Once it was the home of an ice company that cut ice blocks from the lake and sold them in the pre-refrigerator days.  The original settler families of Flushing ran a nursery that collected and sold trees from around the world.  Once, I  was told, aliens landed there, since the Queens Borough president's daughter had been an astronaut.  Some of what I was told was true.  The park runs north from Oak Avenue to Booth Memorial Avenue between Kissena Boulevard and 164 Street.  Tucked into a corner of Queens that is accessible on public transportation by bus and subway from Manhattan, its beauty is mostly a neighborhood secret. 

From Flushing Main Street at the end of the #7 line the Q25 and Q34 buses run up Kissena, and th Q65 goes up 164th Street.

With a few exceptions most of these pictures were taken on a Saturday morning walk in May.

Lefferts Gardens

Jane's Walk 

Saturday May 7, 2016

Robert Marvin, a 30+ year resident of Lefferts Garden showed us his neighborhood

Ed, Bob's friend shows us his house across from Prospect Park, part of the Ocean Park Historic district.

Lefferts Gardens has had a single family covenant that has restricted residency of  any single family home to well- a single family.  That has preserved the single family structures through a city that is constantly morphing.

Block after block of these attached town line the streets.

Town homes in front- large old apartments in back.  The new luxury buildings are creeping in where the landmarking doesn't prohibit them.

A chained Statue of Liberty next to a pig,  Political statement?  Our tour mates thought so.