new York residency

[coreytayloris]

Is residency in New York worth it, for the chance to live in Manhattan
Or is it more hassle than it's worth.? I always read anecdotally that NYC is horrible for residency
Applying this year and would love East coast. Have family and friends in NYC but wondering is it a case that you will work harder and more hours in nyc that it offsets the point in even being there in the first place?internal medicine I'm aiming for for what it's worth.img

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[masaraksh]

Why are you in Ireland?

 

[NickNaylor]

It is an expensive city and you won't be living like a king on a resident's salary. This is assuming you would actually match at a residency in NYC given your IMG status. NYC is a "desirable" area, so lots of people from the US are trying to end up there.

 

[Wordead]

Anecdotally - residents are broke due to the high cost of living, even if youre in subsidized housing. Nurses are a ****ing nightmare. Do you want to do your own stat blood draws? Basically, even though NYC is awesome, its kind of a ****ty place to do residency. Some programs I interviewed at had to cover multiple hospitals on call as well, so add a car on top of that. I'm a pretty aggressive driver, but driving in the city is on the terrifying side.

I truly, truly believe that you cant have a decent life in NYC without a 6 figure salary. No exaggeration.

Are you at Cork? People have matched to community NYC programs I know....not sure about the better IM programs, though as an IMG beggars cant be choosers.

 

[Slack3r]

Anecdotally - residents are broke due to the high cost of living, even if youre in subsidized housing. Nurses are a ****ing nightmare. Do you want to do your own stat blood draws? Basically, even though NYC is awesome, its kind of a ****ty place to do residency. Some programs I interviewed at had to cover multiple hospitals on call as well, so add a car on top of that. I'm a pretty aggressive driver, but driving in the city is on the terrifying side.

I truly, truly believe that you cant have a decent life in NYC without a 6 figure salary. No exaggeration.

Are you at Cork? People have matched to community NYC programs I know....not sure about the better IM programs, though as an IMG beggars cant be choosers.

http://money.cnn.com/calculator/pf/cost-of-living/

$100k in NYC is $50k most other places. Your $50k resident salary doesn't go very far.

 

[Kaustikos]

http://money.cnn.com/calculator/pf/cost-of-living/

$100k in NYC is $50k most other places. Your $50k resident salary doesn't go very far.

There's always section 8 housing...

 

[mpdoc2]

Is residency in New York worth it, for the chance to live in Manhattan
Or is it more hassle than it's worth.? I always read anecdotally that NYC is horrible for residency
Applying this year and would love East coast. Have family and friends in NYC but wondering is it a case that you will work harder and more hours in nyc that it offsets the point in even being there in the first place?internal medicine I'm aiming for for what it's worth.img

Absolutely do not do your residency in NYC. You have the shiittiest nurses and support staff in that city. You're working horrible hours with horrible pay and the chicks don't dig you, they dig the bankers making real money.

 

[Dral]

I did residency there. I loved it, but it was also not in IM. As others have pointed out, support staff and nursing is not as good as it is elsewhere.

You will be transporting pts to xray, doing your own EKGs, blood draws, etc. a lot of times.

Money is a struggle, but you make it work. We all still managed to have a good time.

 

[Bombrainiac]

I did residency there. I loved it, but it was also not in IM. As others have pointed out, support staff and nursing is not as good as it is elsewhere.

You will be transporting pts to xray, doing your own EKGs, blood draws, etc. a lot of times.

Money is a struggle, but you make it work. We all still managed to have a good time.

Sounds like Columbia University…

New York is a fun place, no doubt. But as a resident, you will struggle with money in NYC. Wouldn't train in any surgical subspecialty in the Northeast in general, but IM is probably a good experience.

 

[mpdoc2]

Sounds like Columbia University…

New York is a fun place, no doubt. But as a resident, you will struggle with money in NYC. Wouldn't train in any surgical subspecialty in the Northeast in general, but IM is probably a good experience.

I had friends do medicine in NYC and they said it sucked balls.

 

[Bombrainiac]

I had friends do medicine in NYC and they said it sucked balls.

Yeah, I'm not surprised. Out of curiosity, did your friends stay in NYC to practice? If they did, do they think differently now that they are no longer residents?

 

[YoungestBrother]

Sounds like Columbia University…

New York is a fun place, no doubt. But as a resident, you will struggle with money in NYC. Wouldn't train in any surgical subspecialty in the Northeast in general, but IM is probably a good experience.

Why would you do IM in the Northeast but not any surgical subspecialty?

 

[Bombrainiac]

Why would you do IM in the Northeast but not any surgical subspecialty?

Not enough hands on experience. Attending are much less willing to relinquish the reigns to their residents. More litigious, too. This is a generalization of course, but it happens to be true most of the time.

 

[caffeinemia]

I dunno about the past, but I currently am a resident in NYC and I think the pay is pretty decent. In general, it's about 50-70k in the city. Additionally, you often get subsidized housing, which is a huge boon for living in Manhattan and some of the other boroughs. At the end of the day, residency here has been a blast. As to the dude talking about chicks not digging you-- that's all in how you play it bro.

As for nurses and support staff - let me say that the general hospital culture of New York is "do the least I can without killing the patient." It sucks. Also, ED staff in NY hospitals typically blow too, this coming from a surgical resident who's had too many consults called before people have even seen the patient. (Yes, I am absolutely biased).

 

[Salt Salt]

Have you lived in NYC before? It's not all it's cracked up to be. Crime, high cost of living, constant crowds and tourists, racism, the streets smell like **** constantly, the subways are impossible to learn and are ALWAYS delayed or changed—the list goes on. And living in NYC on a resident's salary? Yikes. You won't be living in Manhattan without help from your parents or unless your residency provides subsidized housing.

So unless you know from experience that you'd enjoy it, I don't think it'd be worth the painful residency options. Don't be idealistic about NYC.

 

[takeurmeds02]

Have you lived in NYC before? It's not all it's cracked up to be. Crime, high cost of living, constant crowds and tourists, racism, the streets smell like **** constantly, the subways are impossible to learn and are ALWAYS delayed or changed—the list goes on. And living in NYC on a resident's salary? Yikes. You won't be living in Manhattan without help from your parents or unless your residency provides subsidized housing.

So unless you know from experience that you'd enjoy it, I don't think it'd be worth the painful residency options. Don't be idealistic about NYC.

Some of these qualities don't bother some people. I lived in nyc for a short spell and neither I nor any of my friends who currently live in nyc have been the victim of any crime. I'll give you high cost of living but some people don't mind making due for the experience. All the other stuff you mentioned comes with the territory and like I said before, doesn't bother some people. It's really all based on your personality and temperment.

 

[Nasrudin]

When it comes to where and how you spend your time on this earth you don't take a survey to find out. Yeah we work hard. Yeah nursing and support staff blows here. But the clinical training is superb. And you don't learn by watching or hadn't being a med student taught you that.

New York City suits me. In all it's grit and hustle. It's a place you have to be sharp in and better than the next guy. I take inspiration from this. And I dig the vibe. Also I like to walk. Like 3 miles here. 5 miles there. Or take the trains. This is the lifestyle for me. I watch my budget and I do things that don't cost me much. So it works for me.

That said, the attending pay sucks. So when I finish training and I don't have this sweet subsidized apartment right in the middle of Manhattan, then I'll think I head back to SF, my first love. So. This this, like other places, is a niche for a certain kind of person that you either can't help from being or you aren't and it's not worth it.

Nobody makes that kind of decision for me. Except me. My only advice is for you to do the same.

 

[username456789]

That said, the attending pay sucks. So when I finish training and I don't have this sweet subsidized apartment right in the middle of Manhattan, then I'll think I head back to SF, my first love.

Out of the frying pan and into the fire.

 

[Nasrudin]

Out of the frying pan and into the fire.

Not by any accident. Also SF pays better for Attendings.

What can I say. A McMansion and a brand new car don't get me excited. Have at it wherever you're headed.

And again, these places are a hustle, no doubt. You need hustle to match it. To surpass it. To harness it. You can't just float along with the current. It's not for everybody. It takes creativity and guts.

There's more to these decisions than addition and subtraction. And tapping into cash only practice markets will be but one of my projects. Which both of these markets provide psych's in spades. So...yeah. I'll come to you for advice on rashes (if you're a derm, I can't remember for sure). Otherwise....

Like this, as example of how you make your own mind, to the OP.

 

[coreytayloris]

I've spent about a month in total in NYC on vacation. I enjoy the place. Just trying to weigh up the benefit of work there with the extra scut and lower support staff as opposed to living in Connecticut or mass or New Jersey.
Which hospitals in NYC are img friendly?
Is NYU a good programme?

 

[caffeinemia]

I've spent about a month in total in NYC on vacation. I enjoy the place. Just trying to weigh up the benefit of work there with the extra scut and lower support staff as opposed to living in Connecticut or mass or New Jersey.
Which hospitals in NYC are img friendly?
Is NYU a good programme?

No hospital with a "University" at the end of it's name is going to really be IMG friendly at this point. It's a generalization, but also generally true. Try a community or public hospital.

 

[CR7MedStudent]

I've spent about a month in total in NYC on vacation. I enjoy the place. Just trying to weigh up the benefit of work there with the extra scut and lower support staff as opposed to living in Connecticut or mass or New Jersey.
Which hospitals in NYC are img friendly?
Is NYU a good programme?

From what I've seen in the city, the higher ranked places tend to have more allopathic students while the lower ranked places tend to have more IMGs. If you are an IMG I doubt it's impossible to secure a place at Columbia, NYU, Sinai, or Cornell. I have a friend who's cousin went to med school in Ireland and ended up at Sinai but I don't think that is a common occurrence. And the crime isn't bad at all, you just have to have some common sense imo.

 

[caffeinemia]

From what I've seen in the city, the higher ranked places tend to have more allopathic students while the lower ranked places tend to have more IMGs. If you are an IMG I doubt it's impossible to secure a place at Columbia, NYU, Sinai, or Cornell. I have a friend who's cousin went to med school in Ireland and ended up at Sinai but I don't think that is a common occurrence. And the crime isn't bad at all, you just have to have some common sense imo.

Violent crime in Manhattan? Dafuq? This isn't 1980...

 

[CR7MedStudent]

Violent crime in Manhattan? Dafuq? This isn't 1980...

Yeah I agree that NYC is a lot better than years past but there is still a little crime, especially if you are not paying attention. For example, Columbia med is just a couple stops on broadway from west harlem. Massive gentrification underway but still could be a little sketchy at times. Mount Sinai is not too far from East Harlem. I'm just saying if you practice common sense you are normally fine.

 

[bc65]

Look at it this way: If you want to live in Manhattan at some time in your life, this will be the best way to do it. You'll probably get subsidized housing. You won't have a lot of money, or a lot of time, but NY can be taken it for very little money, a little bit at a time, if you're already living there. Lots of museums, many of which can be "pay what you want". Lot's of half -price tickets. Plenty of cheaper places to eat if you look for them.

If the hospitals are harder to work in, that's ok. You'll have better stories to tell. Just be careful where you do your residency. Some areas are still unsafe.

 

[AlteredScale]

From what I've seen in the city, the higher ranked places tend to have more allopathic students while the lower ranked places tend to have more IMGs. If you are an IMG I doubt it's impossible to secure a place at Columbia, NYU, Sinai, or Cornell. I have a friend who's cousin went to med school in Ireland and ended up at Sinai but I don't think that is a common occurrence. And the crime isn't bad at all, you just have to have some common sense imo.

The cousin probably matched at BEST Mt. Sinai Beth Israel or "below" (St. Luke's, Roosevelt, other affiliated programs). The main Mt. Sinai hospital is a beast to match at, highly competitive.

 

[ChrisMack390]

Yeah I agree that NYC is a lot better than years past but there is still a little crime, especially if you are not paying attention. For example, Columbia med is just a couple stops on broadway from west harlem. Massive gentrification underway but still could be a little sketchy at times. Mount Sinai is not too far from East Harlem. I'm just saying if you practice common sense you are normally fine.

You just cited the upper east side as a high crime area....

 

[Psai]

You just cited the upper east side as a high crime area....

Mount Sinai is basically on the border

 

[Dral]

The cousin probably matched at BEST Mt. Sinai Beth Israel or "below" (St. Luke's, Roosevelt, other affiliated programs). The main Mt. Sinai hospital is a beast to match at, highly competitive.

I'm guessing st lukes roosevelt and BEth Israel will be come more competitive over the next few years. Mt Sinai seems to be heavily influencing what goes on there now.

 

[AlteredScale]

I'm guessing st lukes roosevelt and BEth Israel will be come more competitive over the next few years. Mt Sinai seems to be heavily influencing what goes on there now.

It's all for the better of the system. I wonder what the catalyst was to having Sinai start upping it's influential gear to St. Luke's and Beth Israel.

 

[coreytayloris]

Are Luke's and Beth Israel nightmare to work in?
What about suny downstate?
Are the New Jersey residencies just as scut heavy or do the nurses unions have no influence?

 

[bc65]

Mount Sinai is basically on the border

Yes, it's near the border, but it's actually in a very expensive upscale area. Some of the hospital housing is on streets that are a bit less classy, but the walk to the hospital is safe. It's actually in an area that is just about the best place to live in Manhattan. The hospital is on 5th avenue on Central Park. Walk south from the hospital along side the park on your right, and over the next 15 minutes you pass about 10 famous museums on your left, and 10 blocks down the Metropolitan Museum of Art is on your right, in the park. 5th avenue is still nice going north for several blocks, and north of there it's rapidly gentrifying.

 

[coreytayloris]

I think for me as a foreigner NYC holds appeal as having some family and friends in NYC and plenty of Irish over there if I ever get homesick, ease of access to airports to fly home, and it is a very cool city.

as opposed to living in the middle of nowhere in a better programme, less scutwork, but less stuff to do outside of work and not having any friends/family in the area.

But presumably no point going to one of the smaller programmes in NYC If it's going to be a nightmare three years.

 

[Psai]

Yes, it's near the border, but it's actually in a very expensive upscale area. Some of the hospital housing is on streets that are a bit less classy, but the walk to the hospital is safe. It's actually in an area that is just about the best place to live in Manhattan. The hospital is on 5th avenue on Central Park. Walk south from the hospital along side the park on your right, and over the next 15 minutes you pass about 10 famous museums on your left, and 10 blocks down the Metropolitan Museum of Art is on your right, in the park. 5th avenue is still nice going north for several blocks, and north of there it's rapidly gentrifying.

if you walk a couple blocks east it's not a very nice place

 

[bc65]

if you walk a couple blocks east it's not a very nice place

Again, it's near some bad areas, but so is all of Manhattan. My Sinai itself is in a great area. The housing, in very good areas.
You never need to go into any bad areas if you work or live there.

If you walk due east or due north you will eventually hit bad areas. But if you go south 2 blocks and then east, you're in great areas, all the way to the river.

You know what else is dangerous? if you go about 8 blocks east, you'll drown in the East River. That doesn't make working there dangerous. Just don't go there.

 

[Psai]

why are you cutting out my name and why do you have to take things to extremes to make something seem silly when it isn't?

 

[bc65]

I'm not trying to cut out your name, sorry. I just copy and paste the part of the quote that is relevant.

Sorry if I offended you. I thought you were being argumentative. Perhaps you weren't, and I was. Let me start again. OP wants to know what the neighborhoods are like. Mt Sinai is in a great neighborhood. You are correct that it's near some bad areas, but that isn't relevant for someone concerned about safety or quality of life. OP is someone from another continent who wants general information about where to try to do a residency. That degree of detail that your were pointing out would be fine if we were talking about buying an apartment, but I don't think its relevant for OP and might be misleading. Sorry if I misunderstood your observation. I know that area very well, and lived there for years on two different occasions. It's my favorite part of the city, but yes, if you have to go east of 5th, further south a couple of blocks would be nicer.

 

[Psai]

i'm not being argumentative. i've been there and if you're walking to the 6 train, it can start getting sketchy. i've had friends who were jumped around that area which is why i'm saying that safety can be an issue. although now that i think about it, it was ten years ago so maybe it's different now

 

[bc65]

Actually, you were there more recently than I was, but there's less crime now than there was, or so I hear.
Yes, 96th street can get a little sketchy, but it's still fairly safe. There was student housing down there on 96th, which is why I rated student housing ok but not as great as where the hospital is. Maybe 96th st didn't bother me because I didn't take the subway there very often. I usually walked down Madison or 5th, and then took the subway on 86th st. or kept walking.

 

[Banco]

Have you lived in NYC before? It's not all it's cracked up to be. Crime, high cost of living, constant crowds and tourists, racism, the streets smell like **** constantly, the subways are impossible to learn and are ALWAYS delayed or changed—the list goes on. And living in NYC on a resident's salary? Yikes. You won't be living in Manhattan without help from your parents or unless your residency provides subsidized housing.

So unless you know from experience that you'd enjoy it, I don't think it'd be worth the painful residency options. Don't be idealistic about NYC.

1.) Crime - much lower now than in the past. Most parts of the city are pretty safe.

2.) Racism - Lol?...much better than it is the south or bible belt.

3.) Subway - its pretty consistently reliable and easy to learn.

 

[Dredge]

having some family and friends in NYC and plenty of Irish over there if I ever get homesick

If you have people you know that's great, but if you're expecting it to feel like home because there's "Irish" there, you might be a little disappointed. Unless they're recent immigrants, The Plastic Irish on this side of the pond are definitely nothing like what's back home for you.

 

[shouldigomd]

1.) Crime - much lower now than in the past. Most parts of the city are pretty safe.

2.) Racism - Lol?...much better than it is the south or bible belt.

3.) Subway - its pretty consistently reliable and easy to learn.

Lol that guy clearly hasn't been to new york in the last 15 years. I came here for the first time since pre 9/11 and am amazed by how clean and safe this city feels. Any part of it. It is amazing and it makes sense. It is crawling with police and people so how are you going to do a crime when there are always eyes watching? Living in the city if you have never done it (like me) is an amazing experience even if you are at the hospital for most of every day. To stay here long term is something to think about but spending 4 years for residency here... cool experience.

Living expenses are high of course. To live alone in a "nicer area" without "sketchy people" you are looking at paying 1500 (for a hole in the wall) to 2K for a decent 1bdr apt. Living with a roomy can make this much more manageable. As far as other expenses. Amazon prime has changed the game. You can order anything you need for normal prices and even most non perishable foods / products delivered to your damn door! Subway system is awesome and easy to learn. Much cheeper than having a car so you save money there.

 

[eye love lamp]

Lol that guy clearly hasn't been to new york in the last 15 years. I came here for the first time since pre 9/11 and am amazed by how clean and safe this city feels. Any part of it. It is amazing and it makes sense. It is crawling with police and people so how are you going to do a crime when there are always eyes watching? Living in the city if you have never done it (like me) is an amazing experience even if you are at the hospital for most of every day. To stay here long term is something to think about but spending 4 years for residency here... cool experience.

Living expenses are high of course. To live alone in a "nicer area" without "sketchy people" you are looking at paying 1500 (for a hole in the wall) to 2K for a decent 1bdr apt. Living with a roomy can make this much more manageable. As far as other expenses. Amazon prime has changed the game. You can order anything you need for normal prices and even most non perishable foods / products delivered to your damn door! Subway system is awesome and easy to learn. Much cheeper than having a car so you save money there.

Of all of the descriptions of NYC I don't think "clean" usually comes to anyone's mind.

Also I think your pricing (without a roommate) is a little on the low side. Upper East Side (~90s streets) have one bedroom apartments going for $2,500-3,500+/month. Within Manhattan it doesn't seem to get much better.

 

[Nasrudin]

I took a long walk down the island the other night. Some of the different opinions about the meaning of this place in my head. Wondering what my own were. The romance I'm prone to, blunted by labor. I still feel some of the magic as below in the great Walt Whitman poem, who walked here too:



But there seems to be only the ghosts of a once vibrant and interconnected fabric of humanity. As I walked through Chelsea I could squint, imagine, and strain to hear the working people hustling about involved in all manner of industry and trade. The skeletons of old buildings whispering about their old inhabitants. Which I sense they missed. Replaced now by a constricted, narrow slice of american class and culture.

I wonder if the jewel american cities are what they once were. Now that the extreme divide between rich and poor relegates these places to well manicured aquariums for the ultra rich. Which it's servants pour in an out of. There may have been periods of resurgent cool. On the up and down swing of the flight of the rich to the suburbs in the middle parts of the last century. New York was funky and punk as f@ck for periods in between those swings.

But the rich have demanded back their perches in the urban center. Having realized it's natural topographic lifestyle is appealing.

There's no fighting this, just like you don't fight the tide. And I don't resent people their success. It's just that this new found cleanliness in New York, don't get me wrong, millions of people close together make some inevitable stink, also has a homogenization effect.

Instead of interesting people of all sorts on the lower part of my walk. The disruption of my romantic visage was punctuated by groups of cackling, vapid, bleh, bleh of yuppies at play in their overly cultivated and infantile cool. Replete with bearded bar tenders making $30 cocktails. Which are probably f'n amazing.

The only other people were the immigrants closing down, not their shops, but their minimum wage jobs at corporate chains. Before they take the trains back to the outer boroughs.

The current state of affairs in these highly desirable urban centers, which happen, to accommodate my preferences for walking, training, and an otherwise people coral reef existence, is something I may have to rethink. I've never longed to rub shoulders with the top 1% of 1% of america.

 

[shouldigomd]

Of all of the descriptions of NYC I don't think "clean" usually comes to anyone's mind.

Also I think your pricing (without a roommate) is a little on the low side. Upper East Side (~90s streets) have one bedroom apartments going for $2,500-3,500+/month. Within Manhattan it doesn't seem to get much better.

Clean is a subjective thing of course. The streets are swept, garbage picked up, sidewalks cleaned, litter picked basically every day. It is much more clean than many cities I have seen in the US. Just my humble opinion. I remember how dirty it was pre-9/11 (the last time i was here).

You are right the pricing is on the low side for this area but that was my budget. If you want an elevator, doorman, and central a/c in the upper east side than you will pay. But if you can live in a walk up, with a wall unit, and no doorman there are decent places from 1700-2200. I just moved here not long ago and that was my experience at least.

 

[Slack3r]

Clean is a subjective thing of course. The streets are swept, garbage picked up, sidewalks cleaned, litter picked basically every day. It is much more clean than many cities I have seen in the US. Just my humble opinion. I remember how dirty it was pre-9/11 (the last time i was here).

You are right the pricing is on the low side for this area but that was my budget. If you want an elevator, doorman, and central a/c in the upper east side than you will pay. But if you can live in a walk up, with a wall unit, and no doorman there are decent places from 1700-2200. I just moved here not long ago and that was my experience at least.

You must not have been to many US cities.

 

[Nasrudin]

Cleanliness is a word not unlike professionalism. I always wonder what it says about the wielder of it than the word itself.

New Orleans isn't clean. Yet one of this republic's most unique and interesting cities.

 

[BobbyB]

I took a long walk down the island the other night. Some of the different opinions about the meaning of this place in my head. Wondering what my own were. The romance I'm prone to, blunted by labor. I still feel some of the magic as below in the great Walt Whitman poem, who walked here too:



But there seems to be only the ghosts of a once vibrant and interconnected fabric of humanity. As I walked through Chelsea I could squint, imagine, and strain to hear the working people hustling about involved in all manner of industry and trade. The skeletons of old buildings whispering about their old inhabitants. Which I sense they missed. Replaced now by a constricted, narrow slice of american class and culture.

I wonder if the jewel american cities are what they once were. Now that the extreme divide between rich and poor relegates these places to well manicured aquariums for the ultra rich. Which it's servants pour in an out of. There may have been periods of resurgent cool. On the up and down swing of the flight of the rich to the suburbs in the middle parts of the last century. New York was funky and punk as f@ck for periods in between those swings.

But the rich have demanded back their perches in the urban center. Having realized it's natural topographic lifestyle is appealing.

There's no fighting this, just like you don't fight the tide. And I don't resent people their success. It's just that this new found cleanliness in New York, don't get me wrong, millions of people close together make some inevitable stink, also has a homogenization effect.

Instead of interesting people of all sorts on the lower part of my walk. The disruption of my romantic visage was punctuated by groups of cackling, vapid, bleh, bleh of yuppies at play in their overly cultivated and infantile cool. Replete with bearded bar tenders making $30 cocktails. Which are probably f'n amazing.

The only other people were the immigrants closing down, not their shops, but their minimum wage jobs at corporate chains. Before they take the trains back to the outer boroughs.

The current state of affairs in these highly desirable urban centers, which happen, to accommodate my preferences for walking, training, and an otherwise people coral reef existence, is something I may have to rethink. I've never longed to rub shoulders with the top 1% of 1% of america.

move to Queens if you want immigrants on your daily walk instead of yuppies

 

[shouldigomd]

You must not have been to many US cities.

An insult ... really? pretty sad

 

[Nasrudin]

move to Queens if you want immigrants on your daily walk instead of yuppies

Queens looks like it was annexed by the former Soviet Union. It's what the human slave quarters will look when skynet comes and anyone with a hope of freedom will get underground.

I understand your point. But the bohemian vibe is an ephemeral thing. Pops up here in one time. There in another.

I just dallied too long in the formless ether. And missed my coming of age in late sixties San Francisco or the Village.

I realize what I long for doesn't exist. Sue me.